Originally Posted By Mr X Over on the "Tokyo favorite attractions" topic, Barboy recommended (and I would certainly second) the Yasukuni War Museum. I had some thoughts I wanted to discuss, but rather than take that thread too off topic I thought I'd start a new one for discussion. I'm guessing this might only be a three way conversation since afaik only three frequent posters here have visited, but hopefully others have and can chime in, or even chime in if they have yet to visit with thoughts or observations. First, here's my original reply to Barboy... ***Having recently taken your advice and visited that museum BB, I must say it was a very interesting experience. I enjoyed the details of the exhibits (seeing an actual Emperor's War outfit, one I'd actually seen pics of in a history book, was very cool), and I would recommend it to Tokyo travelers (particularly during cherry blossom season) along with the nearby shrine. However, it had a distinctly jingoistic bias and I really don't think that can be ignored (the bias was so strong as to become propaganda and misinformation in some cases), so the place is not to be taken seriously. But yes, it's certainly not something to be missed in any case. It obviously represents a side of Japan that we rarely see (in public, anyway). Interestingly, nearly all the Japanese folks I mentioned this to had no idea that a museum at that War Shrine even existed!*** A few other thoughts I had after posting included pointing out that the museum seems to pick and choose carefully which exhibits they feel like offering any English explanation of. There were vast swaths of exhibit displays that omitted any commentary in English, and I couldn't be sure but it seemed to be some of the more controversial topics (for example, the entire display concerning the Tokyo war crimes trials, which through other sources I've come to believe the curators of this museum view as a sham trial, was offered up entirely in Japanese with no explanations in English whatsoever. And one GLARING omission was clear going through the museum. Referred to as the "Korean problem", but never explained (at least not in English!), I noticed that although many other historical events were portrayed in detail, they seemed to skip over entirely the events that resulted in Japan occupying Korea in the first place. There was plenty of info pre-Korea and post-Korea, but apparently they simply ended up in the country through no significant events at all. I found that interesting. Thoughts?
Originally Posted By Mr X Here's a snippet of what wikipedia has to say about the beginnings of said "Korean problem", I can sort of see why they wanted to leave that part out. ***In January 1876, following the Meiji Restoration, Japan employed gunboat diplomacy to pressure Korea to sign the Treaty of Ganghwa, an unequal treaty,[2] which opened three Korean ports to Japanese trade and granted extraterritorial rights to Japanese citizens. The rights granted to Japan under the treaty were similar to those granted western powers in Japan following the visit of Commodore Perry*** What I find even more interesting about this, is that at the museum they spend some time complaining about the unfairness of the West when THEY showed up to "force" Japan to trade. And yet here we are only a couple of decades later and Japan is doing the very same thing (though skipping over it in their "history" museum). History is so cool.
Originally Posted By barboy2 I would love to contribute so much more but I'm afraid that I have forgotten many specifics about the museum. I have only been but one time(Jan. '08) and I spent maybe 2-3 hrs there. I remember it having two levels, a seated theater showing a film about pre 1900's warfare and mobilization, a hall plastered with photos of Japanese soldiers, weapons like: swords, rifles, machine guns, canons and siege artillery. I also remember something super interesting: "underwater Kamikaze"(that's my name for them anyway) to defend against the imminent attack on the mainland during WW2 Japan's war department planned to equip soldiers with a dive-suit/scuba/underwater helmet and a pike with a powerful charge or explosive at the end of it........as opposed to doing a Kamikaze/aerial suicide attack the idea was that each diver would wait underwater and as the allies approach the shoreline the diver would poke the boats from underneath with those long poles and blow them up.........those dive-suits and pikes were on display. TOTALLY COOL TO SEE!
Originally Posted By trekkeruss I haven't been to that museum. But I watch a lot of Japanese programming on NHK World, and I'm also actively looking for other shows on TV about Japan. Frequently, when WWII is mentioned, and especially about Hiroshima and Nagasaki, there seems to be this bent that Japan was a vicim. They like to talk about how horrific the bombings were and how it must never be allowed to happen again, all while seemingly ignoring the events leading up to them. They even talk about how people are still dying from the bombings. That's a bit of a stretch, IMO. Kamikaze is treated in a similar fashion. These young men and boys are honored as heroes defending their country, as if the west was the first aggressor in the war. It's all a bit disturbing.
Originally Posted By SuperDry <<< Frequently, when WWII is mentioned, and especially about Hiroshima and Nagasaki, there seems to be this bent that Japan was a vicim. They like to talk about how horrific the bombings were and how it must never be allowed to happen again, all while seemingly ignoring the events leading up to them. >>> Yep. The victim mentality regarding the atomic bombings is very strong, especially in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It wasn't too many years ago that the then-mayor of Nagasaki said something about Japan needing to consider its part of the responsibility for the bombings as a result of what it did during the war - he was promptly shot, which is amazing in itself in a country with essentially no guns and no gun violence. <<< They even talk about how people are still dying from the bombings. That's a bit of a stretch, IMO. >>> Yep. There's an official registry of atomic bombing victims, and it gets added to each year. These days, I'm not sure how they determine who is eligible. Survivors are at least 65, assuming they were just born at the time of the bombings. Let's say you have a group of 80 year olds that were in Nagasaki at the time of the bombings, and based on statistical norms, you'd expect 10 of them to die of a certain kind of cancer this year. Instead, 20 die. Assuming this sort of pattern continues over time, you can probably assume that the extra 10 were due to the bombings, but which 10? How can you possibly know? If you selected 10 at random, the other 10 are going to feel left out (since they are equally likely to actually be the victims). But if you add all 20 to the official register, you end up over-stating the number of victims. Having said all that, it's probably true that there are still victims dying of the atomic bombings. Statistics can support this undeniably (well, at least they *could* support it if the phenomenon exists, and I assume that it does although I don't know for sure). Regardless of the quibbles of who gets added to the official victim's register, I think the point remains the same: There's a special nature to atomic warfare that affects people for decades to come and this makes it different than other forms of warfare, even other forms of WMD, and the world collectively needs to always keep this in mind.
Originally Posted By SuperDry I was with Mr X when he went to the Yasukuni War Museum last month. It was definitely a very interesting experience. They said "allow 90 minutes" for your visit, but we were there for almost 3 hours and I felt that that was the minimum amount of time needed to see all the exhibits. And, that's considering that maybe only 20% of the signage is in English. If you could read Japanese and wanted to take in everything, it would take a whole day to do so. <<< Frequently, when WWII is mentioned, and especially about Hiroshima and Nagasaki, there seems to be this bent that Japan was a vicim. >>> That was one of the most surprising parts of the museum. I was expecting an extensive section on the bombings, and having the victim mentality turned up to 11. Instead, the entirety of the bombings were covered in a single paragraph of at most 4 sentences. There may have been a single picture accompanying the text, but I'm not even sure of that. In short, it was exactly the opposite treatment of the atomic bombings than I would have expected. After giving it some thought, a few things come to mind: for one, although it was straw that broke the camel's back, I think that most people felt that the war had been lost for a couple of years by that point. How, when, and where the war would be officially declared a loss and would end was yet to be determined, but most people accepted that it was inevitable by that point, and would have happened anyway even if there had been no atomic bombs. So in that sense, it's not nearly as important as for example the Battle of Midway, or what lead up to the war. So in that sense, there was no victim mentality in any of the exhibits, which was refreshing. Although, it was made quite clear that WWII was all America's fault. I hadn't known that before
Originally Posted By SuperDry <<< ***In January 1876, following the Meiji Restoration, Japan employed gunboat diplomacy to pressure Korea to sign the Treaty of Ganghwa, an unequal treaty,[2] which opened three Korean ports to Japanese trade and granted extraterritorial rights to Japanese citizens. The rights granted to Japan under the treaty were similar to those granted western powers in Japan following the visit of Commodore Perry*** >>> Oh bulls***. Do you suppose that the Yasukuni War Shrine as a department of people that update the English Wikipedia articles that are relevant to the museum? Did the US occupy Japan as a result of Commodore Perry's visit? Were Japanese public schools all switched over to English, and the citizens forced to take on American names? Were Japanese citizens forcibly relocated to America when extra labor was needed for the next war? Jeesh.
Originally Posted By SuperDry The "Korean Problem" was not the only new vocabulary I learned that day. Perhaps the biggest one was the "Greater East Asia War." They never referred to World War II by name, but instead treated it as if it was just part of this larger Greater East Asia War. It was confusing at first. By the end, I think we figured it out: The Greater East Asia War started in the late 1800's with the Sino-Russia war, and ended in the 1970's with the end of the Vietnam War. Basically, this Greater East Asia War consisted of a continuous effort by Japan of taking on the noble role of protecting the entire region from outside imperialistic forces. They invaded and occupied Korea in 1905 to protect it from Russia and China. Then, they wanted to expand their military influence to include all of southeast Asia to kick the English, French, and the United States out of their colonial possessions in the region and return them to "local" control. Although, it's not clear to me how "local" the control would be, considering that they kept Korea under strict occupation for 40 years that ended only when Japan surrendered to the US. Finally, the Greater East Asian War ended when the US pulled out of Vietnam and the former French colony was finally returned to local control. So I guess in that sense, the war was a success, as all of the nations in the region are more or less independent these days. But something tells me that this would have happened anyway, due to the global progression of events, and that Japan's motivations in WWII were "not quite" as noble as was portrayed in the museum. <<< History is so cool. >>> Isn't it? They come to such different conclusions from the same set of facts. Often, when there are disputed version of history, the two sides will have a completely different set of facts, with it sometimes being obvious that one side is just making stuff up (like with North Korea's version of things). But in this case, there really weren't individual facts that could be disputed - just an overall different take on things. Just consider how the various groups around the world that use violence to achieve a political goal are considered either "terrorists" or "freedom fighters" depending on whether or not the US supports them.
Originally Posted By trekkeruss <<the entirety of the bombings were covered in a single paragraph of at most 4 sentences.>> <<there was no victim mentality in any of the exhibits, which was refreshing. Although, it was made quite clear that WWII was all America's fault>> It sounds to me like collective and selective amnesia, that the losing of the war is too shameful to admit.
Originally Posted By SuperDry <<< It sounds to me like collective and selective amnesia, that the losing of the war is too shameful to admit. >>> I had a Japanese person tell me that this was one of the "problems" with the nation's collective memory and history of WWII: it was the first and only war that Japan lost, and that there was a certain amount of shame and embarrassment that went along with this.
Originally Posted By Mr X ^--actually Russ, another aspect of that SD and I pondered on that day was the notion that this particular museum has a very pro-war, neocon sort of vibe to it...and thus might look upon the usage of an atom bomb very differently. We discussed the possibility that perhaps they actually held a grudging respect for the use of the bomb, or at least wouldn't consider it "unfair play" in the sense that many people do. After all, we've just listened to years of neocon rhetoric about the virtues of torture (said with utter sincerity) and the Yasukuni folks certainly don't view kamikaze tactics as anything to be ashamed of (in fact, there was a reverent "special exhibit" dedicated to those suicide pilots). Using "the bomb" is certainly in line with that notion of justifiable, all-out war. Besides, they didn't lose the war anyway Russ. See "Greater East Asia War" for further info.
