Marco Polo Bridge incident

Chinese history -- Republic of China -- Military history -- List of battles -- World War II Overview
On July 7 1937, Japanese Imperial Army attacked the bridge, officially marked Japanese large scale invasion invasion of China.

Lugou Bridge ( 蘆溝橋 lugouqiao) locates in Fengtai (豐台 feng1 tai2) suburb area of southwest Beijing. It is also known as the Marco Polo Bridge because it was believed that this bridge was described in the works of Marco Polo.

Since 1931, Japan had occupied Manchuria and had created an nominally independent state of Manchukuo with Asin Gioro Pu-yi (the last emperor of China) as its sovereign. These state is widely regarded to have been a puppet government with real power concentrated in the hands of the Japanese, which constituted the only significant military forces in Manchuria.

Although the Kuomintang and the international community refused to recognize the legality of the Japanese occupation, a truce had been negotiated in 1931(918 incident, establish manchuguo. 1933 annex yehhe, use to protect manchuguo as pretext, KMT lost all area outside Great Wall 1935 annex eastern hebei, set up eastern qi automated government purpose nibble China Tainjin and Beijing became front against japan aggression

4 strategic post outside Beijing southwest: yuanping prefecture, luguo bridge (only passage leading Beijing to outside), control the Pinghan rail's throat (Beijing-Wuhan Railway)

east: tongzhou town northwset; Chengping昌prefecture south month town south: fengtai town

before the battle all excpet the bridgge was occupied by japan if bridge occupied,beijing an island

between the Kuomintang and the Japanese. As a result at the start of 1937, Beijing was surrounded at north, west and east by area occupied by Japanese. The bridge guarded roads which connected Beijing to Kuomintang-controlled areas from the south......... Historical significance
Strategic appraisal
Prelude

8 country invasion of beijing, treaty of xin chau (辛 ugly), Aftermath
Beginning late June 1937, the Japanese army (several 100)deployed at the west end of the bridge was practising while Kuomintang forces, patrolling in Yuanping Prefecture which located just east of the bridge, watched closely. In the evening of July 6, the Japanese army telegraphed the Kuomintang forces saying that a soldier was missing and believed to be hiding inside the town. The Japanese demanded that its army should enter the town to search for the missing soldier, who was later found unharmed. There is some dispute among historians over the incident with some historians believing that this was an unintentional accident while others believing that the entire incident was manufactured by the Kwantung Army in order to provide a pretext of the invasion of central China.

Colonel Ji xing-wen (吉星文), commander of the Kuomintang forces (XXIX Corp, 37th Division, 110th brigade, 219th regiment) of the area at the time, denied the request backed by his superior, Commander-in-chief(?) of all forces of the Hebei province, General Song zi-wen (宋子文). On July 7, Japanese(Matsui Taisa = Colonel Matsui 松(matsu) 井(i) 大(tai) 佐(sa)) gave Ji an ultimatum that Kuomintang troops must let japanese troops enetr the town to search within 1 hr or the twon will be fired but japan artillery has already aimed at the toen when the ul was sent. At midnight July 7, Japanese artillery units started bombarding the town while the infantry with tanks matched across the bridge at dawn With order from General Song, Captain Ji led the KMT forces of about 1000 defended at all cost) japana able to take part of the bridge. butKMG force retook it completely next day. ( resisted the attack which lasted for 3 weeks. On the diplomatic front, General Song, who was also the chairman of the province, sent a negotiator, head(?) of the Hebei Provincal Parliament, Zhang zhi zhong (張治中), to Japanese headquarters while the fight was still taking place. The negotiation stalled as the Japanese insisted KMT forces must stop the resistance unconditionally and retreat from the town. Song's stance of not giving up an inch of land was also a factor. Evetually the Japanese promised Zhang that no more similar sort of incidence would take place in the future. Then Song ordered Ji's retreat to Beijing, marking the end of the battle. However, the Japanese broke the promise a month later and invaded the city which fell on October 15 (?) 1937.

I am trying to be as objective as possible; however errors may not be corrected since I'm not an expert of the incident. Feel free to change anything.