H wrote on Mar 18^th, 2007 at 6:30am:


H, It may have happened elsewhere, but the specific incident I was alluding to happened in Saipan .

http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&aq=t&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4GFRC_enUS20...

Some of the links include videos.

Sorry for ther long post.

According to my understanding, from a Japanese perspective, there were two seperated, yet converging concepts that would be cause for a set of bloodletting of the likes the world have never seen should the US invade Japan.  And the bloodletting would have been on all sides, there was none immune from such a catastrophe.

First, there was the political events post Meji Restoration and the cultural/religions events, which were also post Meji Restoration.

After Commodore Perry forced Japan open to trade, Japan recognized this for what it was, exploitation of Asians.  They saw the only way for Japan to not be used up like they saw other Asian nations, they had to develop a modern military, and do it quickly! This happened under Meji.  So they copied the western powers. And they did a very good job at it, the defeat of the Russian Baltic fleet at Tsushima, as evidense.

The new constitution and the modernization of Japan heavily emphasized the military as the arm of power for Japan, but the military was "supposedly" under civilian rule, and ultimately, the emperor.  This worked well as long as there was a strong emperor.  Meji was strong.  However, his successor, Hirohito's father was physically and mentally handicapped.  In the vacuum of a strong emperor, the militerists successfully made a power grab, and with generals being unfettered, they proceded to engage into michief, such as the invasion of Manchuria.  After Hirohito's father died, he ascended to power as the Showa emperor.  But Hirohito was an intellectual, preferring to g horseback riding and his scientific pursuits such his love for biology.  And based on Imperial Court Etiquette, each member played a predefined and rigid role, which means short of a strong emperor, Hirohito for the most part rubber stamped whatever he was told.  There are scholars who strongly disagree with this point, but I believe it to be so.

Now, for the militerists to secure total power, they re-instituted the culture surrounding the samurai.  Recall the movie "The Last Samurai", Meji dissolved the Japanese class system, which means the much revered and much feared samurai class was no more.  But the samurai was intrinsicly Japanese, and was a source of national pride. But the militerists essentally spun the samurai into something any Japanese can obtain.  So they embarked on a program of "national militerism" which means ordinary Japanese life now had military overtones.  Schoolchildren wore military uniforms to school, and play were military exercizes.  Every boy aspired to join the imperial army or navy.  Those institutions rose to the pinnacle of Japanese society.  A young man "arrived" when he won a slot at Eta Jima or Yokarin.  And they modified the samurai oath for their purposes we know as bushido.

Bushido fit perfectly into the Japanese culture of face.  As we have seen in "The Last Samurai", face was more important than life itself.  To the western mind, this is an alien concept, and too many westerners impose their thought processes in analyzing and trying to understand Japanese events, especially in WWII.  Being ignorant to or inwilling to accept these concepts doom the analyst to come up with flawed analysis.  Throughout the course of the war, there have been many instances of Japanese choosing honorable death to accepting defeat.  Tamon Yamaguchi chose to go down they the Hiyru at Midway rather than live to fight another day.  We know about the fruitless banzai charges, and if you've seen "Letters From Iwo Jima", it boggled the mind of the western viewers to see those Japanese soldiers commit suicide when their positions were overrun instead of retreating to fight the marines at another position.  But such an act was perfectly Japanese.

So, when the invasion of the Japanese Islands were imminent, Bushido had reached a feverish pitch.  Though young Japanese men were prepared to obey their orders and figt and die (which was expected by their leaders) to save their homes, they didn't want to die, but they were prepared to.  Onishi told kamakazi pilots that "they were already gods without earthly desires".  Bushido was in full effect, and nobody knew how or was willing to stop the moving train.  Japanese citizens, who have been regurlarily lied to since the first defeat at Midway were also told how the Americans would brutalize the women and children.  Face was more important than life, even for the women.

Conventionally, it was expected that much bombing would occur, then the invasion by marine divisions would come.  Hardships of that nature were expected.  That would change nothing.  Every Japanese were preparing for that.  At this time, Hirohito had long wanted to get out of the war, but he was bound by court etiquette so he was fairly powerless (in his own mind as history tells us) to stop the moving train.  And that train was heading for national suicide rather than Japan bear the unbearable.

When the atomic bombs dropped, those two events were enough to shake Hirohito to FINALLY act decisevely and ask his subjects to bear the unbearable and accept the unacceptable.  That is why I will always maintain the atomic bomb drops actually saved lives, both Japanese and American.  However, if someone disagrees, I'd like to hear their fact-based arguments.

...again, sorry for the lo

Also as another point.  Accepting defeat in WWII would be the first time Japan, as a nation would be defeated in a conflict.  Considering the concept of "all nations under one roof", and that the Japanese emperor was the descendent of the Japanese goddess Amaterasu, and the Japanese people were a superior race to others, it was unaccptable, yet, even impossible that the soft Americans could defeat Yamato Damashii, it was just the ultimate humiliation.  The militerist leaders, who got Japan into this whole mess in the first place, would prefer the face-saving final battle than to concede defeat.

I agree.  All you have to do is to study the various battles and the picture easily emerged that the Japanese were prepared to fight to the death.  And the closer to Japan the battle being fought, the more savage the fighting became.  Tokko tactics were first introduced as a deliberate method at the Phillipines, but was in ernest at Okanawa.

What I attempted to do was to explain what I believe were the reasons why the Japanese were prepared to fight to the death, especially on Japanese soil.  There are those who somehow conclude that the atomic bombs weren't necessary, and in fact unspeakably cruel in comparion to an invasion because the Japanese would just surrender.  I have not seen any facts bearing this idea out.  Given, there was a peace faction, which included Hirohito and Prince Konoe, but the peace faction had to remain secret.  Ponder that for a moment, the emperor of Japan had to keep his personal feelings of the war a secret!  That is a testament to the vice-grip the milterists had on the country!  And they were bent on national suicide.  To be blunt, the atomic bombs shocked Hirohito to the point that he suddenly grew a pair!

Another interesting thought is those military members who were percieved to be involved in a failure were given "opportunities" to atone for their failure.

Chuichi Nagumo was given the opportunity to atone for his failure at Midway by commanding the Saipan forces that even Combined Fleet HQ knew was, at best, a stalling operation.  They expected Naguno to meet his end at Saipan.

Soichi Sugita was one of the 6 escorts of Yamamoto's fatal flight that was jumped by American P38 Lightningts.  All of the escorts were given extremely dangerous missions to atone for their failure.  All died except Sugita.  He ultimately faught air battles over Japan against Navy Hellcats and Corsairs in the final months of the war.

A Tokko pilot seemed to not buy into the "gods without earthly desires" line, especially since he was married and his wife took the unusual step of moving into a hotel next to his base.  he kept coming back from his kamikaze missions with "mechanical failures".  He was successively sent on tokko missions without escort to assur ehe didn't return.  He kept coming back. He was subsequently ordered to do a check flight, upon which he crashed, no doubt from sabotage.

Also, Admiral Onishi, the father of the kamikaze operations, after the surrender announcement by Hirohito, painfully disembowed himself to atone for the men he sent to yakasuni shrine (a physical shrine next to the imperial palace where dead warriors go) prior to himself.  He languished for about 12 hours with his intestines hanging out and refused help.  After he died, all the newspapers celebrated Onishi as a war hero.  He stayed true to Bushido.  It's reasonable to conclude if Onishi refused to commit seppuku, he would have been shamed.

Felix/FFDS wrote on Mar 19^th, 2007 at 8:02pm:



That's what I read about too, but I wouldn't be suprised if it happened elsewhere.  Marpi Point on Saipan is where I've read about civilians committed suicide.  It also happened on Okanawa (sp) too.

Apex, thanks for that.

I suppose even a broken clock is correct twice a day.  I just hope I learn to keep my trap shut for all the other times I don't have a leg to stand on.

Felix/FFDS wrote on Mar 20^th, 2007 at 8:07pm: