Posted on 09/18/2006 7:07:41 PM PDT by radar101
The number of Japanese internees (not those forced to relocate) was 11,229, including 95 and 910 from Alaska and Hawaii, respectively. An additional 2,220 from Latin American countries. The numbers do not include 5,620 who renounced American citizenship nor four nationals who were from islands in the Pacific, excluding Hawaii.
Records show there were 3,278 Italian internees. Records do not count any ones that may have been detained and/or shipped back to the United States from Latin American countries. Further, 52 Hungarian, 25 Romanian, five Bulgarian, and 161 "others" were also interned.
Also, there were plans to relocate germans & italians from the west coast & other sensitive areas at one point, but obviously these were not pursued as vociferously as were those involving the Japanese. I'll need to do more looking around.
Oh, I realize that and wasn't put off by what you said. And yes, there does need to be a hightened sense of security now, especially after 9/11.
But I just wanted to convey my own observations through the years..
Well, this does need further investigation. Those those camps only had 11,229 Japanese-Americans and the rest just moved elsewhere? Where would they move?
Internment refers to 'enemy aliens' who are not free to move anywhere but perhaps back to their home countries.
Opposed to 'evacuees' who are being 'relocated'. According to the executive order which mandated their relocation, they are free to leave the camps provided they have a place outside the security zone to live.
So those pictures of families (women, children and elderly) behind barbed wires with armed guards where free to leave?
Free to leave, that is, if they had a place to go?
I wasn't there, of course, so maybe they really weren't free to leave.
But the literature says they were, and the records indicate many did.
They were also worked hard from morning until night and treated brutally for weeks on end before being packed like sardines on ships and put out on the ocean, many to never return. I think these "compounds" protected by wire and armed guards were places like Fort Dix, Fort Knox, Fort Bragg, Fort Benning etc.
Ok but not too exciting. Now, “Italian-Americans Cheer Arrival of Chinese Navy” would have been more interesting.
Are you referring to axis POWs or civilian internees?
No to both of above. I was referring to U.S. Army draftees and volunteers.
Good point.
Don’t get me started on folks who are not offended if someone has an Italian flag sticker on their car, or an Irish flag handing from their house, yet freaks if they see a Puerto Rican or Mexican flag.
It is unfortunate for people to be treated that way, regardless of the numbers and who they were.
90,000 does seem awefully high for German and Italian Americans though. I'll have to do some more digging into history. My own reading of history seems to indicate that Japanese Americans were interned in significantly greater numbers than the other two groups.
I've had coworkers who were either Norwegian, Finnish, etc. and part of various Scandinavian organizations. By the way, I admired and respected them and feel no ill will towards them at all. And they have helped me with my job. But occasionally, they would make this comment that they had to be careful about promoting their heritage for political reasons. That it wasn't politically correct for them to do so. And maybe so, I dunno.
But if one were to take all of society at large, it is still far more politically acceptable for a European American to promote their culture in America than a non-European American.
Yes, you are right, I've seen those "Proud to be Irish" stickers, "Proud to be Danish", or Swedish, etc. and it doesn't seem to raise an ire. But yes, a Mexican or Puerto Rican flag would raise peoples ire. As well as Indian, Chinese, Japanese, etc. flag.
So, I do wonder sometimes, when people of European descent complain about shouldering the burden of political correctness, that it isn't non-Europeans that are still doing so. I couldn't very well parade around in a Japanese, Korean, or Chinese flag on my jacket the way someone of European heritage could.
I'd welcome any links you can provide.
I couldn't very well parade around in a Japanese, Korean, or Chinese flag on my jacket the way someone of European heritage could of their respective heritage.
You have to be kidding - where do you live - the Ozarks? The local rags around here are constantly promoting other cultures - noteably mexican, chinese and vietnamese. There are festivals, parades and all manner of cultural events in their name.
The only one remotely european in origin is St Patty's day.
I think you're being overly sensitive.
Here is one of them:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_American_internment
While approximately 10,000 were able to relocate to other parts of the country of their own choosing, the remainder – roughly 110,000 men, women and children – were sent to hastily constructed camps called "War Relocation Centers" in remote portions of the nation's interior.
So, aside from the misuse of the term 'internment', the source, as sketchy as it is, generally backs up my claim in this regard.
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