MovieChat Forums > Nanking (2007) Discussion > 2 Old Jap Soliders

2 Old Jap Soliders

posted 16 years ago by GoldenGooner04
13 replies | jump to latest

Why has no one mentioned them? they dont seem very upset as they told about the rapes, they seemed like they were talking about a nice memory from days gone by.
They should have had these 2 with the girl who survived, but i bet these cowards would not have had the guts.

As for putting them with the Nazi bastards both scum of the Earth. You have to ask how could a Jap or a German who has their own family do that to other families POWER with NO COMEBACK!

Power is a very strong pill to swallow better than any drugs, how many women love men who have POWER?

The Japs and like Germans believed they were the Superior People, we will stamp everyone else into the ground they are nother but *beep*

Just think you can Rape, Murder anyone you want, any age, and if someone asks you "how you could do these things" you say "I was told to"

[–] k0lp 16 years ago

war can change a man to an unbelieavable degree, no suprise they feel no guilt about what happened, they were defending their great empire, atrocities were just the fun part for them. I don't believe they even see the chinese as human beings, they were "just following orders"

[–] ricky_sixtynine 16 years ago

it is comfortable for "us" who haven't lived the war to criticize.
we cannot imagine what "operates" in the mind of a man in those conditions.
i can only think that in the eye of those atrocities a man has to free the deep morbid desires that is in all of us. by doing so their humanity is diminished or lost, or worse.

we cannot understand what they went throught and it is very very likely that anyone of "us" here would have done the exact same thing they did in the same conditions.

i'm not saying it is justified or forgivable. i'm just trying to see things with a different eye, with a tolerant eye.

[–] Sei09 16 years ago

I don't mean to sound condescending when I say this- you're kidding right?

"a man has to free the deep morbid desires that is in all of us"
Please tell me I'm misinterpreting this statement, because it sounds like you're claiming that during war, a man sees/does horrible things and because of those horrible things that man must go vent by raping women/children.

I haven't been in a war myself, but my gramps who's an old WWII vet served time in the military and according to him, "Just because a man joins up and gets fcked in up the head when he sees things he can't handle, that ain't giving him no free pass to go do whatever he wants to people not involved." He also went on to say that if a soldier does enter that frame of mind, it's his CO's job to do something about it to prevent him from acting inappropriately in a given situation. During his deployment my gramps said that his COs had no tolerance for that sort of behavior, and he also thought that if they did, the army would've "gone to **** real quick."

Tolerance is good in many types of situations, but tolerance for inappropriate and inhumane behavior is what gets us into trouble as humans because we are allowed to 1) commit the action, and 2) make excuses for the action after we commit it, so as to avoid taking responsibility for it. That's part of what I like about the OP's post where they said that those 2 seemingly unregretful Japanese soldiers should've been put in a room w/one of the women that survived and made to say that straight to her face.

Now, I don't know if this is the case w/the old Japanese soldiers, but I've heard plenty of stories about how soldiers have nervous breakdowns upon returning home after war because they felt so guilty about the horrible (not always ordered or required) things they did during the war. Some of 'em even say that they've regretted their actions for their entire lives because they think they could've gotten through the war without ever doing what they did/whatever it was that made them feel so guilty.

[–] samsan_lee 16 years ago

other antecdotes include

"Eight thousand have gathered near Guang Hua Gate.
Many are still coming to surrender.

Sasaki Detachment has already disposed of 15,000

To dispose of these 8,000 we needed a large trench
but could not find one. My plan is to divide them
into groups of two hundred, lure them to proper places
and dispose of them."
-Lt. Gen. Nakajima Kesago

apparently they demanded the soldiers surrender and told them no harm would come to them and they killed them thereafter that...

[–] sljones44 16 years ago

From what I read about this, was that the Emperor's Uncle General Asaka had given the order to kill the captives and like 70,000 chinese p.o.w's.

There was this sense of disgust that they were pigs, and the fact that the Chinese soldiers had surrendered and just left them convinced them that they were less than human.

The written orders were told to divide them into groups of a dozen and shoot them separately. It was on December 13, 1937. It was like 8 weeks of continual slaughter. 269,000 civilians were murdered according to the Intl military tribunal of the Far East - from December 1937 to March 1938. It could be even more than that.

[–] ricky_sixtynine 16 years ago

dear sei09

what you say is true but you "did" misunderstood what i said.

i'm not saying because of the horrible things they see and do you "have to go raping women" i'm saying that when you DO you clearly loose your mind and sake.

i'm not searching for excuses. what they did is terrible. i'm just saying that even thought they are the "bad guys" they also have their own demons to fight. it doesn't make their actions less horrible or excusable.

also i find interesting and true what you said about the OC who is in charge and who HAS to control this things....and probably the Japanese didn't have such people to control them.
and once you get it loose well...it's already too late.

my gramps also did the WWII and he was a sad man and his spirit was tortured.
unfortunately i didn't get to see him a lot. and i wish i knew more about him and how/what he lived.

[–] matthew-manhorn 16 years ago

the two soldiers are the perfect example of Japanese mentality, because they were proud of it

[–] vortexrider 16 years ago

Well we don't know whats gong on in the mind of those 2 soldiers. We the viewers don't really know if they repent for their crime or not, nor do we know if they had any life changing experience in their life.

I probably wouldn't say that both Nazis and Japanese are scum of the Earth because that would be a blanket statement on all the individuals involved in the war. Their governments and probably a lot of individuals were scum among them. We can't say there weren't any honorable or kind individuals among them. Just like we can't say that the allied armies were all goodie two shoes soldiers.

[–] Sei09 16 years ago

It's good that you recognize the folly of a blanket statement. Just wanted to clear 1 thing up-

...You do realize that the Nazis were a political party and that the Japanese are an entire ethnic group right? Kinda seems weird to lump the 2 together when one's a sort of club you can freely join because you believe in their cause/belief system while the other is a status you're either born with or not. (Not that that's what I think you're doing, but the way you worded it kinda makes that sound like a possibility)

I can see calling the Nazis scum because of the whole, belief that 'Aryans were the purest race and we should kill/commit violence against everyone else because in our opinion they're "impure"' bit; I just have trouble saying to a Japanese person that they're scum because their parents (who were perhaps not even in the military) were Japanese.

[–] bigbadduude 16 years ago

Nazi bastards...? The leader of the gang, Rabe, was a German and a National Socialist, in other words, a Nazi. He held the swastika armband in a fit of rage against the Japs and made them retreat, thus saving many Chinese from being killed or raped. Did you even see the movie?

[–] sljones44 16 years ago

Apparently, Rabe (who was an executive of Siemens) had put a flag to defend Nanjing. He had the fateful diary describing a lot of the horrors. Even the Nazi's were shocked at the brutality and savagery of the Imperial Army's actions.

[–] kag2-1 16 years ago

Yeah, those murderous skunks seemed like they were almost bragging. In THE CENTURY (1997) Peter Jennings interviews an ex-Japanese soldier now extremely remorseful for having raped and killed - but he admitted feeling no remorse until many years later.

[–] 16 years ago

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