Quote:
Originally Posted by Jeff Lebowski
Chang explores this in her book. The Japanese military establishment taught the soldiers to believe that the Japanese were a superior race favored by God and that the Chinese were subhuman; no better then rats or dogs. The Japanese had also been dominated by the Chinese in a cultural sense for 2000 years (writing systems, government, inventions, etc.) and so that played into the dynamics to a certain degree. I.e., this fed into the Japanese people's eagerness to demonstrate their superiority. Another factor is simply that they had just finished a brutal campaign and the Japanese had lost quite a few fellow soldiers. When the commanders not only allowed, but encouraged the soldiers to have their way with the local populace, they let loose with a vengeance.
|
And then you add to this the general Japanese belief that they were, in fact, a divinely appointed people, as evidenced by their direct progenitor the Sun Goddess (or rather, their Emperor's direct progenitor) and as further proven through the dual typhoons that saved them from two invasions by the Mongols circa 1300 or so. This is, in fact, where the phrase "kamikaze" (lit., wind of the gods) came from, and is further reflected in their "kamikaze" pilots. The very acts of those pilots was evidence of their belief that they, as a nation (or, rather, an ethnicity), were invincible and had unique divine protection.
That's why the surrender was so demoralizing to Japan as a whole, and in part explains the complete reverse course they took as a nation after WWII.