Why do some Japanese not admit the atrocities they commited during WW2?

The Japanese people were never informed about the incidents in China while they were happening. The Japanese propaganda at the time, represented the savage Chinese as attacking the outnumbered Japanese soldiers.

The Japanese civilians were never told that the Japanese lost the island of Iwo Jima or that they lost the battle of Midway. The only hint the Japanese population got that they might be losing the war, is that their glorious victories kept getting closer and closer to the home islands.

After the Japanese unconditional surrender, the Japanese population was stunned and humiliated to discover the real truth about the war.

Frankly, it's easier and more comfortable to deny that these events ever occurred. Never doubt the human power of denial. It's very strong.

It's clear some answerers don't know what you're talking about.

Part of the problem is the way the peace settlement occurred. While in Germany all the dirty laundry was aired in a very open and public manner, in Japan a 'convenient lie' was perpetrated. MacArthur judged that to put the Emperor on trial and hang him would have been too much of a shock for the Japanese, even though every atrocity was carried out explicitly in his name, and he had the authority- not just legal but moral and practical- to stop it.

So the myth was peddled that Hirohito was just an ignorant puppet. The generals just had to say it was all their fault, which they were happy to do to protect the God-emperor and their suicide-rich sense of honour. So Japan, symbolically through the emperor, also got to pretend they'd been hijacked by criminals, whereas they made no real defence of democracy against militarism. From here it was easy to forget all about the past, water it down, make it more comfortable. In place, they see themselves as liberators of the Asian peoples, who threw off their European overlords after the Japanese example.

I am 38 and this used to be a bigger problem, Japan is very slowly facing up to the truth and China's emergence as a superpower will make this an interesting issue.

It's absolutly repulsive and just shows how unhonorable the Japanese are. Did you know in Japan leaders and officals have been murdered because they have said things that hinted that the Nanking Massacre was true. Did you know that when young children are told Japan didn't win WW2 they are in disbelief? Japan fails to reconzie it's past, because if it does then they will have to face it. But if they wait a couple more years to come clean, most of the victoms will be dead. And it will be harder to prove how absolutly horrible they were.

Also for Unit 747 or it might have been called Unit 721 I can't quite remeber, but it was where the Japanese preformed horrible expriments on living people, such as putting them at diffrent distances away from bombs then blowing the bomb up to see how much it effected the person, or they would give starving chinese children candy infested with anthax or other diseases like small pox, they would expose chinese people to frost bite. They would even preform vivsections on people. But the reason they got away with all of these atrocities is because America wanted the infromation, so they gave America the infromation and were excused of the Unit.

You ask a few very poignant questions, to each of which scholars of Japanese history have devoted years of time and energy to researching and reporting.

The fact is that the government during the war and Japanese Ministry of Education following it, as well as other censoring entities that have existed in Japan since the Meiji Restoration, have long struggled over the politics of presenting the history the Sino-Japanese wars, as well as the Russo-Japanese wars and the Pacific War.

Saburo Ienaga, a famous Japanese historian and Nobel Peace Prize nominee, spent the greater part of his life fighting to have his Japanese history book published by the MOE, only to have it censored for presenting Japanese war-crimes in a very unflattering light. His other published works unabashedly detailed the horrific atrocities committed by the Japanese against the Chinese and Koreans in the years preceding their defeat in World War II. This man was very much despised by many Japanese conservatives for his unrelenting endeavor to make sure that no Japanese would ever forget the crimes against humanity committed by their government during these times.

One must keep in mind that the opinions of all people in Japan and of Japanese heritage are not one and the same. Many Japanese are outspoken about the issue of war and stand staunchly opposed to it, even though some would rather not recall such horrific scenese of violence. Some, like Ienaga among many others, have dedicated their lives to informing the public to be absolutely sure it never happens again. The issue is the old conservative politics of the fairly-recently formed Japanese government that would rather work fast maintain the illusion of control than actually address the reality of the situation.

Remember, these are the same knee-jerk conservative reactions coming from conservative politics in the same country where the genitals of adults in pornographic film must be pixelated (as if I might not know what it looks like!), or where even the tiniest bit of marijuana could land you in prison for five years (even though cannabis was abundant in Japan before the occupation of Allied Forces following World War II, but that's for another day!).

Because they don't believe they did any atrocities.

There is more important points in history to impart to students that this small skirmish between two neighbors. That is why it is just skimmed. Most schools don't have the time to go "in depth" and many things that some say should be taught more thoroughly. I

I, myself, think that The Trail of Tears should be covered more thoroughly than the textbooks and standards state. In California everything is by the "standards". Some people who make up the standards don't think certain items are worth going into in depth.

Not being Japanese, I have no idea what Japanese school children are taught. I have never heard the comments you quote.

I did watch, with interest and tears, the 60th anniversary celebrations marking the end of the war with Japan where Canadian servicemen who had been prisoners of war travelled to Japan and met with Japanese veterans; together these elderly men participated in memorial services honouring their dead.

Your question prompts me to wonder how far the Canadian and US governments have gone in admitting and apologizing for the atrocities committed against their citizens of Japanese descent, who, upon the outbreak of war with Japan, were arrested and interned in concentration camps, their homes and businesses confiscated.

I believe it's a cultural thing. They are a very proud race. Proud of their ancestry that goes back thousands of years. But proud bordering on arrogance and subtle racism. To openly admit and take responsibility for their actions during WWII would be a stain on their heritage and produce a huge, collective loss of face. They are more about living in the present rather than dragging out dirty laundry from the past. I have no dislike for the Japanese; their behaviour is an ingrained thing honed and refined over thousands of years.

If you are seriously looking for a deep answer, I have a book for you to read.

It is called "On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society " By Ret. Lt. Col Dave Grossman

What makes soldiers kill--or not--animates this intriguing survey by a psychologist and former U.S. Army officer. Col. Grossman reveals that only a fraction of soldiers kill during warfare (and feel revulsion when they do); the rest (about 85 percent in World War II) resist by missing the target or refusing to fire.

With an eye to the military command's imperative of overcoming that innate resistance, Col. Grossman quotes numerous anecdotes that exemplify the phenomenon and studies that examine it.

With such knowledge, the military has implemented training that gets firing rates up to 90 percent of soldiers [as we saw in Vietnam], but the psychic cost of blazing away for real is heavy. Individually, a killer goes through thrill-remorse-rationalization stages; socially, the killer needs reassurance and if it is not received, will suffer post-traumatic stress syndrome, characteristic of Vietnam veterans.

Col. Grossman concludes his findings of "enabling factors" in killing by identifying them at work in the rampant violence afflicting American society. This is a book that requires some steely fortitude to finish, but once done, On Killing delivers insights on human nature that are both gratifying and repelling

I am reading it now and just read the chapter on "Atrocity"

Part of the answer you are looking for is the denial and rationalization stages. Those who have killed, and more especially those who have committed atrocities, MUST find some psychological protection from the horror of what they have done (or have been made to do). If you don't read the whole book, find a copy and at least read the Chapter on Atrocity in warfare. this will perfectly answer your question.

Just as you are not allowed to use the "N" word when talking about Blacks, using the the short term you used for Japanese is derogatory and considered inflammatory speech. Also calling them as a group "brutal bast....ds" is also considered derogatory. I am sure you can find cases of gross brutality on all sides of the war. The Bataan Death March is clearly documented and I do not think there is a need to argue it here.

For the same reason Germans deny the Holocaust or southerners refuse to believe their ancestors died defending slavery: it is hard to believe those you knew and loved and were for the most part moral people could commit such unspeakable acts. On the same token, we shouldnt be beating them over the heads for things they had nothing to do with. What has been done has been done and it is better off being left alone. The perps and victims involved are mostly dead. If we go back far enough, all of us have ancestors who did something horrible in the past. As Gandhi would say, an eye for an eye would end up making the whole world blind.