Spyke

Explanation For Those Wondering: The Rape of Nanjing (or Nanking) is the most notable of Japan's many atrocities during the Second Sino-Japanese War (overlapping with WW2). Don't read up on the details unless you have a strong stomach. Suffice it to say, even by the low standards of wartime, the conduct of the Japanese Empire was beyond horrific, regardless of combatant status, sex, or age.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanjing_Massacre

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feddit.org

There is much to be said about how Germany's "denazification" hasn't worked nearly as well as Germans used to claim until extremist rightwing parties got really popular again about 5-10 years ago and public opinion kinda turned on Israel. But man, Japan just completely skipped that whole thing.

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AeronMelonreply
lemmy.world

Japan effectively got a free pass because America always fancied it as a summer colony.

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chaogomureply
lemmy.world

The actual answer is that the rest of Europe had a say in denazifying Germany, and Japan was mostly left in the hands of the Dulles brothers, at least one of who was a card-carrying Nazi.

Allen Dulles, (the confirmed Nazi) was the first head of the CIA and personally pulled Kishi Nobusuke out of prison to head Japan's post-war hard-right political party/government.

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Also, Japan's surrender, while treated as total, actually came with many conditions, as Japan was still ready to resume the fight if its 'sovereignty' was treated too roughly, whereas Nazi Germany was actually defeated and occupied piece-by-piece.

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You can tell it's not an American colony because the Japanese still exist.

It's satellite state, get it right 😠

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lemmy.world

Recommend "Rape of Nanking" by Iris Chang.

Meticulously researched, the author later committed suicide. A very difficult book to finish.

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There is a copy of her suicide note on wikipedia. I almost cried. Investigating another japanese war crime from WW2 is probably too much for any human on earth

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sh.itjust.works

Would be way more cool if they took the same stance that Germany has about everything that happened. Unfortunately they haven't. Then again most aren't thrilled to openly accept atrocities of the past.

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feddit.org

same stance that Germany has about everything that happened

One of the stances that Germany adopted in response to its WW2 crimes is unconditional support of the nation state of one of its victim groups. I wouldn't recommend that.

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Yeah, that's a tricky one. I was more so just talking about the openly accepting what happened part of the story. I think that can totally be done without the unconditional support part.

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