MovieChat Forums > Midway (2019) Discussion > Throwing someone overboard attached to a...

Throwing someone overboard attached to an anchor


That was a bit inhumane don't you think?

Anyway, what happened to the other prisoner?

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You don’t know your history very well, do you? “Throwing someone overboard attached to an anchor” was mild compared to the atrocities the Japanese committed against POW’s and the Chinese during WWII.

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Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence?

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I’ve never seen the film. From what has been written about it I don’t care to see it. Apparently the film was weird and didn’t depict accurately the true horror of being a POW in a Japanese prison camp.

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If it didn't I would hate to see what it was really like

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Rape of Nanking, Unit 731 and Bataan Death March to name a few. The average Japanese soldier during WWII was savage compared to their common German ally. The death rate of those interned in a Japanese POW camp had a much smaller survival rate than prisoners of the German’s as well.

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Thank you for confirming the true facts of the savagery dealt to those in a Japanese POW camp.

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The rank and file German soldier looked at Allied soldiers as somewhat of a kinfolk who were separated from the Germans by war. Especially the English and the Americans. The Japanese soldier seldom had the same viewpoint towards other Asians never mind the English and the Americans.

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"The rank and file German soldier looked at Allied soldiers as somewhat of a kinfolk..."

That's utter nonsense.

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What country are you from, if I may ask?

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Deutschland. 🇩🇪​

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That’s great. I would love to know as a German, why you believe that US soldiers were better treated in POW camps run by Germans as opposed to those of the Japanese during WWII.

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This question without a question mark you need to answer yourself.
I said that German soldiers did NOT look at Allied soldiers as "kinfolk".
Look above.

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I didn’t say anything about “kinfolk.”

I was curious as to why YOU, as a German, think that US soldiers were treated better by Germans compared to the Japanese. Would you like me to rephrase my statement in the form of a question?

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Except that I didn't say what I "believe" or "think" about POWs of whatever 'faction'.
I said that German soldiers did NOT look at Allied soldiers as "kinfolk" when you needed to know my nationality.

Other than that you can "rephrase" as often as you want to.

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I understand. Do you have an opinion on why us soldiers were treated more favorably by their German captors as compared to when being interned by the Japanese?

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Because the Japanese Empire never treated any prisoners favorably.

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You finally got the answer you were longing for.
Well, that's not really an answer to your repeated question, but Martoto did its best. 🌵​ ☺

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Thank you

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I consider all of TimeTunnel's statements as being suspect. Meaning I doubt his statements concerning his country of origin and the attitude of most of its soldiers. Yes, a soldier can do his or her's job but yet have a degree of empathy towards their adversary.

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Du hast ja keine Ahnung. ☺

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One sentence is not proof as to your origin. Do you believe that a soldier can have empathy towards their adversary. Obviously, any government would strongly dissuade such emotion but at the same time cannot snuff it out in each and every person in their military service. Yes?

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Your response shows how extensive the brainwashing and conditioning process is in a country such as the US. Please remember that I said rank and file and not some high ranking military officer or Gestapo officer. For as unrealistic as Hogan's Heroes was in most respects the mild annoyance shown by Klink and Schultz towards Gestapo and gun ho military officers was fairly accurate on average. Post WWI Germany was politically in bedlam as the traditional government was dissolved. Various political groups such as communists and anarchists were trying to at first undermine and then overthrow the Weimar Republic. If these groups were not fighting with one another they may have very well overthrown that government. The lack of trust that the average German had for those around them given the political chaos created an environment for Hitler to go to the extremes that he did. Pray that things never devolve in the US to the point where you cannot trust neighbors, relatives, and coworkers because they may strike out at you for having different politics than you. But you keep watching Indiana Jones and other literary works that portray Germans as 100 percent bad people. Do you also think that Italians all belong to the mafia or readily jump in bed with others that they are not married to.

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Blablabla. 🙄​
Singing Lili Marleen together in the trenches doesn't establish a "kinfolk".

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Hitler used guys like you as blocks in the foundation of the Third Reich. Loud, illiterate, and arrogant just like the people he gathered together who he found in the Munich Beer Halls.

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Leastwise you realized that your insults "brainwashing" towards the USA didn't work. ☺
Now you change direction and come up with your next platitudes. 🥱​

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Brainwashing on only this one matter and not a general indictment of the US. If you are a German then how would you have collected the information necessary to know if my so-called insult did not work? I'm not changing directions and if you had the least amount of intelligence you would know that. My second post is an expansion and compliment to my first post to you.

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First you insulted the USA "brainwashing". 🇺🇸​
When you realized that I'm German you changed to "Hitler"..."illiterate" and "Munich Beer Halls".
No need for collecting info.
You delivered all that nonsense yourself. 🍻​

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My statement concerning Hitler has no bearing on your statement of being German which I still greatly doubt. In some ways I am a victim of the culture I describe of America when confronting certain issues by making an analogy to Nazi Germany. Especially when there is a degree of unpleasantness involved. But I still contend that my analogy of loud, illiterate, and arrogant as being the foundation of the Third Reich is apt. Your expression of a sentence of German language (which still needs to be investigated) could be the result of opening another window on your computer to a linguistics website. Or it could be the result of learning German elsewhere. Anyways, your refusal to even discuss empathy among opposing troops shows you are not serious . "That's utter nonsense" is not a discussion. If you cannot answer me then answer the other poster. Schnell!!!!

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Rhabarber. 🥬​

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I guess my satisfaction in offering another reply to you will have to be knowing that I created some irritation to you since you refuse to embrace rational thought. Anyways, you do know that quite a number of Germans emigrated to the US in the decades prior to WWII. That in many cases contact was maintained after the emigration took place. That when the war finally took place that many Germans and German-Americans who fought gave thought that they could wind up fighting family. Further, the House of Hanover which ruled over Great Britain was a German house and that a fair number of its members spoke little or no English. That the close relationship resulted in military arrangements where Germans (mainly Prussians) worked with the British such as with the American Revolution. That British royals who many fawn over today are descendants of those rulers and would still carry the name of Hanover if they did not fear reprisal during WWI. Please do not disappoint me by not throwing your dirty diper down specifically not discussing why Germans would have empathy towards their opponents.

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You forgot to mention that about 60% of Americans have German blood in their veins.
But it's interesting what you highlighted and what you skipped in 'our' history.

Please rewind and start with Adam and Eve.
Or with “your dirty diaper”. 👶​
#Hitler was an Austrian. 🇦🇹​
#Werner von Braun was German...a Prussian! 🦅​🚀​

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25 percent has always been considered a safe conservative estimate. That makes it the single largest European based ethnic group in the US. But there is a certain amount of guesswork in most people. This is due to invasions and migrations that have happened over the last couple thousand years. Blending of DNA. Sure there is more that could be discussed but I don't think that the interest is here for it. I think that I covered most of the highlights.

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He used Germans. It's highly doubtful Hitler would have had as much success mobilising any other nation other than the German ones to do what they did.

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I don't know that the word "used" fully or best describes what went on with quite a number of Germans. Some were very willing plus understood what Hitler's objectives were. I would put them into the minority but they were there nonetheless. Most followed out of fear. Extreme situations always allows extreme individuals to rise out of the shadows. It was seen with the French Revolution and the Russian Revolution.

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Well you said to another poster that Hitler used "Guys like you...." So are you comparing them with the many Germans you are describing as being used, against their nature or will, and in fear?

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Used as in going in knowing what Hitler's intentions were. That Hitler intended to capitalize on certain characteristics and then reward these same individuals for it. Not used as in being deceived or tricked into performing acts for Hitler. I'm thinking that is what you meant when you said "He used Germans." That Hitler deceived or tricked Germans.

Hitler needed a core of enforcers to control the population of Germany and they were the ones he rewarded with positions of power. I'm thinking he sought out those who ran with arrogance, illteracy, and ignorance meaning people who would never question policies of the government. That Hitler did not need useful idiots but people who thought they were infallible at least in their own minds.

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No I mean it in the same way that you used it when you described the poster as one of the people Hitler used as the foundation of the turd reich.

It's not from blindly following governments that we understand the crimes of Nazi Germany and people who participated in them. It's from survivors. And even participants. Allied soldiers are well aware that when they entered Germany in 1944 they were given the impression that NOBODY was a Nazi or followed Hitler. No country and its people are all the one thing. All the same. No government, or Indiana Jones movie, has ever told me that the Germans were all evil Nazis either.

I find people's eagerness to sugar coat what they claim the vast majority of Germans felt or did unnecessary. And nauseating. Put me in front of an innocent German whose life has been destroyed by the false perception that they responsible for anything that the third reich did, and I will acknowledge it. But it's not an issue in the general scheme of things. And you theory that any dismissal of your efforts to impose an "actually, not all germans were evil nazis" narrative whenever you can is a symptom of the same attitudes that were the foundation of the third reich is perversely illogical. Specious and spurious.

If you were an adult living in Europe in the 1940s, you are most likely dead by now. You're trying to rehabilitate ghosts who don't even need it.

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I don't know what your origins are but here in the US the word "use" or "used" can simply mean to employ willingly. Who did you use to repair your roof means who did you employ to repair your roof. With tax time here people will ask who you will use to prepare your tax forms meaning who you will employ. I hope this clears up any confusion.

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As to the rest of your statement some of the things that you say are incoherent. You say that no one literary source has ever told you that all Germans were Nazi's but the rest of your post indicates otherwise. Further, myself nor anybody else are trying to sugar coat atrocities. But it is an extreme stretch to imply all Germans were very willing participants. You probably do not live in a situation where you are under constant surveillance as you are allowed to freely express yourself here. Be thankful for that situation. I would observe that the contempt you have for most Germans of that time is like sugar candy to you. That you get a brief high by looking down at others who never had the chance to freely express what happened to themselves. As to my personal stake in this some of my ancestors were German and paid the ultimate price for refusing to be mindless minions to Hitler. My observation is that for no reason readily seen that you cling to what popular culture has said in reference to Germany in general of that era.

So when you say Hitler would not have as much success mobilizing other nations does that mean Germans were more bought in to Hitler's machinations due to some ethnic defect?

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"Germans were more bought in to Hitler's machinations due to some ethnic defect?"

🤣​...Easter can come! 🐰​

FarmerTed and Martoto may watch Babylon Berlin.
https://moviechat.org/tt4378376/Babylon-Berlin/6110600c90e43b221b225762/The-good-communists-really?reply=633d65203b89367645d7e788

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Yes, Easter can come. There is little point in going further on this.

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Seems like a waste of a perfectly good anchor.

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Seems like a waste of a perfectly good *human being*.

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I'm just saying, they were going to kill him anyway, they might actually need that anchor, later.

Normally you pull them back up, and reuse them.

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Come to think about it, how does anyone know if that event was fact? It could be conjecture as I wouldn’t think the Japanese would admit to it. There was another prisoner who the OP inquired about. We don’t know how he was dealt with, do we? This is why I wasn’t impressed with the movie. For a movie which was deemed to be factual, I saw it as fractured and pure speculation.

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The Japanese were brutal and used prisoners as bayonet practice. I would believe they did this as well.

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Probably so....but I prefer confirmed facts, not speculation.

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_war_crimes
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enemy_Airmen%27s_Act

Given everything they did it isn't a stretch.

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Agreed! Normally I thank posters for info links, but....this? It turned my stomach this morning! I knew the barbarism was beyond normal human thought, but this was news to me. This country has always been focused on the atrocities committed by Hitler and his henchmen’s inhumanity and rightly so. But, why not focus on the atrocities committed by Emperor Hirohito and his barbaric henchmen?

“Man’s inhumanity to man”.

My dad served during WW2 (navy). I’m not surprised he was livid and disowned my cousin when my cousin married a Japanese girl in Japan. He didn’t want his name mentioned ever again. He was my mom’s nephew.

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The American's and Allies in Europe after the war also committed a lot of their own atrocities. But the winners write history of course. I think Japan got a huge pass because America wanted to re-create it in it's own image to be honest. Australian soldiers and politicians wanted the Emperor executed as Australian's suffered a great deal at the hands of Japanese.

I can understand your dad doing that. He would have taken it as an insult not to mention what we now know as PTSD would have kicked in and he would have been thinking about having to see this Japanese face at the dinner table, family gatherings etc. Not so easy to deal with.

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The Pacific Theater was horrendous for those who served in that area. Some say it was worse....only to have almost the same environment later...the damn Viet Nam debacle! My cousin’s name is on that black wall....a senseless death in a senseless war.

BTW, my uncle, Dad’s younger brother served in the navy. He drove a beach landing craft and this scene from “Saving Private Ryan” depicts what remained in his memory. My family spoke of how it changed him mentally. He was never quite right again.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=82RTzi5Vt7w&feature=youtu.be&t=1m51s

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I think the advantage for want of a better term in Europe was at least you were up against a similar race/culture. Although the Russians were just as bad as the Japanese.

The link is blocked in my country but I am assuming it is the landing scene. There is no way you could go through war on any level and come out the same I agree.

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It is the landing and storming the beaches (if those brave souls made it to the beaches) scene from “Saving Private Ryan”. I agree about the Russians. Truman should have listened to Patton...maybe we wouldn’t have had a Viet Nam. Sometimes it pays to listen to your generals.

Where do you reside?

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It’s more than Vietnam. We are still having conflicts to this day because of the way lines were drawn and countries were divided after WWII. just take the examples of East and West Germany, and North and South Korea and Vietnam. History shows that the people living under Communism have been repressed and have suffered while those not have enjoyed prosperity. Look at Japan today who was untouched by the Russians after the war.

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True...including the Korean conflict. I referenced Viet Nam due to the US involvement with more battlefield casualties than any other war except for the World Wars. Again senseless deaths in a senseless war.

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Vietnam was going to happen for the US. The Vietnamese had dealt with the French then the Japanese as unwanted invaders. They were going to view any new military force as the same plus they felt they needed to make a stand to the last man to have a place to live. The US initially went into Vietnam clandestinely on behalf of the French as the US felt that the French nominally were the only dependable ally on the European continent.

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Many japanese in the military wrote letters where they spoke of what was going on whether it was good or bad, there have been many used in documentaries on various parts of the war. It is completely plausible that this is the source of the anchor event. Just remember you aren't watching a Ken Burns documentary where they give the name of every source they use.

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considering this, I don't recomment going to the cinema

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This scene seems to be related to the violent interrogation of Ensign Osmus who gave up vital information (according to Japanese records found after the war) prior to being thrown overboard.

Ensign Omus had a ship named for him prior to the end of the war. It was not known at the time that he gave up valuable intel during his brief captivity.

While the German and Allied armies treated prisoners fairly well, the German/Russian and Japanese/Allied treatment of prisoners was frightful all around. The Americans were known for killing even sometimes helpless prisoners instead of capturing and the Japanese would do the same as well as torture and experiment on prisoners.

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I imagine most of those killed by the American forces were in retaliation for brutality. Especially after the Battle Of The Bulge, where American's were slaughtered. A bit later on, The SS started killing anyone who tried to surrender or help the American's. Believe most SS were just killed after that (especially after the camps were discovered).

As for the Pacific, they rarely had prisoners. And even those trying to surrender were suspect of just hiding a grenade, etc. Considering the brutality of the Japanese than, no surprise that same brutality was shown in return. Just read up on the kinds of trophies American soldiers sent home or collected.

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Japanese were not expected to surrender by their own culture. Doing so would be dishonorable, so if your enemy is known to never surrender why would you ever assume they were when they came at you.

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It's a horrible death, probably a way to break the will of the other prisoner and get valuable information

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