[Thanos]

No apology to Japan for anything. Ever. They quite appropriately suffered the harsh consequences of a war they were singularly responsible for starting. They were fascists on the same level as Mussolini and about the only saving grace that they can claim is that they weren't quite as genocidally insane as Nazi Germany was. Other than that they popularly supprted and were willingly controlled by an utterly despicable and vicious quasi-totalitarian regime. They can navel-gaze all they want about how 'badly' they were treated but there's no reason at all for the rest of the world to go along with their revisionist bullshit routine.

[raydan]

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

Okay. I asked for it.

Don't EVER ask for something like that again.


...this is your last warning.

[BartSimpson]

Thanos Thanos:

No apology to Japan for anything. Ever. They quite appropriately suffered the harsh consequences of a war they were singularly responsible for starting. They were fascists on the same level as Mussolini and about the only saving grace that they can claim is that they weren't quite as genocidally insane as Nazi Germany was. Other than that they popularly supprted and were willingly controlled by an utterly despicable and vicious quasi-totalitarian regime. They can navel-gaze all they want about how 'badly' they were treated but there's no reason at all for the rest of the world to go along with their revisionist bullshit routine.

All around great post. +1

But the Japanese were on par with the Nazis for war crimes (Unit 731, anyone?) it's just the allies cut them slack after the war in part due to the then-racist attitudes of the West. The deaths of Europeans were weighed more heavily than the deaths of so many Asians...some 60 million by some accounts. While the Japanese were not deliberate in their acts, they were utterly contemptuous of the people they murdered as being racially inferior. Ergo, the results were the same whether it was a Japanese racial superiority fantasy or a cocaine-induced Nazi fetishist fantasy driving the policy. The Japanese were not motivated by genocide as the Nazis were, but what's the difference when measured in blood?

Chalmers Johnson Chalmers Johnson:

It may be pointless to try to establish which World War Two Axis aggressor, Germany or Japan, was the more brutal to the peoples it victimised. The Germans killed six million Jews and 20 million Russians [i.e. Soviet citizens]; the Japanese slaughtered as many as 30 million Filipinos, Malays, Vietnamese, Cambodians, Indonesians and Burmese, at least 23 million of them ethnic Chinese. Both nations looted the countries they conquered on a monumental scale, though Japan plundered more, over a longer period, than the Nazis. Both conquerors enslaved millions and exploited them as forced labourers—and, in the case of the Japanese, as [forced] prostitutes for front-line troops. If you were a Nazi prisoner of war from Britain, America, Australia, New Zealand or Canada (but not Russia) you faced a 4% chance of not surviving the war; [by comparison] the death rate for Allied POWs held by the Japanese was nearly 30%.

[saturn_656]

Being a Canadian POW held by Germany was rough, but from what I read, they gave you enough food to remain healthy.

This is what Canadian POW's looked like after four or so years in Japanese captivity.

[Mustang1]

Revisionist thy name is jeff

jeff744 jeff744:

Kyoto was the primary target and was changed only because a general had his honeymoon there and didn't want to destroy it. Had the Americans bombed Kyoto they would have killed the only man of power in Japan willing to surrender, the emperor, had they actually hit Kyoto Japan would have fought to the death.

Do some more "research" - there was a list of targets (including Yolohama) and Kyoto was also pushed to the bottom of the list due to its cultural/religious significance (next time, go beyond a cursory glance at wiki U).

The rest is pure speculation.

$1:

Do you also justify the fire bombing that the US used upon Japan killing 500,000 and making another 5 million homeless while at the same time destroying ~60% of all the cities they bombed? Japan started the war so they deserved to have their cities burned in random firebombings that is now considered to be a war crime committed by the Americans?

Lose the argumentative fallacies - Japan was an instigator, belligerent and a nation truly guilty of war crimes. They, NOT the United States, used a sneak attack to begin war in the Pacific (and we're not even going into their previous militaristic exploits or crimes against humanity like the Raping of Nanking) and they certainly deserved to be thoroughly defeated (remember the issues with the Great War's culmination?) and neutered industrially and in spirit.

And who considers the A-Bomb attack as a "war crime"? Let me guess, some uneducated highschool drop out in his mother's basement who trolls the Internet for any junk info that supports his asinine theory? Brilliant. Revisionist dreck.

$1:

The US is just as guilty as Japan of committing war crimes on another people, Japan just happened to lose and somehow all the American ones are forgiven.

Nope. Hiroshima was a legitimate military target. Maybe next time Japan won't start a war it can't finish?

Another day, another revisionist attempt to sully history.

[Mustang1]

Mustang1 Mustang1:

Anything that uses contemporary views, knowledge or agendas is simply revisionist dreck. Here's hoping that stays away from this thread.

And here we go again

current-events-f59/65-years-after-bombing-u-s-to-make-first-appearance-at-hir-t90916-30.html

[Dragom]

I could point to the fact that the US was blocking oil from the worlds most numerous and active fleet as cause for the attack on Pearl Harbor.

Seriously trying to get in the way of the Japs butchering the Chinese? Sooner try to take a plate from a man while he's still eating.

Other people point to "Victory Sickness" as the Japanese had steamrolled every combat up to that point and had begun to suspect they where invincible.

But fault or not, Hiroshima is still a Shrine of Pain and Wounded Pride that can be used as a lens through which the hate of an entire nation can be focused upon the west once more. Any effort to dull the threat it represents is worthy.

[jeff744]

Mustang1 Mustang1:

$1:

Do you also justify the fire bombing that the US used upon Japan killing 500,000 and making another 5 million homeless while at the same time destroying ~60% of all the cities they bombed? Japan started the war so they deserved to have their cities burned in random firebombings that is now considered to be a war crime committed by the Americans?

Lose the argumentative fallacies - Japan was an instigator, belligerent and a nation truly guilty of war crimes. They, NOT the United States, used a sneak attack to begin war in the Pacific (and we're not even going into their previous militaristic exploits or crimes against humanity like the Raping of Nanking) and they certainly deserved to be thoroughly defeated (remember the issues with the Great War's culmination?) and neutered industrially and in spirit.


And who considers the A-Bomb attack as a "war crime"? Let me guess, some uneducated highschool drop out in his mother's basement who trolls the Internet for any junk info that supports his asinine theory? Brilliant. Revisionist dreck.

What does the fact it was a sneak attack matter? Are you another of those that believe that all wars are fought in a clean and tidy manner under a set of rules where everyone gets 24 hours notice and then duke it out on a single field of battle? Sneak attacks always have been and always will be a legitimate war tactic for defeating an enemy that may otherwise cause far more trouble.

Which country left the war and continued on to invade one that had been fighting for independence and then later used a chemical weapon that even today severely cripples most born in the area (Agent Orange). I never said Japan was not guilty however the US is no angel, they used nuclear weapons, firebombed, stripped civilians of land and rights and locked up in camps simply due to their race, then in peace time they proceeded to de-industialize Japan until it hit the standard of living from the early 30's, they allowed the Russians to claim the Kuril islands which resulted in the expulsion of a further 400,000 Japanese, the soviets were allowed to continue their invasion even after peace terms as well.

The Chief of Staff under Truman did not want to use the nukes.

$1:

    "It is my opinion that the use of this barbarious weapon at Hiroshima and Nagasaki was of no material assistance in our war against Japan. The Japanese were already defeated and ready to surrender ...

    "My own feeling was that in being the first to use it, we had adopted an ethical standard common to the barbarians of the Dark Ages. I was not taught to make war in that fashion, and wars cannot be won by destroying women and children."

Guess what? he was right. The emperor was already well on the way to surrendering, in the end all the nuking did was cause mass casualties so that Truman could show that the US had the fancy new weapons to the Soviets. It was a political move, not military which brings it into the realm of being a war crime.

$1:

$1:

The US is just as guilty as Japan of committing war crimes on another people, Japan just happened to lose and somehow all the American ones are forgiven.

Nope. Hiroshima was a legitimate military target. Maybe next time Japan won't start a war it can't finish?

Another day, another revisionist attempt to sully history.

Oh the irony of that advice. You attack Japan for attacking Pearl harbor but say that nuking a primarily civilian location is justified. Japan killed all of 57 civilians in Pearl, 70-90,000 died instantly in Hiroshima alone, including ~90% of their doctors and nurses.

And on the note of starting wars it can't finish, how about 1812, Korea, Drugs, and Iraq?

[ShepherdsDog]

$1:

which brings it into the realm of being a war crime.

Cue the revisionists.

$1:

Japan killed all of 57 civilians in Pearl, 70-90,000 died instantly in Hiroshima alone, including ~90% of their doctors and nurses.

And how many civilians did they kill on Mainland China and other places the Imperial Army marched?

[jeff744]

ShepherdsDog ShepherdsDog:

$1:

which brings it into the realm of being a war crime.

Cue the revisionists.

$1:

Japan killed all of 57 civilians in Pearl, 70-90,000 died instantly in Hiroshima alone, including ~90% of their doctors and nurses.

And how many civilians did they kill on Mainland China and other places the Imperial Army marched?

So, one countries murder of civilians by default makes it fine for you to do the same? Japans crimes are established, the fact the USA has also committed war crimes in their fight to defeat Japan seems to be getting ignored.

[ShepherdsDog]

Those who make the laws determine what the crimes are. The Japanese and Germans were the agressors, not the Americans and the British.

[EyeBrock]

Oh stop being a plonker jeff. You are talking to people who quite obviously know a lot more about this subject than you.

Go read a few real history books from all sides and come back in a couple of years or so with an educated opinion. The stuff you are posting just isn't up to snuff mate.

[jeff744]

ShepherdsDog ShepherdsDog:

Those who make the laws determine what the crimes are. The Japanese and Germans were the agressors, not the Americans and the British.

So by default the defenders have the right to do anything they want?

[ShepherdsDog]

We were governed by our own laws.

[jeff744]

EyeBrock EyeBrock:

Oh stop being a plonker jeff. You are talking to people who quite obviously know a lot more about this subject than you.

Go read a few real history books from all sides and come back in a couple of years or so with an educated opinion. The stuff you are posting just isn't up to snuff mate.

I have read both sides of the nuclear weapons attacks, Japan was on the way to surrender shortly after the firebombing of Tokyo where the emperor saw the damage. The US Chief of Staff and other members were against using the nukes, the bombers crews could not believe what they had dropped onto the city, Roosevelt was unwilling to use them on Japan, Truman wanted to show off for the Soviets.

Truman is a man marked in anti-communist activities.