[jbooth]

Respectfully, that's a bullshit point of view.

For the japanese military in WWII, rape was normal. Butchering civilian populations wholesale was normal. The Americans and British did not play by those rules, even though we did a lot of killing. This was not two equivalent evils.

http://foxtalk.tistory.com/98

[abalone]

That doesn't refute the claim that the allies had a "take no prisoners" policy, killing wounded or surrendering enemy. It's plausible that that got reworked into the more palatable "they all died by choice" meme. Does anyone have sources, either way?

Also, regarding "butchering civilian populations wholesale" see [1], [2].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_bombings_of_Hiroshima_a...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombing_of_Tokyo

[amazing_jose]

I think you will find a few comments in this Quora thread can explain the "take no prisoners" policy. Basically the Japanese were using perfidy as a normal war tactic (perfidy is a war crime, surrender and then, when your enemy's guard is lower, attack).

To me there's not greatest lack of honour than committing perfidy in war.

[1] https://www.quora.com/Is-false-surrendering-a-war-crime

[iwontreddit]

> Basically the Japanese were using perfidy as a normal war tactic (perfidy is a war crime, surrender and then, when your enemy's guard is lower, attack).

The japanese started suicide runs because the allies had a no prisoner policy.

"American soldiers in the Pacific often deliberately killed Japanese soldiers who had surrendered."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allied_war_crimes_during_World...

Not only that the allies were tortured, mutilating and decapitating hundreds of thousands of wounded/surrendered japanese soldiers.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_mutilation_of_Japanes...

That's why the japanese didn't surrender. What the allies were doing in the pacific war is something that even ISIS would view as deranged.

If false surrendering is a war crime, then so is torture, mutilation and "no prisoner" policy.

Why did the japanese soldiers stop surrendering? You have to look at the context. Would you surrender to someone who is going to torture you, mutilate you and decapitate you and boil your head so that your skull could be sent to the US as a war trophy? Of course not.

[amazing_jose]

I think that you will find evidence in both directions. It was a feedback loop. The Americans soldiers had a racist preconception of the Japanese, and at the same time were exposed to the the atrocities that the Japanese committed in China, way before fighting the Americans. You cannot ignore the indoctrination of the Japanese (and please, don't make me here recount some of their massacres in China). Many Americans considered them killing machines without heart with whom it was impossible to reason.

[iwontreddit]

> I think that you will find evidence in both directions

Most american POWs survived ww2 under japanese control. Almost no wounded or surrendering japanese survived ww2 under American control.

There was brutality on both side for sure. But the allies were especially racist and especially brutal. What the allies did in the pacific has no parallels in human history in terms of brutality and savagery on the battlefield.

Hundreds of thousands of japanese were tortured and mutilated. Hundreds of thousands of japanese were decapitated and their heads were boiled to make war trophies.

It is the ugly side of history hidden from view because the winners get to write the histories.

As I said, evil won ww2 and evil lost ww2.

> Many Americans considered them killing machines without heart with whom it was impossible to reason.

That doesn't explain the mutilation, torture and other depraved behavior by the allies. America was the most racist society on earth during ww2. The nazis modeled their racial ideology on the US for a reason.

The brutalizing of nonwhites has a long history in the US. The propaganda about the japanese being "unreasonable" or "suicidal" are lies we invented to hide our savage behavior. No different than our excuses for mutilating native americans and blacks.

FYI: The mutilating of non-whites continued in the korean war and the vietnam war. I guess they were "unreasonable" too... I guess all the blacks that were tortured and lynched were "unreasonable" as well.

Or maybe the US was just extremely racist.

[the_af]

> To me there's not greatest lack of honour than committing perfidy in war.

Well, I can think of a few things that are way worse. Like torture and mutilation.

[pmoriarty]

"Butchering civilian populations wholesale was normal. The Americans and British did not play by those rules"

Perhaps you are not aware of the firebombing of German and Japanese cities, where as many or more civilians died as in the nuclear bomb detonations over Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which perhaps you also forget.

[__s]

Vonnegut's a good read for this, often gets into Dresden

[qrendel]

Specifically, Vonnegut was present at and survived the bombing of Dresden, which became part of (the main?) the inspiration for Slaughterhouse-Five: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_Vonnegut#World_War_II

The book makes a lot more sense once you understand Vonnegut's history with the bombing.

[jhbadger]

Sadly, Vonnegut quotes David Irving's "The Destruction of Dresden" as a source for the number of dead (extremely inflated over other sources). Sadly because although Vonnegut didn't know it at the time, Irving was a Holocaust denier who wanted to rehabilitate the reputation of the Nazis by showing them to be no worse than the Allies.

[nickik]

Ah, those famous Rape bombs.

[cyberferret]

Hmm...because having the flesh burned off your bones or dying slowly of long term radiation sickness etc. is a better option than being raped and bayonetted? Why don't we take a straw poll on that?

[iwontreddit]

I guess you haven't heard of the mass rape of german and japanese women by the victorious allies. The allies raped far more women than the axis.

[nickik]

The allies had far less incidents of rape. And defently not systematic like Japan. If you really beliefe that its clear that you have never actually studied the issue.

[iwontreddit]

>The allies had far less incidents of rape. And defently not systematic like Japan.

Systematic? Is that a joke? Millions more german and japanese women were raped by the allies than vice versa.

Lets not belittle the german and japanese women who were raped.

[Inconel]

The allies raped far more women than the axis.

I'd be very appreciative if you could link to a source for this claim.

[iwontreddit]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_during_the_occupation_of_...

Millions of german women were raped by the allies.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_during_the_occupation_of_...

Tens of thousands of japanese women were raped after ww2. The only reason that more japanese women weren't raped was because the japanese government provided "comfort women" for the allied troops.

[Inconel]

Thanks for the links.

[cyberferret]

Perhaps not complete bullsh!t.

Both my parents were in their early teens in Malaysia during the Japanese invasion and subsequent occupation. The both lived near (different) POW camps, and yes, they both agreed that the treatment of the British & Aussie POWs in those camps by the Japanese guards was brutal.

But they both say that when the roles were reversed and the Allies took back Malaysia, the treatment by Allied soldiers of the Japanese prisoners was equally as horrific. Call it 'revenge mentality' or anything else, but the truth is that it happened and they saw it happen with their own eyes. It is just not documented in the history books we read today.

My father had his bicycle commandeered by a Japanese soldier when the Imperial forces walked into Kuala Lumpur unopposed. The soldier politely asked to 'borrow' it and my dad's family knew better than to refuse. At the end of the war however, the same soldier knew defeat was coming so he actually sought out my father's family and returned the bike. It was a lot worse for wear, but he got it back.

Another Japanese officer gave my grandfather one of his ceremonial swords as a gift because he was going to go down to the river to commit seppuku rather than be captured by allied forces. Bushido or not, that sort of cultural belief was the norm back then.

My mother still speaks fondly of British POWs who she said were just young boys that she felt sorry for. She and her mother used to go down to the camp to collect the clothing of the POWs and the guards so they could mend them. Some of the English soldiers taught her to make toy bunny rabbits out of socks and she still remembers how to make them to this day.

She speaks of the sorrow of going down to the camp one day to return some uniforms only to find the place deserted. A remaining guard told her that the Allied POWs had been shipped off to Burma to build a railway. She cries even now when telling the story.

My mother actually still has some of the 'banana money' that was used by the Japanese in Malaysia during the occupation. Both my parents said that any actual fighting done by the Japanese forces was precise and directed against military installations in order to minimise civilian casualties.

My father's best friend lived among the labour camps on the ground of the KL railway station. When the initial Japanese air attack on the railway yards came, they bombed a few cars/buildings and shot out the clock tower (after dropping leaflets explaining that they would demonstrate their superiority by shooting out all the clock towers in KL). There were hardly any civilian casualties.

Conversely when the allied forces later counter attacked KL, they carpet bombed the railway yards, killing almost all the civilian labourers living there (including my dad's friend).

Perhaps it is because I heard all these first hand witness accounts while growing up that I always listen to any official war reports with a grain of salt. War is hell, and makes monsters of ALL the participants.

[agentultra]

Shigeru Mizuki's epic manga, Showa, recounts much of his history serving in the Japanese military. He doesn't seem sympathetic to the Imperialist propaganda and points out many of the atrocities committed on both sides. It was eye-opening for me since much of the history of the war that I know is British/North American and highly skewed.

These stories are worth retelling... again and again.

[pmoriarty]

Anyone interested in an unconventional account of WW2 from the Japanese side might appreciate a film called "Under the Flag of the Rising Sun".

[acqq]

I can confirm something similar from some other wars, including the huge distortions presented to the public at home. Every side presents themselves as fighting "honorably" and "justly." But you see how much remains intentionally distorted, where even stealing student's work and showing it to the world as the "report of our security services" is symptomatic:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_Dossier

"The media seems to be right" until the war comes to you.

[iwontreddit]

> For the japanese military in WWII, rape was normal.

What racist gibberish. It was "normal" just like it was normal for the allies. The allies did a lot more raping than the axis...

> Butchering civilian populations wholesale was normal.

And it was not normal for the allies? The allies murdered a lot more civilians than the axis.

> The Americans and British did not play by those rules

Is that a joke? Intentionally burning of millions of innocent women and children are what? The nuking of cities full of innocent civilians are what? We intentionally murdered a shitload of innocent civilians too. Lets not pretend otherwise.

> This was not two equivalent evils.

You could argue that the british/americans were more evil than the japanese/germans. I prefer to say evil is evil.

The fact that you think we were any better just shows that you are an unthinking person who mindlessly swallows propaganda. Or that you don't know what really went on in ww2.

The british were some of the worst genocidal maniacs in humans history ( aborigines, indians, africans, etc ). And we did our fair share of genocides ( native americans, inuits, etc ). We didn't go from mass lynching of blacks to turning into saints overnight. The US and Britain were two of the most racist and evil societies on earth in the 1940s. There is a reason why the nazis modeled their ideology after the british/american racial ideology.