Korean Job Discussion Forums

[stevemcgarrett]

A few months ago, PM Shinzo Abe, whose grandfather was a war criminal, made public mention that the comfort women from Korea and China were mostly prostitutes anyhow and that the Japanese military had no system of sexual slavery regardless.

This brought a huge outcry from the Koreans and Chinese, and rightly so. Military records and eyewitness testimony from all countries involved clearly indicate that a system of sexual slavery was in place and that the vast majority of the women (and girls) were not prostitutes. While questions remain about Korean complicity in this horrendous trade, there is no doubt that Chinese (and Filipina and Vietnamese) girls and women were pressed into service for the Imperial Army.

Abe later retracted his statement, but only after the backlash spelled possible economic consequences and the American government also reprimanded him.

And of course there is the longstanding denial of the genocide committed in Nanking in 1937, not to mention other locales in China, which more than a hundred members of the Diet publicly participated in.

Through all of this only a smattering of Japanese intellectuals resisted the party line, echoing the outrage from beyond the islands. For the most part, the Japanese public at large reacted with diffidence.

Now along comes the Minister of Defense, a man whose hometown is Nagasaki and who has a reputation if anything for being hawkish. He suddenly declares at Chibo University that, in essence, Japan got what it had coming to it and that the atomic bombings were inevitable given obvious Japanese military intransigence (itself well documented).

Suddenly the floodgates of indignation open in Japan. How dare he! Why the bombings were barbaric and so unnecessary. The American Left chimed in with its weak claim that the U.S. only sought a way to keep the Soviets out (although earlier their contention was that Truman wanted merely to demonstrate American prowess to Stalin). Take your pick on that score.

Fact is, the Japanese public hasn't shown such a display of emotion, such an outpouring of nationalist intent masquerading as pacifism since the North Koreans lobbed a missile over their waters.

So I ask you: are not the Japanese guilty of blatant hypocrisy in matters related to the Pacific War?

[Guri Guy]

This again?

Are Chinese and Koreans guilty of blatant hypocrisy as well? Everyone has blood on their hands in Northeast Asia.

Let the Chinese and Koreans deal with the Sexual slavery going on in North Korea and North East China in the present first before they condemn anyone else. Moral bankruptcy comes to mind.

[Ilsanman]

Steve, Steve, Steve, Steve

Don't you get tired of sounding like a broken record?

Steve, you admitted to being biased and having a personal vendetta against Japan, for what they did to someone in your family. It's time to give it a rest. You basically say that Japan has no credibility. I think you have about the same amount.

If it needs to be proven again, when Abe made the 1st comment about comfort women, he was misquoted by an American journalist. Maybe that journalist didn't understand Japanese properly, or maybe he/she did it on purpose.

[Guri Guy]

Here's a good article by Katharine H.S. Moon.

'Holier Than Thou Politics of Comfort Women Apology': This Should Be Primarily About the Treatment of Women

Critics of Abe and other Japanese conservatives blame Tokyo for playing a disingenuous round of "apology diplomacy," which amounts to a decade or so of various Japanese leaders bowing deeply and stating soberly that Japan had indeed made mistakes in the recent past and hurt a lot of people with its imperialistic ambitions around Asia.

But if disingenuousness were a sin, Americans, Koreans, Chinese and others should not turn a blind eye to their own misdeeds. Who here hath no sin that he should cast the first stone? Although Korean and other Asian women suffered the abuses of the comfort system most severely, Japanese government officials weren't the only ones who had a hand in it.

Korean civilians served as human traffickers, pimps and overseers for the system of sexual slavery instituted by the Japanese military. One could argue that such people were also coerced, but we do not have good evidence that individual Asians, except the Japanese, bear no guilt. Also, Korean men fought as soldiers in the Japanese military, and some of them certainly knew about the plight of their female compatriots. Yet, that did not stop them from regarding the women as mere prostitutes and soiled goods.

Rep. Eni Faleomavaega, chairman of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, may be correct that "nowhere in recorded history has the U.S. military as a matter of policy issued a directive for the coercion of young women in to sexual slavery." But records of Americans in uniform who regularly oversaw and maintained numerous versions of the sex industry for U.S. troops in Korea, Okinawa, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam certainly do exist. I have seen some with my own eyes.

Regrettably, comfort women politics serves as an occasion for mutual nationalist bashing and counterbashing rather than an opening for governments and people around the world to engage sincerely in the quest for what might constitute and advance women's human rights and the protection of civilians during wartime.

The Japanese system of sexual slavery was first and foremost an atrocity perpetrated on women, not nations. Often, these were women of lower classes or women underprotected in some way by their own people. And whether they were Korean or Dutch or South Pacific Islander, their bodies, minds and souls hurt equally. This applies also to the tens of thousands of Japanese women who were forced or deceived into the military sex system. Their silence -- and the lack of international advocacy on their behalf -- is most striking.

Japanese leaders need to get over the nasty domestic politics of its wartime past. Not only is that necessary for better relations with its Asian neighbors (and possibly the United States). It is also necessary as a way to fulfill the duties of elected office. A recent poll taken this winter by a major Japanese daily shows how out of touch Abe is with his own people: Unlike Abe, only 6.2 percent of respondents regard the push for the reform of the Japanese constitution (and through it, renewed nationalism) as a national priority. But 62 percent want government leadership on reforms related to pensions, health care and social security. The Japanese people as a whole are not eager nationalists, but they do want to improve their country.

Finally, Japanese leaders need to figure out how to keep their word-a virtue still respected by Asians--and hence, national credibility. Official apologies once pronounced, can't simply be revoked.

http://www.nautilus.org/fora/security/07029Moon.html

[Guri Guy]

Modern-Day Comfort Women:
The U.S. Military, Transnational Crime,
and the Trafficking of Women

http://www.uri.edu/artsci/wms/hughes/modern_day_comfort_women.pdf

Give that a read please.

[stevemcgarrett]

No one forced you two to post on this thread, did they?

But thanks for revealing once again your obvious inability to come to grips with Japan's horrific war time record and the continued efforts by many to whitewash it.

This thread is different in that my accusation is directed at the Japanese public at large. Some have suggested that only ultranationalists condone denial of the Imperial past.

The swift and unequivocal reaction of so many Japanese to their own Defense Minister's passing public remarks seems to me to speak volumes of where their concerns really lie. It's simply not enough to respond that as Japanese they would of course focus on perceived wrongs committed against Japanese.

Indeed, if they are the pacifists they claim to be they should be clamoring to get to the mic to denounce Abe (who did not misspeak and who, despite whatever mistranslation was clearly being disingenuous).

But, no, you remain the perennial apologists.

And for the record, I felt as strongly about this utter hypocrisy long before I had a personal stake in it, so you'll need to find another tactic to dismiss my concerns.

For a nation that claims democracy, it sure has trouble getting its history right in its own school textbooks. It's shameful but not as shameful as the extent to which the Diet has avoided full national responsibility.

I've spent time in Japan. You ought to spend more time in China. It might open your eyes if not your hearts.

[Guri Guy]

Oh, and if you were wondering why the whole Comfort women issue came up after almost 50 years of silence... Interesting discussion on this forum here:

[Guri Guy]

Whatever Mr Garrett. Your naive view that Chinese and Korean history are correct and Japanese history has been changed and corrupted leads to only one obvious conclusion.

I don't deny that the Japanese were brutal in World War 2. War is hell. They have apologized countless times and paid enormous compensation.

As far as comfort women go, I feel that Korea isn't telling the whole truth about it's colonial past. It's not a cut and dry issue. I am not saying Japan is totally innocent here but Korea certainly played a large role in this too.
Such as 90% of the agents (aka pimps) that procured these women in Korea being Korean. Koreans selling out Koreans. Koreans kidnapping Koreans. Koreans using debt slavery to sexually enslave Koreans. It's no wonder that Korea keeps yelling at Japan. If they took the time to truly look at their own past they feel a deep unrelenting shame.

Once again, there is no evidence that 200,000 Korean women were sex slaves. The numbers were drastically lower in the order of maybe 4,000. Most of these were prostitutes. Korea has many now and Korea had many back in the 1930's and 1940's too. Were some kidnapped or tricked or deceived into sexual slavery by Korean or Japanese pimps? I have no doubt about that. I feel that that was a small minority of the cases.


Here's are a few good takes on the situation. I generally agree with this line of thinking:

Sexual slavery continues to exist in Korea today with the tacit approval of government officials and police, so it is very probable that it also existed during Korea�s colonial period. Some women may have been deceived and some women may have been forced, but not all Korean women were deceived or forced, just as not all of the prostitutes in Korea today are deceived or forced. If Korean women were forced, then why were their families paid money?

I think the Japanese have acknowledged much more than Koreans have in regard to their actions during the China and Pacific Wars. Koreans strongly supported Japan in the wars, but the message in Korea�s textbooks is that they resisted her. Koreans cannot really be blamed for such a having such a message since the allies essentially encouraged her to make such claims.

The Allies wanted to break up the Japanese empire at the end of the war and essentially gave Koreans two options. One was to be acknowledged as an ally to Japan and be included among the defeated. The other option was to claim that they were forced to be ally to Japan, in which case, they would be given an opportunity for independence and freedom. Koreans cannot really be blamed for choosing the second option, but the problem is that over the past sixty years, they have convinced themselves that they really were the victims of Japan and are now demanding apologies and compensation for things that the Japanese do not remember having forced on them.

If the Koreans had simply counted their blessing and kept quiet, leaving the past in the past, then there would probably be little conflict today. But if Korea insists on opening up that can of worms, then the truth of Korea�s support of Japan will eventually come out.

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[Ilsanman]

In a slavery issue, one side is rarely totally innocent.

It's no different than the African slave issue from several moons ago. The black Africans were sold out by their own. Though everyone blames the American slave owners, both sides were partially to blame.

It's been shown time and time again that Koreans were in on it at the same time as the Japanese. But we have to blame the Japanese 100%. Why? Because they wronged Steve's ancestors.


And Steve, I admitted in a different thread that Guri Guy and I are friends. He told me you were sounding like a broken record and posting more Anti-Japanese banter, so I replied.

[koon_taung_daeng]

ive read somewhere that the only reason the japanese have not publicy apologized for all of the atrocities is because then they would be liable and be open to international law suits and other crap. we should have invaded them soviet style and pillaged the shit out of them

[stevemcgarrett]

To the Tokyo Twins:

[Guri Guy]

[Guri Guy]

In order to set a good precedent and lead by example (in order to show the evil Japanese the true light) I suggest starting with:

That China cease their genicidal practices in Tibet and Western China.
Koreans do something about the sexual slavery of their own people.

Then and only then will they have the moral authority to compain about past Japanese transgressions.

[Ilsanman]

You know, in a lot of these cases, the more advanced country carries more of the world's responsibility and blame, as they are expected to know better.

So Steve, are you acknowleding that the Japanese are higher than Koreans or Chinese? You chastize the Japanese, but no one else. I guess the poor ignorant Koreans and Chinese didn't know what they were doing when they sold out their own.

[stevemcgarrett]

One of the Tokyo Twins wrote: