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NEWS: Politically-charged Manga Suspended in Japan

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Warning: This is a lengthy post.

Sigh. The answer is, read the textbooks on your own before referring to some sites. Most of those who critisize Japan have not or not tried to read or study many things, reference material and so forth in Japanese.

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Interestingly, the actions of the Japanese government are quite different from those of the German government, its wartime ally.

I recommend you count how many times the Germany government announced *its* responsiblity for WW2 in the past 50 years. I was surprised to hear that the current President of Germany said in a speech on the effect that he was shamed and terrified with Nazi's brutality. They always say Hitler and Nazi are wrong, but I wonder how many times they said *Germany*.

The German Parliament passed a bill in 2000 setting up a 7.5 billion dollar slave fund for the Nazi-era slave and forced laborers. They formally apologized to the victims "for what Germans did to them".

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Interestingly, the actions of the Japanese government are quite different from those of the German government, its wartime ally.

I recommend you count how many times the Germany government announced *its* responsiblity for WW2 in the past 50 years. I was surprised to hear that the current President of Germany said in a speech on the effect that he was shamed and terrified with Nazi's brutality. They always say Hitler and Nazi are wrong, but I wonder how many times they said *Germany*.

I am not opposed to using the term of Nanking Massacre, though an American student told me that Nanking Atrocities is used commonly in the West. However, Rape of Nanking is the title of Iris Chang's book. I think it is inadequate to use it here as if it were a historically formal name, don't you?

Listen, giao_su. However many guilties of the land of the rising sun you reaccount here, it serves nothing because the Japanese government is not/will not/cannot be involved in the problem.

It is the matter of moral of publication, and Shueisha conceded its error. That's all.

enjin2000 wrote:

Strange. I were the diplomat, I would also have tred to avoid discussing the issue just because I am a diplomat. I think the man/woman in the position is taught in any civilized country not to talk about the political issue hastily, isn't he/she? If I tried to argue about Hiroshima with the American diplomat, he/she would try to avoid the topic.

Excellent point.

Um, your emperor was asked to surrender twice, and he refused twice. He was "warned". And your country didn't exactly warn Asia that it was going to invade either. Oh, and then there's the Pearl Harbor thing...

Or maybe your propaganda people would've twisted it around to make it look like it wasn't such a threat after all.

In the brief period between the Soviet declaration of war and the Japanese capitulation, the Soviet forces made short work of the Japanese forces in the north of China, and would presumably have had little difficulty in executing a concurrent invasion with the Americans, had the U.S. not been one step ahead.

Regardless of Truman's intentions, you're talking about a country that would send out kamikaze fighters when it ran out of weapons, because it refused to admit defeat.

As for the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, General Lemay, commander of the 20th Air Force, selected them because both Hiroshima and Nagasaki were not bombed like other cities in Japan. They were excellent test subjects for the effects of atomic blast on cities. Check out the film "Atomic Cafe." Turman used the bombing to scare the Russians and force the war to end quickly. "Operation Downfall", the invasion of Japan would have destoryed his adminstration.

Japanese at 1853 were living in isolation for nearly two hundred years. Then Commodore Perry sailed into Tokyo bay and threaten the Tokugawa shoguns that controlled Japan to trade with them.

To compete with the Western Imperialists, Japan underwent a massive modernization, the Meji Restoration. They even adopted Western Imperialist ways including conquests of other countries namely Korea and parts of China in the late 19th and early parts of 20th Century and SE asian countries in the World War II.

That's completely erroneous. In fact, the Soviet forces in the East were relatively well-supplied and in a comparatively high state of readiness

In the brief period between the Soviet declaration of war and the Japanese capitulation, the Soviet forces made short work of the Japanese forces in the north of China, and would presumably have had little difficulty in executing a concurrent invasion with the Americans, had the U.S. not been one step ahead

I recommend you count how many times the Germany government announced *its* responsiblity for WW2 in the past 50 years. I was surprised to hear that the current President of Germany said in a speech on the effect that he was shamed and terrified with Nazi's brutality. They always say Hitler and Nazi are wrong, but I wonder how many times they said *Germany*.

Wrong. Saying Germany was wrong would be saying that everyone who lived in Germany at that time was responsible for the Nazi's brutality, including the German Jews.

Many people feigned (sp?) an allegience to Hitler in order to escape the possibility of death, or visiting the death camps too.

And what about those who helped hide the Jews? Certainly they cannot be held responsible for Hitler's work.

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To compete with the Western Imperialists, Japan underwent a massive modernization, the Meji Restoration. They even adopted Western Imperialist ways including conquests of other countries namely Korea and parts of China in the late 19th and early parts of 20th Century and SE asian countries in the World War II.

Actually, Japan became imperialist, because they didn't have enough resources to support a growing population. They used Western imperialism as a "legitimate" pretext to invade-just like Hitler used "self-determination" as an excuse to "annex" Poland and Czechoslovakia- but they were probably going to invade anyway.

That's because the bulk of the Japanese army wasn't in China by then, but in the South Pacific. If it the majority of the Japanese army did take on the Soviets, then the Soviets would've had their arses handed to them, because they couldn't even compete with the Japanese on the water by then.

If they were anything like Schindler, then they waited an awfully long time to do anything...

abunai:

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That's completely erroneous. In fact, the Soviet forces in the East were relatively well-supplied and in a comparatively high state of readiness

Um, they burned down their own crops and villages so Hitler wouldn't get to them.

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In the brief period between the Soviet declaration of war and the Japanese capitulation, the Soviet forces made short work of the Japanese forces in the north of China, and would presumably have had little difficulty in executing a concurrent invasion with the Americans, had the U.S. not been one step ahead

That's because the bulk of the Japanese army wasn't in China by then, but in the South Pacific. If it the majority of the Japanese army did take on the Soviets, then the Soviets would've had their arses handed to them, because they couldn't even compete with the Japanese on the water by then.

GATSU wrote:

abunai: Quote: That's completely erroneous. In fact, the Soviet forces in the East were relatively well-supplied and in a comparatively high state of readiness Um, they burned down their own crops and villages so Hitler wouldn't get to them.

Let's see... I'm guessing that you didn't think a lot about that before you wrote it.

Now, let me help you... Look carefully at that sentence of mine. See where it says "Soviet forces in the East"? That's because we're not talking about the European theatre of operations, but the Asian theatre of operations.

Besides, it would have been rather sensational for Hitler or his troops to be able to do anything in Aisa in the summer of 1945. He was dead, and they had surrendered.

He's right on one technicality:

Hitler considered Russia in his "Eastern Campaign." So it all depends on which side your on.

Of course, nobody bothers to mention that Russia and Japan were on a Neutral terms thru most of WWII.

A number of Japanese-U.S. miscommunications seem to have confounded the process of peace - and even the start of the war. For instance, there seems to be evidence to support the fact that the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour was not, in fact, intended to take place without a preceding declaration of war - but the Japanese ambassador who was to deliver the declaration just before the attack was kept waiting in a front office. By the time he was admitted, the attack had already taken place - and he was received with ire.

Fortunately for the U.S., miscommunication works both ways - poor intelligence had resulted in the Japanese not being aware that just next to Pearl Harbour was, in fact, the only major fuel supply for the U.S. Pacific fleet west of Los Angeles. Had they known, the Japanese could have bombed it, and delayed U.S. naval mobilisation by weeks, maybe even months.

- abunai

Although I will not claim to be an expert from what I know about the Japanese mentality during WWII any land invaision of the main islands of Japan would have been more costly in terms of lives then the A bombs.

Everyone in Japan was expected to fight to the death in case of an American invaision. From what I know from history classes and my own research it seems to me that the death toll would have been much higher for both sides if we had decided to invade Japan instead of dropping the bomb.

Also when talking about the decision to drop the bombs people never mention that American firebombing killed more Japanese then the A Bombs did.