W ORLD WAR II 421 THE WAR IN NORTH CHINA. 1937 REHE HEBEI LIAONING Shanhaiguan Peking Marco Polo Bridg Tianjin ●Tanggu ●1 dshun Baoding★ Taiyuan SHANXI SHANDONG anese assembly area without causing casualties.But when one Japanese dier was missing at roll call,the Japanese commander,thinking the Chi- had captured the man,ordered an attack on Wanping.This attack, ch the Chinese beat back,can be considered the first battle of World 需rⅡ. The following day Chinese troops near the rail junction of Wanping anched an attack on the Japanese position,but were repulsed.Over the few days,though the shooting had stopped,there was a flurry of often coordinated negotiations,statements,and counterstatements.These came m the local military commanders on both sides,the Chinese and Japanese horities in Peking,the Chinese and Japanese regional commanders,and governments in Nanjing and Tokyo.Feelings began to run high.The aese War Ministry called for the mobilization of five divisions within an to handle contingencies that might arise in north and central China hile Chiang Kai-shek ordered four divisions to move into the area around oding in southern Hebei.Prince Konoe,in a press conference,insisted tthe incident was"entirely the result of an anti-Japanese military action the part of China,"and that"the Chinese authorities must apologize to for the illegal anti-Japanese actions."Chiang Kai-shek,from his summer