WW2 Japanese Military Brutality Explained

I'm Japanese, and I can tell you that there is great emphasis on educating people about the atomic bombing in my country – on how "inhumane and atrocious" it was – but little to no effort at all on the crimes that our own people have committed. And if I were to ever promote videos of this kind to my people, I will be called a "traitor".

You wanna to know the difference between German and Japanese wartime atrocities? Germany very much remembers and does everything it can to avoid them in the future while Japan pretends they never even happened

If you surrendered, they tortured and killed you for being a coward. If you put up a tremendous fight, they tortured and killed you in revenge for the casualties you inflicted on them. Samurai honor my tail. I have seen many documentaries and specials on the Pacific Theater, including interviews with Japanese WWII veterans. Unlike the German and Italian WWII veterans, the Japanese veterans to a man seem to have only one regret - that they lost.

Japanese military: Surrender is a massive shame. Japanese emperor: We Surrender. Japanese military: Fuck!.

I had two Japanese roommates in college (in the US). One day I was watching a documentary on the Bataan death march with one of them (the nicest person you will ever find), who watched it with his mouth open - He had never heard a thing in his life about Japanese atrocities in WWII. It is wrong to blame people for the sins of their ancestors - none of us would be spared - but the whitewashing of WWII history in Japan is nothing short of shameful.

>video explaining Japanese war crimes >it’s over an hour long Makes sense

When I was a kid, I was told by someone who fought in the war. "Anything they tell you about the Germans, the Japanese did and did worse." (Something along those lines anyway).

My aunt told me about how she missed being killed in a massacre of Filipino civilians in Banga, Aklan. She said that during the early part of the war the Japanese entered the town where she lived which was Banga in the province of Aklan in the Philippines. The Japanese ordered the population to gather at the town square. She ignored the order saying she had no interest in seeing the Japanese. The hundreds who showed up were then gunned down and beheaded by the Japanese. Today you can see a memorial set up in memory of the victims of that massacre in the middle of the town square.

I had the privilege of knowing one of the American warriors who were caged, couldn't stand, couldn't stretch out resulting in his legs being permanently damaged. He cheerfully said he never had a bad day after liberation, that he had a reference point of what a bad day was.

There is saying in Indonesia "350 years under European occupation was nothing compared to 5 years of Japanese occupation." And European occupation was cruel ..

Dad was USN Pacific. Later in life told a few stories. After island hopping, Said only thing that kept him from absolute hatred of all Japanese was meeting one Japanese POW after war formally ended. His group of sailors were doing island patrols. Day after day of losing buddies to attacks after war was "over" , guarding the few POWs was not a favored task. But he talked to one soldier who eventually told him he had attended UCLA. Dad, son of Georgia sharecropper said, "He spoke better English than I did!" This captive explained a simplified version of the Bushido code. Also said he had to enter the army, but knew once US got in there was no hope of winning. Dad was glad he met one person whom he could sort of understand. And actually was glad it kept him from a life of total bitterness. Always said, " they looked at life different than we did." Had no use for most goings Asian all his life, but at least saw there were still some with whom we could relate. Long entry - sorry. My way of showing appreciation for my first hero. I am sure we never knew the worst he saw.

My now deceased grandfather fought as part of the Australian Imperial Forces on the island of Borneo and by the grace of god he wasn’t captured or killed despite being in the midst of heavy battle at times. So many men never made it home nor did so many nurses. I feel so fortunate to have inherited his service medals. Worth more to me than any money in the world as he was my hero for as long as I can remember. This audiobook has given me more context of the Japanese war machine than I’ve heard or seen before and as the descendant of a WW2 vet I truly thank you.

When I was an undergraduate in the early 80s there were a few Japanese students. One of the techs simply vanished when any of them entered the room. I found out that he had been a PoW, captured in Singapore and he actually had to go and vomit when he saw them. I'll never forget that. He was a sweet gentle man.

as a 12year old school boy, i had a teacher who had been a POW of the japanese, they had slit his cheek flesh on both sides of his lips, and forced sand into the two wounds, destroying the nerves which had allowed him to smile, i'll never forget that man

My Great Uncle was captured by the Japanese and was kept captive until wars end. He couldn't eat or travel anywhere because his stomach was so damaged. Sometimes he could manage a really thin soup that my Grandma made for him, but that was only once a week. But mainly he couldn't eat at all.

Several of my father's relatives served in the British Indian Army and universally despised the Japanese for their extremely cruel treatment of defeated enemy soldiers and non-combatant enemies. My father worked in the Philippines when I was a kid and tales of Japanese cruelty are part of the history and lore of that place and many others. The rest of Asia will never forget what Japan did. Better kawaii and otaku than murderous bushi. Modern Japan's refusal to take responsibility for WW2 is infuriating and terrifying in equal measure.

My grandmother was from the Philippines. Some of the stories she would tell about what the Japanese did to her and her family was unfathomable. To this day she has 3 portraits of MacArthur in her house. To many Filipino’s of that time he was and still is a hero.

I went to a private school in Japan and my teacher was the grandchild of survivors from Nanking. We learned stuff the japanese public school curriculum wouldn't dare teach. God forbid we really learn about our history.

My grandmother told me that when she was young, during the time the Japanese occupied Vietnam in WW2, 3 times that a group of Japanese soldiers used the people of her village as "animals for hunting". Her village was less than a kilometer from the forest, so every time words the Japanese soldiers were coming, anyone that could run went to the forest as fast as they could, they had some men and young teens act as scout forces and good runners in every team to make it back to the village fast (It was a hilly area with lots of vegetation, their village was covered up good). If young women did not run they will likely get taken by the soldiers or worse killed, the soldiers knew this and often went into the forest to hunt them with swords or bayonets. My Grandmother was a small kid at the time so she often used mud to cover her body and hide underneath them, she said that she hadn't got a close encounter with one of the soldiers but many of the children around her age (most below 12) and villagers had never made it back to the village. I asked how did the Japanese soldiers react when they arrived at a village that was almost empty and only occupied by old people that was too old to run? She said that the only reason why they were probably alive was that the soldiers used their village for fun. If they killed too many they can't go back the next day to have fun again. Also, they probably did not use bullets because it was wasteful on "rats". I also asked did anyone tried to fight back or killed any soldiers in the forest, because they were also men who ran with them to protect their families. She said that the village chief heard a tale of a village that fought back and injured a Japanese soldier quite heavily and a few days later, most of the villagers got gunned down and burned during the near evening. What made it worst was the randomness of the 3 times, the First one was bad, and the second was terrible because they arrived in the morning instead of the afternoon (She is eternally grateful for the men that stood guard for almost 24 hours every day). You could imagine the pressure and dread after the second time because you won't know for sure when they gonna come. They came at night for the third time, luckily they managed to spot the bastards and ran before they arrived at the village. 1/3 of the elders got killed and the rest did not know how they managed to survive. After that group of soldiers left, many groups operated near their village but none had bothered her village much, probably thanks to the fact the village was pretty far from other population centers. After the day of Independence (2/9/1945), their family moved to a bigger town in the southern areas. I still love her and remember her stories even years after her death. She never told me what she thinks about Japanese soldiers or people, but my mom said that she thinks them as a bunch of crazy sadists.

I have a friend who married a Japanese woman. So he learned to speak fluent Japanese. But being a white man of very tall stature, he didn’t look like someone who could speak Japanese. He told me that although the Japanese people today act like they are pacifists, they still are very aggressive if they don’t think that anyone can understand what they are saying. According to my friend, who heard and understood what they were saying, “If you put a dozen Japanese in a group and throw in a rifle, they think they can take over the world!”