Japan and U.S. have distant views of Iwojima

The Asahi Shimbun ^ | 18 March 2005

[Racehorse]

Baron Nishi is probably a familiar name to people who know the history of Japan in the days leading up to World War II. Born an aristocrat, his first name was Takeichi. He won a gold medal in the 1932 Los Angeles Olympics, and served in the Imperial Japanese Army during the war. After a tour in Manchuria, he was shipped to Iwojima island, where he was killed in action.

It is said that U.S. soldiers on Iwojima tried in vain to get Nishi to surrender, calling out to him by name: ``Olympic hero Baron Nishi, please turn yourself in. You are too great a man to die.'' But Nishi refused.

Some think this story was made up after the war. According to official records, Nishi died on March 17 exactly 60 years ago.

Mitsuhiko Niwa, 17, Nishi's great-grandson, visited Iwojima for the first time last weekend. Wearing a funereal black necktie and carrying two cameras, he walked around the island with about 110 people whose family members had also died there.

As many as 27,000 Japanese and American soldiers perished on the island, but Mitsuhiko found it surprisingly small. He had read many books about his great-grandfather, but it was only after ``stepping into dark, deep trenches and walking on blood-soaked beaches'' that he was truly able to feel his great-grandfather's ``physical presence'' for the first time.

Mitsuhiko climbed Mount Suribachi, where young Japanese and American soldiers literally fought to the death six decades ago. A photograph of the Stars and Stripes fluttering atop the mountain is still well-known in the United States partly because the photo is effective for raising morale. Whenever a catastrophe comparable in magnitude to 9/11 occurs, the photo is invariably used on fliers soliciting donations or announcing meetings of bereaved families.

Yasunori Nishi, 77, Baron Nishi's eldest son and Mitsuhiko's grandfather, noted: ``Japanese and Americans feel entirely differently about Iwojima. For us Japanese, it is an island for mourning the dead. For the Americans, it is an island for glorifying their victory.''

Mitsuhiko will enroll in an American university this autumn. He hopes to start horseback riding there--a sport his great-grandfather would have enjoyed into old age, had he lived in peacetime.

[glasseye]

``Japanese and Americans feel entirely differently about Iwojima. For us Japanese, it is an island for mourning the dead. For the Americans, it is an island for glorifying their victory.''

Sucks too loose......

[Lockbar]

I think what the Marines really said was "Olympic hero Baron Nishi, come out of your cave so we can put a .45 slug right between your eyes".

[krb]

and carrying two cameras

That's not going to help dispel any stereotypes...

[rottndog]

For us Japanese, it is an island for mourning the dead.


It should be a place of great shame, that their ancestors' ambitions led to so much death. History is once again being forgotten (ignored).

[lbt4000]

and carrying two cameras
That's not going to help dispel any stereotypes...

I wonder if they were Nikons

[martin_fierro]

Pingawinga.

[Rummyfan]

I wonder if they were Nikons

Probably Leicas......

[DaughterOfAnIwoJimaVet]

Thankyawa...nevermind. : )

[martin_fierro]

*snort*

[DaughterOfAnIwoJimaVet]

Clearly, I've been hanging out with Chad Fairbanks too much.

[Californiajones]

I've heard that the Japanese actually have comic books that have rewritten the history of WWII to show that the Japanese won! Very strange situation. National pride can be a good thing or a weird thing, I guess.

[SaltyJoe]

If we are sure enough of ourselves, then we ought never to demand an apology from today's generation for what a grand parent's generation inflicted long ago. Instead, we can find assurance of our steadfast ally of today that we will be friends without polarizing into unresovalbe conflicts, and we will compromise upon what we cannot completely agree.

I was stationed on Okinawa during the anniversary of the 50th year of friendship. There's no need to drag our present Ally's dignity through the mud over battle history. The Japanese have suffered their own defeatist attitude long enough. Objective history can restore honor to the honorable soldiers and rightly condemn those who've acted criminally. Many soldiers from all human history have suffered for having fought in a losing battle.

We don't vilify our Vietnam Vets (Sen Kerry does, but we're not like that are we?), so we don't have to drag those honorable Japanese's dignity with snide remarks of politics they could never have controlled.

[A.A. Cunningham]

"Hey Wang, what's with the pictures?"

[DaughterOfAnIwoJimaVet]

It is said that U.S. soldiers on Iwojima tried in vain to get Nishi to surrender, calling out to him by name: ``Olympic hero Baron Nishi, please turn yourself in. You are too great a man to die.'' But Nishi refused.

Some think this story was made up after the war.

I'm thinking it was made up. No doubt Nishi wouldn't surrender (to have done so would have been considered very dishonorable in his culture), but I think the part about U.S. Marines appealing to his ego is, well, probably something his family conjured up.

Pride was a big thing to them.

[ccmay]

Whenever a catastrophe comparable in magnitude to 9/11 occurs, the photo is invariably used

Good God. . . Did I miss something important? How many events comparable in magnitude to 9/11 have we actually had?

-ccm

[Milhous]

Some refer to Japan as America's Great Britain of the east. Japan's Emperor and Navy opposed the belligerent Army as it embarked on empire building leading up to WWII. After WWII America found it convenient to continue to use Japanese bureaucrats to administer Indochina and surrounding areas, which caused resentment among native populations.

[DaughterOfAnIwoJimaVet]

I read somewhere that many young people in Japan have no idea where Iwo Jima is, let alone what happened there.

[Racehorse]

I was stationed on Okinawa during the anniversary of the 50th year of friendship. There's no need to drag our present Ally's dignity through the mud over battle history.

For quite a few years I lived at Ishikawa on Okinawa.  Loved every moment of it.  And, I believe I visited the majority of battle sites and shrines accessible and a few which were actually not.  I was startled to be hiking in the hills above what was then Ojana t stumble upon a concrete shrine (not an Okinawan tomb but shrine) in which Japanese had placed their dead.  Animals or desecraters or both had broken into it.  The skeletons and bits of equipment were exposed to the elements.  Rather sad and haunting.

But, I also have good friends, some of whom were members of the 2nd Battalion, 131st Field Artillery, which was captured on Java.  Most were sent to Thailand's slave labor camps.  Others were sent to Japan, including a Texas boy named Frank Fujita who I never had the pleasure to meet.  Foo's story and drawings have been published by the University of North Texas Press.

I liked and thoroughly enjoyed knowing the Okinawans and Japanese I met during my life on the island. I really liked them a lot.  But, because of the harm and mistreatment they suffered at the hands of the Imperial Japanese Army, there are some who cannot neither forget nor forgive.  As difficult as it is, I must respect both.

[SaltyJoe]

I think that FDR and Truman were better in foreign diplomacy, we may have had Japan as allies against the Nazis. But hind sight is 20/20. The important thing now is to include as much positive discussion and action to keep a strong and growing friendship with our Japanese Allies.

You're right about continuing Japanese administration on demilitarized former Japanese conquests. The Koreans were particularly resentful and distrustful of Americans who only bothered themselves to use the Japanese administration.

(Did you know that the US Marines fought Koreans in 1871? It was our first real contact with Korea?)
The USS General Sherman Incident: http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/ops/sherman.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Sherman_Incident
The Battle:
http://www.shinmiyangyo.org/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shinmiyangyo

But if post-WW2 Congress and Presidency took seriously the Communist threat like they should have, the US Soldiers in Korea would not have had to use WW2 Japanese military intelligence to defend themselves from the North Korean attack. Post WW2 national defense and foreign diplomacy fell to complacency.

Checking my historical notes...yep, FDR and Truman--both Democrats.