Comments on: Excellent rebuttal of Tamogami in Asahi — but not on the Internet

By: Roy Berman

Roy Berman — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 03:00:47 +0000

Thanks Mozu! I hadn’t seen that paper before but I’ll definitely read through it some time.

By: mozu

mozu — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 21:09:00 +0000

a bit off topic
Some readers of this blog may have already known, but I think this research on “net-uyoku” should be well known to those interested in J-cyberpolitics. Its results confirm my impressions, although its methode seems to have a certain limit.

http://d-tsuji.com/paper/r04/index.htm

By: Roy Berman

Roy Berman — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 09:18:56 +0000

We've definitely long passed the point where anyone could realistically say that there is any "amnesia" about the Nanjing Massacre. I doubt you can find anyone out there who hasn't at least heard of it (at least anyone who would care), and most discussions of the Nanjing Massacre degenerate into an attempt to assign symbolism. Coincidentally, I just ran across this article on the Nanjing Massacre by Richard Bush (no relation to the current president, I think) who is rumored to be the Obama administration's advisor on Taiwan strait issues. His breakdown seems pretty fair to me, and has the tone of someone going out of his way to be diplomatic (i.e. noone is unilaterally to blame, the situation is at fault more than any of the parties)- a skill that will turn out very useful if the rumor is correct.

By: Aceface

Aceface — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 04:15:21 +0000

“After all, this was not the Nazis, who used IBM punch-card proto-computers to keep track of each victim.”

Yeah,but Roy,Japanese troops had it’s internal combat records of confirmed kills.
Besides,the number isn’t the real issues.The issue is it’s been reported over and over again that Japanese had never acknowledged the massacre itself.It’s in the textbook,it’s in the newspaper,and over dozens of books had been published on the issues.

Anybody read Chalmers Johnson’s “Peasant Nationalism and Communist Power”?
How about John Dower’s “Empire and the Aftermat:Yoshida Shigeru and Japanese experience 1878-1954”?The former is a book about Japanese military’s search and destroy mission in the rural area helped Chinese peasant adopting Chinese nationalism and communist leadership in the 30’s.The latter is unauthorized biography of Yoshida Shigeru and focused heavily on Yoshida’s consul days in Mukden being a strong supporter of aggressive policy of the army about the same time.Yet as I checked the index of both works,there were no word of “Nanjing massacre”.Considering both Dower and Johnson are both highly critical of “Japanese historiocal amnesia”,I found this rather odd.But then again,Nanjing Massacre became a hot issues in the mid 80’s.Maybe it just wasn’t the flavor of the month at the time of publication.

By: M-Bone

M-Bone — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 00:36:31 +0000

“when records are so sketchy it’s unlikely that a remotely accurate number will ever be produced.”

The unfortunate thing is, that until the Chinese side acknowledges this and drops the clearly impossible idea that 350,000 civilians were killed in a period of three weeks just in the city of Nanking and its immediate vicinity, guys like Tamogami are not going anywhere.

What to do?

By: Roy Berman

Roy Berman — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 14:20:05 +0000

OK, I looked again at the Ikeda blog post now. I must admit that my initial response was based on Adam’s use of the word “overblown”, and I was thinking more of the arguments saying that the massacre never happened, or just isn’t worth talking about, as opposed to “overblown” in the sense that the numbers have been inflated. It is certainly valid to say that numbers may have been inflated or deflated by one side or the other, but when records are so sketchy it’s unlikely that a remotely accurate number will ever be produced. After all, this was not the Nazis, who used IBM punch-card proto-computers to keep track of each victim.

By: mozu

mozu — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 07:30:20 +0000

You can find brief comments by Mr. Hata and Mr. Koketsu in Mainichi. Mr. Koketsu is a liberal historian on civilian control.

http://mainichi.jp/select/jiken/news/20081113mog00m040020000c.html
http://mainichi.jp/select/jiken/news/20081113mog00m040021000c.html

Although his opinion is different from me in several points, I don’t find Ikda’s argument in this post weak, too. It’s both leftwingers and rightwingers who don’t respect the academic arguments and engage in political mythmaking by using the past. This kind of attitude contributes solely to eternalize the history problem and instabilize the regional order.

By: Jade Oc

Jade Oc — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 18:18:53 +0000

I think we should take a fairly restrictive view of the Massascre scope, not because I’m actually a right-wing Japanese pundit, but because the most visceral imagery is from the civilian rapes and deaths following the occupation rather than the various killings (even if dodgy, like that “kill a hundred gooks” thing the newspapaers either palyed up or made up) leading to it. Otherwise we get to admitting that quarter of a million were killed and people thinking that was just the civilian deaths in a few weeks after the fighting was done.

By: Aceface

Aceface — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 19:25:54 +0000

I don’t find Ikda’s argument weak.I thought he summed it all up pretty nicely.
Although I found his argument on Asahi is pretty old-fashioned.

“Note that on Tuesday Taiwan’s legislature voted unanimously on a resolution seeking apology and redress from Japan.”

Not particulary a surprise.Taiwan isn’t pro-Japan.They are just Pro-Taiwan.
And current Ma administration is the most anti-Japanese regime in the past two decades.
Added to that Japan bashing is the only way to bridge political polaraization here in East Asian democracy.It happened in Hong Kong in 1997 over the Senkakus and recently South Korea had used the Takeshima to swtich off the anti-American sentiment over American beef import.
Plus you lose nothing by demanding foreign government to kow-tow when you know the ither side won’t kick you back.It gives you the feeling of moral superiority for free.Taiwan was under Japanese hands for over half century.I don’t see any problem seeing Taiwanese doing what we had allowed American/Canadian/Dutch congress did.

By: Roy Berman

Roy Berman — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 12:41:30 +0000

“his criticisms of the Asahi approach to say, Nanking (in the above linked post but mostly elsewhere) are at least worthy of response by the Asahi. The Asahi, for example, has firmly decided to stick with a death toll of around 250,000. Not all historians are comfortable with anything near this level.”
My understanding of the figures are pretty similar to yours. The problem isn’t so much a matter of numbers as defining the scope of what can be considered “The Nanjing Massacre” and what is the bloody campaign leading up to it. Anyone who mentions casualty numbers should also specify which they are referring to.