Re: who really started ww2 in the pacific?

"Stuart McGraw" <smcg4191@xxxxxxxx> ha scritto nel messaggio
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On 12/11/2009 09:51 AM, Michele wrote:
"Marlock" <marlockenator@xxxxxxxxx> ha scritto nel messaggio
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Stuart McGraw wrote:
[...]
Winners write history,

Stock hogwash. My shelves groan under the weight of books written by
former
German and Italian generals and admirals. I even have the occasional
Japanese officer. Maybe that line was true at the time of the Phoenician
Wars, certainly not in the 1950s and later.

Why do you dismiss the idea so cavalierly?

Because that's what it deserves.

I don't
think Churchill or anyone subsequent ever meant it to
be taken literally (although it could be in the case
of a society where rulers control all information).


Which is not the case in our worldwide culture, that's why I mentioned that
it might have been true when Carthago was razed down, its language
suppressed - but not today.

The point of it is that the victors will exert pressure
(sometimes completely unconsciously, sometimes subtle,
sometimes overt as with SCAP's censorship of published
material in occupied Japan) that will tend to portray
the victors in a good light and the vanquished in a bad
light. This is a positive feedback loop -- as the "history"
gets established, other views become more marginalized.

And then there is an obvious reaction, as the very existence of the term of
"revisionism" shows. That is, provided that the censorship does not exist
any more - as in Italy, Germany, Japan, Croatia...

In any case, what you are arguing here isn't that "winners make history",
but rather the obvious "propagandists - of both sides - make propaganda,
usually helped by censorship when in a non-free-speech state". By no
measurement can Palestinians be considered winners, but if you pick up the
history textbooks now available in Gaza, you'll discover some surprising
explanations of what happened since the 1920s.


I put "history" in quotes because of course there will
be different interpretations -- this is about slanting
in an average sense.

So, since there is an abundance of historical texts written by former German
generals, the average will not equate with the silly platitude above.

And "victors" does not mean just
the rulers, includes everyone involved in the creation
and distribution of historical information.

You are saying that a US historian today is a "victor", just because he
happens to be of the same nationality of one of the winning countries in
that war. Of course the famous writer who spun the tale about the hundred
thousand casualties in Dresden, being British, also represents the point of
view of the "victors" - mere nonsense.

The pressure
will also affect the losers who will understand that
having a certain point of view will aid in getting their
material published.


And the contrary, of course, too, after a while. Writing shocking tell-all
revisionist conspiracy theories will boost the sales.

The fact that you have or can get some books written
by the losers is not really relevant -- the history
in question is that which we (the people, not you the
history professional or aficionado) get from the big
selling popular books, tv, school, newspapers, casual
comments in non-historical material, etc.


Then you have not read enough of the popular media you mention. If you did,
you would discover that their treatment of the A-bombs, just to make the
most obvious example and a one closely linked with this thread, is much
closer to the losers' point of view than to the winners'. Likewise, while I
don't speak Japanese, I'm told by knowledgeable people that the
justification of Japan being forced to go to war, that is being aired in
this thread, is quite popular in the general layman's culture of Japan
nowadays. Here in Italy, a principle described as "Italiani brava gente"
(Italians (are) good people) is firmly ensconced in popular thinking about
WWII. It means that while the italians invaded here and there like the
Germans, the Italian troops were not so liable to commit atrocities, unlike
the Germans. Then every time a serious history book comes out describing the
gassing of the Ethiopians or the villages burned down in reprisals in
Yugoslavia, there is an uproar to uphold the popular idea.

I noticed in the books suggested in response to my
request for reading about the causes of the war,
there were no authors whose names looked Japanese.


Another poster already dealt with that. Note that if you wrote in Japanese
on a Japanese site, you'd probably be assumed to be able to read Japanese
and you would be supplied with a wealth of non-translated material, some of
which written by former officers of the Imperial Army and Navy.

The next time I go to big-box book store (might be a
couple weeks since I live pretty far from the nearest),
I'll take a look at the pacific war history shelf and
see how many of those are by Japanese authors and report
back here.


I'm aware that this might sound surprising, but the fact that a book was not
translated into English doesn't mean it was never written.

.

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