Excellent observation and the parallels fit perfectly.
Back in the early 80s I got my first lesson of international realities in Japan. I was with a small group of journalists picked for a month-long exchange program. One day we visited a naval shipyard and got to tour a combat ship. I got talking to one of the officers about international conflicts and tensions. Now this was long before the collapse of the Soviet Union. I was shocked -- SHOCKED -- to learn this officer and his colleagues saw the USSR and the USA as equal threats to their country and world peace.
But, I thought, "Wait! We're the good guys!"
In the decades since, that conversation has often come back to me and I view it as -- for me -- one of the first major cracks in the national narrative.
I have worked for the JDF and known few personally since I live right next door. They don't have the same kind of "military" culture that we do in Canada or the US--where our military revels in the often fictitious memories of battlefield accomplishments. The Japanese can't do that. What they appear to be most proud of is disaster relief. It doesn't help that they cannot help but feel the US military looks down on them as Asian sepoys. Oh, and they don't wear uniforms in public and nobody says, "thank you for your service".
Interesting. It sounds like theirs is a culture of true service to nation and fellow citizens. In the US our attitude is so poisoned by the Hollywood John Wayne tough-guy-take-no-prisoners crap. And now add on the warping influence of video war gaming. It's a huge pro-war psyops.
Are you saying that the Japanese do not know their own past ? This is exactly what we can see with the Germans ! Could it be related to the fact that both defeated states have been in a humiliating vassal status for almost eighty years, and foreign armies are stationed on their territory to this day ? Maybe they went through a serious brainwashing ?
For example, when I worked for Toyota, I was asked to prepare materials explaining "omotenashi" for foreigners, especially in the Islamic world. I discovered that nobody in Toyota knew how this concept --now translated as "hospitality" originated or meant. Nor did they understand that Muslims have much older and rather more hospitable concept! Omotenashi is actually a zen concept formulated by an Edo era tea master. Even today, it is not quite "hospitality" as westerners see it. Certainly, not as Muslims do.
Excellent observation and the parallels fit perfectly.
Back in the early 80s I got my first lesson of international realities in Japan. I was with a small group of journalists picked for a month-long exchange program. One day we visited a naval shipyard and got to tour a combat ship. I got talking to one of the officers about international conflicts and tensions. Now this was long before the collapse of the Soviet Union. I was shocked -- SHOCKED -- to learn this officer and his colleagues saw the USSR and the USA as equal threats to their country and world peace.
But, I thought, "Wait! We're the good guys!"
In the decades since, that conversation has often come back to me and I view it as -- for me -- one of the first major cracks in the national narrative.
I have worked for the JDF and known few personally since I live right next door. They don't have the same kind of "military" culture that we do in Canada or the US--where our military revels in the often fictitious memories of battlefield accomplishments. The Japanese can't do that. What they appear to be most proud of is disaster relief. It doesn't help that they cannot help but feel the US military looks down on them as Asian sepoys. Oh, and they don't wear uniforms in public and nobody says, "thank you for your service".
Interesting. It sounds like theirs is a culture of true service to nation and fellow citizens. In the US our attitude is so poisoned by the Hollywood John Wayne tough-guy-take-no-prisoners crap. And now add on the warping influence of video war gaming. It's a huge pro-war psyops.
Are you saying that the Japanese do not know their own past ? This is exactly what we can see with the Germans ! Could it be related to the fact that both defeated states have been in a humiliating vassal status for almost eighty years, and foreign armies are stationed on their territory to this day ? Maybe they went through a serious brainwashing ?
For example, when I worked for Toyota, I was asked to prepare materials explaining "omotenashi" for foreigners, especially in the Islamic world. I discovered that nobody in Toyota knew how this concept --now translated as "hospitality" originated or meant. Nor did they understand that Muslims have much older and rather more hospitable concept! Omotenashi is actually a zen concept formulated by an Edo era tea master. Even today, it is not quite "hospitality" as westerners see it. Certainly, not as Muslims do.
Alas and dammit, all that time I spent reading huge novels by James Clavell and Eric van Lustbader - wasted, all wasted!
Nah...it's FICTION! Fun. Love'm.