In our class discussion we furthered defined what “Whither” stood for. We ultimately settled on a short definition of “where is it (Japan) going?” Such question is only appropriate to ask given the lack of steady leadership in Japan, specifically between 1974 and 2006. Schoppa emphasizes this point by stating that, “In the thirty-two years after […]
In class we discussed just how devoted many North Koreans are to the Kim dynasty, as well as how delusional the Kims have been over the years. The family’s iron-tight grip over the nation has led to isolation, with citizens unaware of just how much of their suffering stems from the Kims’ mismanagement of the […]
During the second half of the twentieth century, China’s position in the global economy could be described as a social awkward teenager that matured into a responsible and social adult. China’s transformation was gradual but each step along the way had great significance on the country. China’s economy became very lucrative for foreign business enterprises […]
The fact that china has gained international prominence got me interested in their development over the past twenty to thirty years. China has become a major player on the world stage. It helps itself by being on the United Nations’ Security Council. Though, China’s national identity was reinvigorated in the 1990s and early 2000s. China […]
This week in the readings it was pointed out how much power is in words. North Korea took offence to things said by both Bush administrations and this caused them to react by being lees open to compromise. This didn’t have a negative impact on America necessarily but it did have a very real impact […]
In 1997 Korea was hurting economically and so was the rest of the world. The nation was experiencing incredible inflation, which was known to increase about five percent per year and the terrible conditions in the economy were felt all over. The economy of Korea was characterized by rapid numbers of financial institutions rising in a […]
For the last half century, North Korean political ideology has been centered around Juche philosophy. According to the North Korean’s, “The Juche idea is based on the philosophical principle that man is the master of everything and decides everything. It is the man-centered world outlook and also a political philosophy to materialize the independence […]
Each time a discussion about the necessity of strong foreign relations is held, almost everyone has a positive intrinsic feeling. Of course, there is nothing wrong with the positive feeling, or the strong relations in themselves. Rather, the question should be asked as to what is the root of the importance of strong foreign relations? […]
Kim Dae Jung is a perfect example of resilience and why fighting for what you believe in is important. Kim Dae Jung was known for being an outspoken critic of the Park government in South Korea. Kim was also known as one of the most charismatic and gifted politicians in South Korea. Kim Dae […]
As North Korea continues to isolate itself from the rest of the world, its situation continues to worsen. By trying to remain 100% independent while trying to keep up with global growth, North Korea continues to show some of the worst poverty levels in the world. Even their population shows a stagnant growth only going […]
Since the beginning of the nineteenth century the nation of Korea has been influenced, manipulated, and controlled by outsiders. Whether it was the Chinese and Japanese trying to fight each other over influence in Korea, the Japanese annexation, or the split into two separate zones by the United States and the Soviet Union, other nations […]
Kim Dae-Jung was the 8th president of South Korea. He was finally elected after years of political struggle and efforts by him to win the presidency. After his victory, he championed efforts to bring about reunification with the North in his Sunshine Policy. Since the Vietnam War, Kim had such “liberal views” on reunification, which […]
“”Teachers would say attendance is down because children are out collecting wild foods”” (1) This means that children were failing to attend school because the famine was so bad that they had to be out looking for food. There is evidence showing that during this famine that people were sending assistance to the country of […]
Close to 7,000 students protested for the reunification rally of the two Koreas at the University of Yonsei in Seoul. “After a week’s standoff, thousands of police, backed by helicopters spraying tear gas, stormed classroom buildings where the students were holed up. One police officer was killed and more than 1,000 police officers and students […]
Reading Schoppa’s chapter on China in the 80’s and 90’s was really not that much different from reading about Jung’s experiences in Wild Swans1. While China becoming more open to foreign visitors and trade and the privatization of business caused a lot of liberalization and freedom for it’s citizens it also caused a lot of hardship2. The privatization […]
In 1980 on Sunday, May 18, paratroopers from the ROK army had entered the city of Kwangju and started killing the residents there.[1] The reason that the soldiers were there was because they had been told that the Communists had taken over the city. The whole thing was organized by Chun Doo-hwan, who had served […]
The first thing that comes to mind when looking at images of the “Goddess of Democracy” is how it resembles the statue of liberty-hat being with the torch being help out in front. However, any information I found regarding this similarity all points to not being linked or the Goddess of Democracy modeled after the […]
Today in class we compared the unification of East and West Germany to the possible future unification of North and South Korea. It is quite interesting to try and apply the past situation of Germany and difficulty that East Germany faced trying to match it’s other half in the West to the current and possible […]
In 1978, China’s leader Deng Xiaoping saw that the economy was moving slowly in China. He saw some farmers in the Anhui province take over a large community farm and split it up so they could farm it for themselves. when Deng heard of such actions, he saw potential in it and he decided to […]
The famine that occurred in North Korea in the early 1990s was caused by and worsened by a number of events. The Soviet Union played a large role in North Korea’s food supply by providing them with agricultural supplies and food, but after its collapse its contributions dwindled. Without the Soviet Union’s support, the people […]
When Kim Dae-jung became South Korea’s president in 1998, one of the top goals he had was the unification of the two halves of Korea. Thus, the Sunshine Policy was enacted in 1998. Within two years on June 13 through the 15, Kim Dae-jung was able to personally meet up with Kim Jong-Il (leader of North Korea) […]
This video is called YouTubers react to K Pop and it seems silly but I actually think that it reveals a lot about how far South Korea has come culturally on a global scale. The people reacting to the K Pop music videos are people that have famous YouTube accounts with millions of subscribers. They are very […]
By 1989, great changes were afoot in China. The political elite of the Chinese Communist Party slowly but surely made small steps towards allowing free speech and expression of beliefs that countered official party doctrine. Western businesses and media were allowed to operate in China for the first time since before the Second Sino-Japanese War. […]
Chai Ling is an interesting figure as she had the makings of impassioned leader and was very dedicated to the protests in Tiananmen Square, almost to an extreme. Chai Ling was very educated and in the process of trying to get a master’s degree in China around the time of the protests (1). She would […]
In Boa Ninh’s novel, The Sorrow of War, Kien is trapped in parts of Vietnam due to long rainy weather that prevents large scale attacks in the north or in the south. According to the Vietnamese embassy in the United Kingdom the rainy season lasts from may to September with an average of 271 mm […]
The Sorrow of War, to me, was a characterized by mainly the difference between hope and sorrow and the intermeshing of the two. It kind of reminds me of the concept of yin and yang in Asian culture, or the cyclical nature that we talked about in class. The human construct of war is really […]
Throughout our reading of The Sorrow of War, various parallels between the impact of war and the impact that love has on humanity. Whether it was Kien’s sence of duty to repay a debt of education on the horrors and inhumanity of war to the next generation, or that of reaching out in care to the female characters in […]
Zach Shariff 04/25/15 HIS 354 The Sorrow of War and the Omens Of Death The Flag of North Vietnam at the time of the Vietnam War Throughout The Sorrow of War, the themes of death and the dishonor in war is quite prevalent throughout the course of the […]
In The Sorrow of War by Bao Ninh, Ninh’s character, Kien, deals with a lot of sorrow and regret from his experiences during his time as a soldier for North Vietnam during the Vietnam War. A second issue for Kien is how he is preyed upon by emotional problems from his feeling guilty about living […]
In reading the novel I was surprised by how time did not seem to move for the soldiers while they were at war. Going into the reading I was aware that soldiers had difficultly adjusting to the world after the fighting was done but this novel helped put it into perspective. Time stopped for the […]
Post Traumatic Stress Disorder or PTSD is a mental health condition that’s triggered by a terrifying event.1 If there is one thing we can pull away from the last several weeks of class is that we have almost no information on how this stress disorder effected non US troops. This says a lot about our […]
Memories have a way of letting us relive the slightest of moments for the rest of our lives. Kien, the main character in the novel, The Sorrow of War, relives his memories every second of the day. He always thinks of his lost love Phuong, and wishes that things could have turned out differently if […]
One of the central themes to the novel The Sorrows of War, is that for the soldiers who fought it, it never truly ended. Soldiers, like Kien and Bao Ninh, constantly reflected on the tragedies they experienced and horrors they committed, in the name for some cause. Often they sought to return to the “glory days” before […]
As we saw in The Sorrow of War, the Vietnam war was decidedly a civil war more than it was an international war1. While the United States took it upon themselves to intervene in an attempt to prevent the spread of communism, the war was actually waged for much longer than the Americans were involved2. As […]
In the book The Sorrow of War written by Bao Ninh, the main character is named Kien. Throughout the novel we can see how the horrors of war have impacted Kien, Kien’s loved ones, Kien’s home country, and even the American troops. As the Vietnam war goes on and Kien continues to survive, Kien’s thoughts […]
As an artist, the passage starting on page 88 of The Sorrow of War by Bao Ninh spoke to me. As he expresses how the writing began to develop a life of its own and was almost composing itself. I thought to my experiences writing and how natural it feels. I have written some poetry […]
(2) As we talked about in class on Thursday (4/23) regarding the book “The Sorrow of War” and from the first week of class (back in January) The Vietnams live in a cyclical time period. Cyclical meaning their history is repeating in a pattern, specifically in a circular motion (1). I completely understand the concept […]
In the book, The Sorrow of War, I was struck by the section of Kien’s father’s death and his prophetic last words to Kien. Kien’s father had been a painter and a failure after the communist government was established. His paintings were criticized as his expressionism was not being relatable to the common worker in a communist country, and was banned […]
We discussed in class the importance of memories, whether they were a good or bad thing. In the confines of war, they can be both. It was the memories of his girlfriend that drove him to fight and survive. He also used memories to think of much simpler times and take himself out of the […]
In “The Sorrow of War” written by Bao Ninh; the main character, Kien, talks a lot about ghosts and the wandering dead. Finally it got to the point where Kien had the inability to forget these ghosts since they visited him every night and haunted his dreams. The dream haunting didn’t just happen to Kien either, […]
As discussed in class this week, the South Vietnamese government demonstrated some self-destructive policies that led to a revolving door of leadership and plummeting approval from the general population of Vietnam. As demonstrated in the video below, even NATO allies couldn’t spin the corruption of the South Vietnamese government in a positive light. Ironically enough, […]
Throughout history and even now, men have used rape as a sign of dominance and strength. Bao Ninh talks several times about how young women are getting raped. He describes these people as “Barbadians”. The men doing the raping are coming from all sides of the war, both American’s as well as other Vietnamese. This […]
War is a touchy subject for all of us as it attracts all of our human emotions. War draws in our anger and excitement to defend the country we hold dear in our hearts. War seduces our happiness when the war is won. Above all, war’s number one fan is sorrow. Kien’s stepfather from the book The Sorrow […]
I have taken a lot from this book, but the most important thing I have learned is that war has the ability to strip an individual of their values and respect. We see this in The Sorrow of War. Kien joins the fight because he is devoted to the communist ideals and the life of his […]
In class we have talked a number of times about American veterans making their way back to Vietnam and finding ways to heal the memory of war. This has been largely successful and many U.S. Veterans, as we have talked about, have developed positive feelings towards the nation. This made me curious about how the […]
This class has really opened my eyes to not only the devastation that war causes but also how there are two sides to every story. In class we mentioned how our American education system does not do that great of a job teaching us about other cultures but I also don’t think it does the […]
One aspect of “The Sorrow of War” that I thought was really interesting from the first section of reading was their discussion of the Rosa Canina. The way Ninh described it, “Rosa canina blossomed in the rain, whitened everywhere, its perfume filling the air, especially at night.” (1) And his mention of it “thriving in […]
What struck me as interesting in The Sorrow Of War was the level of reverence that Kien and his fellow soldiers held towards their fallen comrades. Being a Communist country, Vietnam does not officially recognize any religions. This does not stop many Vietnamese from joining religious sects or practicing religious beliefs in their own way. Even […]
In the novel The Sorrow of War by Bao Ninh, the main character Kien mentions several times encountering commandos from the south ARVN. I found these mentions to be interesting so I looked up these ARVN (Army of the Republic of Vietnam) commandos. During the Vietnam War, the commandos were formed in 1960, taking troops […]
Amongst the blood shed and brutality of the Vietnam War came something innocent, children. American soldiers and Vietnam women having children was very common. Some of these children were the result of young interracial love and some were results of unwanted pregnancy, regardless, when the war was over the fathers of these children were long […]
The Korean War resulted in a family dictatorship that has lasted for over 70 years in North Korea. What astonishes me the most about North Korea is that North Korea was relatively successful in the first two decades of its existence as mentioned several times in class. Though, North Korea’s beginnings of worship of their […]
The Battle of Dienbienphu was a turning point in Indochina, and the struggle for Vietnamese independence from foreign powers. After war had been ongoing for several years, the French decided on a tactic to lure the Vietnamese into a final battle that they believed they could win quite easily due to their flippant attitude towards […]
Zach Shariff 04/16/15 HIS 354 SYMPHONY OF NORTH KOREAN DESTRUCTION http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kim_Il-sung#/media/File:Kim_Il_Sung_Portrait-2.jpg Portrait of Kim Il-Sung (1912-1994) Dictator of North Korea (1948-1994) If one were to observe over time, the developing storm that became North Korea, one thing that would stand out quite distinctly would be the exceedingly fast evolution of the country’s […]
While the United States attempted to keep North Vietnamese influence to a minimum in the South and fight most of its battles within that region against invading NVA forces or Viet Cong irregulars already working from the inside, was it justifiable to bomb cities in the North, even if this was to decrease production for […]
On July 31, 1964 a covert mission by a South Vietnamese patrol boat attacked two North Vietnamese-held islands in the Gulf of Tonkin. Nearby was the United States destroyer USS Maddox. The Maddox was operating as an intelligence gathering vessel in support of the South Vietnamese raids. On the night of August 2nd, the Maddox […]
Both North and South Korea sought to create a unified country and people but both sides had different ideas as to how that unified nation ought to be governed. “The unification rhetoric from both P’yǒngyang and Seoul was belligerent, each threatening to march and take over the other and each stating that unification of the […]
For really the first time during a war the American public was able to see what was happening as it was happening. Before the homefront had always been removed from the war and the Vietnam War was more real than any war before due to the cameras and reporters down on the ground. This changed […]
I found this video on Vietnam veterans and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and I was shocked at the information I heard from it! Vietnam Veterans that were sent into the Vietnam war got PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder). When they got PTSD they were sent home with a dishonorable or “bad” discharge. Here’s the shocking […]
On June 11, 1963, Tich Quang Duc set himself on fire in protest against the persecution of Buddhists in Vietnam. Its hard to imagine ever finding yourself in such a situation that you might feel this act is necessary. While the patrolmen helped speed up the process, burning alive is incredibly painful. Thich Quang Duc […]
It takes a special sort of denial to think that the United States won the war in Vietnam. Every goal we had when we took action was failed, and we left nothing in better shape than it was before we came. In the end the country wound up another on the list of Communist conquests. […]
Ho Chi Minh describes revolutionary mortality as devoting one’s life to struggling for the Party and the revolution. This first line catches my attention because Minh uses the word “struggling” to described someone’s life and how they work for their Party. This means that the life of a people participating in a revolution is a […]
Although here in the US we are beginning to see more political action, these seem to be small and short term in scale. Even the Occupy movement seems to have all but disappeared from the media. As cold-hearted as it may sound the citizens here are just not desperate enough to be able to affect […]
(3) I really don’t mean to offend with this post, but I hear a racial term in our lecture on 4/16 and a different student asked the same question that I was interested in, but Dr. Ganyard really didn’t know the exact answer, so I decided I would look into it and see if I […]
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/ca/Aerial-herbicide-spray-missions-in-Southern-Vietnam–1965-1971.jpg During the Vietnam war, the United States saw that the Viet Kong had an advantage over them: The Jungle. The north Vietnamese could attack US soldiers at anytime and then disappear into the Jungle. United States Tacticians were not creative and cared not for logistics, the well fair of humanity, or any […]
After the Japanese surrendered in World War II, Korea would no longer be their colony. The allies would have to figure out how to re-establish a new Korea. Two generals would make the 38th parallel the dividing line for the Soviet and American military occupations. The two sides wanted to create a single unified provisional government […]
Schoppa briefly went over the My Lai massacre, but the little he did cover sounded as though should have qualified as a war crime[1]. I decided to endeavor on some background research of my own and discovered that My Lai was actually covered up for over a year and a half[2]. After the massacre high-ranking […]
Hanoi’s leaders were committed to launching an offensive in the South in the later part of 1967.[1] They attacked six major cities, thirty-six of the forty-four provincial capitals, and sixty-four district capitals during the Lunar New Year.[2] In 1967, Americans heard propaganda about the great progress that the American forces were making. These propaganda stated, […]
We kind of touched on the poor treatment of soldiers when they returned from war in class and I remember reading the book “Born on the Fourth of July” which is a biography on Ron Kovic. Kovic was a bright eyed high schooler when he first enlisted in the marines. He did two tours over […]
I had initially set out to write this blog about the role of Vietnamese women and children in the Vietnam War against the United States. But as I was searching for information I came across an interesting article from the Smithsonian Magazine called “Children of the Vietnam War.” The article talks about the many children […]
Who started the Korean War? Was it the North Koreans, South Koreans, the USSR, WWII, WWI, the Cold War, Communism, Capitalism, or the United States? It is hard to say who is to blame for the start of the Korean war, really one could find a legitimate reason to point to each. The reason that you […]
Ngo Dinh Diem was the first leader of South Vietnam. He was an intellectual who was taught in France and appointed by the French when they pulled out of Vietnam in 1954, after the Geneva Accords were set. As soon as he was appointed, he started to seize power in any way possible. One of […]
Syngman Rhee a nationalist with a burning hatred of communism. He was in exiled from Korea and lived in the U.S. for decades. He was educated by the Westerns and even went to Princeton and earned his doctorate (1). Overall, a good portion of his life was spent in a democratic nation. With that in mind, […]
Agent Orange was military tactic used by Americans to try and kill some of the dense jungles of Vietnam. Even though this powerful toxin was used to harm the jungle it also has survive effects on the people that were subjected to it. “Agent Orange was sprayed over ten percent of the country” (1) This […]
During the Vietnam War, the United States launched Operation Ranch Hand, which was a program that sprayed herbicides and chemicals across Vietnam with the intent of defoliation, and destroying jungle and forest territory. United States planes sprayed potent herbicides around military bases and crops that could have potentially been used to feed opposing troops. The […]
Drafts, in any situation, create difficult circumstances for those forced into fighting. If called for a draft it is, at least what the circumstance should be although it is not always the case, understood that the situation is dire enough that volunteers are not going to cut it and so the military need more recruits […]
Matthew Perry was sent to the Tokyo Harbor, on behalf of the United States government, to force Japan to enter into trade with the United States and to demand a treaty that allowed United States merchant ships to access Japanese ports. At this time many Western powers were looking to open new markets for […]
Green, John. “The Cold War in Asia: Crash Course US History #38.” YouTube. Accessed April 16, 2015. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y2IcmLkuhG0 The Korean War has always interested me because no one ever seems to talk about it. Everyone always brings up the Vietnam War but never the Korean war. My Great Uncle fought in the Korean War […]
Schoppa states the following about the 38th parallel, “Two army colonels, given half and hour to choose the dividing line, selected the thirty-eight parallel so that Seoul would be in the southern zone” (p. 367). Was this decision truly a chance though? After all, the northern zone had an electric power plant that produced nearly […]
A few years ago, I had the privilege of interviewing two veterans for my Eagle Scout Service Project. Jim Meidenbauer, a veteran of the United States Army, was stationed in Korea from 1957 to 1958. This was a few years after the signing of the ceasefire, but there was still a simmering conflict going on […]
“Berlin Conference of 1884-1885.” New World Encyclopedia. August 29, 2008. Accessed April 14, 2015. http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Berlin_Conference_of_1884-85. Giles, Lancelot. The Siege Of The Peking Legations. Edited by L.R Marchant. University of Western Australia Press, 1970. Retallack, James. Imperial Germany 1871-1918. New York: Oxford University Press, 2008. Tan, Chester. The Boxer Catastrophe. New York, New York: Octagon Books, […]
1.) ʺAtomicBombMuseum.org – Destructive Effects.ʺ AtomicBombMuseum.org – Destructive Effects. AtomicBombMuseum.org, 2006. Web. 14 Apr. 2015. http://atomicbombmuseum.org/3_health.shtml. 2.) ʺHiroshima: Anniversary of the dropping of the Atomic Bombʺ. ABC News. Accessed April 13, 2015. http://abcnews.go.com/International/photos/hiroshima-anniversary-dropping-atomic-bomb-16923505/image-16924132 3.) ʺHyperWar: USSBS: The Effects of Atomic Bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki [Chapter 2].ʺ Ibiblio-The Public Library and Digital Archive, n.d. Web. 14 Apr. […]
Citations for Group Project (History 354)
R. Schoppa ʺCataclysm: East Asia in World War IIʺ In East Asia Identities and Changes in the Modern World 1700-Present, 303-304, Upper Saddle River: Pearson Education, 2008. R. Schoppa ʺCataclysm: East Asia in World War IIʺ In East Asia Identities and Changes in the Modern World 1700-Present, 303-304, Upper Saddle River: Pearson Education, 2008. Chang […]
The United States has maintained a presence in Japan since the end of World War II. Although it was first established as an administrative zone, Okinawa developed into the United States’ primary staging area for the Vietnam War. The Japanese, and particularly the Okinawans, would see the US occupation as a bitter reminder of the […]
Tom Melling Artistic Changes Source footnotes: 4 “Kim Hong-do.” Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, n.d. Web. 13 Apr. 2015. 6 Kim, Won-Yong. “Modern Period.” Encyclopedia Britannica Online. Encyclopedia Britannica, n.d. Web. 13 Apr. 2015. 1,2,9 Kim, Won-Yong. “Painting.” Encyclopedia Britannica Online. Encyclopedia Britannica, n.d. Web. 13 Apr. 2015. 10 “Lee Jung-seob.” Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, n.d. Web. 13 […]
As I read our online readings this week I came across my topic, which was called “The Disease”. In Ishimure Michiko’s “Paradise in the Sea of Sorrow” he references the Minimata Disease which I had never heard of, so I chose to dig deeper into what this disease was. Minamata city is on the coast […]
In the following video, we are given an extremely brief glimpse into Japan during the 50’s. Yet in that minute-long video, some very telling things come out: General “Mac” is nonchalantly refereed to as the “uncrowned emperor of Japan” while Japanese school children sing him a happy birthday song in English. Within a few seconds […]
After the Pacific Theater of WWII had ended, and the occupation of Japan by the Allied (American) Forces had begun, there was a formation of a body to dole out justice to those who had committed crimes against humanity during the war in East Asia. The International Military Tribunal for the Far East (IMFTE) was […]
As we discussed in class on Tuesday and indeed as we have discussed throughout the reading of Wild Swans the peasant was Mao’s model for society1. He wanted every social caste to model themselves after them, especially those who didn’t agree with him2. Jung points out towards the end of the book that she realizes why […]
Zach Shariff 04/09/15 HIS 354 Article 9 or Article Nein? 第九条 日本国民は、正義と秩序を基調とする国際平和を誠実に希求し、国権の発動たる戦争と、武力による威嚇又は武力の行使は、国際紛争を解決する手段としては、永久にこれを放棄する。 二 前項の目的を達するため、陸海空軍その他の戦力は、これを保持しない。国の交戦権は、これを認めない。 Article 9 of Japanese Constitution in Japanese. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_9_of_the_Japanese_Constitution#/media/File:Japanese_sailors_jmsdf.jpg Picture of Japanese Defense force. War, at one time in Japan going to war was a sign of honor, and revering ones ancestors who were felled in battle, a sacred virtue. […]
This week I was interested in the fact that the Constitution included a section on women and their rights. In the book out of the entire section dedicated to the Constitution there is only one sentence that comments on these rights but does not explain the process of how they got there. So I decided […]
It is quite amazing that Japan was able to come back from such a devastating war. Schoppa states that “more than 40 percent of most important industrial cities had been devastated by summer 1945” (1). As was mentioned in class, Article 9 of the new Showa Constitution dramatically helped Japan focus most of its efforts […]
Japan surrendering and formally signing their surrender on September 2, 1945 was what finally ended World War II. A year later The Tokyo trials began on May 3, 1946, and lasted two and a half years. “The Tokyo trials were not the only forum for the punishment of Japanese war criminals, merely the most visible. In fact, the […]
During the years 1953 to 1974 Japan experienced major economic growth. While it may seem like Japan’s economic achievement came out of nowhere, they had experienced success since the Meiji period and continued to advance and grow from that point on. A surprising fact is that in the time period between the two world wars […]
In 1947 the occupying forces in Japan would need to create a new law of the land to rebuild the country after it had been devastated by the many years of war. The old constitution, the Meiji Constitution, was flawed. It had been based on the old German government, which gave most of the power […]
For some reason every time we started disguising Mao or Nazi’s(Despite our focus being Asia) and the like my mind kept pulling from what I knew about McCarthy and his campaign in the United States. Mao’s thought police and mass denouncing reminded me of the power McCarthy was able to command because of the fear of […]
The Income Doubling Plan was a plan that Japan set up and the objectives were to double the individual income, to double the gross national product, attain full employment through expansion in employment opportunities, and to raise the living standard of the people of Japan. This plan was set forth to and address the issue […]
Deng Xiaoping was one of the leaders in China during the mid-late decades of the 20th century. He had progressive and capitalist ideas that meshed well with the ideas of communism. Unfortunately for him, Mao Zedong was still the leader of China during this period and he was heading down the path of personal gain […]
When the war ended, and the emperor of Japan came on the the radio to tell them that it was over and they had lost, many people didnt believe it. They didnt want to believe it, that all they had sacrificed for and suffered was for nothing. One can imagine that the world for many […]
I will talk about the Japanese economy, mainly the miracle of economic growth that Japan had experiences after World War 2. After World War 2 Japan was completely devastated. With the fire bombing and the two atomic bomb dropped on japan and numerous other bombings, there was not much left to Japan. At this point […]
Satō Eisaku was the prime minister of Japan from 1964-1972. Satō brought incredible economic growth in Japan and helped close some of the lingering wounds from the Second World War. Satō was former Prime Minister Kishi Nobusuke’s brother. Like Prime Minister Ikeda Hayato before him, Satō had been the head of the Finance Ministry and […]
The occupation of Japan was called the “third turn [or turning point] in the Japanese history after having borrowed from China and the Meiji Restoration.[1] During the occupation, the Japanese economy was very poor where inflation was rampant and production in certain industries was reviving slowly.[2] Schoppa puts it into perspective a little bit for […]
It is amazing to see how a nation so devastated in war can go from a pile of burned rubble to the second largest economic powerhouse in less than three decades. Japan did such a thing. Rising out of the ashes of World War Two, the island nation of the rising sun was able to […]
Mishima Yukio was a man who seemed to live in the wrong time period in Japan. He was briefly mentioned in the textbook, but I find his story to be both fascinating and tragic. After being rejected for service in the Imperial Japanese Army during World War II, he devoted most of his energies to […]
(1) I am almost certain we can all put together what Skinkansen is or what it means based on the image above. But just for clarification, the actual definition is defined as a high speed railroad carrying (train) system in Japan (4). Japan and its creators (Shinji Sogo and Hideo Shima) originally created this system after […]
Here is a brief history of why historians feel that one of General Douglas MacArthur’s finest moments in his military career was the six years he was managing Japan after Japan had been defeated. From 1945-1952, the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers (SCAP) was set in motion during the postwar U.S. occupation of Japan under General Douglas MacArthur. MacArthur came into […]
For my post this week I wanted to look more into the Shinto religion that we briefly talked about in class today. I actually didn’t know too much about it to begin with besides the few things that were mentioned like how it was polytheistic and it was a nature religion. We also talked about […]
Later in his life MacArthur would comment on his thoughts of the controversial anti-war article in the Japanese constitution. What is interesting is that he claims that the idea for the inclusion of Article 9 was not his idea at all. In Schoppa we see an excerpt that is written by MacArthur that goes on […]
In 1945, the Japanese surrendered to the allied forces and accepted an unconditional surrender. the Americans allowed the Japanese to keep their emperor but they required a new constitution so Japan would not be able to gain that much power again. At First SCAP (Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces) appointed a Japanese board to […]
In 1947 the Japanese had a constitution that made them look more advanced than in the past. This new constitution provided people the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. This was taken much from their westernized counterpart’s constitution I believe. This constitution provided all races, gender, and age to be equal and […]
After World War Two, there were two major powers in china bidding for power over the entire nation: the communist party lead by Mao Zedong, and the Guomindong lead by Jiang Jeishi. in 1945, the Guomindong had a large upper hand in the battle. they had more men, supplies, and territory. the communists were mostly […]
Earlier in the text of Wild Swans, we see emphasis put on the unpredictability of the happenings in China, in the late 1800s. Later on in the text wee see the following statement, “workers came out to greet my father’s party on the quay, waving little red paper flags with five stars–the new flag of […]
When looking back at the actions of Mao’s Red Guards, it’s hard to imagine what forces could push young people to perform such acts of wanton violence and destruction. However, it is important to remember the events still fresh in the minds of the Chinese people during the 60’s and 70’s. In the above […]
After the failure of the Great Leap Forward, Mao Zedong had lost a significant amount of political power. Small groups of people, both within the Chinese Communist Party and outside of it, sought to advance China through means that were at odds with Mao. To counter the perceived “revisionist,” the Chinese Communist Party utilized the […]
Chairman Mao had nothing but good intentions when he planned elements of the Great Leap Forward. Let’s double steel production in one year and show the West we can be self sufficient. Never mind the fact that the Civil War just ended and millions of people are malnourished and have little to live on. None […]
In the book there is a great deal of focus on how people can convince themselves that everything is fine. This is especially prevalent in the section where the more fantastical the claim the better. This kind of thinking proved to be very dangerous for the country seeing how so many people died because of […]
Zach Shariff HIS 354 04/02/15 “MAO: THE MOST UN-CHINESE LEADER OF CHINA” The original 1991 English cover of Wild Swans http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wild_Swans#/media/File:Wild_Swans.jpg While reading wild swans closer to the end Jung makes a mention in her book of the […]
1. The Women’s Federation (All-China Women’s Federation) is a topic that is continuously brought up in our book-Wild Swans (Three Daughters of China). I from class discussion, had an idea what was all entailed with this “group” but was still interested to fully understand what it is and has to offer for the women of Chine. […]
The story of the “perfect” soldier of Lei Feng in Chang’s novel and the Cult of Mao is comparable in some ways to our understanding of North Korea’s Kim Jong Un and his family. The fact that Chairman Mao could do no wrong and that there was almost no way to denounce his authority is […]
In 1956, Chairman Mao decided that the only way to grow the communist party was to hear from the people about how they felt the government was running, and thus the Hundred Flowers Campaign was born. It was named after a traditional Chinese poem: “Let a hundred flowers bloom / Let a hundred schools of […]
Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung or The Little Red Book as it became known as in the West due to its red cover, was like the good communist’s handbook during the period just before and during the Cultural Revolution in China. It is one of the most widely printed books in the world. It […]
The Red Guard’s were a large movement of young people in the People’s Republic of China, these young people were paramilitary. The Red Guard’s were mobilized by Mao around 1967 during the Cultural Revolution. The goal of the Red Guard’s was to make China red from inside out and then continue to make the whole […]
As we are reading through Chang and talking through in class, I was interested in looking more into the Red Guards. We discussed how they started as a youth “movement” who began as children of high officials. Their first targets were teachers and education came to a halt in China as students gained authority over […]
Last week I had written about the communist takeover of China, as told By Jung Chang in her book Wild Swans. It appeared for a time that things had changed for the better over the reign of the Guomindong. For a time things had, perhaps. Here was a cause with the betterment of the people […]
In Communist China under General Mao’s rule the “Four Olds” were a potential because they reminded the people of the previous ruler in power. What are the “Four Olds”? They are old Chinese customs, culture, habits, and ideas. During the Cultural Revolution Mao attempted to tighten his grip on China by implementing more radical ideas. The idea of […]
Reading though Wild Swans, chapter tens title was called “Suffering Will Make You a Better Communist” was a very interesting overall. This chapter made me think about De-Hong and how in the past few chapters focus on her hard work and sacrifice for the communist party. Taking what we talked about in class and from […]
“My mother had become pregnant in 1959, and had written to the part asking for permission to have an abortion. This was the standard procedure. One reason the Party had to give its consent was that the operation was a dangerous one at the time. My mother had said she was busy working for the […]
I guess the level of hypocrisy here just really astounds me. The policies that Mao enacted to initiate The Great Leap Forward basically created the famine1. People were literally starving because he assured everyone that there would be a surplus of food and the peasants believed him and stopped working as hard2. As Jung points out the […]
In July of 1955 Mao had really started stepping up his attempt on changing China.[1] He wanted speeding up of collective farming and later in the year he suddenly announced that all industry and commerce, that was originally in private hands was now to be nationalized.[2] Jung’s mother was actually put into detention at […]
Well it has been a while since I have posted, I have been busy with scholastic kudos and producing art for my senior show. Since I missed commenting last week and am still unable to get the foot binding imagery as described in “Wild Swans” by Jung Chang. One would think that the idea of […]
Mao states that he wanted to get rid of the old customs, old culture, old ideas, and old habits of China through the use of the youth, however was that the only reason? There is one phrase that sums up the Red Guard’s mission but also Mao’s as well, “We vow to launch a bloody war against anymore who […]
We have been learning in class a bit about the Red Guard. This group is quite fascinating to me because they were a group of children in the late 20th Century in Communist China, and they give us a chance to study how the Maoist mentality and government affected young people in China. In the […]
In Wild Swans Jung Chang touches on an interesting dynamic that occurred with Mao’s descent into madness. This starts with a group known as the Red Guard who had been, in a way, egged on by Mao to attack those that were seen as a threat. The Red Guard were mainly made up of younger […]
The Great Leap Forward was intended to help China’s industrial problems. The Chinese wanted industrialization to happen quickly, so the appearance of furnaces in every neighborhood was common and was anticipated to further the process of industrialization. This program of melting objects to make steel led to the melting of agricultural equipment and slaughtering of […]
dAug. 18, 1966, supreme Chinese leader Mao Zedong hosted a rally of more than a million “Red Guards,” mingling with the crowd and putting his personal stamp on a decade of political violence and turmoil that was to become the Cultural Revolutiondle During the Chinese Revolution students and the Red […]
Much of the latter part of Wild Swans deals with Jung Chang and her family’s experiences living through the Cultural Revolution. What struck me was the constant destruction and violence that occurred throughout China, brought on by Mao’s exhortations to the people to “destroy old ideas, habits, customs, and culture.” Anything that didn’t fit within approved […]
As we discussed in class, China’s cultural shift to a more communist focused culture called for radical change. When adapting change they attempted to destroy and erase things that reminded/taught/contributed to the old teachings. As a history major this greatly bothers me as the preservation and protection of history is something I think to be […]
It is very interesting to learn about communism from a communist perspective. For instance, in Chapter 13 of our class book East Asia: Identities and Change in the Modern World, we learn about Maoism and its motivations for equality and empowerment of the peasant class. We learn that the idea behind the practice of Maoism […]
When examining the differences between Maoist thought and mainstream communism, one cannot help but see echoes of past instances of foreign invaders or concepts being brought into China, only to become assimilated or re-purposed by the incredibly strong native culture and massive population. In this case, the incredibly populated, impoverished, yet overwhelmingly rural China proved […]
When the Soviet Union and China signed the Treaty of Friendship, Alliance, and Mutual Aid in 1950 it was a sign to the world of the close relationship that the two communist countries had forged. Through as of the hardships that each nation had encountered on its path, the communist fractions of both countries had […]
Many often wondered how the Communists came to defeat the Nationalists in the Chinese Civil War given all the setbacks they had encountered. After escaping encirclement in the south, the Communists marched northward for over a year to get out of the Nationalists reach. Despite losing a large amount of men and women they still […]
China had just overcome its revolution that has lasted decades. Jen Jishi has fled to the island of Taiwan and set up a small nationalist government on said island. China was now under communist control and the leader who led the Chinese people has been made the new leader of the nation. His name is […]
While reading the novel this week I was impressed by the way that Communists were presented as heroes and surprised to see that many of their programs were actually practical. It seemed like their main desire was to give the people more power and that did happen in a sense. The public committees and neighborhood […]
The Great Leap Forward was Chairman Mao’s answer to making China be as economically superior as the United States. The idea was sound: put Chinese citizens in communes (essentially small communities), have them produce food through agricultural means and produce mostly building materials through the use of backyard furnaces. Everybody shares land, tools, and animals […]
The Great Leap Forward was a plan created by Mao to quickly modernize China in 1958. Mao believed that by restructuring the population’s labor, China could avoid making mistakes of other developing countries. The plan established communes all across China, which consisted mostly of rural families. About 99.1 percent of all rural families would join communes (1). The […]
The fifth chapter of Wild Swans by Jung Chang offered rich insight into a struggle many in the West, or at least here, are never taught. Detailing the Communist takeover of the city of Jinzhou from the Guomindang administration, it also provides a look at what life was like just up to that point. The […]
After World War II, the Guomindang regime and the communist party were on the brink of civil war in China. The civil war didn’t break out until 1947 and became one of the largest wars in modern times. The civil war was decided on the battlefield but problems with Jiang’s rule significantly determined why he […]
As I read Chang’s Wild Swans I became interested in what City God Temples were and the background of the depictions of Hell, which were referenced on page sixty-one. City God Temples housed Chinese deities that were responsible for protecting the people and well-being of a certain city. The deities were also responsible for the afterlife of the […]
With talking a little bit in class on Tuesday (3/24)-Chinese marriages. I was curious to adventure in to more detail about the Marriage Law of 1950. Below is an image (propaganda) that was used after the new law became effective. The writing underneath the photo of the married couple reads: “A free and independent marriage […]
I’ve always thought of foot binding as cruel and inhuman but it wasn’t until we started reading this book that I honestly realized just how horrible it is. The mere description invokes a gag reflex and while I’m not certain but the smell would probably make me pass out. Its no wonder that after getting […]
In Wild Swans we are exposed to women with a unique notion of power1. While Chinese women hold almost no power over their fellow man they do have their own hierarchy within their gender. Although this may appear to be empowering I make the argument that it is in fact counter intuitive and furthers the patriarchal society […]
The cultural revolution is a key moment in Chinese history and was directly from the failure of Mao’s the Great Leap Forward. After the disaster of the Great Leap Forward cause a fissure of the communist party. New key leaders came out of the Great Leap with Deng Xiaoping and Liu Shaoqi. Mao was losing […]
As I was reading Chapter 13 for this week in Schoppa’s book, I noticed a picture of a landlord getting executed. I decided to read more into this and I think it’s bizarre that the landlords were tried and executed. For over nearly 20 years, China had been fighting in wars such as the Civil War and […]
In the 1920’s in Shanghai during the Jiang’s purge, the Central Committee of the party had remained underground until 1933 where a new and different party was coming up in Southeast China under the rule of Mao Zedong.[1] Mao had understood that the Communist movement would not be successful if based on the proletariat instead […]
All Mao Zedong ever wanted was for China to flourish. He was a man who loved his country and his people. He would do anything to make sure China was the number one country. He was a liberator. Or was he? Well, lets examine what he has done for his country until his death. It […]
Deng Xiaoping was born in 1904 in Sichaun Province in China, and was the son of a landowners. He went to study in France for four years starting in 1920, where he became involved with the Communist movement, and later lived in the Soviet Union for a year. He returned to China after and became […]
A scene I found disturbing in Wild Swans was the description of Jung’s grandmother’s foot binding. Foot binding was most likely created in the tenth century by a court dancer named Yao Niang, who had bound feet in the shape of a new moon. Over time, other ladies in the court began foot binding which […]
During the time of Japanese occupation in China there were some finer details that were talked about that rang similar bells to events that also happened in Lost Names. Particularly in regards to school children. The first similarity is that children were separated based on nationality. Chinese attended their own schools and were physically separated […]
In 1949, according to Liu Shaoqi, the goal of the land reform was, “to free rural productive forces from the shackles of the landlords’ feudal land-ownership system, so as to develop agricultural production and open the way for new China’s industrialization” (Schoppa, 323). This post will focus on the idea of freedom that was promised […]
As the old saying goes, “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.” So why, in 1972, would President Richard Nixon, a virulent anti-communist, visit China and shake hands with Chairman Mao Zedong? For starters, even Mao distrusted the Soviet Union. For the longest time, the Soviet Union saw itself as the world leader in […]
“Wild Swans Author Jung Chang: 2013 Hong Kong Book Fair Writers Series.” YouTube. Accessed March 25, 2015. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V8D8h5FUdhk. I found an interview with the author of Wild Swans, Jung Chang. She talks briefly about the book Wild Swans and goes into more depth about her other book she wrote about Mao. She talks a little […]
In the manga, Barefoot Gen, we see a reoccurring theme of making difficult decisions throughout the book. It depicts people standing up for what they believe in, but also having to live with the decisions the make as well. We see the devotion the Japanese had for the war effort in the book. They gave up their […]
Devotion to Japan Probably the most intriguing thing I noticed when reading Barefoot Gen was Nakazawa’s mention of devotion that was expected of everyone in Japan during the war because everything was for the war. Even Gen’s brother Koji wants to join the war effort from all the outside pressure of Japanese society, even though […]
The fictional parts in Keiji Nakazawa’s Barefoot Gen stand out throughout. Nonetheless, the book captures the reality of the atomic horror. Nakazawa goes beyond the traditional textbook coverage when “The age of the atomic bomb began at 5:30 a.m. on July 16, 1945” (pg. 204). Rather Nakazawa talks about the melting flesh, the “monsters,” and the suffering […]
During our discussion in class, we covered at length the strong domestic propaganda machine that the Japanese government had crafted during the early 20th century. We saw that Japanese families were willing to send their children off to war, fully expecting them to die for the Emperor and the nation of Japan. However, the Japanese […]
In Barefoot Gen, we got to see what happens to those to speak out against imperial Japan. They become the black sheep of the community. Gen’s father, Mr. Nakaoka, is labelled a traitor and a coward because of how he speaks out against the emperor and Japan’s war efforts. The hazing begins when Mr. Nakaoka […]
In Barefoot Gen, there is a scene where Hanada goes to boot camp in the Imperial Japanese Navy. He is not as physically fit as the other recruits nor is he as willing to fight in the war as them either. 1) Hanada often messes up and for his inability to adjust to the rigors […]
During World War II propaganda was in high abundance from all of the warring countries involved. There goal? Win the people in their country over and convince them that the war was worth while and that the high casualties were worth while. The key was to be seen by many in their daily life. Some […]
While reading Barefoot Gen, I began thinking back to my earliest memories about World War Two, and particularly the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Soon after finishing the manga, I stumbled upon the memory of the novel, Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes, by Eleanor Coerr. I was around eight years old when I read the book, […]
Just reading the textbooks and the online sources didn’t really serve to portray how indoctrinated many of the Japanese people were. In the manga however it is scary how clueless and brainwashed some of the characters shown appear to be. We are shown these ideas through the eyes of the main characters who often comment […]
What do we think of when we think of Manga? Perhaps we think of some Japanese comics that are popular to the nerds of our local comic book stores, or maybe it is a enjoyable source of reading on your off time. Well it turns out that manga, at least the drawing style, has existed […]
Zach Shariff 03/13/15 HIS 354 BLOG 6 Violence is never truly portrayed in a positive light at any point in the manga Barefoot Gen. From the start of the book to the end of it violence is portrayed negatively as savage and at best unnecessary. For an obvious example one […]
During WWII everything went towards the war. However some had it harder than others, it seems that the poor of the world were the ones who really suffered. Before reading the book Barefoot Gen by Keiji Nakazawa, I had not realized to what extent that suffering gone specifically when it came to the citizens getting enough food. […]
In the Western adapted Manga book “Barefoot Gen: A Cartoon Story of Hiroshima, Volume 1” by Keiji Nakazawa, the one theme that stands out as crucial to understanding the context of the book and the war, is that of nationalism as a result of propaganda. Above I have included a few examples of US wartime […]
The dropping of the Little Boy from the Enola Gay at 8:15 AM local time on August 6, 1945 over Hiroshima, Japan resulted in horrific loss of life, quality of life, and immense destruction of property. United States prisoners of war took to painting the letter P on the roof of their barracks to show […]
“Mother, Natsuko… forgive me. I want to live, but everyone around me is determined that I should die…”1 This statement speaks volumes for the amount of pressure that was being placed on people to die for their country. Its not just having a will to die for your country either, they are going in knowing […]
After the class today on the reading and learning about the heavily used propaganda on Japanese citizens, I had to do more research on the Kamikaze Pilots. However, after a couple hours into the research, I found this great video that shows how both the Americans and the Japanese felt about the Kamikaze pilots or what […]
“Human beings are foolish. Thanks to bigotry, religious fanaticism, and the greed of those who traffic war, the Earth is never at peace, and the specter of nuclear war is never far away (1).” – Keiji Nakazawa Barefoot Gen is a fictitious chronicling of this event, with details both before and after, but undoubtedly […]
In Barefoot Gen, there was a lot of talk of the kamikaze pilots but here I will look into the background of the word kamikaze and the pilots that threw during the war. Starting with the historical background of the word started in 1274 and 1281. Like the talk that we have in class, at […]
This week we began talking about the history of manga and I decided to look up Tezuka Osamu who is the “Godfather of manga” and created some very popular manga stories. I found a great website explaining Tezuka’s life and his manga creations. When he was 16 he was drafted into World War Two like […]
During WWII at Nanking, the Japanese Army killed many Chinese civilians, including the old, women and children.[1] The police and firemen were mainly targeted by bayonet.[2] To me, I can understand why the police and firemen would be the ones that were mainly attacked. The police would have weapons and the firemen would be the […]
On Tuesday when we first started talking about Barefoot Gen1 Professor Ganyard mentioned that recently there has been controversy over the book and motions to ban its use in the classroom. I found this extremely interesting given how much the atomic bomb affected Japan (and still effects it today). Upon further research, I found that […]
When someone screams “Banzai”, in today’s world it usually is associated with the word “hooray” or some other form of excitement. So I found it quite odd when Mr. Nakaoka chanted “KOJI NAKAOKA, BANZAAAI!!” (2) because Mr. Nakaoka was completely against his son joining the Naval Air Corps to fight a useless war that would only end with Koji dying or mutilated. Surely, when […]
In times of war, death occurs not only in battle, but from malnutrition and starvation as well. Famines occur and starvation as a result of that. Since Japan at the time relied so heavily on imported food it was quickly cut off by the Allies in 1941 creating devastating results. The blockade by the Americans […]
Throughout history, Japanese families have relied on honor, this honor goes for their ancestors, the parents, and to honor their heritage. Honor means everything to the Japanese, whether it is the time of the sameri or during World war 2. In Nakazawa book he talks about a young man named Hanada, he is training for […]
I found a documentary from national geographic about dropping the atomic bomb and the aftermath of it. The documentary is rather long, but I found it to be informative and interesting. It has interviews with American soldiers flying the Enola Gay, the ones that dropped the bomb on Hiroshima, and also interviews from Japanese survivors. […]
When reading Barefoot Gen I became interested in the thousand stitch belt that Gen and his siblings were making for Koji.[1] I have seen numerous depictions of these belts, like in Letters from Iwo Jima, and other WWII films and books, but I had never learned too much about them. The thousand stitch belt, or […]
Eugene Heller was just one of millions of soldiers in the United States Army during World War II. As an engineer with the 1067th Engineering Constructions Group, he was tasked with maintaining and constructing portable bridges in combat conditions. This skill would have proved useful in the upcoming Operation Olympic, the proposed invasion of the […]
One of the biggest “traditions” I have been coming across with the traditional Japanese family is how the Father is the head of the household (3). I especially see this true in the book we are reading, Barefoot Gen. I see this in many aspects the first being-the father doesn’t like war, so he […]
During the early 20th century, The Japanese Empire demonstrated an increasing disregard for borders in neighboring countries. However, the borders ignored we not only territorial, but also moral. Horrific war crimes of rape, genocide, and exploitation are all legacies of Japanese conquests into neighboring lands. But the actions of various “research” groups in Japan highlight […]
One thing I really wanted to touch on more is identity. The protagonist in Lost Names: Scenes from a Korean Boyhood by Richard Kim spends a good portion of his story being reminded he is Korean, when surrounded by Japanese. His Japanese teacher frequently punishes the boy for his own thinking, yet he struggles with […]
Yamamoto Isoroku was born April 4, 1884 in Nagaoka, Japan as Takano Isoroku. By the age of 20 he graduated from the Japanese Naval Academy, serving in the Russo-Japanese war in 1905. He participated and was injured in the Battle of Tsushima. A decade later, he was adopted by the Yamamoto family after graduating from the […]
World War II was a war that brought massive casualties and destruction to Europe and East Asia (Pacific) respectively. The Pacific War’s start for the United States did not happen until after the Second Sino-Japanese War in 1937. When the United States was attacked on Pearl Harbor in 1941, Americans were eager to go to […]
It is quite funny to see that when the Japanese are winning the war and able to take vast amounts of natural resources that they give all the children in the Greater Japanese Empire rubber balls to celebrate the conquests. However, as the war starts to turn out of favor for the Japanese, they begin […]
After learning about the Kamikaze Pilots in class and reading, “Reading 7: World War II”, I decided to look further into the Kamikaze pilot’s last farewell letters. In my research, I found out there was a book that was published which had last letters from Kamikaze pilots to their loved ones. I was able to […]
“Bushido, a modern term rather than a historical one, originates from the samurai moral values, most commonly stressing some combination of frugality, loyalty, martial arts mastery, and honor unto death.” (1) As we were talking about in class on Tuesday, Bushido was more of a ghostly memory of Japan. The samurai all but disappeared at […]
When we were talking about WWII in class and as I read the texts I couldn’t help but think what would have happened if Japan would have done differently. With Jiang at the helm Japan embarked on some very questionable decisions. The first thing I found to be a very poor decision was for Japan, […]
During World War 2, Japan played an important role. Japan attacked almost all of its Asian neighbors and allied itself with Nazi Germany, they also launched a surprised attack on the United States naval base at Pearl Harbor. At the time, Hirohito was seen as a powerless monarch, but since World War 2 many scholars […]
This week in class we explored the second World War through the eyes of a young Korean Boy with reading the book, Lost Names: Scenes from a Korean Boyhood. The book brings to the surface some major issues of the time in Korea such as, colonization by Japan, cultural identity, and Nationalism to name a few. […]