MrV
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December 7th, 2016 at 8:10:24 AM permalink
75 years ago today, the Japanese attacked the American fleet at Pearl Harbor.



Never forget.
"What, me worry?"
Joeman
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December 7th, 2016 at 9:08:32 AM permalink
A date which will live in infamy. Indeed.

The father of my sister's best friend in high school was actually on the USS Arizona that day. He was in one of the 16" gun turrets. The turret itself wasn't hit, but the turret door was damaged and would not open. He escaped by climbing through one of the gun barrels!

Another story that he told was that right after the war ended, the Navy was taking sailors by train to survey the site of the nuclear blast at Hiroshima. He was scheduled to go on the trip, but he and his buddy were screwing around in Tokyo and ended up missing the train. Needless to say, everyone on board that train would eventually die of radiation poisoning.
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DRich
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December 7th, 2016 at 9:45:53 AM permalink
Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor? Hell no.
At my age, a "Life In Prison" sentence is not much of a deterrent.
bobbartop
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December 7th, 2016 at 10:17:42 AM permalink
Quote: DRich

Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor? Hell no.




Operation Keelhaul

"The author Nikolai Tolstoy described the scene of Americans returning to the internment camp after delivering a shipment of people to the Soviet authorities: "The Americans returned to Plattling visibly shamefaced. Before their departure from the rendezvous in the forest, many had seen rows of bodies already hanging from the branches of nearby trees."

"Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn called this operation "the last secret of World War II."

(wikipedia)
'Emergencies' have always been the pretext on which the safeguards of individual liberty have been eroded.
RogerKint
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December 7th, 2016 at 11:35:28 AM permalink
Quote: MrV



Never forget.



Why not?
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MrV
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December 7th, 2016 at 12:58:44 PM permalink
Quote: RogerKint

Why not?





Seriously?

"Why not?"

If you have to ask ...
"What, me worry?"
RogerKint
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December 7th, 2016 at 1:07:08 PM permalink
Lol I mean, I feel like forgiving and forgetting is the best course of action here. I'm supposed to hate Japanese people forever cause my grandfather fought them in the Pacific? Don't we ask blacks and natives to kindly forget the evils we whities have done?
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MathExtremist
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December 7th, 2016 at 2:30:17 PM permalink
Quote: RogerKint

Lol I mean, I feel like forgiving and forgetting is the best course of action here. I'm supposed to hate Japanese people forever cause my grandfather fought them in the Pacific? Don't we ask blacks and natives to kindly forget the evils we whities have done?

That's not what "never forget" means. Equivalent to your interpretation of Pearl Harbor day would be the interpretation that Jews should hate German people forever when remembering the Holocaust.

Forgive but don't forget.
-- Tupac

Yes, I just quoted Tupac.
"In my own case, when it seemed to me after a long illness that death was close at hand, I found no little solace in playing constantly at dice." -- Girolamo Cardano, 1563
MrV
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December 7th, 2016 at 4:04:12 PM permalink
In the realm of war, forgiveness is a relative thing.

Here, the Japanese took a shot and ultimately got their asses nuked, irradiated, and handed back to them.

I for one will never turn my back on the Japanese or the Germans: both were and still are "hungry for power."

WWII marked our ascent to being a major power; we must fend off all challengers.

Smile and nod at the Japanese and Germans, but "just to be safe" we'd be well advised to watch our back and to keep a knife and a gun close at hand.

It's not a question of hate; it is one of trust.
"What, me worry?"
RogerKint
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December 7th, 2016 at 5:10:03 PM permalink
Quote: MathExtremist

That's not what "never forget" means. Equivalent to your interpretation of Pearl Harbor day would be the interpretation that Jews should hate German people forever when remembering the Holocaust.

Forgive but don't forget.
-- Tupac

Yes, I just quoted Tupac.



Normally I don't take advice from dead rappers. However since you, an alive rapper, vouch for him I may reconsider my position.

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FleaStiff
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RogerKint
December 7th, 2016 at 5:15:40 PM permalink
Quote: MrV

75 years ago today, the Japanese attacked the American fleet at Pearl Harbor. Never forget.


You should be more historically correct, Mr. V.
First of all, it was a court-martial offense to say "Japanese". The word was "Jap" and heaven help the sailor who forgot that. The verb was "Japped".

December 7th was the end of a long struggle. Warner Brothers and their Celluoid Soldiers could finally stop their campaign to get America into a war frenzy. Senator Nye and the America First movement could no longer keep America out of foreign entanglements. The Nye Committee would no longer hold hearings on Warner Brothers and the movie industry. No one would dare speak of FDR's desire to have a significant event bring us to war rather than some modest far off 'gunboat incident'. The Jewish Harvard Advisers had succeeded in rushing into effect the ban on sales of scrap metal to Japan even though Japan had formally made it known that interfering with their coprosperity sphere in Manchuria would lead to war. FDR had relieved of command the Admiral who protested sending the fleet to an unprotected hardship berth of Pearl Harbor instead of San Diego. FDR had kept the eldest Admiral in place in Hawaii and had kept Hawaii out of the loop as far as radio intercepts or the 'bomb plot' grid like structure across the port. FDR has the Coast Guard escorting UK bound convoys hundreds of miles out to sea but was aggressively enforcing the Neutrality Act as it related to Germany. All those far flung commercial attaches were sending in reports on ship movements and it was obvious the Jap merchant ships would be within the home waters by Dec 8th. FDR wanted America in the war to fight on the side of England..... and he got it.
FleaStiff
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December 7th, 2016 at 5:28:25 PM permalink
Billy Mitchell had told us the next war we fought would be a war with the empire of Japan, we ignored him.

When the US wanted a TransCanada highway to link Alaska, Japan announced it would be considered an unfriendly act.

Japan announced its fleet was scouring the seas for Amelia Erhardt but in fact their ships remained in harbor since that ultra-advanced airplane was just too tempting a target for Japan to pass up.

At least the Japs lived up to their ideals. In the CBI theater one lumbering bomber was shot down by Jap fighter planes and as befits the Japanese code, the planes followed the crew down and shot up their parachute canopies. One US Lieutenant 2g took his pistol and shot at the pilot trying to machine gun him as he descended. It seems that beyond all belief one of his four shots must have hit their mark as the Japanese pilot crashed and died without damage to his plane. The Japanese so admired the American soldier that he was the only POW formally offered a chance to commit ritual disembowlment to avoid the shame of surrender.
RogerKint
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December 7th, 2016 at 5:28:48 PM permalink
Expanding an empire is tough work. Expanding an empire while making people believe you're the good guy is even tougher. "Never forget what that ever-present evil boogeyman did across the sea. Keep giving us your money and we'll make sure it doesn't happen again, until the next time." How many Japanese girls are raped every year by our servicemen who are STILL stationed in Japan? I forget. Oops, look, I forgot.
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FleaStiff
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December 7th, 2016 at 5:37:57 PM permalink
Quote: RogerKint

How many Japanese girls are raped every year by our servicemen who are STILL stationed in Japan? I forget. Oops, look, I forgot.

How many American women working feverishly at Hickam Field hospital couldn't get the Rape of Nanking out of their minds?
RogerKint
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December 7th, 2016 at 5:42:21 PM permalink
Quote: FleaStiff

How many American women working feverishly at Hickam Field hospital couldn't get the Rape of Nanking out of their minds?



I thought it was only Chinese? They don't count Jk
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bobbartop
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December 7th, 2016 at 10:30:32 PM permalink
Quote: FleaStiff


The Japanese so admired the American soldier that he was the only POW formally offered a chance to commit ritual disembowlment to avoid the shame of surrender.




Holy smoke, that made me cringe. Brutal.
'Emergencies' have always been the pretext on which the safeguards of individual liberty have been eroded.
MrV
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December 7th, 2016 at 11:39:00 PM permalink
Funny how Japan and Hawaii do not allow casinos, but the mainland USA is covered with them.
Last edited by: MrV on Dec 8, 2016
"What, me worry?"
RS
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December 8th, 2016 at 9:07:15 AM permalink
Quote: MrV

Funny how Japan and Hawaii do not allow casinos, but the mainland USA is covered with them.



I don't get it. ??
MrV
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December 8th, 2016 at 9:26:45 AM permalink
Hawaii is now "owned" mainly, or seemingly so, by Japanese / Japanese interests.

Japan does not allow casino gambling, and they've allowed this tenet of their culture to remain applicable in Hawaii.

Meanwhile, we on the mainland are awash in casinos.

My point: who really "won" at Pearl Harbor, if "winning" is measured by ownership, cultural and political influence?
"What, me worry?"
FleaStiff
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December 8th, 2016 at 9:35:09 AM permalink
Quote: bobbartop

Holy smoke, that made me cringe. Brutal.

It was in keeping with their sense of honor.

Pursuit Planes, as they were then called, firing machine guns at helpless parachutists who had abandoned an airplane was in keeping with their sense of honor, as was fighting to the end, such as a pistol shot against a 240 mph plane. Surrender was shameful and Japan did sign some of the protocols of the Geneva (and successor) Conventions on the Conduct of Forces in the Field of War.

When a Japanese woman on a streetcar said she hated Americans during the aftermath of some bombing raid, their blonde haired fellow passenger thought by them to be German announced she was an American. Upon learning that after Pearl Harbor her diplomat husband had been repatriated and she chose to stay with him, the driver left his controls and turned around to bow to her as every woman on the street car bowed to her for having done such a Japanese Act.

The Japanese language provided for surrender (dishonor) and attack by surrender-like ploys (honorable).
RS
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December 8th, 2016 at 10:01:32 AM permalink
SoCal, Arizona, and at least Texas is full of Mexicans. But I'm pretty sure the USA still owns those areas.

Hiroshima and Nagasaki got rekt.
onenickelmiracle
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December 8th, 2016 at 10:02:25 AM permalink
Didn't September 11th prove we already forgot?
I am a robot.
RogerKint
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December 8th, 2016 at 10:35:27 AM permalink
Quote: MrV

Hawaii is now "owned" mainly, or seemingly so, by Japanese / Japanese interests.

Japan does not allow casino gambling, and they've allowed this tenet of their culture to remain applicable in Hawaii.

Meanwhile, we on the mainland are awash in casinos.

My point: who really "won" at Pearl Harbor, if "winning" is measured by ownership, cultural and political influence?



The winner is determined by who they pay taxes to and/or who's faces are on the "money" in their wallets.
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MrV
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December 8th, 2016 at 11:09:59 AM permalink
Yes, it is interesting how as simple a thing as not fearing death influences the cultural, political,and social development of a people.

We in the Western Christian Civilizations have based our religious beliefs on a fear of death and a yearning for an afterlife; the Japanese have no such concerns.

The code of Bushido seems to be yet another manifestation of Japanese Zen.

This Zen tale seems apt: "Eshun’s Departure"

When Eshun, the Zen nun, was past sixty and about to leave this world, she asked some monks to pile up wood in the yard.

Seating herself firmly in the center of the funeral pyre, she had it set fire around the edges.

“O nun!” shouted one monk, “is it hot in there?”

“Such a matter would concern only a stupid person like yourself,” answered Eshun.

The flames arose, and she passed away.



and see: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pR7e0fmfXGw
"What, me worry?"
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