In the West, it is natural that remembrances of the Second World War have tended to be Eurocentric. Europeans consider the Nazi invasion of Poland in 1939 as the event which triggered the start of World War II; for Americans, this would probably be the bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1941. What few may know is that in the Far East and the Asia Pacific, the winds of war were brewing well before this.

In 1931, Japan invaded and annexed Manchuria, a northern province of China. This display of military aggression would portend its imperialist ambitions in the coming decade. Withdrawing from the League of Nations in 1933 in the face of condemnation over Manchuria, Japan eventually embarked on a full-scale invasion of China in 1937. By late 1941 and early 1942, the Japanese Imperial Army turned its attention southward, overrunning most of Southeast Asia and the Pacific, occupying British Malaya (now Malaysia), Singapore, Borneo and Burma, Dutch East Indies (now Indonesia), and the American-occupied Philippines.

Between 1931 and 1945, it is estimated that more than 23 million lives were lost in this region; some to armed resistance efforts, others to various war crimes – torture, slavery, biological and chemical weapons testing to name a few, while still countless others starved or fell fatally ill owing to disastrous occupation administration policies. This website intends to honour the memories of those who were lost, in the hopes that they do not remain unknown, nameless, faceless and forgotten victims.

Image above: Cover of propaganda leaflet for Greater East-Asia Co Prosperity Sphere