Chiwie posted:

Detroit_Dogg posted:

Maybe if we occupied them in a more literal sense it wouldn't have taken them until the year 2014 to ban child pornography.

Rent-A-Cop posted:

Bunch of quislings surrendering before the US even invaded China. Had they any integrity at all they would have fought to the last man.

So many women left unraped, so many babies un-bayoneted. Really a shame.

LGD posted:

But nobody seems to be coming to that conclusion but you? Most people seem to be able to separate "an occupying government is going to arrange some things to suit its economic/defense purposes, possibly at some inconvenience and expense to the locals" and literal Nazi-style genocide.

Okinawan resentment is justified, but only about as justified as any resentment based on regionalism and NIMBYish concerns ever is- and worth taking about as seriously.

Chiwie posted:

I'm so sorry about your jet noise. Truly it is a crime against humanity. I'm also sorry that thanks to the US military presence, you only have to spend 1% of GDP to defend yourself against your peers. So sorry. Really sorry about how the US is backing you against China's outrageous south sea claims. Really sorry.

I also can't remember why we forced them into an uncondional surrender and built the bases in the first pla...





Oh. poo poo.

Detroit_Dogg posted:

Maybe if we occupied them in a more literal sense it wouldn't have taken them until the year 2014 to ban child pornography.

LGD posted:

Okinawan resentment is justified, but only about as justified as any resentment based on regionalism and NIMBYish concerns ever is- and worth taking about as seriously.

afatwhiteloaf posted:

Not wanting a foreign military base in your country is the exact same thing as homeowners in the U.S. not wanting homeless shelters built near their neighborhood.

Effectronica posted:

Take that up with the people who said that we may do what we like with Okinawa and Okinawans because we won the war.

Chomskyan posted:

The Americans dont think of them as equals, they trivialize their concerns, and they see themselves as the legitimate rules of Okinawa under the right of conquest.

afatwhiteloaf posted:

Not wanting a foreign military base in your country is the exact same thing as homeowners in the U.S. not wanting homeless shelters built near their neighborhood.

VitalSigns posted:

So if the central government does something, it can't be immoral?

Dead Reckoning posted:

I'm going to break this down for you, since I'm starting to think you're actually for-real clinically retarded instead of the more common internet retarded.

The Japanese instrument of surrender signed at the conclusion give the United States the legal and, I would argue, moral right to exercise certain powers of government, which included expropriating land for the construction of various defense projects during the occupation. Although some of the land owners clearly felt that their compensation was inadequate, the nature of the occupation and the fact that the land was taken for what were seen as essential defense projects rather than as a punitive measure or to enrich an individual means that they had no standing to challenge the occupation government's decision. This sort of thing is incredibly common during both wars and occupations, and is generally seen as part of the exigencies of war. The legality of founding the bases having been established, their continued operation with the full consent of the Japanese government (which Okinawa voluntarily joined) cements the moral and legal basis for dismissing any objections to their existence stemming from the manner in which they were constructed.

Had the United States seized local land in order to build a plantation for General MacArthur, or construct loving dealth camps to exterminate an inconvenient minority, then you might have some reasonable basis to the loving Nazis.

VitalSigns posted:

Wait what's wrong with those pictures according to you. I thought whoever wins the war gets to do whatever they want, right?

Or is the justification for the US bases not actually "we got an unconditional surrender" and it's something else?

Chomskyan posted:

Bingo. This thread proves what the Okinawans are saying to be true, especially since there's such a large number of soldiers posting in this thread. The Americans dont think of them as equals, they trivialize their concerns, and they see themselves as the legitimate rules of Okinawa under the right of conquest. What a group of people to have as neighbors.

Chiwie posted:

You are right, I'm pretty sure the war crimes depicted in these pictures is hard to see.

The initial justification was yeah, we forced an unconditional surrender on a dangerous, war crimes happy nation. The US was in the right to seize the ground. On the upside modern day japan gets a huge military force protecting it for the low, low cost of pissing off some NIMBY types.


I'm not a soldier and it would be pretty stupid to assume everyone that disagrees with you in this thread has military service time. In fact it would be on par with me assuming that everyone that is anti base is a mouth drooling idiot that doesn't understand international politics.

Rent-A-Cop posted:

If Okinawans or the Okinawan local government have a conflict with the Japanese central government the US would be morally in the wrong if it interfered in what was obviously an internal political issue by changing the SOFA without the approval of the host nation government.

LGD posted:

Well, the actual concerns expressed in this thread seem to be related to noise complaints, the presence of smelly people who look different in their cities, the extra crime those people allegedly bring in, and the bases occupying land that could allegedly be put to more productive use by local businesses, so actually yeah that comparison seems pretty apt.

Chiwie posted:

You are right, I'm pretty sure the war crimes depicted in these pictures is hard to see.

The initial justification was yeah, we forced an unconditional surrender on a dangerous, war crimes happy nation. The US was in the right to seize the ground. On the upside modern day japan gets a huge military force protecting it for the low, low cost of pissing off some NIMBY types.

Effectronica posted:

I'm pretty sure that was not the justification the US had, internally, for maintaining control of the Ryukyus and Daitos after the rest of Japan was no longer occupied. It's actually a much better justification than the one you're using, too. Dunno why you wouldn't bring it up.

LGD posted:

Well, the actual concerns expressed in this thread seem to be related to noise complaints, the presence of smelly people who look different in their cities, the extra crime those people allegedly bring in, and the bases occupying land that could allegedly be put to more productive use by local businesses, so actually yeah that comparison seems pretty apt.

The Guardian posted:

Futenma air base runs through the middle of his town. Since the islands reverted from US to Japanese rule in 1972, there have been 42 crashes of US aircraft, 37 cases of falling parts, 328 emergency landings, 17 landing failures. For Londoners, it would be like having F22s landing in Hyde Park.

Then there are the rapes, muggings and burglaries committed by US servicemen - 5,634 criminal offences between 1972 and 2009. Among them are 25 murders, 385 burglaries, 25 arsons, 127 rapes, 306 assaults and 2,827 thefts. The worst was the rape of a 12-year-old schoolgirl in 1995.

VitalSigns posted:

Are you actually arguing that the USA doesn't currently interfere with Japanese politics when it comes to our military bases?


The most persecuted minority of all: soldiers occupying land in a foreign country


But those who win on the battlefield have the right to dispose of conquered peoples and territory however they wish, at least according to you. So those can't be crimes in your eyes, to the victor go the spoils and all that.

Effectronica posted:

Interestingly, nobody has bothered with the legal poo poo, since it's only relevant to lawsuits about the expropriation of the land. Instead, they've gone with "vae victis" and "sins of the fathers", and I haven't even bothered touching that last one because the irony levels are toxic when Americans say it. Both of these are immoral unless you're a gigantic hypocrite.

Effectronica posted:

We have multiple people declaring their belief that if you lose a war, you should collaborate with the occupiers. What's worse, some of them seem to be former members of the military.

Chiwie posted:

Why don't you post it here then so we can all discuss it?

Dead Reckoning posted:

I see, you're not actually disagreeing with any of the points raised in the thread, but have instead chosen to argure against your personal and incredibly uncharitable interpretation of things others have said.

Oh, and despite what the activists will tell you, most Okinawans were in favor of reunification because they believed it would hasten the departure of US military forces.

Chiwie posted:

Yes, aircraft noise and Unit 731 are the same thing. How silly of me to think otherwise.

Effectronica posted:

I said that in the part you cut out. Granted, since you apparently view everything as a black-and-white conflict, and whine about people not giving "might makes right" the benefit of the doubt, I should probably have bolded it and added some exclamation marks.

afatwhiteloaf posted:

"allegedly"

Also, there's the tiny matter of thousands of barrels of Agent Orange being dumped on Okinawa. Not to mention the near extinction of a local endangered species.

But I guess none of that should matter here, because the Okinawan people were on the losing side of a war and that makes every hardship they've had to suffer since it ended a good thing.

Dead Reckoning posted:

"The bases were built over the locals' objections."
"Pretty sure their surrender gave us all the justification we needed to build the bases irrespective of the locals' wishes."
"Oh, so you think HITLER was justified in enacting the Final Solution in occupied Europe because he won!"

Do you see the part where this argument breaks down? Why, perhaps, circumstances which justify eminent domain and runway construction do not by extension justify genocide? Do you see how these things are different?

Effectronica posted:

What was actually said in the middle there is "We won the war and so could do what we like", by certain specific people, none of whom are you. Granted, you very obviously have a problem with ideas or thinking about things on anything more than the most concrete level, so you'll insist that this is identical to what you said. I hope that someday you mature enough to be able to use the full power of your brain.

You also have a problem admitting when you're wrong, and the two may be connected.

Dead Reckoning posted:

I see that, having once again been vexed by your nemesis "context", you've reverted to your old standby of psychoanalyzing people who disagree with you and declaring them deficient.

afatwhiteloaf posted:

"allegedly"

Also, there's the tiny matter of thousands of barrels of Agent Orange being dumped on Okinawa. Not to mention the near extinction of a local endangered species.

But I guess none of that should matter here, because the Okinawan people were on the losing side of a war and that makes every hardship they've had to suffer since it ended a good thing.

LGD posted:

Relative to any other large institutional structure or industry that would exist in its place. I mean obviously no base means no base related crime or aviation incidents, but that's a tautology and honestly a running 37-year tally of all crimes committed by foreigners, a 70's era waste disposal scandal, and a single environmental dispute is not really convincing me that Okinawa has been suffering under a yoke of extreme and undue hardship. Because that list looks extremely similar to the NIMBYish complaints that crop up in any area with large industrial/institutional concerns. I mean sorry, but look at that list of crimes you posted. That works out to <1 murder, 3 rapes, 8 assaults, 10 burglaries, and 76 thefts a year. Given the demographics and staffing levels of the U.S. bases does that seem like evidence of undue hardships imposed on the Okinawan people by an occupying power? Because if anything, I'm actually extremely impressed by how well U.S. service members are apparently behaving, and indeed a quick look at police statistics indicates that U.S. service personnel commit crime at a significantly lower rate than the native Okinawan population. I mean I'm sure that Okinawans do have some worthy complaints (as do towns abutting universities/military bases/mines/industrial facilities the world over) but this is hardly the damning indictment you seem to think it is.

Detroit_Dogg posted:

When debating morality I usually look and see if one of the sides involved dragged their feet until the year two thousand and fourteen to ban pornography involving children.

Effectronica posted:

How about the fact that they have to deal with people like this? Is that something every college town has to deal with.

LGD posted:

What sort of question is that? Have you ever spent any protracted amount of time around undergraduates? Of course they do.

Effectronica posted:

I don't recall any of my peers calling everyone in town a pedophile, or going on about how much they loathed the townies. Are you from 1934 or something? But maybe I should rephrase it like this: are Okinawans justified in resenting a situation where they're required to serve people who loathe them in order to thrive?

Detroit_Dogg posted:

I don't loathe the Okinawans at all, I'm just pointing out that the country of Japan thought it was a-okay to own video of children engaged in sexual acts until the year 2014AD. I for one don't support child pornography but this is a free world so think as you wish.

LGD posted:

You can just say "no."

And the answer is an emphatic "gently caress no" if the Okinawan in question is treating an offhanded joke at the expense of the entire nation of Japan on the SomethingAwful Debate & Discussion internet forums as emblematic of on-the-ground U.S./Okinawan relations. However I'm fairly certain the average Okinawan isn't nearly that dumb.