Posted on 12/09/2006 9:31:30 AM PST by Zakeet
TOKYO - Hiromasa Murakami went to see Clint Eastwood's "Letters from Iwo Jima" to find out if an American could tell the Japanese side of a battle that became a symbol of U.S. patriotism, but for Japan was a bitter memory of defeat.
After viewing the film on Saturday when it opened it Tokyo, Murakami thinks Eastwood got it right.
"It was marvelous," the 50-year-old carpenter said as he emerged from the theater. "How should I express it? It was the same for both sides, for them and us. Everyone was a victim."
[Snip]
For many Japanese, the battle that killed 6,800 U.S. Marines and 21,000 Japanese has long been a tragedy best forgotten.
"Iwo Jima was a defeat. It was miserable and no Japanese movie company wanted to try to show it," said Eichi Tsukada, a 71-year-old retiree whose father died in World War Two.
Six decades after its defeat, Japan is still trying to come to grips with the Pacific War and who was to blame.
[Snip]
Few young Japanese these days know much about the battle for the tiny, tear-shaped island 700 miles south of Tokyo.
But after watching the film on Saturday, 17-year-old high school student Satoshi Koyama said he had learned something.
"American and Japanese soldiers were fighting with the same emotion. Both wanted to return to their homelands," he said.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
There are to Fly Boys books. One is about the pilots and the Japanese. Don't remember the author.
My father did not come back. KIA by a Japanese Oscar in Pacific. I will not soften. I don't hate the Japanese because as the poster up-thread states, I can't blame the next generation but I would like to see some recognition and acknowledgment that it was wrong as to the atrocities done by their peoples. Instead, I hear how horrible we were to drop the bomb. I say tough-$hit. It should have been dropped sooner. Further, our own country let the majority of those responsible for the war crimes off. Now, look at what is going on today--the old U.S. of A. gets no free pass--ever.
Yes, finish it. You should be able to clearly recognize the kumbaya moments and take them for what they are. The meeting of Japanese and American survivors is instructive. It's hard to gauge the honesty of the Japanese grunt when he blames it all on the officers. Myself, I took it with a pound of salt and skipped/scanned the "someother dude it" parts.
You saw the Japanese version? It is a different movie.
Fly Boys the book is not the new movie. I can't find the author. I will look for the book and get back to you.
I used to think that way until my Chevy Vega blew an engine for the third and last time.
Which shows the power of our nation that we could forgive an enemy for such pain and later become friends. Could China do this? Or Russia? Or almost every other country on the planet? The US didn't take Iwo Jima for territory--we took it to defeat the Japanese
It is a difficult thing to forgive ones enemies. They might strike at you again. But it is the right thing to do.
i found one at a garage sale. it was titled "soldat"....don't remember who wrote it. gave it to a naturalized american who immigrated to the states after the second world war; he was an ex-german soldier. very interesting man. now in his eighties....he painted my mother-in-laws' house way before i knew my wife,in the 1950's.
"I simply do not understand how any of the Vets can forgive them. I would never own a Japanese made car."
I too will never own one of those stinking things. When they have displaced our companies and Americans bow to them for their jobs at US Jap car factories, who will it be said has won in the long run.
Here it is and all 201 reviews. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/customer-reviews/0316105848/ref=cm_cr_dp_pt/104-4768065-4464739?ie=UTF8&n=283155&s=books
I'm a former Marine, drive a Mercedes with Toyo (Japanese) tires. Great car ... great tires. :o)
Good grief! You think you can summarize Japan's motivations for their attack on the US and their subsequent defeat at the hands of the US forces in a single sentence? You couldn't summarize Admiral Tojo's motivations for using the head on the morning of the attacks in one sentence! Pretending that you can summarize history in little catchphrases is nice and patriotic, but it doesn't do a damn thing to cure ignorance. WWII was a hell of a lot more complicated that just "them=evil; us=good."
And in Germany, too. MacArthur gets -- and deserves -- full credit for the reconstruction (in every sense) of Japan, but Clay is too often forgotten.
Clay was from Marietta, Georgia, and was raised on stories of Reconstruction. Some historians believe, and I am inclined to degree, that he had a clear and vivid blueprint for how not to run an occupation. The idiocy of the Soviets' Berlin blockade helped his position, and he and his troops went from being oppressors to protectors in the Germans' hearts in a few short years.
In both Germany and Japan, the American leadership learned the lessons of Reconstruction in the South and of the Versailles treaty -- they took punitive actions against leaders, but not the population as a whole, and didn't saddle the new governments with the misdeeds of the old. and they got a much better outcome.
Oops. I should have given the full name on first reference. That's Gen. Lucius Clay.
That's the one.
When and where?
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