Pearl Harbor really was not so bad. It was a military attack on a military target … unlike the firebombing and ultimately atomic strikes on Japanese little old ladies and children. Its part of the the farce to say that Americans were not already involved in hostilities against the Japanese, they were on two account. Firstly, they were pumping in money and resources to fuel (one side) of China; secondly, there was an agreement between the Brits, Dutch and US to defend one another if any of their financial interests in SE Asia, read Empires, were challenged.

As far as the Western powers go, since the time of the Portuguese Christians and Maranos in the 15 th Century brining gunpowder, seeking to practise divide and rule, starting an exploitative slave trading of Japanese women. They had all been queuing up one by one to cajole or kick in the door of the Japanese islands; threatening both the people and the sovereignty of the islands until Perry cracked it. There was no legitimacy for the Americans to do so. It served solely capitalists interests and led, progressively, to the same form of total cultural genocide certain sort of Americans do best.

I can remember reading anything in history about the Japanese sailing thousands of miles to enslave and attack Europe or America. (Funnily enough though, the pumped up Christian Daimyo of Kyushu at that time did actually do their fair bit of that in Korea, along with the usual atrocities which makes me laugh. So much for “loving thy neighbor”.)

Interestingly enough, under international law of that time, there was legitimacy for the Japanese government to go into Korea to defend itself as Korea was unable to and, of course, it had the support of a certain aspect of Korea powermongers. Japan was being threatened by sizable aggressors, particularly Russia. It was already caught in the game between two super powers.

If it made a failing, it was to walk into the trap that was set for it by wilier opponents but confrontation over resources was unavoidable. For me the poison in all this is that it was not for right and wrong, progress and “freedom” … but just capital interests. All the little grannies got firebombed for the sake of capital interests.

With Korea, there had ding-dongs going back centuries and I give the Korea a break as, in essence, they are a young nation just entering the world stage … but they really need to get rid of the chip of their shoulder. To allow one’s self to be drawn down to a nationalistic level is always a mistake. One is nearly always being willfully misled. The fight was not nation against nation, people against people. It was more one class of individuals, the same class on both sides, against other classes. We, the people, just dragged into their commercial war games. Its another form of divide and rule.

But, just to keep on topic, how and why if prostitution was such an offense to Korean society, could it increase *5 TIMES* in a matter of 5 or more years? That means 5 times more individuals involved in supporting it. Perhaps it is just down to capital interests again … as is all this tiresome “Japan Beating”.

Personally, I’d rather see SE Asia bury the hatchet, work together to build common economic strength in the region without America’s involvement. I mean, who is it in Korea that is going about deviling? Chinese … communist … CIA … Japanese nationalists … who is it that is making trouble?

But in reality, the causes of the war were much more complicated and it was not only Japan that was the cause of the war. The western powers and Russia were also to blame for their pressure on Japan and their control of China as well.

I am by no meabns defending Japan. Japan committed horrible acts (Pearl Harbor, Battan Death March, Nanking). But the Japanese are not solely to blame for the war.

Here is a link to an excerpt of the book; http://www.ciaonet.org/book/moon/Moon01.html

Now you can make whatever sociological deductions you wish about the position of Korean males in Japanese society as per the feminist article but, at the end of the day, it is the hand with the stick in it that is responsible for giving the beatings.

I also always wondered why, if the wartime prostitution of Korean females was such a terrible and alien thing during WWII (the estimated numbers fluctuate between 10,000 to 200,000 or more), did upward of one million South Korean women work as “sex providers” between 1950 and 1971 for the Americans? *

Likewise to, ahem, service an industry of up to 1,000,000 “workers” takes a considerable infrastructure although, my guess is that a proportion of those much have been part-time workers, as per young students in Korea these days or Japan’s Korean prostitutes posting their videos on YouTube. Moon reports in her book, “Owners and pimps generally take 80% and give the prostitute 20% of her earnings per trick.” Are and were these owners and pimps not mainly Korea males. “Korean males” and the male bound officialdom have always washed their hands of any involvement in it from their side, but we know that is not true.

This is my lead into another statement. War are truly not fought “nation” against “nation”. They are between one bunch of cranky old men against another that they have prior dealings with. And invariably, the victims are women and children without any representative rights or influence in the debate. Who are most important and who can we actually help the most, the victims of yesterday or the victims of today? I am sick of an entire nation being blamed for things they personally had nothing to do with. Anyway, Is a recent figure such as “4.1% of Korean women in their 20s working in the sex trade” (Korean Institute of Criminology, 2003) entirely composed of “victims” and who organizes it? Pass me the Luis Vuitton handbag, I am going shopping …

I am neither Japanese nor Korean and have never used either a voluntary or an involuntary prostitute and so hold my hands up and say, “Don’t shoot me. I am in innocent bystander”. Some authors have questioned the mindset of Koreans abroad, and especially vocal Koreans, as to be unrepresentative. This is especially seen on the internet and amongst Korean-Americans boys. I encourage anyone to attempt to edit any Korean related topic on the Wikipedia or follow dialogues on Youtube …

I have met kind “normal” Korean embarrassed by the whole deal (linguist married to a Japanese woman, living in Japan), a fairly sleazy Korean, and an absolutely whacko Ultra-Protestant, post-plastic surgery, Korean virgin firebrand. I need to meet some coolheaded intellectuals.

So what is it with the Japanese Left? Is there really Chinese political influence, is there a lack of maturity in Japanese liberals, due to its relatively youth and inexperience, looking over their shoulders to Papa America for examples and encouragement … or are they just genuine afraid and naturally want to appease their nearest neighboring monster?

It is effecting world politics negatively and needs to be put to bed nicely, metaphorically speaking.

*Sex among Allies: Military Prostitution in U.S.-Korea Relations. By Katharine H. S. Moon. New York: Columbia University Press, 1997

By the way, does anybody know whether next photograph that Chinese soldiers have Tibetan clerical robe to disguise is true or not?
http://headlines.yahoo.co.jp/hl?a=20080328-00000028-scn-cn