Posted on 09/18/2007 3:36:43 PM PDT by Stoat
(your secretary is a flippin' idiot just the same).
But I think part of the problem is that we judge Germans by the standard of European/Western morals and behavior, while Japanese culture and society is far away and just so different. It always amazes me that the people who produced Beethoven and Schiller and Dürer could produce Hitler and Göring and Göbbels. We hold 'family' to a higher standard than a stranger off the street.
The Japanese were not punished nearly enough for their unspeakable crimes. Right about now they should be rediscovering fire enabling them to move out of their caves.
It’s not good enough for anybody. New Zealand shouldn’t be doing it, America shouldn’t have done it for the things we have, Japan shouldn’t do it. My bottom line is that unless there’s at least 50% of the decision makers who did the bad thing left around to sign onto the apology it’s worthless and pointless and shouldn’t be done. If an apology needs to be issued it needs to come from the people responsible, not their grandchildren. NZ should tell the Waitangis to blow it out their rears, no more money or guilt for stuff nobody currently in charge had anything to do with.
Except of course the Japan that exists now isn’t the same Japan, they aren’t governed the same way, they aren’t governed by the same people, I’m not even sure the official name of the country is the same. An apology from modern Japan, which really only has a geographic relationship with the Japan that did those things, is meaningless. You can’t legitimately apologize for other people, and that’s what all these “sorry about history” are. America has done a few apologies in my lifetime, and I didn’t feel sorry during any of them, they were all things I didn’t do, people I elected didn’t do, heck some of them were even things that happened before my relatives got to this country. And I think most Americans shared my lack of sentiment during those apologies. All national apologies really are is the current government wanting some inconvenient history to go away so they can stop being bothered by it.
I got this from one of the reviews (Amazon):
“This book confused me. It’s not that the book was difficult to read; in fact, it’s a very easy read. The problem with the book is that rather than just telling the story of the flyers, the author delves into a litany of moral equivalence and cultural relativism to make the barbaric conduct of the Japanese seem to be no different from that of the United States. Indeed, a book which one would think to be a sympathetic portrayal of pilots who fought, died and were brutally killed by the Japanese seems to turn the concept on its head. In the first 107 pages, he effectively blames the US for `ethnically cleansing’ the Native Americans, stealing half of Mexico and then greedily using gunboat diplomacy to open up Japan to trade while we invaded an uninhabited island named Chichi Jima, where the `Flyboys’ fought in WWII. In 1862 when Japan’s first steam ship seized Chichi Jima back, the author notes sagely, that the Japanese had `learned their lessons [of conquest] well.” In other words, it’s our fault became militaristic “
Do you agree with this?
I have the book and for the most part it is an unreadable piece of crap. The reviewer's statement that the text is a litany of moral equivalence between the actions of the Japanese and the US Indian Wars is very true.
I'm not sure if this qualifies, but I think that is already happening... sort of... I just bought a new Toyota Vibe and I'm very pleased with it. I hear the Honda Focus is also quite good.
Not to contradict you, but he must have joined before Pearl Harbor, since Bataan fell an April 9, not enough time to train and ship men to the islands, not to mention that after Pearl Harbor, the navy was in no position to get men there. I don't believe any reinforcements were sent to the Philippines.
> NZ should tell the Waitangis to blow it out their rears, no more money or guilt for stuff nobody currently in charge had anything to do with.
Mate, when you are right, you are right. I cannot disagree with your point: it is elegantly made, brilliantly argued, and correct in every way.
Still, I would like to see Japan say sorry, and cough up to the fact that they did wrong, and that the Allies were perfectly justified in dropping bombs on Nagasaki and Hiroshima. And, as penance, Japan should stop killing whales “for (sushi) research”. That would draw a tidy line under that bit of our world’s history, and we could from there move on.
I certainly wouldn’t mind Japan stopping the whining about being nuked. They have to have seen at least as much of the documentation as I have and should know that if we hadn’t nuked them we’d have had to basically genocide them. Sometimes I wonder how much different the world if rude beer drinkers like me were in charge of a couple of countries, it would be funny the next time Japan whines about being nuked to have the president say “f#$% yeah we nuked you, and I should remind you that while we were bluffing about having more nukes then we aren’t now so STFU”. Of course such a president would be run out of office hours later, but it would be worth it.
I think rude beer drinkers like you would find plenty of support from rude beer drinkers like me. It might be difficult, on that basis, to run you out of office.
Problem is at any given time half my supporters would be plotzed in a bar somewhere watching the game and have no idea I’d been taken away.
> Problem is at any given time half my supporters would be plotzed in a bar somewhere watching the game and have no idea I’d been taken away.
Easy answer there, mate. You be the guy with the Amex tab running at the bar, and just make sure you’re shouting all rounds. THEN they will pay attention!
Summarily stripped of my citizenship?
Tsk, tsk. How very fascist if you.
The sources I'd heard from stated that we had material for 10 weapons. I had heard we had acquired some materials from captured or abandoned Axis labs.
I'll have to go back to those sources and see how accurate they are.
I should have put an “/s” after my comment like so many people do when they say something in jest. I thought you would know. My fault.
My sincerest apologies.
FRegards.
Yes late in the war (a few months before Germany surrendered) we captured a German sub on route to Japan with several drums of un-enriched Uranium on board.
Useful but not bomb material.
Damn Jap ping.
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