MILLIONS OF CHINESE FAMILIES SUFFERED during the invasion and occupation of the mainland by Imperial Japanese armies in the Second World War. But President Hu Jintao's and Premier Wen Jiabao's family tragedies came at the hands of fellow Chinese, not Japanese--and occurred rather more recently.

Wen Jiabao is the third-ranked member of the Chinese Communist party and as such is probably the third-from-last person in China who should complain about anyone's inability to "face up to history squarely." Of course, this didn't deter him from demanding exactly that of Japan on April 12. "Only a country that respects history, takes responsibility for history, and wins over the trust of peoples in Asia and the world at large can take greater responsibilities in the international community," he declaimed, by way of justifying China's opposition to a permanent Japanese seat at the United Nations Security Council, and by way of excusing the recent anti-Japanese rioting in China.

Indeed, Japan was responsible for mass deaths in China between 1937 and 1945. Western historians say as many as 8 million Chinese civilians died during the period, and perhaps 2.5 million soldiers. Chinese polemicists say 30-35 million died. It was horrific, and Japan paid a price for its aggression. Since its unconditional surrender in 1945, a democratic Japan has become one of the world's most generous aid donors, giving about $35 billion in development assistance to China between 1980 and 2004.

It does not add to the argument to point out that, by all accounts, the Chinese Communist party

Premier Wen's childhood is described in a definitive Chinese-language biography, China's New Premier: The Rise to Power by Dr. Yang Zhongmei, written in early 2003. According to this account, when Wen Jiabao was just six years old, he suffered the trauma of seeing his village sacked, his family compound burned to the ground, and his beloved grandfather, Wen Yingshi, shot. This occurred in January 1949, in the middle of the Chinese Communist fourth field army's offensive against the city of Tientsin during China's civil war.

Young Jiabao's home village of Yixingfu was just across a narrow canal that marked the northern border of Tientsin city and its outskirts, on the defensive perimeter of the defending Nationalist Chinese army. Apparently, the Nationalists destroyed Yixingfu and 12 other suburban villages to clear a line of fire against the invading Communists, an act of brutality that the American consulate in Tientsin protested at the time. Premier Wen's home was burned and his grandfather shot by Chinese Nationalists.

Premier Wen has not been shy about recounting his youth to American audiences. During his December 2003 visit to the United States, the premier told an audience at Harvard University, "I spent my childhood mostly in the smoke and fire of war. . . . When Japanese aggressors drove all the people in my place to the Central Plaza, I had to huddle closely against my mother. Later on, my whole family and house were all burned up, and even the primary school that my grandpa built himself all went up in flames."