I am a 56 year old Taiwanese. My ancestors were from Mainland maybe 300-400 years ago. I am so sick of Japanese occupation of Taiwan for 50 years. Personally, I hope someday the same will happen to Japan. I mean “occupied by other country for 50 or more years”. And, it might happen, giving the Japanese attitude today – arrogant, lying, …………………………..

Puyopuyo made a series of claim to equate the shrine with Arlinton national semetry, Hiroshima with Nanjing massacre and Truman with class A criminals.

I have not read any objections from you. If you agree with those statement, I actually fully appreciate your position and think your position is quite consistent. This position, in my humble opinion, is also held dearly by right-wings in Japan.

I am just wondering how many people in US will actually agree with you.

The first atomic bomb probably did shorten the war. The second was excessive. Either way, Mr./Ms. Puyopuyo is one of many reading this who miss the point.

I’m an old fashioned Hobbesian realist. I believe that humans have have always been doing deplorable things across the globe since history began, and although civil society can emerge and create communities, the fundamental truth will never change. Every country has its war criminals. America has done awful things, Japan has done awful things, as has every other country in the history of the world.

So all: get over it already!

Correct me if I’m wrong (shouldn’t even say that since I know it will happen), but I was under the assumption that Yasukuni is completely privately funded.

I don’t agree with forcing anything to happen there via government decree. I just feel the place should be avoided by anyone who feels that reverencing these war criminals is wrong.

On the other hand though, some people have proposed removing the 13 or 14 executed class A war criminals from veneration at Yasukuni. How can you possibly do that? A government order to that effect would be an agregious violation of the church and state barrier in Japan. Admittedly the line can be rather porous at times since many of the largest shrines were originally created as Imperial institutions and continues to be supported by government funds as cultural artifacts, but to actually tell the priests flat out whow they are allowed to worship would be going too far.

You don’t think revering war criminals is bad? I see something very wrong with this and so do many of the Japanese as well. Remember, since enshrining these criminals, the Emperor of Japan has refused to visit the shrine along with most of the Prime Ministers. Only Koizumi has seen fit to go every year.

It has become a symbol of what was bad with Japan. It has become a symbol of Japan’s imperialistic past. So every year, these memories are brought back and it wipes away much of the good that Japan has done, along with stoking the fear of a imperialistic resurgence.

Perhaps we should dig up their tombs and toss their bones to the dogs.
Their bones aren’t at the Yasukuni Shrine as you well know.
Sorry, that was a historical reference. Supposedely — although there’s no per se proof — when the Turks took Constantinople they allegedly dug up the grave of Doge Enrico Dandolo of Venice (who led the Fourth Crusade in its attack on Constantinople) and threw his bones to the dogs — the ultimate show of disrespect for the dead.

Curzon: No no no. Now we need to get into whether or not Truman was justified in dropping the bombs and was dropping the bombs a war crime. But, if that is the topic you wish to get into, give me a couple days, I just finished a rather long posting on something else.

And because of the legal ruling that a few are Class A war criminals, any remembrance of them is unacceptable.

Remember is good. Revering is not.

Perhaps we should dig up their tombs and toss their bones to the dogs.

Their bones aren’t at the Yasukuni Shrine as you well know.

Plunge — so you’re basically affirming my point made here that guilt is defined by defeat. Truman’s orders did kill hundreds of thousands of civilians, but because the US won he’s a hero. The Japanese lost and their leaders went to war crimes court. And because of the legal ruling that a few are Class A war criminals, any remebrance of them is unacceptable. Perhaps we should dig up their tombs and toss their bones to the dogs.

Truman wasn’t a Class A war criminal. There is no equivalency.

Anon,
Looks like you have been carefully considering people’s sentiment prevailed in China. I think that only shedding light on history textbooks in China doesn’t explain the whole aspects of the sentiment. If you turn on TV in China, you’ll see a lot of soap operas where Japanese soldiers torturing people as villains. CCP agitates people with every medium! This would explain ONE of the reasons why they hate Japan.

In early 1980s, there were almost annual widespread protest against Japan in Beijing. The anti-Japan sentiment grew stronger after the official visit of the shrine by Japan prime minister in 1985. However, after 1989 massacre, there was no anti-Japan demonstration all all. Japan actually had a good relationship with CCP because most western countries shunned CCP. Therefore your argument of dating anti-Japan sentiment from 1989 as proof of man-made is weak.

If my memory serves me correctly, Japanese prime minister visited shrine annually, but never claimed in official capacity before 1985. The visit by prime minist in 1985 was the first one. Koizumi pushed further and visited annually in official capacity since 2001. This kind of gesture is viewed as intentionally offensive by many asian even though it is viewed ok by the west. The central argument is that Japan is not Nazi. However, not every Nazi participated in Holocaust and some of them were actually against it. Many of them was just fighting for their country. By the same logic, those Nazi can be remembered by Germans for their sacrifice.

Your another argument is that, since CCP is fabricating history, what is wrong with Japan? Well, you are using the same argument as CCP’s, when CCP counters US human rights accusation by citing US problems. Do you really want to argue like them?

A fair bit of ink has been spilled either reporting or commenting on the recent anti-Japan riots that have occured in various cities across China the past couple of weeks.

Coming Anarchy argues that mainland China’s sense of patriotism is newfound and stoked by the CCP. Simon calls Hong Kong’s plan to hold anti-Japanese rallies “an effort to catch the populist wave.” Both, in essence, are suggesting that th…

I can only imagine the inaccuraces that
are taught in China’s history text books.

Japan is much farther along in recognizing the errors of
its past compared to China – far far along.

I’m currently residing in Beijing. Something I’ve tried to understand better during my stay here is what the ordinary Chinese think of the Japan. Occassionally, I ask my Chinese friends what they think. Sometimes, I hear unprompted, usually very critical, remarks on Japan.

The conclusion I’ve come to is that resentment, dislike, and even hatred of Japan is widespread – from students, office workers, to taxi drivers, and even academics at prominent Chinese universities.

How does one explain this? You argue that “China’s anti-Japanese nationalism is a modern invention” and write that “then came Tiananmen Square. Threatened with internal collapse, the government realized that it had to manufacture a stronger sense of national pride to survive … The convenient bugaboo was Japan, and the state began a new campaign in the media and education, taking aim at Japan’s invasion fifty years earlier. The students raised on the anti-Japan bile are now pissed off youngsters, and only now has China’s government realized that it’s created a monster it cannot control.”

This isn’t a new argument; I’ve heard a Tokyo University professor advance essentially the same thesis. While there may be some truth to this, I think this argument lacks explanatory power.It doesn’t explain the widespread resentment of Japan – across different age groups – I’ve observed here. Logically, if anti-Japan education started only after ‘89, you would expect that only the younger Chinese would have been indoctrinated. Furthermore, many Chinese I know are intelligent, critical thinkers – critical of their government in other aspects – but nonetheless critical of Japan. In summary, the indoctrination argument doesn’t hold up too well.

I once met a young South Korean during a trip in China. He disliked Japan. He told me that his grandfather had worked in Japan out of economic necessity; his grandfather went to Japan disliking the Japanese, and returned from Japan disliking the Japanese. My impression that resentment of Japan in South Korea is just as widespread and broad-based as in China. If nationalism and indoctrination explain Chinese resentment towards Japan, how would you explain resentment by the South Koreans towards Japan?

Finally, some comments on your previous post, “Apples and Oranges” where you write that “please compare Japan’s imperial rule in Korea and Taiwan*, where they set up schools, built roads, a police force, and established civil society, to other instances of colonial rule.”

Japanese colonisation of Taiwan was by a civil government, unlike their subsequent military actions in mainland China. Japan’s objective in Taiwan was to run a model colony, and it’s generally agreed that they did a relatively good job – I wasn’t aware of this until I heard these points made, grudgingly, by several Chinese academics. On Korea, I’m not familiar with the details, but clearly the South Koreans are not happy with the Japanese. My point is that the contrasting attitudes of the Taiwanese and Koreans towards the Japanese suggest that colonized peoples have the ability to judge and respond accordingly.

Finally, to be clear, this post is not written in support of Japan-bashing.

It’s the old Japan that made the fault. But the modern Japan – or the modern japanese government do not face up the history frankly. ALthough I like their music, their electronic products, I dont like their government.

On another site, pekingduck.org, one Chinese guy asked how Jews would feel if the German government endorsed textbooks glossing over the Holocaust, thinking he’d garner sympathy. In the case of Germany and European anti-semiticism in general, Jewish groups aren’t known for attacking German soccer teams, throwing rocks at stores or embassies, or boiling over with hatred and spitting out an intense desire to invade Berlin personally with a knife in their teeth. They made inroads by gaining the sympathy of the world (Schindler’s List style), peaceful media campaigns, and using that to lobby for policy changes through meaningful dialogue with the Germans (et al). Why not, instead of organizing to throw water bottles, organize to make a movie? I point out, also, that with something like Schindler’s List, there are appeals to other people I never see Chinese nationalists make, namely a) the Holocaust is representative of something universal, not only about Germans and Jews, that all human beings are capable of and b) a German can be a good person. Maybe if the protests expressed those ideas more clearly and loudly, those of us looking in from outside wouldn’t think the protesters are ignorant and bigoted.

Thanks.