Who was more barbaric in World War II?

[dbk]

Japanese is brutal by far not only because of the extent of their carnage, but because to this day, they still refuse to admit fully to their war crimes.

It's sad. I heard that social activists movements in Japan are pretty much dead, and most of those still involved are old seniors.

The youngins must be too involved with hentai and video games to give a care.

Exactly. In Korea, all the surviving comfort women still protest every year asking for a formal apology. One by one they've been passing away.. i don't think Japan's ever going to apology. Shame!

 

[Atomic Playboy]

The Japanese were probably more barbaric; the Germans were far more efficient. For all the atrocities the Japanese did, they didn't manage to kill 6 million Chinese people assembly-line style. But there's something inherently more gruesome about detonating grenades between a few people chained to posts as opposed to gassing a room full of people.

 

[preslove]

The nazis managed to kill 20 million people in only a couple of years by building factories whose unit of production was 'death.' Mao and Stalin killed more people, but they had decades to do it. The reason why the holocaust holds such a vivid place in our cultural memory is because the nazis combined the ruthless precision of industrialization with mass slaughter, creating the most efficient mass killing, ever.

 

[unokitty]

Ultimately, there is no one answer here. And while it is important to forgive, it is also important to remember.

Nor should we forget that Curtis LeMay often spoke of being tried as a war criminal had the Japanese won the war.

Though, I can't help but notice that the Japanese have enshrined some of their war criminals at Yasukuni. To me, it seems like denial... I can understand how that would complicate the present.

Ultimately, it seems like a shades of black question. Which group had the darkest shade? Doesn't seem like there would be a single answer for that.

Uno

 

[Linflas]

The Japanese were probably more barbaric; the Germans were far more efficient. For all the atrocities the Japanese did, they didn't manage to kill 6 million Chinese people assembly-line style. But there's something inherently more gruesome about detonating grenades between a few people chained to posts as opposed to gassing a room full of people.

I guess I just don't see the difference. Too me it is equally barbaric to picture a room full of people clawing at each other and the walls as the gas pours in as it is to chain people to a post and detonate a grenade. The main difference between the Japanese and German barbarity from what I see is the Germans restricted theirs for the most part for POW's other than Russians while the Japanese felt free to inflict it on POW's and civilians alike.

 

[yllus]

Are you talking about their current history books they teach in school? 😕

No, I mean the careful record keeping of the Nazis as they went about their day to day tasks.

CBS News - Revisiting The Horrors Of The Holocaust

While the Nazis did not write down the names of those executed in the gas chambers at places like Auschwitz, they did keep detailed records of millions of others who died in the camps. Their names are listed in notebooks labeled "Totenbuch," which means "death book." The names are written here, single-spaced, in meticulous handwriting.

"Here we see the cause of death: executed. And you can see, every two minutes they shot one prisoner," Jost explains.

"So they shot a prisoner every two minutes for a little over an hour and a half?" Pelley asks.

"Yes. Now look at the date: it's the 20th of April. That was Adolf Hitler's birthday. And this was a birthday present, a gift for the Führer. That's the bureaucracy of the devil," Jost says.

The devil is in the details - the smallest details. Pelley and the 60 Minutes crew were amazed to see the Nazis kept records of head lice.

"You can see the names and numbers of each prisoner, and the amount of lice that were found," Jost says.

The Nazis couldn't have disease spreading among slave laborers. "You can see he was a perfectionist. He even put down the size of the lice. Large, small or medium-sized lice," Jost comments about the Nazi lice inspector.

Paul Shapiro helped pry open the archive. He's Director of Holocaust Studies of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington D.C.

"I'm curious. Why did the Nazis keep all these records? If they were gonna murder these people anyway, why keep the paperwork?" Pelley asks.

"Because they wanted to show they were getting the job done. So, in terms of people whose destiny was to be murdered, recording how well that was being done was very important," Shapiro explains.

 

[Printer Bandit]

the banksters who armed both sides.

 

[surfsatwerk]

The filthy rotten neutral savages of Switzerland.

 

[BoomerD]

the banksters who armed both sides.

Ah, so the Bush family...

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,100474,00.html

 

[FoBoT]

The Japanese were extraordinarily brutal, although the Germans remain the only country that's ever engaged in assembly-line style, industrialized genocide.

i agree, nothing really to add, that is about it

 

[uhohs]

Japan the government has acknowledged and apologized for their crimes and atrocities, whether it is sufficient or not is a matter of opinion. But due to the lack/failing of education and other factors such as the American policies adopted in post-war Japan, most of the public or current generation have no clue what their country did during that era. Heck, many believe Japan was the victim of American/Western aggression. :thumbsdown:

 

[NikolaeVarius]

Japan the government has acknowledged and apologized for their crimes and atrocities, whether it is sufficient or not is a matter of opinion. But due to the lack/failing of education and other factors such as the American policies adopted in post-war Japan, most of the public or current generation have no clue what their country did during that era. Heck, many believe Japan was the victim of American/Western aggression. :thumbsdown:

Japan DID bomb America due to American economic aggression.

America did not like one bit that Japan attacked Manchuria and imposed economic sanctions that included metal and oil, two key components of doing anything.

Japan did not want to go to war with America, they knew for a fact that Japan could not compete with the sheer industrial capacity that American had over the long run, and in fact going to war with America was extremely unpopular in Japan. But they felt the pinch from the economic sanctions that American imposed on them.

Simultaneously, America beefed up its pacific fleets which made Japan very cautious about the area while they also realized that it simply didn't have a choice and had to expand in order to seize oil fields to fuel their war. However, the expanded American presence in the pacific made them realize they had no way of expanding without opening themselves up to American Naval counterattack. This was when they decided that they needed to cripple the pacific fleet in order to secure their oil interests.

Oil was the reason Japan went to war with America, same reason America has started a half dozen conflicts elsewhere.

Sure Japan attacked FIRST, but Roosevelt simply pushed the delicate "don't piss of Japan but try and contain the Japanese war" a bit too far, and made the Japanese desperate to expand to gather the oil that they were cut off from. Hell, at the beginning, America didn't cut off oil BECAUSE they knew that cutting it off could incite Japanese aggression because they knew how important oil was for Japan.

 

[Linflas]

Ah, so the Bush family...

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,100474,00.html

Funny that you ignore important parts of your own link:

The documents do not show any evidence Bush directly aided that effort.

And if they did show some link that would make that Bush, not the Bush family, responsible.

 

[brainhulk]

Japan DID bomb America due to American economic aggression.

America did not like one bit that Japan attacked Manchuria and imposed economic sanctions that included metal and oil, two key components of doing anything.

Japan did not want to go to war with America, they knew for a fact that Japan could not compete with the sheer industrial capacity that American had over the long run. But they felt the pinch from the economic sanctions that American imposed on them.

Simultaneously, America beefed up its pacific fleets which made Japan very cautious about the area and realized that it simply didn't have a choice and had to expand in order to seize oil fields to fuel their war. However, the expanded American presence in the pacific made them realize they had no way of expanding without opening themselves up to American Naval counterattack. This was when they decided that they needed to cripple the pacific fleet in order to secure their oil interests.

Oil was the reason Japan went to war with America, same reason America has started a half dozen conflicts elsewhere.

Interadasting

 

[zinfamous]

Russians > Japanese ~ Nazis

 

[Raizinman]

I was really surprised you didn't list the Americans for dropping two atomic bombs on civilians. Would this be considered terrorism in todays standards? Are killing civilians OK only when you are attacked?

 

[uhohs]

Economic aggression/sanctions because of Japanese invasions and military actions in Asia. I see no problem.

 

[BurnItDwn]

I think the absolute limits of Barbarism were reached a million-fold by all participating parties in WW2.

Germany, the USSR, and Japan do take credit in the history books for their exceptionally barbaric war behavior. And I don't think I could pick a winner of this contest.

 

[uhohs]

I was really surprised you didn't list the Americans for dropping two atomic bombs on civilians. Would this be considered terrorism in todays standards? Are killing civilians OK only when you are attacked?

Hiroshima and Nagasaki were legitimate military and industrial targets. Unfortunately they had large civilian populations as well.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

The youngins must be too involved with hentai and video games to give a care.

Understandable, really.

I'd really rather jack off an play Skyrim that be forced to feel guilty about stuff my great grandparents did.

(And I'm a white american male, so there's a lot of stuff on that list...)

 

[NikolaeVarius]

Hiroshima and Nagasaki were legitimate military and industrial targets. Unfortunately they had large civilian populations as well.

They weren't chosen specifically because they were military targets, it was merely a criteria so that if the bomb didn't stop the war through sheer shock and awe, at the very least they would have done something good industrial wise.

They were done to showcase the bomb and its effect on civilians. The two cities had never been the target of any actual bombing raid and were "virgin" targets to get a before and after picture of the effect of a single bomb on a "pristine" city. It was quite definitely chosen because of its untouched civilian population.

Of course, WW2 was during an era where mass killing civilians wasn't an issue for any side during wartime. Russia, Germany, Japan may have committed atrocities against their own during the war, but everyone massacred civilians on the enemy side.

 

[JTsyo]

I guess I just don't see the difference. Too me it is equally barbaric to picture a room full of people clawing at each other and the walls as the gas pours in as it is to chain people to a post and detonate a grenade. The main difference between the Japanese and German barbarity from what I see is the Germans restricted theirs for the most part for POW's other than Russians while the Japanese felt free to inflict it on POW's and civilians alike.

From what I read the German army was pretty professional. They treated Allied POWs well other than Russians.

 

[lxskllr]

I was really surprised you didn't list the Americans for dropping two atomic bombs on civilians. Would this be considered terrorism in todays standards? Are killing civilians OK only when you are attacked?

You're always right when god's on your side ;^)

 

[zinfamous]

I think the absolute limits of Barbarism were reached a million-fold by all participating parties in WW2.

Germany, the USSR, and Japan do take credit in the history books for their exceptionally barbaric war behavior. And I don't think I could pick a winner of this contest.

/thread

 

[Linflas]

From what I read the German army was pretty professional. They treated Allied POWs well other than Russians.

That is my understanding as well, they pretty much followed whatever agreements there were in place regarding POW'S with the exception of slavs and Russians.