bamboo pink comments

"A generation which ignores history has no past: and no future. " Robert Heinlein

The same thing can be said of every country that involved in WW2 in any way. Japan and Germany are very likely to be condemned for their deeds because they lost. But the Allies have been avoided from being criticized in despite of their cruelty during the past war. And now the Allies, for example Russia, the US, China, the UK, France been involving in many conflicts with their forces all over the world while the Axis ,Japan and Germany, have been peaceful for 70 years. We have learned from the past. What about the Allies. Are they thinking they are privilleged to act like a bully in the international commyunity since they won. Maybe.

Basically he says that by merely placing recruitment ads for Ianfu is an act of enslavement since it robs the female to seek other jobs of choice even if the person had applied free of will due to other social consideration. (P 103 Jugunianfu)

According to his definition, almost all of prostitute in the world today are coerced by the results of social consideration. It's awful.

Quite ridiculous position to dismiss 70 years of profound research by historians and several 100 testimonials by victims.

Well, let me nitpick. Historians didn't conduct "70 years of profound research". The very first time this comfort women issue came to light is 1983 when Seiji Yoshida wrote a book about ianfu-gari, and Asahi-Shinbun and Japanese sayoku(left-wings) started lying about it. Untill then, comfort women were considered just as prostitute even in Korea and korean govt never brought it to the table. So technically, it's 30 years of reseach. And I don't know the exact number of testimonies and how many of them are supported with reliable source. But I know that there are certain amounts of early testiomonies(mainly from koreans) in 80s and 90s. that they were sold by their parents, not abducted by japanese soldiers. And as the issue got attention and became political, they changed their testimonies quite differently that they were gang-raped and abducted. We shouldn't believe unconditionally the ianfu's testimonies are always truth. Should be more skeptical.

When description is not accurate, there must always be room for adjustment or revision. If you deny this, it's the end of history as an academic study. With backed up evidences, we re talking about the textbook's references which might be wrong, not trying to play with the pathetic women.

*EasternCowboy

Compensation was completed through Asian Women's Fund with an apology letter from former PM of Japan. Except for some korean women who couldn't accept it since Korean govt and media intimidated them not to.

Congressional Research Service Memorandum, April 3, 2007

*Conclusions (an extract)

*The Asian Women's Fund appears to have been a genuine effort by the Japanese government to compensate and assist former comfort women. As discussed, several governments appeared to have accepted this by cooperating with the Asian Women's Fund.

The Japanese government appears to have a credible legal position based on the Japanese Peace Treaty, Japan's reparations agreements with several countries, and the language of the South Korea-Japan normalization treaty of 1965.

The Prime Ministers' letters state that the Prime Minister is speaking in The letters "as Prime Minister of Japan." The letters, all of which are identical in language, use the words "apology" and "apologies" and addresses these to all comfort women rather than just the recipients of the letters. Critics state that these are inadequate, but they have not detailed their reasons for considering the statements inadequate.

Japanese military may not have directly carried out the majority of recruitment, especially in Korea.

The Abe government and the Committee to Consider Japan's Future Historical Education seem to base their position largely on the situation in Korea where it appears that the majority of the recruitment of comfort women seemed to have been done by civilian recruiters who used deception and pressure on families rather than physical coercion.

An overlooked issue in much of the discussion of comfort women is whether former comfort women in allied and occupied countries had adequate freedom to decide whether to accept compensation and/or assistance from the Asian Women's Fund. It appears that they were intimidated in South Korea not to accept assistance from the Asian Women's Fund.

Despite the financial generosity of the South Korean government's own fund for former comfort women, the South Korean government and NGOs used it and other means as instruments of pressure and intimidation against Korean women who otherwise would have sought assistance from the Asian Women's Fund in 1997.

So who's giving me any single evidence on abducted "200,000" women?

We believe what we want to believe and call it truth.

I think this article is intentianally written without the main point why some Japanese got upset. The movie tells that Japanese troops ate prisoners alive and even calls it "a Japanese culture". This is wrong.

Personally I think I want to see the movie if released in Japan. She has adopted asian kids and been good at human rights movements. So I don't think she describes the war in a way that spreads hatred against todays Japanese.

Don't exaggerate the numbers. We want to know the truth. We want to know that our grandfathers really did something deserves the condemnation for 80 years.

Japanese gov doesn't claim that the scientific research is tradition. We call commercial whaling a tradition. To begin with, whale meat became unpopular after 1986 when IWC and US put a ban on Japaneses commercial whaling and whale price in market went extremely high. They do scientific whaling to gain evidences for sustanable commercial whaling.

JCP's policies sound like sweet and reasonable. However they are too ignorant and optimistic of politics like national security and economy. I mean their positions are not based in real economy and international relations. Just saying something sweet that people have good impression on. Still much better than DPJ though. They just be aginst LDP without strong belief.

Korea has no legal and moral obligation to say “Yes” to Japan’s asking to go to ICJ

In 1952 or 53? when Japan had no force to defend, Korea established a boundary on the sea of japan by force, violating international law, and killed many japanese fishermen and arrested thousands of japanese people. and they required the release of Korean criminals who were imprisoned in Japan in exchange for japanese hostage. Since then, korea has been illegally occupaying takeshima. Japan can't use armed force to take it back due to japanese constitution.

Do you think korea doesn't have to accept the offer from japan to settle the dispute "peacefully" over the ilands korea took by killing japanese people?

I think the main point of his remark is if there is proof of wrong doing, Japan will have to accept and apologize once more. And if the allies did wrong, they should also accept and apologize. No difference between winners and losers. All wrong doing must be punished. Why are you guys so upset?

Nanjing massacre is a strange incident where "300,000 people" disappeared in 9 days and left no physical evidence. Testimony must be supported with proof otherwise false charges will prevail readily. You can't achieve an impossible proof. CPC is responsible for this proof.

Don't go hysterical. It's just whale.

EthanWilber Here is an example that how American dealt with its past war crimes: on Match 16, 1968, American solders committed a terrible war crime by killing 300-500 innocent villagers from infants to elders in My Lai of Vietnam. After an initial attempt of cover-up, American Govt, finally stepped up the plate and owned it. That was it. Since 970’s there hasn’t been single American president or government officer or lawmakers who tried to deny the massacre or wanted to recount the numbers of victims for reducing the crime.

I think it's a completely different case than Japan. There was certain proof of the massacre in Vietnam and no evidence to the contrary. Fortunately, Vietnam doesn't exaggerate the numbers of its victims and not blame on America and SKorea now. Japan too has already admitted and apologized for the fact supported with the certain evidences, however, japan should stand up against obvious fabrications made up to unjustly offend Japan. That's a just right of a sovereign nation. For example,Japanese lawmakers don't deny that there was certain scale of massacre in Nanjing, but it never be the killing of "300,000" of innocent civilians. After reading the comments of foreigners here, I strongly think Japan should take action against the propaganda already wide spreaded in the international community. I hope you understand what I'm trying to say.

That's all korean wanted to hear. Good lip service.

Let japanese be japanese. Lost souls need a place to return.

mmm...agree.

Before you guys label the government as "right-wing" and " revisionist", I hope you doubt what source you are based on. This is not a matter of justice and humanity but who speaks out louder amongst the international relationships.

toshiko

They don't have to offer a bribe but votes and donations. That's what the governors really want. And yes, so true he made a respectful decision for koreans, but also true he ignored this japanese minorities in VA. Democacy often makes minorities seem less important.

Sir_Edgar

I see you. I don't care if Korean call it whatever they want in korea. But they shoudn't have to do it in the US. Immigtants shouldn't bring their home country's disputes into the US.

It is a source of intense bitterness for Koreans that the Sea of Japan was standardized worldwide while Korea was under Japanese colonial rule

And this claim sounds to me just like koreans are trying to blame on japan.

Sir_Edgar

Your remarks and research also seem one-sided. Seeing both sides not only koreans but japaneses will help enlighten you better.

http://www.mofa.go.jp/policy/maritime/japan/study-4.html

A problem won't come to its peaceful settlement on its own. They should have reliable third party to judge like the International Court of Justice.

It is a source of intense bitterness for Koreans that the “Sea of Japan” was standardized worldwide while Korea was under Japanese colonial rule.

The Japanese Government's survey of historical maps confirms that the name Sea of Japan was already prevalent at the early 19th century. Japan during the Edo Period (1603-1867) had an isolationist policy, and was unable to exercise any influence to establish the name Sea of Japan. Consequently, the ROK's assertion that the name Sea of Japan became widespread as a result of "expansionism and colonial rule" in the latter half of the 19th century is wholly invalid.

http://www.mofa.go.jp/policy/maritime/japan/

Why does China keep insisting 300,000 being killed? Is there any suppotive evidence of 300,000 bieng killed?

Our neighbours will never stop blaming. What they want is not sincere apology but money and supporting. That's all.

highball,

A large range of information is needed for the management and conservation of whales, such as population, age structure, growth rates, age of maturity, reproductive rates, feeding, nutrition and levels of contaminants. This type of important information cannot be obtained through small DNA samples or analysis of organochlorine, but only through lethal research.

There have been dozens of scientific reports and information made available to the public in brochures on the findings of the Japanese research program. The difficulty faced by the Japanese researchers is the interest of western media, who have failed to run stories in newspapers etc about the results. The results are available on http://www.icrwhale.org/eng-index.htm

The market died after 1986 when IWC and US put a ban on Japaneses commercial whaling and whale price in market went extremely high. They didn't stop eating whales by themselves but was forced to stop. Japan is an island country which depends on import for most amount of its food . If some conflicts happened between Japan and other countries and trading stopped, it couldn't feed itself. One of the reasons of research whaling is to gain evidence to prove that there are enough whales to resume whaling.