For all his other faults, Tom Hanks has always been a supporter of our soldiers. Which is why this statement about his 10-part miniseries on HBO about WWII, The Pacific, is perplexing.....
Regarding the Japanese: They were out to kill us because our way of living was different. We, in turn, wanted to annihilate them because they were different.
That statement is as upside-down as the glasses he's trying to put on his face. The Japanese attacked us because they didn't want any resistance to their conquest and domination of southeast Asia and the oil in the South Pacific which they needed to fuel their adventures in murder, torture, and aggression in east Asia. They chose a surprise attack at Pearl Harbor because they couldn't defeat us head to head.
Moreover, we didn't care what color their skin was, as Hanks suggests. We were avenging the Pearl Harbor attack and preventing them from seizing half the pacific ocean for their own.
10 comments:
I hope TH's comments were taken out of context.
I really don't think you can take the racial angle out of the Pacific War. Many things factored into it, including the code of Bushido (never surrender and don't respect those who do). Read "With the Old Breed: At Peleliu and Okinawa" by Eugene Sledge for the true ugliness of the fighting. They were "dirty Japs" and some of our guys descended to the level of collecting ears and teeth. They treated our captured guys worse. There was a lot of real intense hate in that part of the war that wasn't there against the Germans and Italians. Look at the difference in the treatment of American citizens of enemy ancestry.
The Pacific War was righteous and we did what we had to do - up to and including the Atom Bombs, but one can't deny the racial angle of it.
The first racial "angle" of the Pacific war was that the Japanese murdered thousands of innocent Chinese men, women and children. When the US began to stand up to those atrocities and deny Japan the natural resources they needed to over run all of Asia, they responded by trying to destroy America. To re-write these most basic FACTS of history is horrendous and Tom Hanks should hand his head in total shame. Any racial response AFTER these facts are not excused, but that was not the point of the blog. The point Tom appears to make is that Japan went to war because our "way of life" was different. If by different he later explains that our difference was we didn't want them to murder and rape thousands of innocent Chinese, then MAYBE he it could be understood. But I'm sure this explaination would be a stretch. While I've not read his original text it certainly appears fairly clear he was refering to our cultural, religious and political differences. Freedom versus subjugation.
Perhaps he was talking about the them the HBO production worked around to create it's mini-series. In that case, it might be interesting to watch to see if it's a liberal take on racial issues as opposed to an historic account of WWII.
If the mini-series about The Pacific is close to Band of Brothers, it will be very, very good indeed.
According to the article I read, it's not the rah, rah soldier movie like Band. It shows the bad stuff our guys did to the Japanese.
Last night I saw a clip of Hanks talking about the war in the Pacific against the Japanese was about "racism and terror". Then he asked if that sounds familiar, as if that's what our current mid-east adventure is about. What a jackass!
Either way we recently "Subscribed" HBO in order to watch this mini-series and I intend to.
I look forward to your review, David.
Remember, no matter what we do it is always racially motivated according to the select few non racists (Jesse and Al). Regardless of time and truth. If the left wingers that control the media and entertainment, continue, history will be rewritten - literally! Sad. Did we fight WW1 b/c racially we despised the Germans, or b/c their skin is white does that make it OK? I used to have some respect for Hanks, but that is out the window now.
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