Neighbors urge Japan to stick to history

Associated Press ^ | Aug 28, 2014 2:16 AM EDT | Mari Yamaguchi

[Olog-hai]

China and South Korea on Thursday urged Japan to stick to history and reflect on its wartime aggression after Tokyo confirmed that Prime Minister Shinzo Abe sent a note earlier this year to a ceremony honoring more than a thousand World War II-era war criminals praising their contributions. […]

Many Asian countries that suffered from Japanese militarism in the first half of the 20^th century see honoring war criminals as a lack of remorse by Tokyo for wartime aggression. The revelation of Abe’s note could especially worsen Japan’s ties with China and South Korea, which have repeatedly criticized Abe’s views on wartime history, widely seen as revisionist. …

[Netz]

For all it's advancements and amazing society (I've been there), Japan, unlike Germany, has yet to really come to terms with its wartime past which is strange because their whole face saving crying, apologizing and self effacement if shown to be dishonest does not jibe with the lack of wartime guilt or educating their young, (what few they are producing).

[Olog-hai]

Germany hasn’t come to terms with its past either. Look a little deeper.

[dr_lew]

They took two nukes. Whaddaya want?

More than that, they SURRENDERED. They bore the unbearable. It meant a lot to them.

[Netz]

The Germans talk about it, hold seminars, write about it and educate their people about it. All the Germans I have met are “aware”.

This is not to say they’re truly sorry for (as my late WWII vet father used to say), “...they’re sorry for one thing only, that they lost” their deeds.

The Japanese are in total denial because after Nagasaki, they’re all “Pacifists”.

[Olog-hai]

Still not aware enough. When a majority polled compare the IDF with the Wehrmacht and believe that Israel is out to exterminate the “Palestinians”, something is quite rotten.

As for Japan, the fact that Issei Sagawa still lives speaks volumes.

[WhiskeyX]

Japan has long needed help with the historical reeducation of its people in order for its past genocidal mistakes to not be repeated..

[Ace's Dad]

As tour director, in the Winter, at an aircraft museum in Florida, I'm aware of how well versed Germans, even teen-agers, are of their country's crimes in WWII. They are also aware of the Berlin Airlift, where American and allied nations helped break the Soviet blockade. I can't speak to the Japanese situation, but I think the Germans are one of our best allies, based on how we are treated by German tourists.

[Jack Hammer]

Oh, for Pete’s sake, enough of this. It was ages ago; let the effing Koreans and the effing Chinese come to terms with their own, far more recent, aggressions.

[Dallas59]

Too bad we didn’t have the A bomb to drop on Berlin.

[Chainsawj]

I read the book Unbreakable and will see the movie in December when it comes out. It’s about a guy who’s name is long and that I can’t spell. He was an olympiccaliber runner and he was a pilot that got shot down in the pacific.

He was beaten and badly abused by the japs and his main tormenter was LET GO and NEVER TRIED for his crimes. At the end of the book, when they explained that we LET jap WAR CRIMINALS GO and let prisoners on DEATH ROW-go,that they went on to build businesses and live their lives like they did nothing wrong, I lost some respect for this country and when they said how the jap people CELBRATE these CRIMINALS I lost ALL RESPECT for japs and their country. We STILL hunt Nazis and we should be hunting the jap criminals also.

[Olog-hai]

If one insists on left wingers to “come to terms with” anything of their own volition, then all you are going to have is trouble. Abe (money printer, borrow/spend addict, government spending addict) can be counted among them.

[dr_lew]

To me ... just sayin’ ... just suggesting for consideration, this is the same attitude that Al Sharpton et al. bring to the table. That is, “You are eternally GUILTY, now bow down to us in our righteousness.”

I say, it all comes out in the wash.

[Netz]

The Germans will always carry the stain but they have made some efforts to learn about their past. I am no German apologist but elements within Germany comparing the Israel Defense Forces to Nazis is not uniquely German. The entire Arab world does and that is silly given the fact that they were actually aligned with the Nazis in WWII.

Since 1982 (Peace for the Galilee Operation) and the Sabra&Shatilla massacres (committed by the Christian Phalange Party), Israel has been painted as Nazis all over Europe and the West. This is only getting worse. The Germans are no different than the rest of Europe right now, so they have to be antisemitic in order to buy themselves more time in the face of an Islamic conquest of Europe (Eurabia).

The Japanese rarely let Muslims into Japan and certainly not to live. The Japanese are in WWII denial. True they felt humiliated that they had to surrender and be occupied but, I have seen their textbooks and the Hiroshima museum. There's nothing there about the 1931-August 5th 1945. The museum is all about how they were minding their business and one sunny morning, they became horrible victims. The rest of the museum is all about Nuclear disarmament and Pacifist desires to halt the spread of Nuclear weapons...nothing about the atrocities they committed during the war.

That seems to be the difference between Germany and Japan.

The German leadership supports Israel big time and supplies her with all kinds of military goodies.

Some of you may remember in 1982 a French artist had a display showing a famous picture of Jews being rounded up by SS soldiers during the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. A young boy (and the rest of the Jews) are being led out of a building with their hands up. This is a famous photograph.

This scum Bag, Cheese Eating Surrender Monkey Frog reversed the roles in his work showing Israelis leading Kaffiyah (Arab headdress) wearing Arabs being led out instead of the actual Jews. In other words, role reversal and a deep insult to Jews. This was the start of the Jew to Nazi comparisons.

[Ethan Clive Osgoode]

Japanese doctors who tortured and vivisected humans during WWII came home with honors and found new lives running corporations. None of them were ever brought to justice or even denounced by the Japanese.

[j. earl carter]

Too bad we didn't have the A bomb to drop on Berlin

It's like those TV shows you see about the secret weapons of the NAZI's. The shows always say, "If the Germans had 6 more months, they would've come out with this or that weapon, and might have changed the outcome of the war."

I always laugh at that. If the NAZI's had hung on for 6 more months, they would've gotten nuked.

[rlmorel]

Japan was, without a doubt, pretty evil from 1936 to 1945.

But, for bloodthirsty evil, they are pikers when it comes to murder when compared to China.

Until China “sticks to history” and acknowledges the deaths of 30-60 million of their own citizens by their own hands, I don’t want to hear anything issue from their pie-holes about the evil that others have done.

[Netz]

True, Mao Tse DUNG killed millions just like Stalin’s Famines, “Collectivization”, wars and purges. Mao’s “Long MArch” and “Great Leap Forward” killed millions...

[rlmorel]

There are people who think if you are an anti-communist, then you are some kind of ideologically based, right-wing, paranoid, nut-job.

There is far more innocent blood on the hands of the communists throughout history than any other single entity with the single possible exceptions of certain religions.

[bakeneko]

With all the talk here about ‘sticking to history’ and demanding that current Japanese folk pay for the misdeeds of a transient political party in their past, I hope you guys are all ready to dig deep for ‘reparations’.

Prepare to dig even deeper in your golden years when the recriminations come for the transient parties in power here now.