It's All About Me, Man: [ItsAllAboutMeMan] Re: [progressive] Wash. Post 11/3/08: WWII apologists persist despite Japanese policy

Monday, November 03, 2008

[ItsAllAboutMeMan] Re: [progressive] Wash. Post 11/3/08: WWII apologists persist despite Japanese policy

It's the kind of thing apologists for empire always say, innit? or course, because they are an empire that lost, they have an official policy, which is that Japan deeply regrets and apologizes for its wartime aggression.

In the USA, delusion IS the official policy, where all serious intellectuals are required to believe that it is certainly a false accusation to say that our country was an aggressor nation - a kind, peaceful nation that gets involved in wars of aggression every decade or so, but never apologizes for them, or even remembers most of them.

A country where serious intellectuals must believe,and regularly write in the major propaganda organs that the US attacked Iraq because of a "trap" set by Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. What bizarre mental processes were at work that impelled Hussein to openly claim that he had no weapons of mass destruction, when in fact he had no weapons of mass destruction? Oh, the treacherous bastard!

One time on some right wing list I repeated a few tales of US servicemen raping school girls in various countries of occupation (depending on how you count, the US has 700 to 1000 bases in other, supposedly sovereign countries. A former serviceman said this pointed out the necessity for a healthy supply of prostitutes around military bases, so that soldiers normal and healthy needs were regularly met. So being forced into prostitution at gunpoint is bad, via economic necessity is good? What separates those "ladies of the night" from the schoolgirls other than misfortune? We can't say without certainty that age is even a factor.

Has the US government ever apologized to their "comfort women" or offered them compensation, or ever taking a position that would cause wingnuts like my "intellectual" adversary on that list to feel anything other than pride in his pragmatism and the festive carnality he displayed in his youth?

There's some utility in pointing out Japanese failings in acknowledging the horrors of their imperial past, but it's a lot more useful and moral to confront the horrific crimes being committed in our names in the US' imperial present.

On Sun, Nov 2, 2008 at 9:08 PM, Rick Kisséll <rick@kissell.org> wrote:

WWII Apologists Persist Despite Japanese Policy

By Blaine Harden
Washington Post Foreign Service
Monday, November 3, 2008

TOKYO, Nov. 2 -- Once again, a Japanese official with nationalist sympathies -- in this case, the head of the air force -- has glossed over the Asian suffering caused by Japan during World War II.

Once again, China and South Korea -- principal victims of Japan's wartime depredations -- have expressed shock and anger.

And once again, the government in Tokyo has restated its official policy, which is that Japan deeply regrets and apologizes for its wartime aggression.

The abiding reluctance of prominent nationalists in Japan to come to grips with the past resurfaced Friday, when a hotel company announced the winner of its $30,000 "true modern history" essay contest.

The winning essay was written by Gen. Toshio Tamogami, who until Friday night was chief of staff of the air force. He was fired a few hours after the essay appeared on the hotel company's Web site.

Japan attacked Pearl Harbor because of a "trap" set by U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Tamogami claimed in his essay, which also argued "that many Asian countries take a positive view" of Japan's role in the war.

He wrote, too, that the war was good for international race relations: "If Japan had not fought the Great East Asia War at that time, it might have taken another 100 or 200 years before we could have experienced the world of racial equality that we have today."

The essay concluded that "it is certainly a false accusation to say that our country was an aggressor nation."

Explaining why Tamogami was fired, Defense Minister Yasukazu Hamada told reporters that a senior military leader "should not make public an opinion opposed to the government's position."

In 1995, then-Prime Minister Tomiichi Murayama officially apologized for Japan's wartime aggression. Still, there is a politically potent minority in the ruling Liberal Democratic Party that periodically backtracks and distances itself from the apology.

Before he became prime minister in September, Taro Aso, 68, a longtime elder in the ruling party, had made a series of statements that suggested his nationalist leanings. He upset the governments of North and South Korea by praising his country's 35-year colonial occupation of their peninsula, saying Japan did many good things.

As foreign minister in 2006, Aso annoyed China by suggesting that Japan's emperor should visit Yasukuni, the war shrine in Tokyo where convicted war criminals are honored along with 2.5 million war dead.

Shinzo Abe, who stepped down as prime minister last year, backed away from Japan's previous apologies to the "comfort women," the term used for the estimated 50,000 to 200,000 Asian women forced by the Japanese government into brothels before and during World War II.

Abe, who had strong support in the nationalist wing of the ruling party, said there was no documentation proving that the Japanese military coerced Asian women into becoming prostitutes.

His statements provoked fury in China and South Korea -- and pushed the U.S. House of Representatives to pass a resolution calling on Japan to apologize for its treatment of the sex slaves.

Abe also appeared to be wrong. Studies by the Japanese government itself have uncovered more than 100 documents showing Japanese military involvement in the building of brothels and the recruitment of women, according to a 2006 report by the Congressional Research Service.

Also under Abe, the government tried to whitewash the history of the war as taught in Japanese public schools. In 2006, the Education Ministry deleted references in textbooks to orders from the Japanese military in 1944 that civilians in Okinawa must commit mass suicide rather than surrender to invading U.S. forces. Courts here have subsequently recognized the military's role in ordering mass suicides on the island.

After Abe abruptly quit as prime minister last year, a new prime minister (also a member of the ruling LDP) quietly dropped the comfort women issue and corrected the textbooks. Yasuo Fukuda made clear that he would do nothing to push the agenda of his party's nationalist wing.

Instead, he moved to improve Japan's image in Asia, especially with China. His policy drew immediate results. On a visit to Tokyo early this year, Chinese President Hu Jintao played down the war and played up trade.

"It's important for us to remember history, but this does not mean we should hold grudges," Hu said.

But since then, Fukuda, who was unpopular with Japanese voters, has resigned. He was replaced by Aso, whose nationalist reputation has again raised some anxiety about Japan's intentions.

Reacting this weekend to Tamogami's denial that Japan was the aggressor in World War II, China was strongly critical of the air force chief of staff but gave Japan and Aso credit for quickly sacking him.

"We are shocked by and express our strong indignation over the senior Japanese military officer's denial of Japan's aggression and overtly glorifying its history of invasion," the New China News Agency quoted Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu as saying.

Still, China and Japan depend on each other as trading partners. Japanese machinery powers many of China's factories, and China is Japan's largest trading partner.

"We have taken notice of the attitude and measures taken by the Japanese government," Jiang said, noting that the countries will continue to work to improve relations.