Posted on 07/19/2015 8:32:25 PM PDT by PROCON
Spain was shipping material like tungsten for AP rounds to the Germans to close to the end, Italy was PART of the Axis until they fell. Hungary and Romania were both allies up til near the end, both fielding units that performed miserably on the eastern front and also with respect to the latter being a major source of Germany’s petroleum and distillate needs.
The Finns were supplied their best weaponry by Germany, they didn’t on the face of it meld operational strategies, but both shared an enemy on the field.
Regardless of whether or not Japan has
contributed funds to the US for maintaining
Japan’s post war defense, that you believe
the dropping of the second A bomb on them
cleared the account is troubling. Should no
Japanese have been tried as war criminals
based on your position? We ARE essentially
discussing war crimes, aren’t we? The Japanese
government and major Japanese companies conspired
to commit war crimes against American POWs.
No, but the inconvenient fact is that most of the Japanese war criminals were already dead by the end of the war or committed suicide shortly after, due to the peculiarities of Japanese culture and the code of bushido. Very very few of those responsible for such atrocities lived past 1948, unlike Nazi Germany.
I’d also point out that my friend’s neighbor is a US Army Captain who was actually held as a POW by the Japanese during the war. He was one of the people who had war crimes perpetrated against him as part of his captivity; he told me that when he was released he was very angry and wanted those responsible brought to justice. Then he found out over the next few years pretty much everyone responsible had either been killed in taking the camp or suicided, either there or back in the Japanese home islands. He said that pretty much put a damper on the matter for him.
The Japanese *people* as a whole had their account cleared by Nagasaki and Hiroshima and the ensuing surrender. Individuals are another matter, and to punish those who had nothing to do with it (especially those who weren’t born yet!) is *wrong*. To say otherwise is to also admit that the people pushing for reparations for slavery have a valid point in asking modern Americans to pay for the suffering of their ancestors.
Or so he was told.
IIRC, estimates had it between 5-10 million and ‘we’re going to be forced to kill every Japanese on the islands’ for casualties on the Japanese side if the US had been forced to invade.
The atomic bomb, as terrible as it was and is, was a *mercy* because it gave the Japanese leadership an out that their value and honor system had precluded before.
True. On the other hand, he wasn’t so trusting of the governments involved, learned Japanese and kept a casual lookout for those that may have gotten away and those who had died just in case he *had* been lied to.
He did, however, get the satisfaction of seeing the corpses of a great many of his tormentors when he was liberated, so not all of it could have been lies.
You did not mention companies, I notice.
Major concerns like Mitsubishi and others
kept their names AFTER the war even though
they had engaged in war crimes during the war.
I submit that Mitsubishi etal retained their
names because of their history of success.
It was a marketing advantage to them. If that
is the case (and I’m sure it is) then Mitsubishi
etal should own the bad along with the good no
matter how often the corporate faces may have
changed.
There is absolutely no comparison to compensation
of American slave descendents unless you can
show me where former slaves actually attempted
to be justly compensated circa 1870 by those
who held them as slaves.
Your POW friend was talking about individual
Japanese. Has he ever given thought to the Japanese
slave owner companies? Others have.
BTW, was your POW acquaintance actually
sent to Japan or was he in a prison outside
of Japan? If he was among those rescued
from Cabanatuan then an acquaintance of
mine was involved in his liberation . Bill
Nellist was a Lt with the 6th Army’s
Alamo Scouts and was a team leader. He
is featured in Ghost Soldiers authored by
Hampton Sides.
“Good. You have just as much of right to
stay ignorant as anyone else has the right to
be informed.”
“What’s the matter? You get schooled by
someone who knows a little more about
the subject and feel the need to strike out?”
I don’t get “schooled” by obvious narcissists. Go impress somebody else with your self-aggrandizements. Maybe your therapist.
Were the Mitsubishi directors tried for war crimes like those from the German Krupp?
“It’s been a very long time, and most of the participants have passed on, but the Japanese had a lot to be ashamed of and a lot to apologize for.”
Japan still has a reckoning with China, one day.
No, not to my knowledge. But, many fewer
Japanese were indicted for war crimes than
could have been.
Unfortunately, I can’t ask him any more. Not necessarily because he passed on but because my friend moved away and I haven’t been over that way in a couple years. No idea what happened with him.
So did Mercedes, BMW, Messerschmitt, and most of the other big German companies despite taking advantage of slave labor and profiting from war crimes. Why should the Japanese companies be treated any differently?
And yes, there is a comparison. “Forty acres and a mule” ring a bell?
Agreed. China’s bill never got cancelled and *that* particular adventure ended up with a lot of survivors.
That’s because many of them were already dead or committed suicide after the fall of Japan. 500 Japanese officers suicided immediately after the surrender and thousands were executed for war crimes.
It should also be noted that it was *MacArthur* and the US government who decided to let a lot of the few surviving war criminals go, especially in the face of the new Cold War - we apparently needed an eastern bulwark against the USSR more than we needed absolute justice. See the Tokyo Trials for that particular farce.
If you have a problem with individuals going unpunished, you need to take it up with the US Government - it’s not like they slunk away and got away scott free on their own.
Er, that should read ‘thousands were executed or imprisoned on war crimes charges - or suicided as investigators closed in on them’. I remember reading that something like 1800 war crimes cases were closed by the suicide of the principal subject of the investigation.
But if you want to see why we stopped caring about it... You should look closer at the Truman Administration and their actions.
That is incredible. We are talking
about Americans, here. Let other
nations address there own issues with
German companies. In fact, some of
them did. I don’t know what German
companies did to American POWs but
I do know there was some slave labor
performed by American POWs in Europe.
What I really DO know is what some
Japanese companies did. And, your argument
seems to be the kind thing Dear Leader
Obama would introduce into the mix.
To hell with our own.....
No, I’m just saying that individuals should be held to account for their actions, not entire companies. The leaders of those companies, the people responsible for those actions, that were in charge back then are long gone for the most part. If they aren’t, yes, they could charge them with crimes - IF the US government hadn’t let them off.
Since you are rather diligent in responding
to me on this matter then I suggest a book
called Unjust Enrichment by Linda Goetz Holmes.
If you don’t choose the book then you might
consider perusing the reviews at Amazon.
Among other things you will see that in 1999
a group of 500 former American POWs
organized to sue Mitsubishi. They didn’t
get far but not because they didn’t have a
legit case.
Wonder how many of the 500 survive today? I do.
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