ARmy Rumour SErvice

Stonker says
"I read a lot of James Clavell books years ago - they are an interesting insight to the Japanese mind: not least since despite being wounded, captured, imprisoned in Changi and brutalised by by them for the duration of WW2, he developed a deep admiration for Japanese culture."

Yes it is this attitude that baffles me.
My father eventually passed away as a result of Malaria which he contracted in the Kabaw Valley 40 or so Years earlier.
As a Kid I could remember mi old dad would 'Shudder' on occasions when He mentioned jap and what he had seen in Burma/India.
I have a New Zealand friend and on first time occasion I spoke to him he mentioned how his father would 'Shudder' when he spoke of jap.
We have a 90 year old Vet of Burma, Battle of Sittang River the Retreat to India, First & Second Arakan, then the advance down Burma to finish up back on the Mighty Sittang in August 45. When I first got to know him he too 'Shuddered' and then Gripped my forearm and said, 'In wartime John there are things even Soldiers should not see.'

Yet all the Japanese I have ever met, known are so polite, so correct.
They come across as another Island Race, with an attitude I can respect.
They where said to treat Prisoners well during WW I, got totally out of control in WW II and now I do wonder about them and their National Ambition.
john

Jonwilly, your right about them in WWI. The Japanese Military was very correct in its treatment of the Germans captured at Tsingtao, and IIRC the Russians at Port Arthur. Officers were even given Parole. A Definitive difference in 30 years

BAA BAA Black Sheep By Gregory 'Pappy' Boyington is a good read, about his flying career with the Flying Tigers and later the USMC in the Pacific. Boyington eventually gets shotdown and shipped back to Japan where he is starving to death until he is put to work in a kitchen and an old Japanese crone starts feeding him on the sly and saves him. Some Japanese guards at his camp are Christian and refuse to beat the prisoners and take the beatings themselves for refusing, etc. Many other interesting anecdotes.
Medal of Honor winner Boyingtons famous quote; " Just name a hero and I'll prove he's a bum."

Quite right: As pointed out, the Japanese were considered great gentlemen in the Russo-Japanese War and in WWI (where they were on OUR side). Things went very badly pear-shaped in the 1930s when the Great Depression struck (this, by no coincidence, was when Adolf took power in Germany) and Japanese society became increasingly militarized, led by fanatics (there is no other word for them) in the IJA.

As for those who note the disappontment of British vetarans when they hear that the war ended on VE Day, have some sympathy for the Chinese: For them, WWII started in 1937.

"Quartered Safe out Here" is a brilliant memoir, though offers little on the Japenese mindset. In similar vein, in terms of author honesty, are "With the Old Breed" and "Goodbye Darkness" by USMC veterans: I was astonished at the intensity of battle the US Marines endured in the Pacific. "The Knights of Bushido" offers graphic (some might say overly graphic) accounts of the sufferings of POWs, but offered zero understanding of the Japanese and did not place what happened in any strategic concept, IIRC - it seemed very much aimed at the "Indignant of Tunbridge Wells"-type reader.

There is a very, very good history of the Burma Campaign "Burma: The Longest War" written by one of the corps or divisional intelligence officers, Louis Allen, who was a Japanese-speaker. It is the most even-handed campaign history I have read, and offers considerable insight into the Japanese soldiers and officers.

I thought "Requiem for Battleship Yamato" was crassly overwritten, sentimental tripe. 'Zero" by a fighter pilot whose name escapes me, is a far better read (and is written by a far more effective fighting man).

For those who want to understand the brutalization of Japan and the Japanese - and their apocalyptic experience of WWII - read Cook's "Japan at War: An Oral History," and watch "Grave of the Fireflies."

The latter is truly extraordinary - easily one of the finest war films ever made. I watched it in Japanese (of which I speak not a word) and was deeply moved.

Instances of mindless brutality and beheadings were widespread throughout the Japanese Army and were pursued In complete disregard of the Geneva Convention or justice to the point , or so it would seem , that genocide was part of the Japanese agenda.

But when stripped of their authority and weapons, are a pathetic but devious lot.

The junior ranks are included in this description but with the observation that many them are of low intelligence and can lie against all odds, making the Devil smile in evil admiration.

Personal notes, March 1948, by Captain James Gowing Godwin Australian Army Intelligence.



The Japanese had their own version of the Hitler youth who brainwashed a generation of kids with a bastardised version of the way of Bushido.


It seems they are surprisingly ignorant of all cultures around their own little bubble.
Less than 20 years ago my father went to China with a number of Japanese business men who all were shocked that they could read Chinese writing on road signs and shops even though the pronunciation was a world apart you think they would know that the Chinese write more or less the same as them.

I always thought there hats with the flappy bits on the back looked pretty bad ass.

You have to hand it to the Japanese - they are experts at playing the victim card. Look what they did to Asia between the mid 1930 and 1945.

Their history books, for school kids today deflect all blame and responsibility for the war. If Japan had been held to the same standards we held Germany, from 1945 until today, they would be screaming racism.

Look, the Japs were brutal to all non-Japanese. They see non-Japanese as subhuman. A few years ago, while passing through Narita, I was called a gaijan, the Jap equivalent of the N-word.

Japan was avoided responsibility for their treatment of POWs, Koreans, Chinese, etc.

read Iris Chaing's book the Rape of Nanking...it will shock you. But, only because the west gave Japan a Pass after the war.

Did Granddad have anything to say about the half a million Filipinos who died as as a result of the US invasion of the Philippines in 1899?

"In November 1901, the Manila correspondent of the Philadelphia Ledger reported:"The present war is no bloodless, opera bouffe engagement; our men have been relentless, have killed to exterminate men, women, children, prisoners and captives, active insurgents and suspected people from lads of ten up, the idea prevailing that the Filipino as such was little better than a dog...."[71] Some Filipino prisoners were waterboarded during interrogation."


Little Jim


having read, and replied to, some of your previous posts, this idiotic statement above does not surprise me one bit. Where do you get such drivel...and, why do you even post such trash. What is your point?