Thanks for those links. The Japanese have a well earned reputation for having an insular, even xenophobic, society. Their tolerance towards Jews, at the same time as they were engaging in atrocities against Chinese and others, seems inexplicable. Divine providence?

The FDR administration rather famously was “uncooperative” to Jewish refugees seeking to enter America. Can either of you offer a theory as to how this can be reconciled with the extraordinary Jewish-American loyalty to the Democratic party?

Of the many (many, many) gripes I had with Bill Clinton, one of the biggest was his penchant for apologizing to anyone and everyone for America’s past sins, real or imagined. It was self-indulgent, self-serving, self-aggrandizing and egregiously hypocritical considering he never seemed to get around to apologizing for his own bad behavior.

I do not want apologies from anyone for anything over which they had no control. All I want from Japan, or Germany, or America for that matter, is acknowledgement of a history that is neither revised nor ignored and present behavior that evidences the lessons learned from that history.

You neglect to establish how much handwringing is necessary in order for you to feel satisfied. You correctly note a number of faults but I’m rather disinclined to believe that correcting those particular items would result in an “OK, that’s enough” statement on your part.

How much time do you spend in contemplative reflection on the collective guilt of Jews for attempting genocide on the Canaanites? How much much time on the Jewish practice of slavery?

None, I would imagine. I spend precisely that much time on “collective guilt” myself. I’ll never spend a moment more on it, either.

We live today, not yesterday. What is Japan doing today that merits concern? The killers are still running China and there is no reason to believe that they won’t kill again.

Interesting. Do you have any sources for that, Joshua?”

Polish Jews in Japan

http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/article.php?lang=en&ModuleId=10005283

Refuge in Shanghai

http://www.gluckman.com/ShanghaiJewsChina.html

http://www.gluckman.com/ShangJew99.html

I don’t know whether it is mentioned in the above pieces, but the Japanese refused to hand over the Shanghai Jews to representatives of the German Gestapo when they visited that city.

There are many other articles if you Google for them.

1) If a nation’s citizens cannot feel guilt and sorrow for the past wrongs their country has committed, they also cannot feel pride for her past achievements, and without the latter no nation would continue to exist. If you cannot feel guilt about slavery, you cannot feel pride about Jefferson, Washingston or Lincoln, or indeed even your nation’s contribution to the defeat of fascism. You have no more real, literal connection with the good than the bad.

2) A nation like Japan that not only does not genuinely apologise for her past crimes but engages in denial is likely at some point to repeat them. The Holocaust could not have occurred without the almost complete co-operation of occupied Europe and the so-called neutral nations. One of the main reasons for the resurgence of anti-Semitism in Europe is because of its failure to face up to the active collaboration of many millions of her citizens in the Holocaust and the fever of Jew-hatred which has gripped Europe for many centuries. Because of this failure, the vast bulk of property that was stolen from the victims of the Holocaust remains in the hands of the gentile thieves of Europe. Because of this failure, Europe feels at liberty to dish Israel at every opportunity. Had Europe faced up to her crimes, I doubt very much whether in 1973 when Israel stood on the verge of destruction, Europe would have refused to allow the overflights of American planes rushing military aid to the Jewish state.

I also have grave doubts as to whether Japan has undergone much of a change at all: the rampant racism, jingoism and insularity are all very much still part of that nation.

3) A denial of crimes in many ways makes a person just as guilty as the individual who carried them out. Who could possibly refute the charge that most Holocaust deniers would have gladly participated in that genocide if they had had the opportunity?

4) In asking for an apology, China is saying to Japan that the wholesale whitewashing of history that she still engages in is an affront to the sensitivities of the survivors of the genocide Japan visited upon that and other nations in the region.

5) If Germany together with its German eduction system had embarked on a campaign of Holocaust denial and justification, Simon would be outraged. That he is not likewise outraged by Japan’s conduct here is more than a little sickening. Is the life of an innocent Chinese child murdered in Nanjing by Japanese fascists any less sacred than a Jewish child murdered in Lodz or Treblinka by a Ukrainian or Lithuanian collaborator?

6) Whatever the conduct of China’s communist party, that has absolutely nothing to do with this issue. Germany’s crimes in World War II are not diminished in any way because millions of her citizens were ethnically cleansed (and in many cases killed) by Poland. Germany and Austria’s rape of Poland is not somehow made less because of that latter nation’s vicious anti-Semitism or the collaboration of many of her citizens in the Holocaust. More pertinently, Germany’s manifold crimes against millions of Russia’s citizens in World War II are not diminished because Stalin and his henchmen murdered millions of fellow citizens.

7) Those who believe this is all due to the machinations of China’s political elite have no understanding of the great well of anger that still exists among China’s citizens about this issue.

John Dahlís The Great Raid is a must see movie. It deals with the real life rescue of American POWs held by the Japanese at the end of WWII in the Philippines. Left wing movie reviewers like Stephen Holden of the New York Times are ridiculing the heroism and nonpolitically correct view of Japanís disgusting Buishido culture. Donít listen to them. The Great Raid is the sort of story that should be viewed by everyone who is a teenager or older. It stars Benjamin Bratt, Joseph Fiennes, James Franco, and Connie Nielsen. This fantastic film is not for the faint of heart. There is much violence and cruelty. In the very beginning, there is a scene showing American soldiers being deliberately set on fire by their Japanese captors.

How much is The Great Raid hated by the likes of Holden and his fellow leftists? Take a look at his review:

ìAbout the only thing to be said on behalf of “The Great Raid,” a tedious World War II epic that slogs across the screen like a forced march in quicksand, is that it illustrates a depressing similarity between reckless war-mongering and grandiose moviemaking. ì

http://movies2.nytimes.com/2005/08/12/movies/12raid.html

A good idea but a prepared pre -apology apology template would show that the nation planned to commit a grave offense and thus would require another apology for the pre meditated contemplation of evil. And it would trigger the lack of sincerity apology clause.