Posted on 12/28/2018 10:29:46 AM PST by Captain Peter Blood
For Christmas I gave myself several books on World War II that I had read about in the Wall Street Journal Weekend edition.
One of the books was James M. Scott's latest book "Rampage" about the battle for Manila in January and February of 1945.
I have read my share of books on the war and of the atrocities committed by both the Germans and Japanese during the war.
Scott's book on what happened during the battle for Manila was without a doubt the most detailed book I have ever read. It literally made me sick to read what the Japanese did to those people that were not only their prisoners but to the general population at large.
Excessive murder, rape, and total destruction of a beautiful city for no real purpose except a misconception that they were providing a delaying action so that General Yamahsita and his forces could stage some sort of counterattack to stop MacArthur.
The fact of the matter is that is it really accomplished nothing except to cause misery on a scale that defies the human imagination unless you were there.
The human misery that the Internees endured in the prison camps they were in is so sickening and stomach turning that I almost could not read the book without stopping at times to think about what I had just read.
I am at odds as to who was worse, the Germans or the Japanese in the war crimes committed, It's possible it's a draw but add in the the kinds of atrocities that Japan committed in Nanking and Shanghai and maybe Japan was worse. I just don't know.
There is no rational for what happened in Manila. This book was very well researched and the testimony of the survivors to the atrocities of the Japanese was gut wrenching to read.
To those that are students of history I recommend this book to read as hard as it is to read it.
Yes I was thinking of China as I read the paragraph and then at the end the cities are mentioned...
Japan invaded China and stayed there for 10 years and the horrible things they did to the Chinese are usually not considered part of the war crimes...
This terrible battle never should have happened. The Allies should have simply bypassed the Philippines. It was no more needed than, say, the island of Formosa was.
But wait. Douglas MacArthur said “I shall return”. So return he must, regardless of the cost.
Thanks sounds like a good subject for John Batchelor to review on his talkie.
I haven’t read this particular book but in Max Hasting’s book Retribution about the last year of the War in the Pacific he states that the entire Philippines Campaign was a pointless waste of life that did nothing to shorten the war. Of course he is contemptuous of Macarthur’s generalship overall.
“This book was very well researched and the testimony of the survivors to the atrocities of the Japanese was gut wrenching to read.”
It doesn’t seem like a topic discussed often, but the Americans did bring a large number of Japanese war criminals to justice after the war.
I’m not sure how many Japanese were hanged after trials - several thousand if I remember correctly.
And many thousands of others refused to surrender and were killed in combat.
The Japanese are considered allies now, and I guess they are - but during WWII they were a bad lot.
Scott points that Roosevelt and chiefs wanted to bypass the Philippines and conquer Formosa instead since it would have been a good staging point for our bombers and troops to invade Japan.
MacArthur used every trick in the book at the July 1944 Hawaii conference to twist Roosevelt chiefs arms to invade and free the Philippines even though it could have been bypassed.
Subordinate commanders ignored Yamashita's orders and instigated a bloodbath that in the process destroyed most of the old city.
George H.W. Bush was shot down attacking the same island. He landed far enough off shore he was picked up by a Navy submarine. Had he been taken by the Japanese, he would have been murdered too.
The entire Battlefield series by the BBC is on Youtube. I downloaded the Midway and the entire tarawa, Okinawa, Philippine Sea battle episodes. Good stuff.
And there are at least 5 damn good docuvideos on the Battle of Manila. I head to the RP twice a year for both business (we have offices there) and my brother is married to a Filipina who happens to belong to a strong political family there..so when I get picked up at the airport, I have ARMED guards haha
But wait. Douglas MacArthur said “I shall return”. So return he must, regardless of the cost."
The Philippines were an American territory at the time, so yes, we had to get it back.
Plus I’ve been to UST or Univ of Santo Tomas where they interned a LOT of American prisoners. It still looks the same as you see in those videos as the university predates Harvard. Scary at night too.
Nips, by a long shot. Close tie between Germany and Russia for second, with Russia probably winning by a nose.
There has been a lively debate about the subject with merit on both sides.
I think Hastings is wrong. The Philippines was the next logical target after New Guinea. We needed a staging area to support an invasion of the Home Islands. Okinawa isn't big enough. Plus, the populace was friendly and we wouldn't have to guard our back. Another plus was that we recovered American territory and fulfilled a promise made. Finally, having a naval base on the Philippines cut Japanese access to supplies from S.E. Asia and the East Indies for good.
The Navy plan was to bypass the Philippines and invade Formosa to use as our base to invade the China coast and possibly the Home Islands. Formosa would have been an even bigger bloodbath on much more defensible terrain. The notion of engaging the Japanese army in China was wrong for many reasons.
In hindsight, we didn't need the Philippines or, for that matter, Okinawa. But in 1944 none but a tiny group of people knew about the atomic bomb and even they didn't know if it would really work. No, we were planning an invasion of the Home Islands, a gigantic undertaking to place and support at least 1 million men in Japan, with casualties in the first wave estimated to be 100%. We needed a big base to support such a vast undertaking.
Finally, about McArthur's generalship. It was bad. His defense of the Philippines was incompetent. But, the Philippines campaign was fought by Krueger, who did know what he was doing. And he was smart enough to give Dugout Doug all the credit.
Possession of the Philippines denies Japan imports from the Dutch East Indies which is why they went to war in the first place.
The Japanese invaded in 41' to deny the US Clark Field on Luzon and the Navy yard at Cavite.
The last Japanese tanker from the Indies limped into Japan in March 45'.
It had been bombed by B-24's from the Philippines and had to jettison much of it's cargo to make it.
It was pretty well established at the end of WW2 that the German military fought a mostly clean war (with some glaring exceptions in the east but considering the brutality of their opponents there, no surprise). Notice that only now, decades after the fact, when nearly everyone involved is dead, “new scholarship” has been “deconstructing the myth of the ‘good Wehrmacht’”. By comparision, it was established and known, during and after the war and up to the present day, that the Japanese military was horrifically brutal in its treatment of enemy troops, prisoners, civilians, women, children, everyone.
Hitler read about Nanking he commented the he thought the Japs were being cruel to the Chinese. When Hitler thinks you are cruel then that tells you something
Two answers to how many Japs were sentenced to death for war crimes after World War II.
1) Just under 1000.
2) Not enough.
I am at odds as to who was worse, the Germans or the Japanese in the war crimes committed, ........................ They didn’t stop in 1945, others were just as guilty when the iron curtain began to come down. Atrocities were committed in Asia and Eastern Europe and the Balkans. I’d like to say we were clean, but Korea and Nam had their instances also. In Korea it was payback for the murdered POW’s, in Nam it was blood lust due to frustration of pacification by removal. I believe it was in Song Ve were our guys had their own way of removing people out of the area.(Permanently) In wars the worst is brought out in humans, and no nation is exempt. The beat will go on, and it will get worse. I am already at the point of seeing dark clouds and the 4 horseman on the horizon.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.