Japanese units learned of the Chinese retreat on December 13th, which led to skirmishes and mass surrendering in Nanking. The attack on Nanking was marked by a sense of out of control troops that contributed to the atrocities committed.
The Japanese units learned of the Chinese retreat on December 13th, which leads to skirmished and ultimately surrender by many Chinese soldiers. The attack on Nanking appears out of control from the start with glory-hungry units leading the charge, which can be compared to the sack of Carthage by the Romans.
Japanese soldiers in China in 1937 had a "no prisoners" policy and killed thousands of abandoned enemy bodies, POWs and civilians. The Japanese soldiers lured groups of 100 to 200 Chinese people to secluded locations to be killed en masse.