Japanese Atrocities.

Discussion in 'War Against Japan' started by Kaiser, Mar 27, 2005.

  1. jspitery

    jspitery Member

    "Unfortunately here in the U.S. it is politically incorrect to call Japan out for its human rights abuses."

    There are many American's former POWs of the Japanese who will completely agree with your statement. Many believe it started with MacArthur who allowed many Japanese War Criminals to go free.

    I agree with you, what really would sets me off is when the victims were Australians, British, Indians, Chinese or New Zealanders and MacArthur seem to have power over even those trials and sentences.

    He never really got dirty himself, he was always in the rear or close to it, and he never missed a meal. How many POWs of the Japanese starved to death and the Japanese criminals who allowed this were never prosecuted by MacArthur?
    It's seems to be true that here in the U.S. we go out of our way for the sake of healing and normalizing relations and trade that we sidestep the issues of abuse by the Japanese during WW2. There were some truly horrific occurrences one after the other in fact Death March at Bataan, railroad building in Malaysia, abuse of captured pilots in the Pacific. I once corresponded with a Battan Death march survivor now living in PA and he told me he was very upset at the making of the sanitized Pearl Harbor movie and Japan paying reparations to Korean women who were forced into prostitution in Japanese comfort houses and never admitting what they did to Americans, Australians and others. Not to say the poor women were not deserving. It just upset him to think the admission of guilt has to not been made in regard to his buddies that died by their hands. I have met scores of the many younger generation of Japanese people who are totally sympathetic and who embrace anything or anyone American and are truly good people. I think that's what makes things even harder to put all this behind us. The Japanese that exist today are for most part a very warm and compassionate people. We have to make an effort to differentiate between their current and older generations and some times that very hard to do If you are part of our greatest (WW2 vet) generation.
     
  2. Assam

    Assam Senior Member

    I think it must also be said that there were many attrocities commited against POW's were in fact carried out by Korean Guards. Korean members of the JIA were given the most lowly unclean jobs & guarding POW's was considered something equal with their status These were usually conscripts to the JIA. In the eyes of the Japanese only 1 rung up on the ladder to a POW. Their brutality & vicious methods were an overt attempt to try to elevate their standing with their Japanese superiors. They were given Japanese names & after the war were able to drift very much into obscurity for the most part. 3 of the worst on the Death Railway were "Monkey Face", "Dr. Death' & "The Undertaker".

    It is arguable that the Koreans at that time albeit an occupied country, provided manpower that assisted in the purpetration of attrocities, yet because they were an annexed country at the time, the Korean politicians of the preceding generations have not felt the need to say "sorry" for attrocities carried out by their citizens. Maybe they should, after all, the Korean guards didn't have to enjoy themselves so much.

    Regards
     
  3. spider

    spider Very Senior Member

  4. martin14

    martin14 Senior Member

    Will they translate it to Japanese ?
     
  5. Tab

    Tab Senior Member

    Isn't it odd that the Germans were chased down tried and convicted for their war crimes and even recently there was a trail of a eighty year old German Guard at a Concentration Camp, yet may of the real Japanese torture walked free under deals done by MacArthur.
    Japanese Military Doctors had a camp in china were they infected POW with all sorts of jungle diseases and they would cut the organs out of the mens bodies while they were still alive to see how the disease was spreading and all with out anesthetic. The deal on this was that America would get all research details and all the staff there would go free.
    Many Japanese where caught by the British & Commonwealth troops who had committed many vile atrocities and had their trials stopped by MacArthur and the men turned over to the Americans.
    Still what annoys me most is that many of the Japanese people still think that they were wronged and that they did nothing wrong,and what happened was every ones else's fault.
    Yet the Germans who are taught what they did during the war, will stand there and say that they are ashamed of what was done in their name
     
  6. Assam

    Assam Senior Member

    TAB,

    I suppose that what comes of being an Island nation. They did not have the civilian population in places where they could wittness 1st hand the attrocities that were committed, this coupled with the fact that the "divinity" of the emperor, meaning if the JIA acted in the Emperors name then no wrong had been done because the Emperor could do no wrong. This was the mindset of the nation at the time. It is arguable that the occupation administration should have been forward thinking enough to to purge the revisionist theories that were to permeate through the Japanese schooling system. but after the US & BCOF left the Islands there was not much they could really do about it - regettably.

    This together with the US desire to use top people (their war crimes overlooked) effectively meant that justice was not only Not seen to be done it was not done. I suppose being aware that the psychology of humiliation of a nation might have bred a generation not dissimilar to the disaffected of Germany post WW1.


    Regards

    Simon
     
  7. spider

    spider Very Senior Member

  8. Charley Fortnum

    Charley Fortnum Dreaming of Red Eagles

    This may interest some:

    Surviving Hell, Stories from the Fall of Singapore - The Railway of Death




     
    Last edited: Nov 1, 2016

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