China vs Japan

[xarir]

So, after 3 consecutive weekends of violence in various Chinese cities against Japanese interests (shops etc) China has stated that it owes no apology to Japan. Japan on the other hand is insisting on a very public apology by the Chinese government.

At the same time, Japan downplays its role in WWII and apparently is watering-down actions of the Japanese military in Manchuria and other areas of China.

So if China right to allow the displeasure of its citizens to show in so public a fashion? Is this the "right" way to get Japan to concede wartime atrocities? Or does Japan even have anything to concede in the first place?

Thoughts?

 

[enjoyall]

There is simply no political will on either side, Japan or China, or improve the relationship at this point. An economically and militarily powerful (growing) China has made Japn feel insecure. Japan is trying to shake off the post war, American written peace consititution and rebuild its military (with US encouraging). It needs the support of the public, so confrontation with China is the best thing it can have. For China's part, it's obvious Japan has decided to side with the US and contain China, economically and militarily. It's recent announced policy change toward Taiwan is a big slap on China's face. All these just brought back the painful memory of dealing with Japanese in the past century. The fact that Japan refuse to apologize for war atrocities and continue to whitewash history has not helped the relationship.

The anti-Japan demonstration got little out of hands. The smashing of windows of the embassy and store front is uncalled for. But I don't think the Chinese government has anything to apologize for, since it did not ask people to do so. Those people who break the store windows should be punished. On the other hand, Japan felt that it did not have to apologize for mass killing civilians in World War II, but wants China government to apologize for some of its citizens' breaking few windows is simply ironic. Japan is using the anti-Japan demonstration in China to stir up nationalistic feeling at home. Those nationalistic feelings will transfer into political currency for the government when it tries to revise its constitution.

 

[raverboy]

So, after 3 consecutive weekends of violence in various Chinese cities against Japanese interests (shops etc) China has stated that it owes no apology to Japan. Japan on the other hand is insisting on a very public apology by the Chinese government.

At the same time, Japan downplays its role in WWII and apparently is watering-down actions of the Japanese military in Manchuria and other areas of China.

So if China right to allow the displeasure of its citizens to show in so public a fashion? Is this the "right" way to get Japan to concede wartime atrocities? Or does Japan even have anything to concede in the first place?

Thoughts?

"Downplay" is a kind choice of word. I find it hard to consider reducing Japan's role in WWII to a single sentence in Japanese high school history textbooks to be "downplaying" its involvement in events from 1937-1945. I was an exchange student attending their equivalent of Grade 9.

Here's a little background reading, for those who are interested.

 

[grantmeng]

If German's primer minister visits the shrine that buried war criminal every year, what will U.S and other european allies do? Also, China is not the only country has anti-Japan protests. It is so obvious.

 

[athlete]

Well, my guess is that they would continue to try and make countries feel shame for the evil done to a relatively small number of people that suffered during a conflict that killed 40,000,000 people orphaned millions of children, toppled governments, destroyed environments...

Bad shit happens in war. Making people continue to apologize for the acts perpetrated by people in thier history books is ridiculous, and one man's war criminal is another man's hero, and believe it or not, there really were some valiant, corragious soldiers fighting for Germany and Japan. You just won't hear much about them.

 

[KBear]

Wondering, if the west had lost WW2, what war crimes would we be reminded of, and persuaded to apologise for.

 

[enjoyall]

Well, my guess is that they would continue to try and make countries feel shame for the evil done to a relatively small number of people that suffered during a conflict that killed 40,000,000 people orphaned millions of children, toppled governments, destroyed environments...

Bad shit happens in war. Making people continue to apologize for the acts perpetrated by people in thier history books is ridiculous, and one man's war criminal is another man's hero, and believe it or not, there really were some valiant, corragious soldiers fighting for Germany and Japan. You just won't hear much about them.

You are one big believer of relativism. During wartime, it is ok to kill your enermies in battle field. It is NOT ok to rape or kill unarmed civilians once you have sacked the city just to vent your anger. The later is called war crime and is punishable by the court. What the Chinese want the Japanese apologize for is the later. They massacred hundreds of thousands in Nanking. They experimented biological warfare agents (the infamous 731 army unit) on live human being. They buried thousand of chemical bombs in Northern China, yet they refuse to tell China where they are. To this day, construction workers are getting hurt every year. How would you feel if the above were done to your family and your country? Previous Japan prime ministers have apologized twice for the war it inflicted on its asian neighbours, but those are only personal apologies, the Japanese government never apologized. What China and Korea, and other Asia nations want is government apology. Once it is given and Japan will be forgiven. I agree with you that many soldiers fought courageously for Japan and Germany and they deserve some sort of honouring in their own country, but those who committed war crimes should not be honored.

The problem with Japan is it continues to deny wrong doings during the past war. In Japan, histroy books for schools need government approval. By approving those history books with distorted facts and pay respect to class A war criminals every year, Japan keeps the wound of its Asian neighbours fresh. In stead of those insincere "personal apologies", Japan should heal the wounds of its neighbours by giving a state apology. IMO, Chinese people have every right to protest when Japan prime minister pay respect to class A war criminals. If you ask me, throughing couple stones at embassy windows if ok as well, just to show how strong the people feels!

 

[enjoyall]

Wondering, if the west had lost WW2, what war crimes would we be reminded of, and persuaded to apologise for.

For dropping the second nuclear bomb.

 

[xarir]

My personal opinion on all this is that China has not chosen the most constructive way to deal with the issue. Nevertheless, a strong case can be made in China's favour that Japan has not apologised strongly enough for her past sins. More to the point, Japan does not even accept that what happened in the past was even wrong.

When I was visiting various sites in Normandy, I was surprised (plesantly so) to see so many German tourists there too. Germans of all ages were there in droves to visit the same sites that everyone else was visiting. They not only accepted their role in that portion of WWII, but they were obviously trying to learn more. I even went to a few of the cemetaries and saw Germans not only at the German cemetaries but at the Allied ones as well.

On the other hand, when I went to Hawaii there were Japanese tourists everywhere. It was weird in a way - in a US state signs were very often in English & Japanese. But at Pearl Harbour there was not a single Japanese tourist to be seen. The tourists were literally everywhere in Hawaii except Pearl.

On the topic of atrocities in China during WWII, callous as it may sound, it doesn't bother me so much that the Japanese army did what they did. War is hell and shit happened on both sides. Even today, just look at Abu Gharaib and what the US military did to the Iraqi prisoners. I obviously don't condone the atrocities, but I'm not naive enough to be surprised that shit like that happened. What does bother me though is the refusal by the Japanese government and by extension the Japanese people, to own up to the fact that they did something wrong. A recent Globe & Mail editorial claimed that most Japanese today weren't even alive when the atrocities took place and therefore shouldn't be held responsible. So Germans today should be allowed to forget what the Nazis did?

While I don't see Japan becoming a nation to use its military in an offensive manner any time soon, (and thus a repeat of history is unlikely) the fact remains that many Japanese might not even know what their fellow countrymen did a mere 60 years ago. This is not right. China is right to pursue the Japanese government into changing its stand on the past.

 

[xarir]

"Downplay" is a kind choice of word. I find it hard to consider reducing Japan's role in WWII to a single sentence in Japanese high school history textbooks to be "downplaying" its involvement in events from 1937-1945. I was an exchange student attending their equivalent of Grade 9.

I used the word carefully because I haven't read any Japanese textbooks. I would like to though, to see what they actually say. I hear and read on various news outlets that the new textbooks are even more watered-down than previous ones. If your textbook only had one sentence, I wonder what the new books are like?

Out of curiosity, do you remember what that single sentence was?

 

[enjoyall]

My personal opinion on all this is that China has not chosen the most constructive way to deal with the issue. Nevertheless, a strong case can be made in China's favour that Japan has not apologised strongly enough for her past sins. More to the point, Japan does not even accept that what happened in the past was even wrong.

When I was visiting various sites in Normandy, I was surprised (plesantly so) to see so many German tourists there too. Germans of all ages were there in droves to visit the same sites that everyone else was visiting. They not only accepted their role in that portion of WWII, but they were obviously trying to learn more. I even went to a few of the cemetaries and saw Germans not only at the German cemetaries but at the Allied ones as well.

On the other hand, when I went to Hawaii there were Japanese tourists everywhere. It was weird in a way - in a US state signs were very often in English & Japanese. But at Pearl Harbour there was not a single Japanese tourist to be seen. The tourists were literally everywhere in Hawaii except Pearl.

On the topic of atrocities in China during WWII, callous as it may sound, it doesn't bother me so much that the Japanese army did what they did. War is hell and shit happened on both sides. Even today, just look at Abu Gharaib and what the US military did to the Iraqi prisoners. I obviously don't condone the atrocities, but I'm not naive enough to be surprised that shit like that happened. What does bother me though is the refusal by the Japanese government and by extension the Japanese people, to own up to the fact that they did something wrong. A recent Globe & Mail editorial claimed that most Japanese today weren't even alive when the atrocities took place and therefore shouldn't be held responsible. So Germans today should be allowed to forget what the Nazis did?

While I don't see Japan becoming a nation to use its military in an offensive manner any time soon, (and thus a repeat of history is unlikely) the fact remains that many Japanese might not even know what their fellow countrymen did a mere 60 years ago. This is not right. China is right to pursue the Japanese government into changing its stand on the past.

Exactly my point as well. China and other asian nations just want an sincere apology from Japan, have Japan acknowlodge what it did in the past was wrong. Japan so far refuse to do the deed. The difference between German and Japan culture is that shame is viewed by the later as something to avoid at all cost, even if by shamefully deny the truth. Another reason Japan never apologized is that Asian nations, include China are not rich or powerful enough. Japan has a sense of supriority over its asian neighbours. Japanese culture is such that it will look up to the strong, and look down on the weak. For this reason, it view itself as a "western" country, rather an asian country.

 

[Peeping Tom]

Those two States interested in re-writing Japanese history always forget the most relevant detail: That they were trounced, and rightly so, by a superior force. In turn, Japan was trounced, and rightly so, by a superior force. Japan paid its fair share of the punishment bill, enjoying the dubious status of being the sole State to have been nuked. Any apologies Japan was responsible for was to the victorious power, beyond that Japan needed not to apologize to losers unless at the request of this victorious power. Anyway, its too old to be relevant.

Maybe China needs to include some info in their history books, mainly about the 35 million dead by the hands of the odiously evil communist regime - this is much more relevant - the mass murder campaign is documented up to 1987 - if this regime can do this to their own people it doesn't require much in the way of imagination to what they might do on an adventure abroad.

Linky to China's saintly deeds

 

[ice_dog]

You may have a point, but China now has the trump card- the veto power of a permanent security council memeber to block Japan's bid to be a permament member.

I know this is pure politics - that's not news, but that too is reality, as Peter Truman used to say in his closing line .

 

[Peeping Tom]

It is pure politics - that is why reform of the UN is required.

 

[raverboy]

...

Out of curiosity, do you remember what that single sentence was?

I would grace you with the exact quote in the appropriate script, but I will spare you the trauma

Bear in mind that this is from memory, but it went something like "During the years 1939 - 1945, Japan took part in the Second World War". Again, my memory is fuzzy from when I read it, but their entire WWII involvement was condensed to the like in no more than a single small paragraph. Interestingly enough, I remember the following section to be on post-war industrialization.

"sen-kyu-hyaku-sanjyu-kyu nen kara sen-kyuu-hyaku-nana-jyu-go nen made, dai-nippon wa seikai dai-ni zenso ni haite-imashita."

 

[enjoyall]

Those two States interested in re-writing Japanese history always forget the most relevant detail: That they were trounced, and rightly so, by a superior force. In turn, Japan was trounced, and rightly so, by a superior force. Japan paid its fair share of the punishment bill, enjoying the dubious status of being the sole State to have been nuked. Any apologies Japan was responsible for was to the victorious power, beyond that Japan needed not to apologize to losers unless at the request of this victorious power. Anyway, its too old to be relevant.

Maybe China needs to include some info in their history books, mainly about the 35 million dead by the hands of the odiously evil communist regime - this is much more relevant - the mass murder campaign is documented up to 1987 - if this regime can do this to their own people it doesn't require much in the way of imagination to what they might do on an adventure abroad.

Linky to China's saintly deeds

Are you suggesting if I bring a gun to your house, kill your family members, and I do not have to apologize for my action, simply because I have more power than you do? Also do you imply those responsible for 9/11 are not guilty because somehow they were a "suprior force" for a while? You are one twisted individule.

For China's part, it needs to learn something from the past experience. The communist party also needs to apologize to the Chinese people and adds to Chinese histroy book the things omitted. Japan also needs to come to term with its past, or history may repeat itself.

 

[enjoyall]

It is pure politics - that is why reform of the UN is required.

Based on what sort of principle, if not politics? ultraism? And who's to decide how to reform? the US?