ABSTRACT
In 1965 Nanjing was allocated the mission of receiving a Japanese delegation, consisting of Japanese youths from many different interest groups. They had come to China for a quasi-diplomatic event, the Sino–Japanese Youth Friendship Get-together, and their tour passed through Beijing and fifteen other big cities starting on 21 August 1965. From the very beginning, the quasi-diplomatic mission was queried strongly by Nanjing citizens. The cadres of the Nanjing branch of the Chinese Communist Youth League made a painstaking effort to mobilise Nanjing citizens. In the background of the youth get-together, from August 1965 onwards, a nationwide campaign to commemorate the 20th anniversary of winning the 'Anti-Japanese War' was launched. Numerous activities of bashing Japanese militarists were launched by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) regime when it was on bad terms with the Japanese government. Immediately after the end of the Fifteen-Year War, for the CCP the main theme related to the war was the issue of Japanese war criminality.
