Japanese war crimes

[SamiBTX]

Certain Japanese leaders & politicians have been very insensitive in recent years.
But the government needs to own up to its past crimes

[Luís Henrique]

The only people they ever seem to mourn is their own.

"They" who? Are you suggesting that every single Japanese man or woman is like that?


The scale of death & devistation in China, Korea & etc. was just as bad as in Europe. They feel they've already "apologized", but the only people who can decided that are their 'victim' nations.Sorry, this makes absolutely no sense. Nations aren't "victims"; only concrete human beings can be so. Is Japanese imperialism harming people in other countries? No doubt. It's what imperialism does, and it has nothing to do with some especial "Japanese" characteristic.


To this day they still wave their old Imperial Ensign without any regard to how it might make their neighbours feel?Again, "they" who?

Are we going now to take exception with the public display of the American flag, too?


Personally, I love all things Japanese & this is not intended to be a smear thread.But it is what it looks like...

Luís Henrique

[jake williams]

"They" who? Are you suggesting that every single Japanese man or woman is like that?

Sorry, this makes absolutely no sense. Nations aren't "victims"; only concrete human beings can be so. Is Japanese imperialism harming people in other countries? No doubt. It's what imperialism does, and it has nothing to do with some especial "Japanese" characteristic.

Again, "they" who?

Are we going now to take exception with the public display of the American flag, too?

But it is what it looks like...

Luís Henrique
The reaction of Germany to its WWII crimes is completely different from Japan's reaction to its. Granted both are separate from the reactions of the victorious countries to theirs, but I still don't think we can accept Japan's current view/lack of view of what it did.

[SamiBTX]

"They" who? Are you suggesting that every single Japanese man or woman is like that?

Sorry, this makes absolutely no sense. Nations aren't "victims"; only concrete human beings can be so. Is Japanese imperialism harming people in other countries? No doubt. It's what imperialism does, and it has nothing to do with some especial "Japanese" characteristic.

Again, "they" who?

Are we going now to take exception with the public display of the American flag, too?

But it is what it looks like...

Luís Henrique



Of course not every Japanese person is like that! I feel I didn't write that clear enough. NO WAY do I think that, by they I meant the government's & their main conservative party. You're right, that up there made no sense.
Sometimes I kinda babble when I write.:blushing:
"They" as in people like Tokyo's governor who I heard is a fanatical right-winger. Victims as in the still living victims who were there during WWII.
And all of the modern people there who have have their feelings hurt by things certain Japanese leaders have said.
Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against Japan, & it is never the people's fault for what their leaders say & feel.

[RedStarOverChina]

One of the reasons why Japanese fascists are so powerful today is because Japanese fascism was never truly destroyed, like the Nazis were at the hands of the Soviets.

The US, instead of prosecuting Japanese war criminals (such as the Japanese Emperor and those responsible for Nanking Massacre), used many of them as pawns in the Cold War against communists.

[Comrade Wolfie's Very Nearly Banned Adventures]

Unit 371 did some really fucked up stuff, like cutting off peoples arms and stiching them to the other side,

The US protected these people, and took their 'research' at the end of WWII, and the Japanese government has never appologised for these and other war crimes, and in a recent history textbooks for high schools they glossed over these crimes, causing protests in china and korea too.

[Lenin II]

It's Unit 731. ;)

[MarxSchmarx]

This is one of those issues that is poorly understood in former allied countries.

The best way I can explain the reluctance of some Japanese politicians and officials to own up to their past is to point to a similar lack of contrition in the UK, France or the U$.

Japan's colonial atrocities were acts of imperialist aggression. They are not radically different from what the U$, UK, and USSR all did leading up to and during the WWII. It is frequently assumed Japan, being an ally of Germany, had similar genocidal policies. Yes, the Japanese military was ruthless. But I think something can be said for the raw insanity and evil of Nazism - something that went beyond the usual confusions engendered in people's psyche by imperialism.

Indeed, the scale of the genocide in the third Reich really went above and beyond what imperialism had been accustomed to.

The attitude SamiBTX describes is that what was meted out in Tokyo was victor's justice. None of the allied nations have ever really been held to account for their colonial atrocities.

Indeed, just as a vocal minority of Brits, Americans, Russians, French, etc... feel that they shouldn't apologize for their imperialist past, SOME Japanese feel their behavior in WWII isn't that different from what the Americans did to the Filipinos before they got there or the Brits did to the Indians.

Don't get me wrong, I think that just because the other imperialist states haven't apologized doesn't mean the Japanese government is off the hook. My only point is that the fairer comparison for Japan isn't to Nazi Germany but to the USSR or the U$A.


in a recent history textbooks for high schools they glossed over these crimes, causing protests in china and korea too.This is rather misleading. The textbook controversy has a messy past, but a lot of the points of concern from China and Korea have been addressed in the last two decades. What happened recently, and caused the anti-Japanese demos in China, was the Ministry of Education approved a textbook for public school use that glosses over Japan's colonial atrocities. However, this particular book is in use in only 8 junior high schools in the entire country. Most Japanese Jr. High schools do discuss this aspect of Japan's past, and you will be hard pressed to find anyone in Japan who isn't aware of many of Japan's atrocities in China or Korea. I'm afraid the same cannot be said of any of the Anglo-Saxon countries...

[Gitfiddle Jim]

One of the reasons why Japanese fascists are so powerful today is because Japanese fascism was never truly destroyed, like the Nazis were at the hands of the Soviets.


Exactly. The Japanese need to own up now, in the same way the German government did. The Japanese were far worse than the Nazis when it came to the treatment of POWs and not abiding to the Geneva Convention.

[jake williams]

One of the reasons why Japanese fascists are so powerful today is because Japanese fascism was never truly destroyed, like the Nazis were at the hands of the Soviets.

The US, instead of prosecuting Japanese war criminals (such as the Japanese Emperor and those responsible for Nanking Massacre), used many of them as pawns in the Cold War against communists.
As I understand it, the Americans engaged all kinds of European fascists to help keep down the communists, or at least denied any support to the communists. Italy wasn't it?

[spartan]

As I understand it, the Americans engaged all kinds of European fascists to help keep down the communists, or at least denied any support to the communists. Italy wasn't it?

Yeah all sides did it, including the USSR who openly supported a west German Fascist party with funding during the cold war in the 50's.

Socialist Reich party:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialist_Reich_Party

What is most intresting about the Socialist Reich party is that they were banned in 1952 (A year before Stalins death) 3 years after being formed in 1949.

This means that they were funded during Stalins rule of the USSR.

At least the Capitalists have an excuse for supporting Fascists (Fascists are always used by the Bourgeois to enforce their rule over the workers in a revolutionary situation) Stalin, on the other hand, had absolutely no excuse for his supporting of these Fascist parties.

[commiecrusader]

Exactly. The Japanese need to own up now, in the same way the German government did. The Japanese were far worse than the Nazis when it came to the treatment of POWs and not abiding to the Geneva Convention.

Do you really have any evidence for this?

What difference would it really make for Japan to make a state apology for WWII now? It wouldn't change anything.

[SamiBTX]

Do you really have any evidence for this?

What difference would it really make for Japan to make a state apology for WWII now? It wouldn't change anything.

It is a bit late, but it's the thought that counts to many Chinese & Koreans.
I believe the only way to cure resentment is to forget it *but*
I think one of the most respectable & mature things a leader & or a nation can do is to own up to its mistakes, even if it is 63 years later.