The Anti-Japanese War in Western Yunnan was an extremely tragic chapter in the history of China’s Anti-Japanese War. In order to cut off the Burma Highway, the only channel for international aid to China at that time, the Japanese fascists counterattacked China's rear areas from Southeast Asia, attempted to capture Yunnan, threaten Chongqing, and force China to submit.
In May 1942, the Japanese invaders set foot on the land of western Yunnan, and Tengchong fell. On May 5, the Chinese army promptly blew up the Huitong Bridge on the Nu River, blocking the Japanese troops invading along the Burma Highway on the west bank of the Nu River. From then on, the two armies faced off on the east and west banks of the Nu River for two years.
In May 1944, in order to cope with the counterattack of the Chinese, British and Indian coalition forces against the Japanese army in northern Burma, re-open the Yunnan-Burma Highway and regain the lost land west of the Nu River, the Chinese Expeditionary Force guarding the east bank of the Nu River launched the Yunnan Western Counterattack Campaign.
In May 1944, the Expeditionary Force launched the Tengchong counterattack with the strength of 6 divisions of the 20th Army. Tengchong City is the strongest city in western Yunnan. It also has Laifeng Mountain as a barrier. The two places rely on each other. After more than two years of defense, the Japanese army built strong fortifications and fortresses in the two places and prepared sufficient food and ammunition.
According to statistics, it took 127 days from May 11, 1944, when the 20th Group Army of the Expeditionary Force forcibly crossed the Nu River to September 14, 1944, when it conquered Tengchong City. It experienced more than 40 major and minor battles and killed more than 6,000 enemies. , the 20th National Army's 20th Group Army killed 9,168 people and finally recaptured Tengchong, making Tengchong the first county to be recovered in western Yunnan.
After the battle, Li Genyuan, then a member of the National Government and Supervisor of Yunnan and Guizhou, proposed the construction of a cemetery to commemorate the fallen soldiers of the national army. After that, with the assistance of overseas Chinese in India, the construction of the cemetery began, and it was officially completed on July 7, 1945. Li Genyuan named it "National Memorial Cemetery" based on the "National Memorial" chapter in "The Songs of Chu".