Funny, I didn’t see Hirohito in that clip like Pres. Obama said he was.
bump
THANKS !
Should be recommended viewing for all school age children.
Thank You for posting this remarkable piece of our History.
Wow.
I liked the part in MacArthur's speech where he says something like “The issues involving different ideals and ideologies has been determined on the battlefields of the world, and are not for our discussion or debate. The surrender documents in front of us contain the terms that are given and to be received.”
My old tagline was “Peace through Victory”. A total victory really did provide for a long-lasting peace with both Germany and Japan. Not the half-measures taken in so many other conflicts (Israel/Palestinians comes to mind).
I read somewhere that they had to scrounge the ship for a suitable table. They ended up using a table (maybe two tables shoved together?) from the kitchen used to prepare the food. With a cover tossed over it to make it presentable.
Thanks for the clip.
I remember one of the Japanese diplomats who was there later said that when he looked at all the foreign nations that were represented, he wondered “How in the world did we ever think we’d beat all of these people?”.
I noticed on a film clip of a recent visit to Japan by some U.S. politician, one of the Jap (intentional) reporters asked the perennial question, “Do you think using the atomic bomb on Japan was right?” I forgot how the guy tap-danced around it, but I would have been in their face.
To wit: “If we had not dropped the atom bombs, you, and probably half the people here would not have been born as your parents would have killed themselves in suicide attacks against the allies. We would still have today a North and South Japan with the North ruled by the Russians. I would also request that you ask the people who suffered under Japanese occupation if we made the right decision. When they were asked, they responded, “Why did you drop only two?” The final question would be to ask those Japanese professional victims if Japan would have used the bomb on us to save the emperor. We should be “in your face” over this lay-the-guilt-trip-on-the-Americans routine.
One wonders how long Harry Truman and the Democrats would have lasted if they hadn’t dropped the bomb, suffered all those invasion casualties (Jap prison commanders were instructed to kill all prisoners if they heard Japan was invaded) and the public found out we had them and didn’t use them.