"The 'Good War' Myth of World War Two" Topic

Fred Cartwright:

You have wisely exposed a second great myth of the 20th C, that of American commercial imperialism in Asia. It amuses me that some Americans correctly denounce the violent and inhumane Japanese occupation of China but fail to recollect the US behaviour in the annexation of the Philippines – a violent and vicious campaign that paralleled the Japanese expansion into mainland Asia and showed similar disregard for the lives and cultures of the conquered peoples. It seems crimes are always easier to forget when they are committed by one's own nation.

Cheers.
Rod Robertson

Oh we Brits sorted that one out years ago. Conquering the natives was for their own good and brought them the benefits of British civilisation.

Once again mixing apples and oranges. That the US was an imperialistic power at a portion of our history is not disputed. What is in dispute is the obligation of a county, any country, to continue to provide the means for another country to carry out policies with which the original country disagrees.

The Japanese were clearly both increasingly belligerent and anti-US.

As early as 1910 they annex Korea with the Japan-Korea treaty, a treaty Korea never signed.

In 1931 they seize an area in Northeast China called Manchuko during the "Mukden" incident. In 1932 they install their own puppet government. In time Japanese citizen's would come to own over 50 percent of the farmland.

In 1937, using Manchuko as a base, they invade China.

In Dec of 1937 the Japanese bomb the USS Panay then evacuating US citizens from Nanjing

In Jan 1940 the Japanese abrogate the existing treaty of commerce with the US. Legally the US in NOT obligated to honor contracts with Japan from this point on.

In August of 1940 Japan proclaims the "Greater East Asia Co-prosperity Sphere"

In September of 1940 Japan signs the Tripartite pact with Germany and Italy. This pact is acknowledged as largely being anti-US.

Despite increasing pressures diplomatic talks went nowhere and in July of 1941 the US institutes an embargo on the Japanese.

Are you really arguing the US should have continued to fuel Japanese industry and the military under these circumstances?

That the Japanese sought to establish their own empire in Asia was up to them. To do so while actively working against the interests of the US, when it chose to base its economy on exports from the US, was foolish.

Marc33594:

This thread is about the myth/myths of good war in WWII, not about evaluating the legitimacy of imperial machinations of either Japan or the USA. My comment was made in relation to the myth of good war.

I am a big fan of FDR, but even I have to admit that he and the US Administration created the conditions (short of an actual declaration of war for which there was no political will in the Congress) to maximize the likelihood of war with Japan. They increased munition and arms supplies to Nationalist China. They pressured the British to keep the Burma Road open when the British temporarily closed it due to threats from Japan. They embargoed all sorts of resources and manufactured goods from purchase by Japan. They unsuccessfully embargoed petroleum exports but ran afoul of US law so when that failed they then froze first 3/4's and then all of Japan's funds to stop them buying crude oil legally. It was not the oil embargo but the financial freeze which shut off the flow of oil and triggered the war.

Had Roosevelt wanted to avoid a two-front war in order to defeat Nazi Germany first, he should have avoided this course of action. But the Germans refused to baited into war with the US by similar non-neutral policies and provocations and thus the cost of entering the war was the successful baiting of Japan to military action.

Japan was absolutely and solely responsible for its decision to attack the USA. The Japanese government and military were foolish and reaped the whirlwind for their actions. However, the myth of WWII popularly held by most Americans ignores the role of the Roosevelt Administration and certain key senators in shaping the necessary conditions for war in the face of a determined pacifist and isolationist electorate. That is the mythic dimension to which I'm referring.

Cheers.
Rod Robertson.

I am encouraged to see the progress of this thread.

My earlier posts were directed explicitly at the source quoted in the OP. I sought to expose that source for what it is … a mouthpiece of the holocaust denial / nazi glorification movement, which hides under the quasi-intellectual label of "historical revisionism".

That said, I embrace the topic of examining the history of WW2 for new perspectives and insights. I just don't like to have that examination hijacked by those with a very deliberate agenda, not of exposing and understanding history, but of covering up and disposing of history.

Huzzah boys! You have taken a very misguided opening, and turned it into a reasoned, respectful and balanced conversation!

-Mark
(aka: Mk 1)

+1 Mark 1,and I withdraw my original post!

No DH'ing as yet--congratulations,gentlemen!

I think your collective wisdom, and easy manner, is required over on the Napoleonic boards, ok?

John

Oh, great thread, good read, lot's of stuff I knew nothing about.

Well put, Rod.

What's the moral here? Perhaps that many folks underestimate the powerful effect and prodigiously long half-life of even their own propaganda.

B

Aw shucks, will have us blushing. Though Rod and I may disagree on some of the issues his responses are well thought out, his argument logically constructed and his knowledge of history impressive. And I was especially taken with Patrick's last summation.

And, as always, in awe of Mark.

The way to silence the revisionists is simple. Used it in grad school when the profs and students were agitating against "the Greatest Generation." I simply asked them this.

"So you think the world would be a better place if the Nazis, fascists, and Japanese racists won? So you really would like to live in such a world?"

Only the crickets could be heard.

Mark I basically laid down the law in here. Kudos sir.

Should you be so inclined, can you pop me an email at runequester@gmail.com ?

Marc33594

No I'm not saying that the US shouldn't have imposed sanctions or fought the war with them. The Japanese methods were particularly nasty – the history of the rape of Nanking makes very horrific reading. What both Rod and I have been trying to point out was the US did not do so out of any morale obligation, but because Japan directly threatened US economic interests in the region. If it was some great morale crusade to force nasty people to give up their ways why did they not do so to Mussolini's fascist Italy when the ventured into Africa? The Japanese saw the US attempts to to get them to stop as a deliberate ploy to hold back Japan's economic growth and prevent them from becoming a significant power in the region. To a nation such as the Japanese where honour and saving face are important the US backed them into a corner from which culturally the Japanese were going to opt for war not peace. None of which absolves the Japanese from their subsequent actions, but it does put the start of the war in context and as Rod has said explodes the myth that the nasty Japanese attacked the US out of the blue.
As for the question of relying on the US to supply the raw materials for its war effort, yes indeed, very foolish, but it is difficult to see where else they would have got the oil from. Not from their Axis partners, both of whom were short of oil. Not the Russians that's for sure! Unlikely the Brits, Dutch etc. would have sold them any either.

Fred;

Marc is fine :)

I dont disagree that the US had interests in the area. I have no illusions that US actions were in anyway tied to some perceived notion of a moral obligation to the Chinese people on humanitarian grounds for example. If nothing else the history of the China lobby in the US is well known both prior to and after the war. Look at the influence Madame Chang wielded.

However my point is that, for much of the build up in tensions, it was indeed the Japanese as the driver with the US reacting. Their history of aggression dates back to at least 1910 and their annexation of Korea.

That the Japanese had wide ranging ambitions is understandable. But they seemed in some sense to live in a fantasy world where they were dependent on others to achieve those aims yet felt emboldened to challenge those self same "partners" and not consider the possible consequences.

As to the whole idea of face very familiar with it after 2 years in Japan, though no expert.

To understand the Japanese psyche on the threshold of WW2, it is (in my opinion) especially important to appreciate the Japanese national experience after it had abandoned its anachronistic self-isolated xenophobic feudal shogunate culture and embraced the ideal of becoming a modern western-style 20th century industrial nation-state as the model of the way forward. Japan at the turn of the 20th century most ardent aspiration to become the Great Britain of the Pacific and ultimately join the great Western powers as a great player in the world. In pursuit thereof, they diplomatically behaved themselves in the most noble and correct western fashion. They allied with the western powers and materially participated in subduing the Boxer Rebellion. They defeated the Russian incursion into north China at great expense and sacrifice to themselves, only to have their expectations dashed by Theodore Roosevelt at the Treaty of Portsmouth negotiations to end the Russo-Japanese War (interesting side-note: Japanese treatment of their Russian prisoners in that war was impeccable by every western standard of conduct – compare to forty years later). They again allied themselves to the western powers during World War I, where they were again given short shrift in the dividing of the spoils during the Treaty of Versailles. Then the post-WW1 Naval Treaties firmly placed Japan into a permanent secondary power status. Whether the result of cynical western diplomatic hardball or racism or some admixture of both, it combined (exacerbated by the Great Depression) to put a very bad taste in the mouth of the Japanese. This perceived disrespect and rejection created a poisonous counter-reaction within Japan (especially among the young officer corps) that rejected all things western. The last straw, Roosevelt's interference through economic embargo, was reasonably was seen by the Japanese as yet another escalation in western meddling and interference.

The short story is that there are no white hats or black hats in this melodrama. Everyone, including the western powers, shares responsibility for the outbreak of war in the Pacific.

Strictly my opinion, of course.

B