Japanese uniform with "battle damage"

[arjan]

to each Jap American interred !

Can u explain me the reason why you put the Japanese americans prison and you didn't round up all the german americans?

Arjan

[WalterB]

Can u explain me the reason why you put the Japanese americans prison and you didn't round up all the german americans?

Arjan

I personally do not agree with the policy of internment of Japanese Americans. It was definitely a mistake that arose as a result of fear and, frankly, ignorance. The record of courage and sacrifice of Japanese American units in the European theater speaks for itself. If anything, such units were probably not decorated as much as they truly deserved as a result, again, of a high degree of xenophobia. While I do condemn the Japanese military junta for their unspeakable crimes (and a great many frontline soldiers who complied obediently with their inhumane policies), I by no means agree with trexco's criticism. Japanese Americans, especially those who fought and bled for the Stars and Stripes, have shown where their loyalties lie. Definitely demonstrate your contempt for those truly responsible for the horrors and crimes, but do keep a clear head and don't blame everyone who happens to look "like them".

P.S. While I believe that the nuclear attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were the right thing to do, I do not believe we should be happy that this occurred. Many innocent people suffered and died. The atomic bombs were the price for a faster and cheaper peace, alas, the price of a faster and cheaper peace still cost a lot, especially in terms of the innocent.

[Jack T.]

We harassed the Germans in the 1st World War.

Should have done in the 2nd World War. My mother in law was an air raid warden in WW2. During the black out drills, certain German sections of New York would "accidentially" turn on the lights during blackout. She would run over to them to shut off the lights and lights would go on at the other side of the block. She was also in upstate New York one day on a canoe trip on some remote lake and came upon some sort of Nazi sympathizer rally. She quickly left in fear of her life.

Maybe next time

[NavyFCO]

Lets not let this bomb argument make us forget what a tragedy an atomic bomb causes. Many of the items pictured in the link belonged to children; and we can all see what horrible death the atomic bomb brings.
JL

Almost the entire second floor of the Hiroshima museum is dedicated to the devistating effects of the bomb on children. That's the section that that left a bad taste in my mouth. I can see portraying the effect of the bomb on the population as a whole, but showing artifacts belonging from one child, and another, and another, and another... ad nauseum ... it was a bit much.

With regard to the posters who noted about the Japanese-American internment. I agree that it wasn't done in the best manner possible, that's for darn sure. At the time though, SOMETHING needed to happen. Not only for the protection of loyal Japanese-Americans, but also to prevent spying, which was a MAJOR concern at the beginning of the War (that's the way the Japanese had gotten so much information about Pearl Harbor, and we were still smarting from that!) So, of the available options, and noting the general lack of respect for human dignity based on race generally exhibited back then (note the poor treatment of African-Americans), putting oneself in the shoes of the folks in control, it's possible to understand their reasoning (even though it wasn't right.)

Incidentally, we DID intern German-Americans during the War. It was slightly more difficult because of the dissemination of German immigrants throughout the country (the vast majority of Japanese were in Southern California and in the western US). However, recent immigrants were interred in camps in the North East, particularly in New York. Folks don't know much about them because it frankly wasn't a "race-related" issue, thus there was no public repentance of it as was so frequent during the 1980's and 1990's (apologizing to the Japanese, apologizing to the African Americans, apologizing to the Indians... why apologize to German-Americans?)

Sorry to get this soapbox going in the first place, but while growing I was confronted with the whole Japanese-American internment issues where I was from, and later did a tour in Japan with the military where I saw the other side of it all. There are great things in history to put behind oneself, and this whole part of that period in history is one of them.

--Dave

[Jean-Loup]

"Almost the entire second floor of the Hiroshima museum is dedicated to the devistating effects of the bomb on children. That's the section that that left a bad taste in my mouth. I can see portraying the effect of the bomb on the population as a whole, but showing artifacts belonging from one child, and another, and another, and another... ad nauseum ... it was a bit much."

Hey, I havent been to Hiroshima. All I saw was the link I posted. I didnt post it for political reasons, but just because I hadnt imagined you could get a uniform burned right off of you.
JL

[Theodor]

The Japs were very bad, because killed hundreds of thousands civillians!

Ops, didn't the States do the same???

So, I think the criteria used here is wrong. You US guys are still and will always be the good guys, but yet this does no mean, that the good guys don't make big mistales and don't do warcrimes.

A marine blocade plus bombing the military factories, wouldn't it crush the Japanese and make them surrender at quite very low casualty rate? /very much lower than an invasion or an A-bomb/. Yes, but it would take time and money. So it was a typical military decision: end things faster and cheaper, show the the world /both allies and foes/ power and might. Hundereds of thousand dead civillians? That's not important, just some statistics. Military planning...

Killing of innocent civillian people has the same value, no matter whether it is done by coward asians or brave Allies. In my opinion, only, of course.

[NavyFCO]

Hey, I havent been to Hiroshima. All I saw was the link I posted. I didnt post it for political reasons, but just because I hadnt imagined you could get a uniform burned right off of you.
JL

Jean-Loup-

No worries. I'm sorry I "let it fly" a bit with my first post. I do appreciate you posting up the website as that way I could show my family (who haven't been to Hiroshima) the effects of the bombing. If you ever have a chance to make it to Hiroshima, the museum WILL give you a "reality check"... What was most amazing to me was the steps where a person had been sitting, and they had been vaporized, leaving only a shadow! It really does give you food for thought...

Thanks again for posting it.

--Dave

[NavyFCO]

A marine blocade plus bombing the military factories, wouldn't it crush the Japanese and make them surrender at quite very low casualty rate?

By the time we dropped the A-bomb, we had 1) bombed ever major military factor into oblivion, since we had been making concentrated bombing raids on the Japanese mainland for over a year and 2) had sunk or captured nearly every merchant ship in the Japanese fleet! Yet there was still no end in sight, and a straight invasion of Japan was going to cost an estimated 1 million US lives, and probably an additional 3 million Japanese lives. So, when you look at it from that perspective, dropping the bomb almost seemed like the logical thing to do.

--Dave

[WalterB]

A marine blocade plus bombing the military factories, wouldn't it crush the Japanese and make them surrender at quite very low casualty rate? /very much lower than an invasion or an A-bomb/. Yes, but it would take time and money. So it was a typical military decision: end things faster and cheaper, show the the world /both allies and foes/ power and might. Hundereds of thousand dead civillians? That's not important, just some statistics. Military planning...

Killing of innocent civillian people has the same value, no matter whether it is done by coward asians or brave Allies. In my opinion, only, of course.

This is the typical armchair general response. What you are ignoring or simply don't know is that air power alone cannot win a war. You will still need the grunt to go in and secure the area. Your idea that air power would have been sufficient to break the will of this fanatical enemy is simply wishful thinking.

[Theodor]

Hehe thanks for the "armchair general", I got several stars at once

Seriously though, I have always considered the A-bomb a military mistake with tragic results.

Wishful thinking? Well, my wishful thinking is written history! Because exactly this happened, the air power finished the war! An aviation bomb /though A-bomb/ was dropped and it was all over, without ground forces, secured areas and ect...

I have always been far far away from the Due /or Duet or whatever the spelling is/ doctrine, I know very well that the air power can not win a war... but in a way this happened in Japan!

My theory is that the same was going to happen with only a few months of marine blokade and bombng the military factories. Do not ignore, that I put "marine blokade" on the first place in my previous reply, before the air strikes.

With the sea roads for raw matherials supply blocked and the military facilities destroyed, the Japanese were going to surrender. They surrendered to the A-bomb, only because saw a superior force. They were going to see and feel exactly the same force, when a couple of months later run out of any supply and in the same time see a steel wall of battleships on the horizon... My 5 eurocents

[Perry Floyd]

Theodor, all that you say had allready been done..they had nothing left but manpower and a wall of ships faced them..

I'm very proud of our Navy, Marine and Army soldiers in the Pacific campaign. They made a undefeated enemy that did not surrender, and has never surrendered throughout history,,,
surrender.

[Theodor]

Very well said!