Posted on 09/15/2024 7:02:28 PM PDT by RedMonqey
Bernard Stein never talked about his combat experiences in Southeast Asia during World War II, but he’d brought the flag home as a war trophy after fighting with the U.S. Army’s 38th Infantry Division in the Philippines, said Scott Stein.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
This article says his grandfather fought in the Philippines but the son of Yukikazu Hiyama says his father was killed in China.
This is a touching story but can anyone imagine a flag or any other personal items with a swastika or dairy of an SS soldier getting this same sentimental story if this was an German soldier? And don't say the Holocaust as the Imperial Japanese regime was killing innocent Chinese civilians in numbers equal, if not superceding the Nazis.
What a POS. His grandpa fought the Japanese as an infantryman. Brings something home and gives it to his son. That man gives it to HIS son. And that idiot doesn’t pass the legacy of his great grandpa to his son.... no, he seeks out the Japanese and gives it back.... and makes sure EVERYONE knows he did so.
This is not the easiest of calls. Many decent men fought for Imperial Japan. Just as many decent people fought for Nazi Germany.
But Imperial Japan was an evil entity. I would have destroyed the flag and then forgot about it. But then again, my father was a WW2 vet. He hated the Japanese (Pearl Harbor), even though he served in the Atlantic.
Others might think differently, and I respect that.
Virtue signalling in spades?
I am sure his social circles applaud it
Maybe compare the Japanses military to the SS. By and large the number of decent Japanses is miniscule compared to the Wehrmacht.
The Japanese were, generally, viscious animals.
> By and large the number of decent Japanese is minuscule compared to the Wehrmacht. <
I would agree. There are recorded instances of Wehrmacht (but not SS) soldiers being horrified by the atrocities they saw. But I am not aware of any such complaints from Japanese soldiers.
Plus even the SS tended to treat captured American and British soldiers decently. Not so with the Japanese. Beheading prisoners was sport for them.
I myself would have kept it, my father’s brother was on the USS Idaho before Pearl Harbor. His grandpa thought it was worthy of going home with it and gave it to his grandson for him to pass down to his children.
However I would have kept any Nazi or German military gear as my maternal uncle brought home a German Lugar that I thought was very cool. He was an supply clerk so I don’t or didn’t hear any stories attached to it.
What I don’t hear is any stories going the other way, i.e, any Japanese families returning any keepsakes from American soldiers and I know from hearing veterans of POW camps that the guards stripped them of anything valuable and, down to wedding bands and pocket watches from their grandpa’s.
The rape of Nanking and Project 731 come to mind where victims were called “logs”!
“Not so with the Japanese.”
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I was just listening to an audio story on u-tube about the soldiers that were detained at Wake Island and during the way to later battles in the West, battleship and aircraft carrier pilots would practice their aim by shooting and bombing the ⁸sand, one such pilot was George HW Bush
The commander was frustrated and lined up a few and beheaded them the other of the 89 were just machine gunned.
Some the crews of the First Tokyo raid were also beheaded.
No one was more “racist” in WWII than the Japanese.
Mark Felton is a fantastic historian.
“What I don’t hear is any stories going the other way,”
True. And you mentioned a Lugar. My brother in law has one from his dad that was in Patton’s 3rd army. His dad captured a general and got the pistol. It is absolutely 99%. Just perfect. He is torn because he wants his only kid to have it. But she’s a big lib, self proclaimed socialist, Kamala voter etc.
A sad problem with no good answer.
The SS was notorious for executing POWs. The Wermacht less so.
It wasn’t called the Rape of Nanjing for nothing.
I would sell the Lugar to a collector and donate the money to Trump - in her name.
Very true.
They were following the Western powers to the “t” and wanted to join the imperialist club. They fought on the side of the Allies and didn’t get what they thought they deserved and to rub salt in their wounds,we’re limited to how many warships they could have compared to Washington or Britain.
They looked down at other Asians as Europeans did and believed it was their rightful place to rule the world in their “8 corners of the world” philosophy.
They,just as the Nazis did, believed Americans were decadent, lazy, weak and corrupt(seems like they were 90 years too early)
But for some reason they get a pass while the Germans do not
May be he can send it me, I’ll be his adopted son!😂🤣
In 1969-1971, I worked side by side for two years with two Japanese soldiers. Their names were Yugi and Minesaki. They were great guys and all of us young GI’s talked with them endlessly, rough housed with them and basically just liked them and they us.
That said, I had 5 uncles who fought them. One was on Saipan and was a corpsman. Another was a loader on an anti aircraft gun in the Solomon Islands. I guarantee you none of them would agree with honoring the typical Japanese Soldier in any public, organized, collective way. Basically, they hated them.
My Dad was an anti-aircraft gunner in the Pacific during WWII. When my mom told him one day that her Church Women United group was looking for volunteers to house two Japanese visitors, dad said he would never allow Japs under his roof. Jokinly, I said, “I didn’t know my dad was an Archie Bunker.” Dad didn’t say anything, but my joke got dad to thinking and he changed his mind. They welcomed the two Japanese gentlemen into their house. They were too young to have participated in WWII, and they regarded the war as a dark time in Japanese history. My parents became good friends with these two men, and the corresponded with each other the rest of their lives.
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