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The Pacific War was in great part a product of racism, Japan's notion of their own cultural superiority clashing with the western prejudice of the day against the idea of an Asian colonial power. Racism contributed to the creation of the war, and it was fought in a racist manner employing grotesque propaganda characterizations of the enemy.
Why would the interment be the one aspect of that war which was free of racial motivations?
What happened to the Japanese Americans was not right and I've admitted in earlier posts. I consider the internment of these people to be a major mistake on the part of President Franklin D. Roosevelt I am grateful our country has officially recognized it as being a mistake.
Anytime an innocent person is deprived of their liberty and incarcerated its cause for all of us to take notice.
I think, though, that many people who condemn the internment camps fail to place the whole thing in context. That context is that a huge number of people suffered during World War II. Approximately 300,000 of our citizens, including my own uncle, never came home from that war. Others who came home were badly wounded. My parents each gave up three years of their lives to serve this country in the armed forces. My father felt what was done to the Japanese was an injustice, but also jokingly asked if since the Japanese were getting reparations if he should get them too for his years of involuntary service in the Navy. He shouldn't have because service in the armed forces is a duty of citizenship. However, I think his larger point was that perhaps the Japanese Americans should have demanded an apology from our government and let it go at that. Money can cheapen things. There were so many people who were unfair victims in that war that its difficult to know who should get what.
I'll plead guilty here.
Because the context to me doesn't mitigate how wrong interment was. What it does mitigate, perhaps (and I think it in fact does, to some extent), is the moral culpability of those who engineered and/or agreed with interment. People are products of their times, and citizens at the very least probably had real fears of a Japanese invasion of the West Coast (as ludicrous as the possibility ever was) and of the plotting assistance of the 'inscrutrable' Asians living among them. But the wrong done to a family that is uprooted, the family business lost (property seized, or sold at fire-sale prices, the intangible and slowly-cultivated customer base of a local business obliterated), and forced into a camp is the same regardless of the context in which it was done. My interest in this thread has been the wrong, not the implementers of that wrong.
We can understand why wrong things were done, and I think we can sympathize, in many cases, with those who chose to do things that were wrong. But I am less concerned with the 'who' than the 'what', and ensuring that it does not happen again. If that makes people feel bad because they were there and did not act as they might now wish they had, or because they have/had relatives in such positions, I'll simply say that I do not see why that should even factor into this discussion. We all live with our choices, and as much as I'd like to, I can't say that I wouldn't have supported interment, had I been born in (say) 1915 and my views shaped by a typical environment of the time. And I have little doubt that future generations will look back on some things ours sees as necessary and proper with justified harsh criticism, as has always happened with the general progression of human civilization. That's fine, too - I look forward to living at least long enough to come and understand some of that myself.
I'll say this - I have a lot more sympathy for someone who supported interment in 1942 than for someone who still insists today that it was justified.
Reparations for military service? Wages. Adjusted for inflation, and compounded with interest for over four decades, I'm guessing it well exceeded the $20,000/individual that began to be put forward in 1988. I'm not saying that pay was anything great - but neither was $20,000, delivered almost a half-century later.
A strong nation with a sense of justice and confidence in itself looks to its mistakes, owns them, and makes appropiate amends.
All that said, my participation in this discussion has been focused on the wrongs done, not on the perpetrating entity of the wrongs. The fact that discussing a wrong by a known perpetrator implicitly fingers that perpetrator is unavoidable. And, frankly, unimportant - America can handle it.
Quote:
America is a good country. Not a perfect one.
And I do think America is a generally good country. It seems to me that the participants in this thread who have tended to shift the focus from the wrongs done, to the notion that America is being attacked, are those trying to justify interment. As I said, my main interest is the event, not the entity behind that event.
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Further, I have never liked the term concentration camp used in discussing the internment camps because the comparison between what America did and what the Germans did is a terrible comparison. The Japanese were not beaten, starved, worked to the point of death, tortured, or murdered in gas chambers. They were released before the end of the war too. The buildings they were housed in were barracks. They weren't fancy. However, they were decent buildings that were properly constructed. One such building remains in use as an administration building at a college I attended as a youth.
Agreed. While technically correct, the associations of the term 'concentration camp' with the death camps of Nazi Germany have essentially made that term useless for anything else.
"In this thought-provoking episode of “War Stories with Oliver North,†you’ll learn about the men of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team and Military Intelligence Service who overcame racism and prejudice to prove their loyalty to America. This unit earned over 18,000 individual decorations during the course of the war.
You’ll meet MIS soldier Roy Matsumoto, who volunteered from a relocation camp to spy on the enemy in Burma. At the same time, his two brothers served in the Japanese Imperial Army.
We’ll also take you on a journey through the mountains of Europe as 442nd veterans Yuki Minaga and George Sakato brave enemy fire and risk life and limb to save their brothers in arms of “The Lost Battalion.â€
And in a rare interview, Secretary of Transportation Norman Minetatalks about being a ten-year boy when he and his family were interned for over a year at Heart Mountain relocation center in Wyoming. This is the story of some 20,000 Japanese Americans who were determined to serve with honor and distinction and earned the right to be called real “American heroes.â€
true war stories
Racism is a crime committed against HUMANITY. ALL human kind suffers when such a crime is committed. Nobody really is the winner when such darkness of human nature exists.
A strong nation with a sense of justice and confidence in itself looks to its mistakes, owns them, and makes appropiate amends.
Agreed. While technically correct, the associations of the term 'concentration camp' with the death camps of Nazi Germany have essentially made that term useless for anything else.
bolded is really the bottom line for me too.
Last edited by lilyflower3191981; 01-10-2014 at 03:58 PM..
you know what's ironic is the same namby pamby liberals who
decry Japanese internment are the ones who said in the poll
FDR and Truman were two of our 7 best Presidents.
Scam rolls on.
Well, not me. I said FDR was one of the greatest presidents and I am still critical of the internment of Japanese Americans. The two are not mutually exclusive when one realizes how excellent a job FDR in terms of strategic thinking that got us through a world war with fewer casualties than any of the other major powers that participated in it.
As far as your comment "scam rolls on", I'm waiting to read a post from you that shows some real analysis of World War II or any other major historical events. Anyone can express an opinion and that's all you continue to do.
U.S. history has shown that only Caucasians are considered American citizens. All non-white American citizens have been treated differently. Of course, now the illegal immigrants have more rights than the ordinary U.S. citizen.
I also base these statements on my own life experiences.
I'm a third generation Japanese American.
Actually, even the worst racists of the post Civil War era regarded Blacks as citizens and there was never any serious attempt or even suggestion that citizenship be taken away from Blacks. Blacks in the South were threatened if they ever tried to vote but no one ever tried to deprive Blacks of citizenship. Most of the anti Black voting laws were also applicable to Whites BUT of course Whites easily passed the tests and didn't have any problems while those laws affected Blacks greatly. In any case, there was never any time in which Blacks were NOT considered citizens unless they were immigrants which were obviously uncommon or rare during that era due to immigration restrictions. The situation is obviously different from Asians but I just wanted to point out that nonwhite Americans were regarded as citizens even in the most racist era.
Actually, even the worst racists of the post Civil War era regarded Blacks as citizens and there was never any serious attempt or even suggestion that citizenship be taken away from Blacks. Blacks in the South were threatened if they ever tried to vote but no one ever tried to deprive Blacks of citizenship. Most of the anti Black voting laws were also applicable to Whites BUT of course Whites easily passed the tests and didn't have any problems while those laws affected Blacks greatly. In any case, there was never any time in which Blacks were NOT considered citizens unless they were immigrants which were obviously uncommon or rare during that era due to immigration restrictions. The situation is obviously different from Asians but I just wanted to point out that nonwhite Americans were regarded as citizens even in the most racist era.
I am mixed Asian myself. I have always been asked "Where are you coming from? You are a very exotic looking beauty. Are you Asian? You look mostly Asian, but not quite, what are you?"
I am Japanese/German/Irish/Hawaiian. I am pretty sure that if I look full German or Irish. NOBODY would ask me "What are you?" or "Where are you coming from?"
A little off topic, I know.
I just cannot imagine the horror and anger those Japanese-Americans must have felt during world war II. Imagine you were living in a country where you call home, all of sudden, you were forced to sell your business, your land, and all your family members were put in a "camp". You were not trusted, respected simply because of your heritage.
I never want to experience something like that. I hope NOBODY ever experiences something like that. This is why history is important. We learn from it and we move on.
p.s. According to this internet article
"During the entire war only ten people were convicted of spying for Japan and these were all Caucasian."
Ahem. WWII is the only war with a decisive victory but only because there wasn't any other wars ever a since
. Neither Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan nor Iraq operations were wars since we never declared a war against any of these countries, have we?
A war under international treaties has to be declared and communicated to the other party prior to any military action. It means that the enemy is clearly identified as the party to which declaration of war is addressed to. A war also requires a clear military objective.
None of the post-WWII military campaigns had a clear military objective. How can you even expect a decisive victory if we the military doesn't know what we are trying to accomplish here?
Look at Iraq. We are there for quite a few years and still nobody knows what the objective is or when exactly we can say that our job is done and we can go home. Why? Because there never was a clear military objective.
The same holds true with respect to Korea and Afghanistan: we are still there and nobody knows for how long. Why? Again, nobody bothered to tell the military what the objective is in any of this countries.
BTW. I am not a big fan of communist regimes or Islamic militants but to accuse the military of not being successful or strong while not setting a clear objective is simply sad.
Ps sorry for being off-topic
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Originally Posted by War Beagle
Sort of interesting that FDR is hailed as one of the greatest (and most liberal) Presidents despite having rounded up nearly every member of a racial minority group and forcibly relocated them to internment camps. Meanwhile, Bush and Obama get dumped on for sending confirmed terrorists to club Gitmo.
Great point. If you are going to fight a war, fight to win it decisively. Otherwise, you end up with North Koreas, Afghanistans or Iraqs. This new kindler, gentler way of fighting wars seems to lead to more longer term problems.
Last edited by risotto11; 01-11-2014 at 04:47 AM..
Actually, even the worst racists of the post Civil War era regarded Blacks as citizens and there was never any serious attempt or even suggestion that citizenship be taken away from Blacks. Blacks in the South were threatened if they ever tried to vote but no one ever tried to deprive Blacks of citizenship. Most of the anti Black voting laws were also applicable to Whites BUT of course Whites easily passed the tests and didn't have any problems while those laws affected Blacks greatly. In any case, there was never any time in which Blacks were NOT considered citizens unless they were immigrants which were obviously uncommon or rare during that era due to immigration restrictions. The situation is obviously different from Asians but I just wanted to point out that nonwhite Americans were regarded as citizens even in the most racist era.
Did you ever hear of 'grandfather clause'? Whites didn't have to take literacy tests or pay poll taxes. Isn't the right to vote a basic part of citizenship?
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