Manchukuo's Tragic Legacy: Japan's Exploitation of Manchuria

by Seongbin Hyun

The first half of the twentieth century was marked by Japan’s rapid rise as a global power and its eventual defeat in 1945. After defeating the Russian Empire in the Russo-Japanese War (1904–1905), Japan pursued its territorial ambitions, having already annexed Okinawa in 1879, Taiwan in 1895, and Korea in 1910. This expansion included gaining influence over southern Manchuria by 1905 and establishing the puppet state of Manchukuo in 1932. These successes, coupled with international recognition as a major power, further fueled Japan’s imperial ambitions. Driven by militarism, imperialism, and a belief in Japanese superiority, Japan justified its actions in Manchuria as modernization, a pretext used to exploit the region’s resources and oppress non-Japanese populations, particularly the Chinese. [1] 

Japan’s establishment of Manchukuo in 1932 was a calculated act of aggression that left a profound and lasting impact on postwar Sino-Japanese relations. The Japanese initiated their takeover of Manchuria after the Mukden Incident on September 18, 1931, a staged explosion on their South Manchuria Railway used to justify the invasion. Having swiftly occupied the region, Japan established Manchukuo on March 1, 1932, installing the last Qing emperor, Puyi, as the nominal sovereign, while maintaining complete control as masters of a puppet state.
Manchukuo was a crucible of clashing ambitions, reflecting the unrealized dreams of two Japanese factions. The military, led by the Kwantung Army, envisioned a self-sufficient, state-controlled economy modeled on the USSR or Nazi Germany, seeking to dominate Manchukuo’s development over private capitalists. Conversely, Japanese businessmen aimed to exploit Manchukuo for profit and influence, focusing on resource extraction and regional trade.
 [2] Ultimately, neither vision was fully realized. While businessmen failed to achieve their goals, the Kwantung Army’s dream of heavy industrialization paradoxically required their financial and technical support. This tense, noncooperative relationship led to Manchukuo’s fragmented and inefficient development, heavily reliant on exploited Chinese labor.[3]

A crowd of Japanese soldiers; Chinese coolies in right foreground, Manchuria, 1905, photograph: Underwood & Underwood, New York, https://lccn.loc.gov/2005678636

Manchukuo’s uncoordinated modernization relied heavily on an expendable Chinese labor force. From the outset, Japanese control in Manchukuo enabled landlords and officials to exploit desperate peasants and workers, often through coercion and profit-driven arrangements. These local figures used violence to enforce labor compliance, supported by the Japanese colonial system.[4] This exploitative environment was intensified by the Japanese, who extorted destitute workers in factories and infrastructure projects. Frequently dehumanizing workers with derogatory terms, such as likening them to “horses” or “below beggars,” the Japanese provided only minimal sustenance.[5] Indeed, the scale of this systematic abuse was immense. By 1944, the Japanese and Manchukuo authorities reportedly mobilized approximately 2.56 million workers, exploiting human and raw resources in Manchuria with little regard for peasants’ and workers’ conditions.[6]  
The death toll of coerced workers in Manchukuo remains heavily debated, but even conservative estimates are staggering. Japan conscripted over a million Chinese laborers in Manchuria, with an estimated 100,000 to 200,000 deaths over seven years. [7] This figure reflects only Chinese laborers. Of the 5.4 million Koreans mobilized across Japanese-controlled territories, approximately 1–2 million resided in Manchuria by 1945. With a conservative estimate of 270,000 to 810,000 Korean deaths, it is likely that tens of thousands, if not more, died under harsh conditions in Manchukuo. [8] Combined with massacres to suppress resistance, opioid-related deaths, widespread repression, and Unit 731’s biological warfare, which may have claimed 200,000–250,000 lives, the total deaths from Japan’s occupation of Manchuria likely exceed a million, though precise figures remain uncertain. [9]
The numerous deaths and atrocities in Manchukuo highlight the divergent ways East Asians and Japanese remember their shared history. For the Chinese, the creation of Manchukuo and the Second Sino-Japanese War represent a painful, bloody period under Japanese occupation. In contrast, Japanese wartime propaganda portrayed Manchukuo as a peaceful “second home” for settlers, and some postwar narratives emphasized Japanese suffering during repatriation, as they faced violence from Chinese civilians and Soviet forces. [10] The omission of atrocities against Manchuria’s people in some Japanese accounts underscores differences in how history is taught in East Asia. Greater acknowledgment of these atrocities could foster reconciliation among East Asian nations, though challenges remain.

Sources:
[1] Sheldon H. Harris, Factories of Death: Japanese Biological Warfare 1932-45 and the American Cover-Up, (London, Routledge: 2002), 9-10.
[2] Louise Young, Japan’s Total Empire: Manchuria and the culture of Wartime Imperialism (Berkley, University of California Press: 1999), 43, 204. 
[3] Louise Young, Japan’s Total Empire: Manchuria and the culture of Wartime Imperialism (Berkley, University of California Press: 1999), 42-3.
[4] Quinan Li, “Everyday life in the puppet state: A study of ordinary people's experiences in Manchukuo,” PhD Thes., (University of Sheffield, 2018), 111, 180. 
[5] David Tucker, “Labor Policy and the Construction Industry in Manchukuo: Systems of Recruitment, Management, and Control,” in Asian Labor in the Wartime Japanese Empire: Unknown Histories, ed. Paul H. Kratoska, (London, Routledge: 2005), 53. 
[6] Ibid, 51.
[7] R. J. Rummel, “Statistics of Japanese Democide: Estimates, Calculations, and Sources,” in Statistics of Democide: Genocide and Mass Murder Since 1900 (Charlottesville: Center for National Security Law, 1997), lines 126-8. 
[8] Rummel, “Statistics of Japanese Democide,” line 119; Tsutomu Nishioka, “The Reality of the Mobilization of Koreans During World War II- An analysis based on statistics and written records” (Japan Review 2, no. 2, 2018): 55. 
[9] James Gow et al, Routledge Handbook of War, Law, and Technology (London, Routledge: 2019), 246 [15]. 
[10] Mariko Tamanoi, “A Road to ‘A Redeemed Mankind’: The Politics of Memory among the Former Japanese Peasant Settlers in Manchuria” (The South Atlantic Quarterly 99, no. 1, 2000): 168-9.