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 whembly wrote:
there are a few questions that current and future generations will have about the Allies:
1) Is demanding unconditional surrender moral?

Why does that matter?

2) Was the wide spread bombing of civilian targets known to the allies, necessary for the allies, and if yes and no, was it moral?

Why does that matter? In WWII, there wasn't much precision bombing... so, in order to be effective, carpet bombing is a tactic.

Let me ask you this: Is there such thing as conducting a "Moral" war?

3) How strong was the racial component in the Pacific war?

? Is this referring to the American-Japanese internment camps?

There were no doubt war crimes committed by the allies, even in the West. The question seems to be did the allies do everything they could reasonably do to prevent them.

Again... what are these "war crimes" really about?

Simply put, the victor makes the rules.

Oh come on, don't be silly. Deliberately targeting civilian population centers was not an accidental necessity. No one was targeting factories, and those pesky cities just got in the way. Targeting cities and populations centers was a deliberate tactic by both sides of psychological reasons and to force the enemy to split their forces. If they're too busy defending their cities, they can't do anything else.

Further, the idea of being at war with a certain element of a country, but not others, was completely alien to the people of the time. Civilians were often viweded as being just as much the enemy as combatants were.

 Inquisitor Ehrenstein wrote:

...but sometimes I get frustrated that people are taking a less than desirable view of the Nazis...

Uh....what? 0.o

Sir, what other view are people supposed to take with the actions of the Nazi party? ¬¬

Looking at the actions of the United States or other allies during World War 2 does not equal reducing it to a war of "american aggression". The allies, both citizens and soldiers, made a lot of sacrifices and I am glad that I didn't grow up in a Germany still ruled by Hitler. But that doesn't mean that we cannot look at the actions of all participants with a critical eye. The worst thing we can do is ignore wrongs by the allies using the justification that the axis powers did worse things.

While I have heard people talk about american war crimes and thing that the allies have done wrong, I have never heard anybody seriously talk about WW2 being a war of US aggression.

The bombing of cities should have never happened. It had to happen, as there was not enough advancement to bomb any more accurately.

While there were deliberate raids against entire cities that were unjustified, it is inappropriate to condemn the entire air war.

Polonius wrote:There were no doubt war crimes committed by the allies, even in the West. The question seems to be did the allies do everything they could reasonably do to prevent them.

Of course not, though I'm not sure you could actually blame them. There's a certain tendency in any nation's military to confer a lot of leeway towards its troops, out of an esprit-du-corps as well as out of respect for their service. Even today, militaries attempt to cover up war crimes by moving against the whistleblowers - the "traitors" - more often than the actual perpretrators.

whembly wrote:Why does that matter? In WWII, there wasn't much precision bombing... so, in order to be effective, carpet bombing is a tactic.

When carpet bombings are conducted against the city rather than the factories outside the city, that starts to sound like a cop-out.

Not to mention the indiscriminate bombing of Tokyo, which saw 100.000 men, women and children killed in a firestorm that completely destroyed the city's residental area - the most destructive bombing in the history of mankind. Yes, even worse than the nukes.

Polonius wrote:

whembly wrote:Let me ask you this: Is there such thing as conducting a "Moral" war?

Of course there is moral war. Wars of defense, both of self and allies. Wars of intervention can be.

I think that (barring extreme circumstances) even more important than the cause are the means. It may sound weird, but I might even be able to feel better about a simple war of conquest and expansion that is done with a strict enforcement of a minimum collateral damage policy, rather than a "just" war where a defender commits to eradicate entire cities of the invader, or execute/torture/rape POWs and noncoms.

And yes, this is possible. Sadly, it is also very inefficient, and requires additional sacrifice from the forces involved. Still, many attempts have been made at making wars less destructive for the civilian populace throughout history, and the current public outrage at even minor incidents is a good sign of a culture's commitment to morals.

Polonius wrote:

whembly wrote:Is this referring to the American-Japanese internment camps?

At most indirectly. There is a very good argument I'd read from a prior thread that the Pacific war was really about whether the East or West controlled the Pacific. I'm not sold, as it seems more like any other nationalist conflict of interest, but the Pacific theater is the only time a Non-Western fully industrialized great power fought a western one. It's also the most important conflict in history to not mainly feature a european power.

Oh, I thought this was about the accounts of G.I.s regarding Japanese people as "sub-humans", which - together with the Japanese reluctance to surrender in the first place - allegedly resulted in a "take no prisoners" attitude and lots of POWs not reaching the collection point.

Also, all the stuff that d-usa said. Have an exaltation.

WWII in a modern perspective looks atrocious from the allies side, and we really were the nice guys. If it was OK for them to slaughter our civilians, then they should have no complaints when we rained death on untold hundreds of thousands of there’s. The lesson the axis country’s learned was dont start genocidal wars of conquest. My grandparents attitude was always feth em, and they fought them so I stick with there first hand knowledge. They were there.

For those that complain about what the allies did in WWII, ponder on this. With the allies when the fighting stopped the killing stopped. With the Germans and Japanese when the fighting stopped the killing continued. Thats why we were the good guys, any one says different is a moron of epic proportions.

 Lynata wrote:

Polonius wrote:There were no doubt war crimes committed by the allies, even in the West. The question seems to be did the allies do everything they could reasonably do to prevent them.

Of course not, though I'm not sure you could actually blame them. There's a certain tendency in any nation's military to confer a lot of leeway towards its troops, out of an esprit-du-corps as well as out of respect for their service. Even today, militaries attempt to cover up war crimes by moving against the whistleblowers - the "traitors" - more often than the actual perpretrators.

Well, I'm a lawyer. The term "reasonably" is a bit elastic. I think that even given the times, there were likely times when command allowed more than they should. By the same token, I think the allies, as a whole, acted more morally than the axis.

Oh, I thought this was about the accounts of G.I.s regarding Japanese people as "sub-humans", which - together with the Japanese reluctance to surrender in the first place - allegedly resulted in a "take no prisoners" attitude and lots of POWs not reaching the collection point.

Also, all the stuff that d-usa said. Have an exaltation.

Well, the actual combatant on combatant stuff is trickier. There is no referee in war. If you have one side sniping medics, and desecrating bodies, and torturing prisoners... it's hard to come down too hard on guys, knee deep in stress and trauma we can't imagine, that give in kind.

There likely were sadists, and there were guys that got caught up. War, and the pacific theater in general, is not a clean place in which one can act morally without problems.

In short, I'm always more willing to overlook the morality fo the guys in the trenches, while I focus on what's encouraged from on high.

cpt_fishcakes wrote:For those that complain about what the allies did in WWII, ponder on this. With the allies when the fighting stopped the killing stopped.

Whilst much of what you said is true, this is not. See the links provided earlier.

Or did you mean the war in general, not just a particular battle?

Polonius wrote:Well, I'm a lawyer. The term "reasonably" is a bit elastic. I think that even given the times, there were likely times when command allowed more than they should. By the same token, I think the allies, as a whole, acted more morally than the axis.

My thoughts exactly.

Polonius wrote:There likely were sadists, and there were guys that got caught up. War, and the pacific theater in general, is not a clean place in which one can act morally without problems.
In short, I'm always more willing to overlook the morality fo the guys in the trenches, while I focus on what's encouraged from on high.

Definitively. Although I have to say that racism very likely was already ingrained in people's heads (keep in mind that this was the time when black people still were treated unjustly as well, and that was in their own nation) and did not just develop on-location. The war would have obviously served to intensify such feelings, though. Especially war with an enemy who doesn't shy back from sacrificing his own life so long as they can just take a couple of the enemy with them. I imagine that lots of soldiers came down with thoughts like "safer to just shoot them now", in addition to any thirst for revenge for the death of a comrade.

Many of the air raids are said to be motivated by revenge as well, with the British always pushing for more - obviously as a sort of payback for what the Luftwaffe did to their cities.

 Squigsquasher wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
The only war crime the US might be guilty of is that Japanese warcriminals weren't prosecuted for their treatment of POWs and civilians.

So I guess the Tokyo Fire Raids, atomic bombing, mutiliation of Japanese war dead, and hideous behaviour of US occupation troops in Okinawa and postwar Japan were all perfectly acceptable.

As Whembly said, it was war.

And the Atomic Bomb was the best thing that happened for the Japanese and the US.


Otherwise, we would have invaded. Casualities were estimated at one million US soldiers, which given what we know now would have been a VERY conservative number. it was conservative when it was given.

For the inhabitants of Japan, it would have been out right Genocide. because the entire population was prepared to fight to the death, we would have had to kill everyone that was able to inflict physical harm on our soldiers.

The only people of Japanese descent today would have been descendents of anyone living elsewhere in the world, including PoWs, and any people too young or too old to fight that were found in the course of the invasion.

Japan would not exist today except as a geograpic location.


The Bomb then gave us the option of saving over a million americans and giving the Japanese Empire the option of total annhilation or unconditional surrender.

The fact it took 2 bombs and 2 cities just shows the fighting spirit the Japanese had at the time. And their population was prepared to fight to the death. They only stopped because the Emperor capitulated.

2 bombs was mercifully light. We, and everyone descended from people living in Japan at the time, are exceedingly lucky it only took 2.



War is horrible, and rightly so. it is good that such atrocities occur in the course of it.

it reminds me of a star trek episode. There are 2 planets that engage in mock war, and calculate the war dead. Those killed must then voluntarily kill themselves to keep their society surviving. Thats horrible.

 Inquisitor Ehrenstein wrote:

 Alfndrate wrote:
Can you elaborate on the whole American agression? Did we remain out of the war until we were attacked?

Yes, we stayed out, even after Pearl Harbor, until the Germans specifically declared war.

The topic though is also on the ridiculousness of people constantly trying to turn us into the aggressor.

I'm afraid that's not exactly the case. Here's how it happened:
1. Japan bombs Pearl Harbor
2. US declares war on Japan.
3. Germany and Italy declare war on US.
So, we entered the war right after we were attacked, unless you consider the US vs. Japan war to not be part of WWII.
Although, that viewpoint isn't totally invalid. The Japanese weren't that closely associated with Germany and Italy. They were kind of doing their own thing.
Back on topic though... I doubt anyone will ever see WWII as raw American aggression. People have been pretty eager to label us aggressors since the 2003 Iraq War, but I think people will forgive us for that (whether we deserve to be forgiven or not) before they go that far.

 Inquisitor Ehrenstein wrote:

 Alfndrate wrote:
Can you elaborate on the whole American agression? Did we remain out of the war until we were attacked?

Yes, we stayed out, even after Pearl Harbor, until the Germans specifically declared war.

The topic though is also on the ridiculousness of people constantly trying to turn us into the aggressor.

We? You've got the canadian flag on your posts, and they went to war in 39' along with the rest of the British Empire and Commonwealth. Long before Pearl Harbor that had the US fully jumping in.

As Whembly said, it was war.

And the Atomic Bomb was the best thing that happened for the Japanese and the US.


Otherwise, we would have invaded. Casualities were estimated at one million US soldiers, which given what we know now would have been a VERY conservative number. it was conservative when it was given.

For the inhabitants of Japan, it would have been out right Genocide. because the entire population was prepared to fight to the death, we would have had to kill everyone that was able to inflict physical harm on our soldiers.

The only people of Japanese descent today would have been descendents of anyone living elsewhere in the world, including PoWs, and any people too young or too old to fight that were found in the course of the invasion.

Japan would not exist today except as a geograpic location.

That's a very unrealistic view of the Japanese civilian population during the war. Certainly, an invasion would be difficult, but the idea that a civilian population of over one hundred million would fight to the last against an invading force is cartoony. That's never happened before. No level of indoctrination is that powerful or consistent.

It's also highly unlikely that we would engage in that kind of warfare given that our goal was to dismantle the Japanese military. Something that would happen in relatively short order once total air supremacy had been achieved in the islands and their factory supply base had been cut.

 ShumaGorath wrote:

As Whembly said, it was war.

And the Atomic Bomb was the best thing that happened for the Japanese and the US.


Otherwise, we would have invaded. Casualities were estimated at one million US soldiers, which given what we know now would have been a VERY conservative number. it was conservative when it was given.

For the inhabitants of Japan, it would have been out right Genocide. because the entire population was prepared to fight to the death, we would have had to kill everyone that was able to inflict physical harm on our soldiers.

The only people of Japanese descent today would have been descendents of anyone living elsewhere in the world, including PoWs, and any people too young or too old to fight that were found in the course of the invasion.

Japan would not exist today except as a geograpic location.

That's a very unrealistic view of the Japanese civilian population during the war. Certainly, an invasion would be difficult, but the idea that a civilian population of over one hundred million would fight to the last against an invading force is cartoony. That's never happened before. No level of indoctrination is that powerful or consistent.

It's also highly unlikely that we would engage in that kind of warfare given that our goal was to dismantle the Japanese military. Something that would happen in relatively short order once total air supremacy had been achieved in the islands and their factory supply base had been cut.

The Japanese were actively training their citizens, including young children to oppose the invaders. They were training people in the use of bamboo spears. children were taught to carry hidden grenades up to US soldiers and detonate them.


While if the invasion had gone on like this it might not have resulted in the extermination of the Japanese(there would be people that decided not to do that) the US response to it would have.

In the face of such desperate tactics it is likely we would instituded a scorched earth policy. We would have fire bombed and bombarded any place any human could have hidden in. Civilians would have been legitimate targets and would be shot on sight.

This is what the US government was prepared to do and expecting, and they knew it would happen to a great degree.

The Atom bomb was sooo secret not even Trumen knew about it after he was sworn in when FDR died. Most of the top brass didn't even know about it.

As far as everyone was concerned, we were going into hell and were going to have to kill everything that moved on the way through it.

This is what the US government was prepared to do and expecting, and they knew it would happen to a great degree.

I'd like to see some proof to the claim that were both preparing for and expecting to have to commit genocide to the degree of killing over one hundred million people. That would beat the nazis, stalin, and mao combined.

 ShumaGorath wrote:

This is what the US government was prepared to do and expecting, and they knew it would happen to a great degree.

I'd like to see some proof to the claim that were both preparing for and expecting to have to commit genocide to the degree of killing over one hundred million people. That would beat the nazis, stalin, and mao combined.

If you want proof all you have to do is look at how the Battle of Okinawa went down. 150,000 civilian casualties. Mass suicides were rampant. The people were indoctrinated to believe that US Soldiers were going to rape, torture, and murder them, and they found more honor in death at their own hands then the Americans.

On the home islands, 28 million Japanese civilians were being prepared to take part in combat operations. They were even issuing garden tools to school girls and giving guidance on the best way to kill Americans with them. Leaderships plan was one of two things. To make the cost of life to the allies so high that they went to the negotiating table, or to simply be wiped out.

 ShumaGorath wrote:

This is what the US government was prepared to do and expecting, and they knew it would happen to a great degree.

I'd like to see some proof to the claim that were both preparing for and expecting to have to commit genocide to the degree of killing over one hundred million people. That would beat the nazis, stalin, and mao combined.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Downfall wrote:A study done for Secretary of War Henry Stimson's staff by William Shockley estimated that conquering Japan would cost 1.7-4 million American casualties, including 400,000–800,000 fatalities, and five to ten million Japanese fatalities. The key assumption was large-scale participation by civilians in the defense of Japan.[1]

Keep in mind this was based on the assumption of a fairly short (6 month) campaign to conquoer Japan. Had things not gone well things would have spiralled upwards.

So while not expecting to exactly commit a total depopulating of the Japanese home islands, there was a long, hard bloody fight anticipated.


As for the OP, my fiance is Japanese. Having spoken with her about what is taught in the schools there, yes, the American involvement in WWII is being portrayed as a war of aggression. All the Japanese children are taught about the war is that there were American economic sanctions in the 1930s and bombers in the 1940s.

Jefffar wrote:

 ShumaGorath wrote:

This is what the US government was prepared to do and expecting, and they knew it would happen to a great degree.

I'd like to see some proof to the claim that were both preparing for and expecting to have to commit genocide to the degree of killing over one hundred million people. That would beat the nazis, stalin, and mao combined.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Downfall wrote:A study done for Secretary of War Henry Stimson's staff by William Shockley estimated that conquering Japan would cost 1.7-4 million American casualties, including 400,000–800,000 fatalities, and five to ten million Japanese fatalities. The key assumption was large-scale participation by civilians in the defense of Japan.[1]

Keep in mind this was based on the assumption of a fairly short (6 month) campaign to conquoer Japan. Had things not gone well things would have spiralled upwards.

So while not expecting to exactly commit a total depopulating of the Japanese home islands, there was a long, hard bloody fight anticipated.

Certainly, but what was being claimed was the genocide of the japanese in totality, not an incredibly bloody and intractable campaign. When you times the number of fatalities by ten it raises red flags.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

djones520 wrote:

 ShumaGorath wrote:

This is what the US government was prepared to do and expecting, and they knew it would happen to a great degree.

I'd like to see some proof to the claim that were both preparing for and expecting to have to commit genocide to the degree of killing over one hundred million people. That would beat the nazis, stalin, and mao combined.

If you want proof all you have to do is look at how the Battle of Okinawa went down. 150,000 civilian casualties. Mass suicides were rampant. The people were indoctrinated to believe that US Soldiers were going to rape, torture, and murder them, and they found more honor in death at their own hands then the Americans.

On the home islands, 28 million Japanese civilians were being prepared to take part in combat operations. They were even issuing garden tools to school girls and giving guidance on the best way to kill Americans with them. Leaderships plan was one of two things. To make the cost of life to the allies so high that they went to the negotiating table, or to simply be wiped out.

Which is a rather unrealistic battle strategy. There has never been a largescale population in history that would, in unison, and without a functioning hierarchy of leadership resist an occupying force to death. That's simply not how humans work. The closest I can come to as an example is the depopulation of native Laos through their protracted geurilla capaigns funded by the CIA. That's a significantly smaller population though, and even that wasn't unified.

And 1940's Japan was quite a differant culture from what this world has ever seen. Bushido was still alive and well in that day. Death by combat, never surrender. They did not think on the same wave length that we do. To them glorious death in futile combat was far preferable to allowing an invasion force to land even if you know you cannot win. The nuclear option literally was the most humane to end it, because there was no combat. They could not inflict return casualties, even if it was one for every ten you lost. That was the only reason they surrendered unconditionally.

Jefffar wrote:



As for the OP, my fiance is Japanese. Having spoken with her about what is taught in the schools there, yes, the American involvement in WWII is being portrayed as a war of aggression. All the Japanese children are taught about the war is that there were American economic sanctions in the 1930s and bombers in the 1940s.

Fascinating, more info on this Jeff?

 whembly wrote:
Simply put, the victor makes the rules.

Once again, by the same book the IJA's atrocious behaviour in Korea and China was justified because they won those wars and the victor makes the rules.

As far as I'm concerned (I will admit I have VERY strong views on this), war should be fought against the enemy's ARMY, not their people.

Your average Japanese mother is not responsible for atrocities being carried out in a distant country by Japanese troops in the same way that the average American man is not responsible for the horrors carried out in Vietnam by US soldiers.

Blow up as many soldiers as you like (within reason) but the moment millitary brutality extends onto innocent civilians is the moment you lose all rights to feel morally superior. I don't care who's doing it to who or why, Japanese on Chinese, German on Russian, British on German, American on Japaneseor a country's government on their own people. it's all equally monstrous.

But it's all alright, because we were the good guys and we won the war and ALLIES HURR!

Area bombing is the one part of the war in which the western allies may have something to reproach themselves about.

To put it into context;

The other lot started it (Guernica, Rotterdam, Coventry, Nanking, ChongQuing, etc.)

With the technology of the time it was impossible to do effective pinpoint attacks on military targets such as docks and armament factories.

The western leaders considered it a necessary evil, and got uneasy as the campaign progressed.

"This could all have been avoided if we hadn't started the war." (To quote a German Catholic.)

Does a democratic nation have a moral duty to put its citizen soldiers' lives at peril in order to reduce the burden on civilians of an aggressor nation?

Yes. The civilians, for the most part, are completely innocent. They aren't the ones marching into neighboring countries and raping, killing and looting. Their army is. It's like a man is stealing items from a supermarket and arresting his sister, who had nothing to do with the shoplifting.

I can confirm the already mentioned notion that no sensible person in Germany, and surely not a single one I've ever met personally, has tried to claim that the US started a war or were the aggressor in any way. As somebody also pointed out, our education system has a huge emphasis during history lessons on lecturing about WW2 and Hitler's rise to power in great detail. At no point has anyone tried to tell me that the US or the UK or whoever were the "bad guys".

I think the German government and by logical extension our education system are aware of "Those who forget history are doomed to repeat it" and try to make damn sure nobody forgets about the NSDAP rose to power and how WW2 was started.

The nazi-museum in Nuernberg does a great job to tell the story, one of the best places that talk about the subject that I have seen.

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dokumentationszentrum_Reichsparteitagsgelände

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:
Not to mention the US interring loads of Japanese-Americans in camps.

I will point out to this comment, that yes, America interred many Japanese-Americans into camps. BUT, we did so because many (not all) of these same citizens were actively spying against the US, and its interests. We didn't go off one day not liking the Japanese in our country and locking them up like the German Government did to Jews (and anyone else they got their hands on they didnt like), we had a cause which drew the effect of prison camps.

Did we go overboard with the camps? Maybe, but when you don't know who will be the active spy what are you going to do? The vast majority of our Counter-Intelligence was learned from the Brits during WW2, so it's not as if we could root out the spies, and give them all bad information in order to get the IJN and IJA to walk into a trap, we just didn't have those sorts of capabilities.

 Ensis Ferrae wrote:

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:
Not to mention the US interring loads of Japanese-Americans in camps.

I will point out to this comment, that yes, America interred many Japanese-Americans into camps. BUT, we did so because many (not all) of these same citizens were actively spying against the US, and its interests. We didn't go off one day not liking the Japanese in our country and locking them up like the German Government did to Jews (and anyone else they got their hands on they didnt like), we had a cause which drew the effect of prison camps.

Did we go overboard with the camps? Maybe, but when you don't know who will be the active spy what are you going to do? The vast majority of our Counter-Intelligence was learned from the Brits during WW2, so it's not as if we could root out the spies, and give them all bad information in order to get the IJN and IJA to walk into a trap, we just didn't have those sorts of capabilities.

And unlike the Japanese and Nazi's, we didn't exterminate these people.

They were all released after the war ended.


They did get screwed over because they lost all their property, which I don't believe was right. But its in the past. We arn't going to do it again.

And we had the perfect excuse to do the same thing when the war on terror began. We could easily have justified locking up everyone of Arab origin/islamic faith. Terrorists are a far greater threat then the Japanese spies were.

 Grey Templar wrote:

 Ensis Ferrae wrote:

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:
Not to mention the US interring loads of Japanese-Americans in camps.

I will point out to this comment, that yes, America interred many Japanese-Americans into camps. BUT, we did so because many (not all) of these same citizens were actively spying against the US, and its interests. We didn't go off one day not liking the Japanese in our country and locking them up like the German Government did to Jews (and anyone else they got their hands on they didnt like), we had a cause which drew the effect of prison camps.

Did we go overboard with the camps? Maybe, but when you don't know who will be the active spy what are you going to do? The vast majority of our Counter-Intelligence was learned from the Brits during WW2, so it's not as if we could root out the spies, and give them all bad information in order to get the IJN and IJA to walk into a trap, we just didn't have those sorts of capabilities.

And unlike the Japanese and Nazi's, we didn't exterminate these people.

They were all released after the war ended.


They did get screwed over because they lost all their property, which I don't believe was right. But its in the past. We arn't going to do it again.

And we had the perfect excuse to do the same thing when the war on terror began. We could easily have justified locking up everyone of Arab origin/islamic faith. Terrorists are a far greater threat then the Japanese spies were.

or ARE we?


There needs to be a Godwin-like rule for Alex Jones. I dub it Terry's Rule.

 AustonT wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:

 Ensis Ferrae wrote:

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:
Not to mention the US interring loads of Japanese-Americans in camps.

I will point out to this comment, that yes, America interred many Japanese-Americans into camps. BUT, we did so because many (not all) of these same citizens were actively spying against the US, and its interests. We didn't go off one day not liking the Japanese in our country and locking them up like the German Government did to Jews (and anyone else they got their hands on they didnt like), we had a cause which drew the effect of prison camps.

Did we go overboard with the camps? Maybe, but when you don't know who will be the active spy what are you going to do? The vast majority of our Counter-Intelligence was learned from the Brits during WW2, so it's not as if we could root out the spies, and give them all bad information in order to get the IJN and IJA to walk into a trap, we just didn't have those sorts of capabilities.

And unlike the Japanese and Nazi's, we didn't exterminate these people.

They were all released after the war ended.


They did get screwed over because they lost all their property, which I don't believe was right. But its in the past. We arn't going to do it again.

And we had the perfect excuse to do the same thing when the war on terror began. We could easily have justified locking up everyone of Arab origin/islamic faith. Terrorists are a far greater threat then the Japanese spies were.

or ARE we?


There needs to be a Godwin-like rule for Alex Jones. I dub it Terry's Rule.

People are watching too many conspiracy theory movies

 Squigsquasher wrote:
Yes. The civilians, for the most part, are completely innocent. They aren't the ones marching into neighboring countries and raping, killing and looting. Their army is. It's like a man is stealing items from a supermarket and arresting his sister, who had nothing to do with the shoplifting.

It would be more like if his sister gave him the car keys, gun, ammunition, and said "it is my desire for you to go get me some bread" and saluted him as he walked out the door.

As much as we like to act like they exist in two separate worlds and practically don't even know each other, the line between civilian and military is not that simply drawn. The military gets its orders, supplies, funding, and drive from civilians. This does not mean that measures should not be taken to avoid attacking enemy civilians, but saying that civilians are 'completely innocent' is incredibly naive, and shows a lack of recognition of the symbiotic relationship between the two; they don't exist independently of each other.

My head is starting to hurt...

You cannot equate the wars performed during WW2 to anything like what we do now... I think that's the issue.

WW2 was total world war... in that, anything and everyone were legitimate targets. So, yes, Civvies were valid targets.

 Squigsquasher wrote:

 whembly wrote:
Simply put, the victor makes the rules.

Once again, by the same book the IJA's atrocious behaviour in Korea and China was justified because they won those wars and the victor makes the rules.

No... that's not what I said... IJA were NOT the victors. Had they've beaten'ed the US... then, yes they'd be victors.

As far as I'm concerned (I will admit I have VERY strong views on this), war should be fought against the enemy's ARMY, not their people.

If its total world war ala WW2, Civvies are valid targets. Who funds/support any army?

Your average Japanese mother is not responsible for atrocities being carried out in a distant country by Japanese troops in the same way that the average American man is not responsible for the horrors carried out in Vietnam by US soldiers.

Again... see my previous point.

Blow up as many soldiers as you like (within reason) but the moment millitary brutality extends onto innocent civilians is the moment you lose all rights to feel morally superior. I don't care who's doing it to who or why, Japanese on Chinese, German on Russian, British on German, American on Japaneseor a country's government on their own people. it's all equally monstrous.

This get's up my craw... to me, if you go to war... this whole "within reason" crap needs to stop. If we have to spend blood and treasure, you go "do you business by laying down the hammer", then get out.

Case in point: The crap that we're doing in Pakistan with armed drones needs to stop. If there's objectives there, get our guys down there with the help of the ISI and get it done... then get out. WE are the one terrorizing the locals there. (and this isn't a total world war)

But it's all alright, because we were the good guys and we won the war and ALLIES HURR!