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Hiroshima (1946)

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Re: Hiroshima (1946)

#91

Post by niels_olson »

mevile wrote: post #3

> In the street, the first thing he saw was a squad of soldiers who had been burrowing into the hillside opposite, making one of the thousands of dugouts in which the Japanese apparently intended to resist invasion, hill by hill, life for life; the soldiers were coming out of the hole, where they should have been safe, and blood was running from their heads, chests, and backs. They were silent and dazed. However I ma…

> Soviets

That would be some seriously revisionist history that would horrify the Japanese. My goodness. You should visit Japan some time.

Re: Hiroshima (1946)

#92

Post by [deleted] »

doall wrote: post #90
badminton1 wrote: post #59

There are many views on the bombing. The difference is that Americans do not hide it. It's controversial, but people know about it. Same with Germans. People know about how the Germans behaved in WW2, they're not proud about it, it's learned in schools, and they do not hide it. Japan on the other side, actively hide their actions. Japanese schools present a revisionist version of history in which all their horrible a…

It's not that Japanese people are hiding their history. If there are clear evidences that are not flawed and could not be denied, they will not deny, but admit and apologize. For example, there was the famous Korean sexual slavery issue coined by Seiji Yoshida that later he and Asahi Shimbun admitted it was a complete fiction. This revealed that the comfort women issue was not about slavery but prostitution. Why do y…

[deleted]

Re: Hiroshima (1946)

#93

Post by sukilot »

nihonde wrote: post #67
badminton1 wrote: post #59

There are many views on the bombing. The difference is that Americans do not hide it. It's controversial, but people know about it. Same with Germans. People know about how the Germans behaved in WW2, they're not proud about it, it's learned in schools, and they do not hide it. Japan on the other side, actively hide their actions. Japanese schools present a revisionist version of history in which all their horrible a…

For the record, this doesn't reflect my personal experience in Japan in any way whatsoever. People here are quite well aware of their history, but they don't understand some people's focus on Japan's most recent expansion into China and Korea any more than Americans would understand someone whose sole concern is the eradication of native Americans. This kind of "they're not sorry enough for me" discussion is fruitles…

The peace treaty that ended WWII handed over control of Japan's military to the USA. Japan's peacefulness is a gift from foreigners.

Re: Hiroshima (1946)

#94

Post by animeweedlord »

rangibaby wrote: post #70
badminton1 wrote: post #59

There are many views on the bombing. The difference is that Americans do not hide it. It's controversial, but people know about it. Same with Germans. People know about how the Germans behaved in WW2, they're not proud about it, it's learned in schools, and they do not hide it. Japan on the other side, actively hide their actions. Japanese schools present a revisionist version of history in which all their horrible a…

It's not like Japan would be the first country to selectively remember history to make itself look good. I doubt they teach much about Dresden in the UK, or the extermination of Indians in America, or killing literally every Aborigine in Tasmania, or the British forcing the Chinese to buy opium. I went to school in Japan and we didn't learn a sugar-coated version of history. We went to Hiroshima and listened to a tal…

In American schools an overwhelming amount of time is spent teaching about the sins of our country and other white people. Slavery, Jim Crow laws, the genocide of Native Americans. In a unit on WWII, a week would be spent on the entire war, and the other 3 specifically dedicated to the Holocaust. All in all I'd say we spent over half of our history lessons and a third of our English lessons covering subjects like these.

Re: Hiroshima (1946)

#95

Post by sukilot »

rangibaby wrote: post #70
badminton1 wrote: post #59

There are many views on the bombing. The difference is that Americans do not hide it. It's controversial, but people know about it. Same with Germans. People know about how the Germans behaved in WW2, they're not proud about it, it's learned in schools, and they do not hide it. Japan on the other side, actively hide their actions. Japanese schools present a revisionist version of history in which all their horrible a…

It's not like Japan would be the first country to selectively remember history to make itself look good. I doubt they teach much about Dresden in the UK, or the extermination of Indians in America, or killing literally every Aborigine in Tasmania, or the British forcing the Chinese to buy opium. I went to school in Japan and we didn't learn a sugar-coated version of history. We went to Hiroshima and listened to a tal…

The USA just kicked President Jackson off the front of the $20 bill, and his genocide was part of the reason he was the least respected money face.

The "Trail of Tears" is a major unit in several years of K-12 education.

Re: Hiroshima (1946)

#96

Post by sukilot »

GunboatDiplomat wrote: post #77
dkarp wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the UK, children are definitely taught a history to be proud of in general. Which is the opposite of how history is taught in Germany. But there were a few exceptions. I'm certain we studied the Allied bombing of Dresden and also the massacres that occurred during the Indian independence movement.

It seems only right to me that children be taught pride in their country and their history. There's no need to teach people to cringe at the mention of their nation.

There is a middle ground between hating their nation and blind national chauvinism. And if one must choose between extremes, "cringing" beats the heck out of falling in line and being a party to genocide

Re: Hiroshima (1946)

#97

Post by eceppda »

badminton1 wrote: post #59

There are many views on the bombing. The difference is that Americans do not hide it. It's controversial, but people know about it. Same with Germans. People know about how the Germans behaved in WW2, they're not proud about it, it's learned in schools, and they do not hide it. Japan on the other side, actively hide their actions. Japanese schools present a revisionist version of history in which all their horrible a…

http://apjjf.org/-Mark-Selden/1943/article.html

Here is an excellent analysis of American high school textbooks and their handling of the war with Japan.

It's pretty clear that Americans do in fact censure what is taught.

Re: Hiroshima (1946)

#98

Post by eceppda »

afterburner wrote: post #61
eceppda wrote: post #58

The US started targeting defenseless civilians in Japan via fire bombing, and the majority of the Japan's cities had already been destroyed by the time they deployed the atomic bombs. The attacks on civilians in Japan were the first examples of what is now standard procedure in the air force, now known as "strategic bombing". Mark Selden, a researcher at Cornell University, wrote an excellent article detailing this:…

This ignores the changes since Iraq War I though. Carpet bombing is no longer standard procedure, because more accurate bombing became a lot cheaper.

Iraq II re-destroyed Baghdad and destroyed the city center Falluja. An estimated 655,000 civilians were dead by 2006 and another 2,000,000 displaced. The standard procedure of targeting civilians is still the central strategy.

Re: Hiroshima (1946)

#99

Post by badminton1 »

nihonde wrote: post #67
badminton1 wrote: post #59

There are many views on the bombing. The difference is that Americans do not hide it. It's controversial, but people know about it. Same with Germans. People know about how the Germans behaved in WW2, they're not proud about it, it's learned in schools, and they do not hide it. Japan on the other side, actively hide their actions. Japanese schools present a revisionist version of history in which all their horrible a…

For the record, this doesn't reflect my personal experience in Japan in any way whatsoever. People here are quite well aware of their history, but they don't understand some people's focus on Japan's most recent expansion into China and Korea any more than Americans would understand someone whose sole concern is the eradication of native Americans. This kind of "they're not sorry enough for me" discussion is fruitles…

I don't know how much of it can be attributed to the fact that they are required to be peaceful (as a country) by law.

Re: Hiroshima (1946)

#100

Post by sukilot »

bluejekyll wrote: post #66
mevile wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Americans may not hide their actions, but they certainly paint the actions in a light favorable to the American self-image. Germany on the other hand exhibits complete contrition and there is no denial of the wrongness of the actions that happened. There are extreme and fringe holocaust denial beliefs in some sub-groups in Germany, but as a government policy what I've said is true.

As an American, this is a question I struggle with. The the atomic bombs did what they were meant to, a swift end to the war with a full capitulation by the Japanese, before the Russians were able to mount an invasion of their own. This is generally forgiven because it in theory saved the lives of American soldiers who would have had a hard fight to take Japan. But all of this was done, and with an understanding that…

You never noticed the opposition to the Vietnamese war? It is the primary cultural feature of the 1960s-1970s, and then in movies through the 1980s
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