4 ms·

WW2, for example

coldtea 5y ago
Especially that. What with provoking the Japanese before Pearl Harbor to get an excuse to join the war, the propaganda over decades to dismiss the importance of USSR in the fall of Nazi Germany, Dresden, the reasoning behind hitting Hiroshima and Nagashaki, the cozying up with "ex" Nazis in West Germany (now an ally), and tons of other dirty laundry... What, you expected at least this to be a clear cut "pure good vs pure evil" affair, the way "sanctioned" national histories retell it? Here's but an example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MS_St._Louis#The_%22Voyage_of_the_Damned%22 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MS_St._Louis#The_%22Voyage_of_... https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2017/06/american-nazis-in-the-1930sthe-german-american-bund/529185/ https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2017/06/american-nazis-in-... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_and_the_Holocaust https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_and_the_Holocaust https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2001/04/hitlers-willing-business-partners/303146/ https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2001/04/hitlers...
- randomeat 5y ago
  Minor in comparison to the larger propaganda over that war
- reducesuffering 5y ago
  > provoking the Japanese before Pearl Harbor to get an excuse to join the war Not sure really any significant group of historians push this. Japan invading China is basically universally condemned, they signed the Tripartite pact with Nazi Germany, and you think it's the US' fault they decided to stop airplanes and oil to that regime?
  - worrycue 5y ago
    Correct me if I’m wrong, I did not study US history as part of my education, but wasn’t the attack on Pearl Harbour sold to the American public as “unprovoked”?
    - reducesuffering 5y ago
      Yes as is the general historian consensus around the world. There are some that try to make a case that the US also had done bad things, like force open Japan's ports 80 years prior, and then stopped trading oil and airplanes to Japan, as "provoking" a bombing attack. However these are probably the same people that think Russia is being "provoked" into invading other countries... Essentially though, Japan had imperial ambitions across most of East and Southeast Asia, knew the US wouldn't allow them much more conquest, and miscalculated that attacking first would be the best chess move to negotiate and secure the rest of the Asian territory they wanted.
  - coldtea 5y ago
    >Not sure really any significant group of historians push this. No, just the accurate ones. The state sanctioned historiography pretends it's not a thing. >Japan invading China is basically universally condemned, they signed the Tripartite pact with Nazi Germany, and you think it's the US' fault they decided to stop airplanes and oil to that regime? Yeah, the kind US that warred in the Philipines, and toppled/established/promoted regimes all around the world for the whole 20th century (and the 21st) got so upset at Japan invading China... The same Japan they earlier attacked as a sovereign state and forced-open to their trade and terms, just because they could... (Who invaded whom first here?)
    - reducesuffering 5y ago
      1st point is whataboutism, that still doesn't mean the US provoked the attack. 2nd point was in like 1860, 80 years prior, and no one is advocating that it was a good thing. Those are two very weak points if you're trying to make the case that the US "provoked" the attack.
      - coldtea 5y ago
        >1st point is whataboutism Well, I don't care for though-stoppers like "whataboutism". I'm also neither American nor Japanese, so I do care about putting both in perspective, and seeing the historical progress and causes of their grievances, their relative guilt and so on - not about picking this or that target and slice of time, and condemn them in isolation (which is great for posturing and patriotism, but the total opposite of studying history to understand it and to properly assign the required blame). >2nd point was in like 1860, 80 years prior, and no one is advocating that it was a good thing. Yes. And in the US slavery was 150+ years prior today, so? Things have consequences in history, there don't die when the year passes, or someone changes the topic. Contrary to what Americans think, decades or even centuries matter in history, politics, and affairs of state. "That was long ago" might absolve the children of those responsible, but doesn't absolve a state, nor does it change relations between states (unless corrections have been made, or the point is no longer a threat. But US expanding in the Philipines and SE Asia in 1940, was more a threat to Japan that the US of Perry that forced it to open its borders "because I say so". And in the following decades after the war US would also meddle where it had no business being in Asia, in Vietnam, Korea, all the way to Suharto's Indonesia). (In any case, for countries with long historical experiences - like Japan -, "80 years prior" is nothing, there are disputes and continued attacks that go back to millenia in many cases). China, for one, still considers what they had to go through during the "century of humilliation" in its politics (and does very well for doing so).

WW2, for example

Especially that. What with provoking the Japanese before Pearl Harbor to get an excuse to join the war, the propaganda over decades to dismiss the importance of USSR in the fall of Nazi Germany, Dresden, the reasoning behind hitting Hiroshima and Nagashaki, the cozying up with "ex" Nazis in West Germany (now an ally), and tons of other dirty laundry... What, you expected at least this to be a clear cut "pure good vs pure evil" affair, the way "sanctioned" national histories retell it? Here's but an example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MS_St._Louis#The_%22Voyage_of_the_Damned%22 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MS_St._Louis#The_%22Voyage_of_... https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2017/06/american-nazis-in-the-1930sthe-german-american-bund/529185/ https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2017/06/american-nazis-in-... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_and_the_Holocaust https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_and_the_Holocaust https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2001/04/hitlers-willing-business-partners/303146/ https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2001/04/hitlers...

randomeat 5y ago
Minor in comparison to the larger propaganda over that war
reducesuffering 5y ago
> provoking the Japanese before Pearl Harbor to get an excuse to join the war Not sure really any significant group of historians push this. Japan invading China is basically universally condemned, they signed the Tripartite pact with Nazi Germany, and you think it's the US' fault they decided to stop airplanes and oil to that regime?
- worrycue 5y ago
  Correct me if I’m wrong, I did not study US history as part of my education, but wasn’t the attack on Pearl Harbour sold to the American public as “unprovoked”?
  - reducesuffering 5y ago
    Yes as is the general historian consensus around the world. There are some that try to make a case that the US also had done bad things, like force open Japan's ports 80 years prior, and then stopped trading oil and airplanes to Japan, as "provoking" a bombing attack. However these are probably the same people that think Russia is being "provoked" into invading other countries... Essentially though, Japan had imperial ambitions across most of East and Southeast Asia, knew the US wouldn't allow them much more conquest, and miscalculated that attacking first would be the best chess move to negotiate and secure the rest of the Asian territory they wanted.
- coldtea 5y ago
  >Not sure really any significant group of historians push this. No, just the accurate ones. The state sanctioned historiography pretends it's not a thing. >Japan invading China is basically universally condemned, they signed the Tripartite pact with Nazi Germany, and you think it's the US' fault they decided to stop airplanes and oil to that regime? Yeah, the kind US that warred in the Philipines, and toppled/established/promoted regimes all around the world for the whole 20th century (and the 21st) got so upset at Japan invading China... The same Japan they earlier attacked as a sovereign state and forced-open to their trade and terms, just because they could... (Who invaded whom first here?)
  - reducesuffering 5y ago
    1st point is whataboutism, that still doesn't mean the US provoked the attack. 2nd point was in like 1860, 80 years prior, and no one is advocating that it was a good thing. Those are two very weak points if you're trying to make the case that the US "provoked" the attack.
    - coldtea 5y ago
      >1st point is whataboutism Well, I don't care for though-stoppers like "whataboutism". I'm also neither American nor Japanese, so I do care about putting both in perspective, and seeing the historical progress and causes of their grievances, their relative guilt and so on - not about picking this or that target and slice of time, and condemn them in isolation (which is great for posturing and patriotism, but the total opposite of studying history to understand it and to properly assign the required blame). >2nd point was in like 1860, 80 years prior, and no one is advocating that it was a good thing. Yes. And in the US slavery was 150+ years prior today, so? Things have consequences in history, there don't die when the year passes, or someone changes the topic. Contrary to what Americans think, decades or even centuries matter in history, politics, and affairs of state. "That was long ago" might absolve the children of those responsible, but doesn't absolve a state, nor does it change relations between states (unless corrections have been made, or the point is no longer a threat. But US expanding in the Philipines and SE Asia in 1940, was more a threat to Japan that the US of Perry that forced it to open its borders "because I say so". And in the following decades after the war US would also meddle where it had no business being in Asia, in Vietnam, Korea, all the way to Suharto's Indonesia). (In any case, for countries with long historical experiences - like Japan -, "80 years prior" is nothing, there are disputes and continued attacks that go back to millenia in many cases). China, for one, still considers what they had to go through during the "century of humilliation" in its politics (and does very well for doing so).