There are a number of myths and counter myths involving the end World War 2.
It was Russia declaring war, and not the atomic bombs, that convinced Japan to surrender.
Not dropping the bombs would have cost hundreds of thousands of American lives during the
invasion.
But perhaps my favorite is the leaflets.
Critics of the use of the atomic bomb make it sound like the bombs weren’t dropped
out of necessity, but some sort of bloodthirsty rage or even morbid curiosity.
“And they haven’t used the bomb yet and were curious to see if it works, so they drop
it on Japan.
They actually dropped two.”
But they leave out the fact that in the weeks prior to the bombing, the US dropped leaflets
on three dozen Japanese cities warning civilians that these cities would be bombed and to evacuate.
Including Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Critics of the leaflets point out that they didn’t specifically say atomic bomb and
that the picture is of B-29s dropping firebombs.
But remember, this is 1945.
Atomic bomb wasn’t really in anyone’s vocabulary, so explicitly saying atomic bomb
wouldn’t really make sense to the – forgive the pun here – target audience.
And what difference would it make?
This is Tokyo after being firebombed and this is Hiroshima after being atomic bombed.
It doesn’t matter whether it’s one bomb or hundreds, the effect is basically the same.
In fact, more people died in Tokyo than Hiroshima or Nagasaki.
After Hiroshima, we started dropping leaflets specifically saying “We are in possession
of the most destructive explosive ever devised by man.
If you still have any doubt, make inquiry as to what happened to Hiroshima.”
This was somewhat of a bluff though since we only had the two and we used both of them,
we wouldn’t have another one for several weeks… but they didn’t know that.
A few weeks ago I was asked by….
Fiosracht?
To respond to a twitter rant regarding Winston Churchill.
I won’t respond to the entire thing in this video, but link down below.
It got me thinking about the many ways that people pluck out pieces of history, maybe
dust off the context and embellish parts in order to make it fit the story they want to
tell.
While the twitter thread itself never mentions it, several others commented that Winston
Churchill didn’t care about Australia and said things like “let the Japanese have
it.”
Australians often call it the Great Betrayal and this is somewhat of a mischaracterization.
After the Fall of France in 1940, when the Battle of Britain started, the British met
with the Americans to figure out a strategy for World War 2.
They agreed on two major points.
The Atlantic and European areas were the “decisive theater” and as such would be the primary
focus of US military efforts.
A defensive strategy in the Far East/Pacific.
This is commonly referred to as the Germany First plan.
There was no plan to cede territory to the Japanese just get it back later, in fact one
of the sub-points was The security of the British Commonwealth must
be maintained in all circumstance including the retention of a Far East position.
Both the US and Britain agreed that since Nazi Germany was rapidly expanding and on
Britain’s doorstep, that it was the greatest threat and even the backbone of the Axis powers.
And so it should be the primary focus of the war.
But the US wasn’t in the war yet.
We were not-so-covertly helping Britain, France, and Russia, but not officially.
Of course, all of that changed on December 7th, 1941, a date which will live in infamy.
There is seriously so much to say about Pearl Harbor, but I would like to focus on the conspiracy
theory that FDR let Pearl Harbor happen in order to justify getting into the war.
This is a real conspiracy theory, you can look it up, there are dozens of videos and
books on the topic.
The main problem here is that they’re focusing on just Pearl Harbor.
Like they have historical tunnel vision or something.
To be fair, when we look back, that’s the only one we talk about since it was on the
front page of every newspaper and it even got entire Michael Bay explosions devoted
to it.
In the December 7th, 1941, a date which will live in infamy speech given by Jon Voight
in that movie, he says…
“The attack yesterday on the Hawaiian Islands has caused severe damage to American military
forces.
I regret to tell you that over 3000 American lives have been lost.”
Which makes it seem like Hawaii was the only place that was attacked.
But as accurate as that movie is, that’s an abridged version of the speech.
“I regret to tell you that very many American lives have been lost.
In addition American ships have been reported torpedoed on the high seas between San Francisco
and Honolulu.
Yesterday, the Japanese government also launched an attack against Malaya.
Last night, Japanese forces attacked Hong Kong.
Last night, Japanese forces attacked Guam.
Last night, Japanese forces attacked the Philippine Islands.
Last night, the Japanese attacked Wake Island.
And this morning the Japanese attacked Midway Island.
Japan has therefore undertaken a surprise offensive extending throughout the Pacific
area.”
Saying FDR let Pearl Harbor happen is a myopic view of history that strips away the fact
that dozens of islands and countries across the Pacific were all attacked at once.
Pearl Harbor was by far the most important to the American military, but certainly not
the only one.
American entry into World War 2 was inevitable at this point.
FDR didn’t need to sacrifice nearly every US territory in the Pacific, thousands of
American lives, five battleships and about a dozen other smaller ships to justify it.
Ah, but what about the carriers?
Stan, mmk.
At the time of the attack on Pearl Harbor, aircraft carriers were still somewhat of a
novelty and curiosity.
We only had 3 in the Pacific Fleet.
The undisputed pride of the US Navy was its battleships, 8 of which were in Pearl Harbor
on that day.
The primary objective of the Japanese attack in Pearl Harbor was to disable the battleships
– they launched the attack knowing that the carriers weren’t in the harbor, and
not caring, because they weren’t seen as important.
A major part of the conspiracy is that the carriers weren’t at Pearl Harbor.
Suggesting that FDR thought they were more important than any admiral moved them so they
wouldn’t be destroyed in the coming attack.
So where were they?
The USS Lexington was delivering dive bombers to Midway.
The USS Saratoga was in San Diego.
And the USS Enterprise had just finished delivering a squadron of fighters to Wake Island and
was returning to Pearl Harbor that morning.
Many of its fighters actually participated in Pearl Harbor’s defense ahead of the carrier’s
arrival.
Ben Affleck and Josh Hartnett weren’t the only ones flying around that day.
All of these missions were planned separately, weeks before the attack on Pearl Harbor.
The reason people find this suspicious is because aircraft carriers were key to our
victory over Japan.
This is historical hindsight at its worst.
Think about it, what did we have left after Pearl Harbor?
Since all of our battleships were either damaged or sunk.
Aircraft carriers.
So we were forced to use what we had left, and we suddenly realized that these former
novelty items were actually pretty dang useful.
Once America declared war on Japan, anti-Japanese sentiment exploded.
Americans were suspicious of any Japanese person living in America, thinking they might
be spies or saboteurs… which…
remember this scene from Pearl Harbor?
Yeah, that actually happened, his name was Tadashi Morimura, or actually Takeo Yoshikawa.
Though, we didn’t find out about him until well after the war.
Suspicions and racial tensions were excessively high and as a result, FDR signed an executive
order that moved all people of Japanese ancestry from the western states to internment camps
in the interior of the country.
Many people, who want to make this event sound as bad as possible, will call them concentration
camps.
And I guess by literal definition, they could be considered concentration camps.
But also by literal definition, if you try to kill more than one person, that’s genocide.
It’s the connotation, the background meaning that’s evoked when you hear the phrase that’s
important.
When you hear concentration camp, you think of that one specific concentration camp.
When they weren’t at all comparable in terms of purpose or end result.
These weren’t labor camps or death camps.
In fact more people came out of the camps than went in.
Yes, people died, but the death toll in the internment camps was actually no higher than
the outside civilian population, and there were more births than deaths.
“Adults could work if they wanted to, for a measly salary of $5 a day.”
Five dollars a day sounds awfully low.
But we’re in 2018.
They were paid five dollars in 1942 money, which is almost 80 dollars today.
To put that into perspective, a private in the US military in 1942 made 50 dollars a
month.
“Measly” is an added adjective to make it sound worse.
I’m not saying the conditions weren’t awful, but Internment Camp is a perfectly
accurate term for what they were.
As awful as Heart Mountain, Wyoming might’ve been, it wasn’t Auschwitz.
When you exaggerate everything, you diminish everything.
When everything is the worst thing that ever happened, nothing is.
We should all be able to agree that both internment camps and concentration camps were both bad
– but one of them was clearly worse.
The camps were absolutely racially motivated and without any hard evidence of military
necessity.
Two-thirds of the internees were US citizens and I’m willing to bet all of them were
loyal to the United States.
I personally don’t agree with it, but when it’s put into the wider historical context,
I can at least try to understand it.
But I’m saying that with 2018 Hindsight.
Get it?
Instead of 20/20?
I thought it was funny.
When talking about the Japanese Internment Camps, people often point to Hawaii as an
odd example.
Since that’s where the Pearl Harbor attack happened, and over a third of the population
was Japanese and they weren’t rounded up into camps.
They usually say something to the effect of how devastating it would have been to the
economy.
“The military governor of Hawaii actually said, please don’t do this you can’t do
it, it’s impractical, we could never pull it off and you’re going to wreck the territory’s
economy.
Just leave it alone.”
Did you catch that?
Because it’s really subtle.
“The military governor” Hawaii did have an internment camp, it only
held about 1400 people but more importantly, the entire island was placed under martial
law.
As in, barbed wire on the beach, tanks in the streets, freaks in sheets, martial law.
Hawaii wasn’t some liberal paradise where everyone got along in racial harmony despite
the war.
There were travel restrictions, no radio stations, curfews, and a blackout.
Which meant that you had to cover all doors and windows, you weren’t allowed to light
fires or drive around with your headlights on at night.
This was done so that Japanese bombers flying overhead wouldn’t be able to find their
targets.
Not that they ever tried bombing at night, but still.
They even printed special money just for Hawaii so that if it ever got invaded, the US Government
could immediately render it useless.
So just saying that Hawaii didn’t have a camp and they didn’t round up all the Japanese
is inaccurate.
Because the entire territory was on military lockdown, like one giant internment camp.
But, there were some Japanese Americans, mostly from Hawaii, who joined the military.
“One of the last German units to see action in World War 2 was the 33rd Waffen Grenadier
Division, which participated in the defense of central Berlin.
And that was comprised of French volunteers.
And of course, some Japanese people fought for America in the Second World War.
The 442nd Infantry Regiment of the United States Army was made up almost entirely of
soldiers of Japanese ancestry.”
These two units are not at all comparable.
The 33rd Waffen Grenadier Division was made up of French people, from France, fighting
for the Germans, against France.
The 442nd Infantry Regiment was made up of Japanese people, from America, fighting for
America, against…
the Germans.
Yeah, the reason why is actually both smart and a little racist.
They were assigned to Europe not because they were worried that the Japanese would defect,
but because they were worried that other American soldiers would mistake them for the enemy.
There weren’t a lot of enemy Japanese people running around Europe at the time so… yeah.
They were American soldiers fighting for America, they weren’t at all traitors to their nation.
In the aftermath of World War 1, when the Ottoman Empire was broken up, Britain got
control of a large section of the Middle East.
It’s actually a pretty interesting story, someone should make a video about that.
Would you like to know more?
The very first tweet in that Churchill rant is about the British occupation of Afghanistan.
But Afghanistan’s not part of the Middle East.
Alright, Stan, mmk.
“While he was there Churchill discovered his passion for war and viewed the Pashtuns
as beneath him.
Going so far as saying that ‘all who resist will be killed without quarter.’
That they ‘needed to recognize the superiority of race”
“He wrote about how ‘We systematically, village by village, destroyed the houses,
filled up the wells, blew down the towers, cut down the great shady trees, burned the
crops and broke the reservoirs in punitive devastation.”
This makes Churchill look pretty bad, right?
Well here’s a question for you – what year is this?
He rather conveniently leaves that information out, because it’s 1897.
1897 isn’t even close to World War 2.
Stan, mmk.
Churchill is a 22 year old war correspondent for the Telegraph, he’s not exactly the
Prime Minister or in charge of… anything.
And everything he was quoted as saying is wartime propaganda – we do the exact same
thing in every single war.
I am tempted to quote the great Leonard Cohen, I am guided by the beauty of our weapons.
And they are beautiful pictures of fearsome armaments.
I’m not saying it’s a good thing, I’m just saying it makes a lot more sense when
you put it in context.
“Churchill was ‘Secretary of State for the Colonies’ in ’21.
This is when he decided air power was superior to troops on the ground and he bombed the
s*** out of any resistance” He advocated for the use of the air force
rather than troops because it was cheaper.
No other reason really.
“’I am strongly in favour of using poisoned gas against the uncivilized tribes, it would
spread a lively terror.’”
But that isn’t the full quote is it?
… No, it isn’t: “I am strongly in favour of using poisoned
gas against uncivilised tribes.
The moral effect should be so good that the loss of life should be reduced to a minimum.
It is not necessary to use only the most deadly gasses: gasses can be used which cause great
inconvenience and would spread a lively terror and yet would leave no serious permanent effects
on most of those affected.”
He advocated for the use of non-lethal tear gas to subdue rebellions.
It’s pretty important to note that they never actually used any gas – of any kind.
He just kind of suggested it.
But there is one Arab Revolt that he doesn’t bring up – The Anglo-Iraqi War.
The thing about revolts and independence movements in the middle of a war is that you never really
know who’s behind it.
Is it a natural uprising from within – or is it being funded and supported by your enemy?
The Germans did this a lot.
In fact, during World War 1 they tried it in Afghanistan against the British, which
didn’t work.
They tried to get Mexico to start a war with the United States in order to keep the Americans
occupied and out of Europe.
Which also didn’t work.
In order to get Russia out of the war, they funded and sent Vladimir Lenin to Moscow to
start an internal coup.
Which did work, rather famously actually.
And Spain didn’t participate in WW2, because it had just finished fighting an internal
civil war, supported by… the Nazis.
So it shouldn’t surprise you to find out that the leader of the Iraqi revolt was the
Ba’ath Party, yes, the same Ba’ath Party that this guy was part of.
Supported by, say it with me – Germany… or the Nazis, whichever one you said.
Revolts and independence movements during a war are never a good idea for this very
reason – they’re going to crack down on you even harder.
You can’t pick and choose revolts that you think were unjustly put down while ignoring
the ones you now know were justly put down, because you’re coming at it with 70 plus
years of extra knowledge.
In the moment, whether it’s funded by the enemy or a natural uprising of the people,
it all looks the same.
I got a lot of flak for saying that during my video on Gandhi, and I got comments like
this, saying “No reason why a country can’t fight for
independence instead of waging a war in Europe.”
India wasn’t fighting in Europe, they were fighting in India.
Indians were fighting against the Japanese, who were right here, this is India.
So when the enemy is right on your doorstep and you start demanding independence…
it raises some questions is all I’m saying.
But the twitter rant mentions India as well.
“He orchestrated a mass genocide in Bengal.”
“It was a famine in the same sense that we had a famine over here.
He starved over 4 million Bengalis in 1943.”
It’s actually two million, not that makes it any better.
This bit right here is Bengal, it’s part of India and also happens to be the front
line.
So food was often shipped back from the front line or reserved for the military, and whenever
the Japanese would advance they’d burn it all so that it wouldn’t be captured.
So there was a famine.
“Churchill refused all said to Bengal.
Canada and US offered rice and he refused.”
What?
Your first clue that this is false should be that Canada and the US aren’t exactly
known for their bountiful agriculture of rice.
They offered wheat, not rice.
But Churchill declined because it would take two months to ship it and that’s assuming
it made it through all of this mess.
The United States didn’t offer anything, that part is just plain made up.
In fact, in 1944 when Churchill wrote to FDR asking for help, saying
“I am seriously concerned about the food situation in India…
I have had much hesitation in asking you to add to the great assistance you are giving
us with shipping but a satisfactory situation in India is of such vital importance to the
success of our joint plans against the Japanese that I am impelled to ask you to consider
a special allocation of ships to carry wheat to India.”
FDR refused, for the exact same reasons that Churchill decline Canada’s offer.
Instead, Churchill ordered Australia to ship 350,000 tons of wheat, although the reallocation
of ships was still an issue given the upcoming Normandy invasion.
The writer of these tweets, and indeed many of the other things I’ve mentioned, seems
to want to pluck these events out of World War 2 and talk about them as if they were
the only thing going on at the time.
It’s only when you put it in the larger context that things make sense.
This isn’t always nefarious, it has a lot to do with just how we tell stories.
Nobody wants to hear about the second worst time something happened.
Just like with people, we want to label events as either good or bad.
But that’s not interesting enough, it also has to be the worst.
Not everyone was as bad as Hitler and not everything was as bad as the Holocaust.
The actual history is bad enough on its own.
Exaggerating or embellishing, or cherrypicking things out of context casts doubt on the rest
of history.
Especially if the person ever finds out that there’s more to the story.
So the next time you see someone being labeled as a genocidal maniac…
Gee, where have I heard that before… or hear that people were rounded up into concentration
camps, maybe look into the story a little more because now, you know better.