The Japanese Colonial Legacy in Korea 1910-1945

There are various views on Japanese colonial administration in Korea in 1910-1945. Most Koreans believe, "Because of Japan, Korean modernization was delayed", "Under the Japanese, many Koreans were tortured and forced into labor", or "Koreans were brainwashed and we had to change our names to Japanese names"… Many Koreans label the Japanese colonial period as the cruelest, most atrocious, and the darkest period in Korean history. But is this so? 

George Akita (Emeritus Professor at the University of Hawaii) and Brandon Palmer (Adjunct Professor at Coastal Carolina University) have researched into the issue and published Japan in Korea: Japan’s Fair and Moderate Colonial Policy (1910-1945) and Its Legacy onSouth Korea’s Developmental Miracle (Tokyo: Soshi-sha, 2013). I introduce some points from the book below.

(The English version, The Japanese Colonial Legacy in Korea, 1910-1945, will be available on amazon.com on October 30 this year.)

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Colonial policy of Japan (p.61-66, Akita & Palmer, 2013)

First of all, the basic colonial policy strongly held by the leaders of the Japanese government since the Meiji era (1868-1912) was first presented by Yamagata Aritomo, which was inherited by following leaders. Although Yamagata’s policy was originally concerned with Ryukyu, which became Okinawa in 1897, this progressive and moderate policy was later applied to Taiwan and Korea.

The principle was, first, reflecting on the reality of the fierce territorial fight among the great powers in the 19^th century, to defend Japan from foreign invasion. This corresponds to the belief of the Western leaders that, for the purpose of security and safety, their own nation and areas under their administration must be defended at all cost.

The second principle was sound economy: Yamagata believed that vibrant, productive economy was closely related to making the newly acquired territory function as Japan’s stronghold (policy of increasing wealth and military power). He further pointed out that economic power of a nation / territory depends on whether it can rely on production of goods utilizing the geographic features characteristic of the nation / territory. And he emphasized that sales of such goods should benefit both Japan and the newly acquired territory, which shows that the Japanese colonial policy was based on the principle of reciprocity. 

The policy of reciprocity was expected to additionally provide the native people with strong motivation of defending their own land and Japan, but when the native people have no tradition of military or have little sense of patriotism, this expectation would fail. The solution was to provide Japanese education; and here, Yamagata still emphasized the importance of moderation in education, as in conscription of soldiers. Yamagata’s stance was gradualism, which became the basic stance of the Meiji government regarding reform and colonial administration. The Japanese government decided not to take a radical approach for reforming its colonies. 

Education in Korea (p.174-182, Akita & Palmer, 2013)

Looking at modern education, the policy of the government of the native Yi Dynasty did not move forward. In the traditional Korean society, “Yangban” (両班), males of the patrimonially privileged class, went to Seodang (書堂), small private school, but its education was based on Confucianism and was not fit for the modern era. According to Professor Michael J. Seth at James Madison University, Virginia, in 1904, “school education was limited in the capital Seoul, which only had 7-8 primary schools”, and out of the population of 12 million in Korea, only 500 students attended modern public schools. 

However, the number of students attending public primary schools in Korea was 20,200 in 1910 when Japanese administration officially started, and increased 45-times to 911,209 in 1937. At the same time, the total number of students at all schools, excluding those at private Confucius schools, totaled 110,800 in 1910, and increased 11-times to 1,214,000 in 1937. Moreover, one fourth of the total students were female. 

These numbers show astonishing progress; yet, even with such progress, only one third of the children who reached the school age could attend school. In the middle of the Greater East Asia War / WWII, the Japanese administration had planned to introduce compulsory education system in Korea in 1946. In 1939, the number of students at colleges and teacher’s schools was 6,313, and in addition, 206 students attended Keijo Imperial University, the only university established in 1925 in Seoul (predecessor of Seoul University). Furthermore, several thousand Korean students attended schools in Japan. 

Education in Western colonies (p.174-182, Akita & Palmer, 2013)

When comparing with other colonies of the West, it can be easily seen that the educational achievement in Korea under Japanese administration belonged to the best category. Even though only one third of the children who reached the school age could attend school in Japanese-administered Korea, in Cambodia under French administration, in 1944, “less than one fifth of the male children who reached the school age could go to school”, and the percentage of female pupils was much lower than that in Korea. In Cambodia, there was no university, and by 1953, Cambodians with university diploma totaled only 144. Considering the fact that France had colonized Cambodia since 1863, we can only say that French took education for Cambodians lightly. 

In Vietnam under French administration, only one in ten children of school age could benefit from modern education. Children of colonizers and native people went to different schools, and schools for Vietnamese were of poorer quality than those for French. In Korea under Japanese administration, initially, the schools for Japanese and Koreans were separate due to significant difference in academic ability; yet, as Koreans increased their ability, the number of co-eds increased. At the time of 1945, the literacy rate of Koreans was slightly less than 50%. Though it was lower than the literacy rate of the Philippines under the US administration, which was over 50%, the literacy rate for Indonesia at the end of the colonial period was only 8%, and 10% in French Indochina.

Furthermore, looking at colonized Africa as one continent, the literacy rate was 15-20%. Portugal colonized Angola, Guinea, and Mozambique for over 500 years, yet there was no native doctor in Mozambique, and the average life expectancy in eastern Angola fell short of 30 years. In Congo under Belgian administration, the value of native human resources was neglected, and Belgians only focused on exploitation of local wealth. Belgians had the policy of not creating native elite groups, and neglected mid-level and university education, and as a result, at the time of Congo’s independence in 1960, the native degree holders was less than 20 out of the population of 13 million.

Japanese Investment for Korea (p.182-186, Akita & Palmer, 2013)

The Chosen Government-General, or the Japanese administration in Korea, was in constant lack of funding, and debts kept increasing; however, for development of Korea, it made huge investments on railways, industrial and agricultural development as well as on educational system, health system, police, judicial system, etc. The financial source of the Government-General was mainly borrowing, and in 1941, the debts reached over 1 billion yen. 

For 10 years between 1929 and 1938, the number of businesses in the modern industry increased from 484 to 1,203, with over 230,000 laborers. Including the industry, agricultural industry, manufacturing, and construction, 2.1 million Koreans were employed in 1938 in one or the other modern industry sector. Needless to say, the quality of life for Koreans had dramatically improved compared to that in the pre-colonization period. 

In India under British administration, for 5 years between 1874 and 1879, estimated 4 million Indians were starved to death; whereas in Korea under Japanese administration between 1905 and 1945, not one famine had occurred. 

Research by Hildi Kang – What Koreans experienced under Japanese (p.91-98, Akita & Palmer, 2013)

Hildi Kang, a white American woman married to a Korean-American, interviewed a total of 51 elderly Koreans who had lived through Japanese colonial rule before eventually moving to the United States. Ms. Kang put together details of these interviews in her book, Under the Black Umbrella: Voices from Colonial Korea, 1910-1945 (Cornell University Press; 2005). Some of the interviewees included those who were put into jail, persecuted, or discriminated against in promotion by Japanese, and thus were expected to tell the stories of suffering. 

While Ms. Kang admitted that there was a limit to use the small sample of 51 interviewees as the primary source, and that recollection of the interviewees could be accompanied by misconception or vagueness due to loss of memory, she let the interviewees tell freely their memories of the lives under the Japanese administration, without asking her prepared questions.

As the interviews continued, Ms. Kang observed that the family members of the interviewees smiled and chuckled when listening to the stories of their fathers. She then realized that the experiences that the interviewees told with a sense of nostalgia all happened “under the bitter era of Japanese administration”. Then she asked herself: “Why can’t I hear the stories of Japanese act of atrocity that I expected?”

The interviewees saw, in the Japanese-ruled Korea, complication, shadow, contradiction, as well as normality; and at times, they even accepted favorably Japanese people in general, including the police. The interviewees started their stories by saying, “I experienced nothing harsh…”. There were many who said, “Not much of bad things happened”, 

“I have not experienced anything hard”, 

“Most Koreans adapted to Japanese rules”. 

This means that quite a number of Koreans “lived normal lives”.

Furthermore, three elderly interviewees all mentioned, 

“we could live our lives more or less based on our own choice”. 

Another interviewee described the time of 3.1 movement when a significant number of Korean demonstrators clashed with the Japanese police and army. The police started to arrest the demonstrators, but “the police chief spoke politely” especially to the elderly, and “loosened the rope and allowed us to go home”. He further continued that “the most kind was the police”. 

Another interviewee told Ms. Kang that his father received higher education than that of Japanese leaders, thus, “the Japanese police chief who was the highest authority in town always bowed his head deeply whenever he met my father”.

Another said, “I have no memory of having been harassed by the Japanese police or government officer”. 

Ms. Kang’s research shows that the Koreans who lived under Japanese rules themselves deny “the worst colony in the history”. 

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From the objective facts as well as the hearings from the Koreans who lived the time, we can see that the Japanese administration in Korea was basically fair, and that, even with huge debts, Japan dramatically developed Korea which had been suffering from the misrule of the native Yi Dynasty government. 

The Koreans who never cease to believe that Japan did the worst things to Korea should accept these facts in a matter-of-fact manner. 

How did Japan decide Korean annexation in what kind of the world? 

What was the situations in Korea before having been annexed by Japan? 

What was happening in other colonies around the world? 

By answering these questions, one can start to see the real picture of the Japanese-administered Korea. Koreans must have the courage to “know”. Emotional anti-Japan theory only increases hatred and leads their own country to a wrong direction. Japanese should also realize this, and should have enough knowledge and courage to raise voice to correct misunderstanding. Then, only then, we can start cooperating for the respective future.

If you want to have the objective knowledge on the issue, I strongly recommend you to read Japanese Colonial Legacy in Korea, 1910-1945 by George Akita and Brandon Palmer, available on amazon.com on Oct 30, 2014.

Pearl Harbor facts

Many people still seem to see the Pearl Harbor attack as the symbol of Japanese evilness. But do they know why Japan attacked PH?

People tend to think that Pearl Harbor was a "sneak attack" by imperialistic Japan and the US justifiably fought evil Japan. But President Roosevelt knew it and let Japan attack first so that the US could join the war in Europe and beat Japan which was trying to counter Western invasion into Asia (remember most countries around the world were colonized by the West back then. In Asia, only Korea, Japan and Thailand were left uncolonized. Even parts of China were taken by Britain, France, Germany, Russia, etc).

McCollum memo on 1940.10.07 to Roosevelt (one year before Pearl Harbor) indicated 8 actions to corner Japan, including complete trade embargo with Japan, and concluded, "If by these means Japan could be led to commit an overt act of war, so much the better. At all events we must be fully prepared to accept the threat of war".

http://whatreallyhappened.com/WRHARTICLES/McCollum/index.html

America (A), British (B), China (C), Dutch (D), or ABCD encirclement closed Straight of Malacca, and stopped minerals and oil from being shipped to Japan. In addition, the US imposed complete ban on oil, despite desperate diplomatic efforts by Japan. Japan imported oil mostly from the US, and with the ban, only 2 years reserve was left. This was a matter of life or death for Japan - waiting meant losing the nation without fighting. Having realized these facts, General MacArthur testified in the US Senate later in 1951, "They (Japan) feared that if those supplies were cut off, there would be 10-12 million people unoccupied in Japan. Their purpose, therefore, in going to war was largely dictated by security".

Henry Stimson, then US secretary of State, in his diary stated that the issue was "how we should maneuver them (Japanese) into the position of firing the first shot without allowing too much danger to ourselves".

People tend to think that Japan went into the war for the purpose of invading Asia, in the spirit of imperialism and expansionism, but this is naive. They need to think what kind of world it was back then, and why Japan decided to go into the war against the US, a super power that had 80 times more resources than Japan did.

Read more in the Pearl Harbor Deception 
http://www.apfn.org/apfn/pearl_harbor.htm

See BBC documentary "Sacrifice at Pearl Harbor"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7p1TOA99S88

Japanese and Koreans: we fought together in the war

I received the following comment on the previous posting "Japanese war crimes: I'm sorry? by Adrian Salbuchi" (thanks a lot for commenting). I felt that it was again somehow based on the common misunderstanding on "what Japan did to Korea", to which I wanted to clarify a few issues in response. I of course cannot comment anything on individual experiences, but would like to describe the overall picture.

Comment received: 

"To rest of the world, those in shrine are war criminals because Japan lost the World War II. But to many Koreans, they are war criminals because they killed their own grand parents, destroyed life of many and tried to deny existence of Koreans by destroying their cultural and historical elements. Talk to any Koreans if you know any. Ask them if they think they have won World War II against Japan. I can assure you none of them will say yes. To Koreans, it is not about whether they have won the war or not. I have Korean grandmother who passed away last year at age 98. I remember hearing from her about what Japanese did to Koreans. To many Koreans, what Abe Shinzo did is equivalent of Angela Merkel putting flowers in Adolf Hitler's grave. Regardless of how many times the apologies were given in the past, it's going to hurt many Koreans and the reaction of Koreans are only natural."

Japanese and Koreans fought together against the allies in the WWII, because Korea had been annexed by Japan since 1910 and Koreans were treated as Japanese. Unlike the West who only exploited people and resources in their colonies, Japan developed Korea and improved the welfare of people dramatically. These advancements occurred in all spheres including education, health, economy, safety, judicial system, infrastructure and local administration, benefits of which were enjoyed by Koreans both in urban and rural areas. Keijo (Seoul) became more modern than Tokyo, which itself is an incredible fact. Up to the annexation, due to the misrule of the Yi Dynasty, general people in Korea were extremely poor, subject to exploitation and mistreatment in the authoritarian system, with no proper basic services. This is clearly documented by a British scholar Alleyne Ireland, the then authority on colonial administration, who analyzed the Japanese administration in Korea and published “The New Korea” in 1926 after 3 years of field research (available at Amazon.co.jp).

You mention that Japanese destroyed Korean culture, but it was the Yi Dynasty who destroyed the good of Korea and made Korean people suffer. Alleyne writes as follows:

“I met many Japanese who were eager to enlarge upon the admirable features of the early Korean culture and to express their appreciation of the contribution which Koreans had made to the art, religion, and philosophy of Japan itself, in the centuries preceding the accession of the Yi Dynasty, which after more than five hundred years of misrule had reduced the Korean people to a cultural and economic condition deplorable in the extreme, and which came to an end when Japan annexed the country in 1910” (p.72-73).

You should also know that Koreans wanted to fight together with Japanese against the allies during the WWII. Some Koreans played active part in the Japanese army as senior military officers, such as 洪思翊, 金錫源, and 朴正熙 (Park Chung-hee, subsequent President of Korea and the father of the current Korean President Park Geun-hye 朴槿惠). Stimulated by their bravery and success, over 300,000 young Koreans voluntarily responded to the call for voluntary services with the Japanese army in 1943, which only had 6,300 seats. Several hundreds of them wrote their plea in their blood, which surprised the Government-General of Japan in Seoul. This fact proves that Japanese administration in Korea was going extremely well and it gained trust of Koreans. Korean soldiers who fought along with the Japanese army totaled 240,000, out of which 21,000 died on the battleground and are enshrined at Yasukuni. Japanese soldiers who died in the WWII were 2,300,000 in total.

Unfortunately, none of these facts are taught in Korea due to extreme anti-Japanese education that it has been promoting for the past decades. This only creates hatred among Koreans, makes them blind, depriving them of facing their own history. Koreans should realize that Japanese Prime Minister visiting  Yasukuni has nothing to hurt their feelings. Japanese and Koreans stood up and fought together to defend the united countries from the dominant White supremacy back then. It was a difficult choice for Korea, but all things considered, the annexation played a critical role in the history of Korea and its people for better.

"Japanese war crimes: I'm sorry?" by Adrian Salbuchi

The following is an article by Adrian Salbuchi, a political analyst, author, speaker and radio / TV commentator in Argentina (click here for the link on RT), which is very well written and I'd just like to paste the whole thing below:

Japanese war crimes: I’m sorry?

Adrian Salbuchi is a political analyst, author, speaker and radio/TV commentator in Argentina.

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Published time: December 27, 2013 12:24

: Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe visits the controversial Yasukuni war shrine in Tokyo on December 26, 2013, in a move Beijing condemned as "absolutely unacceptable". (AFP Photo/Toru Yamanaka)

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China and South Korea are very angry with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe because he visited the Yosukuni Shrine in Tokyo honoring some 2.5 million Japanese – both military and civilian – who died in war.

Many are irate with Mr Abe because, amongst those honored in the 19th Century Yosukuni Shrine, are Japanese World War II heroes, branded as “war criminals” by US occupation forces. The list numbers fourteen “Class-A criminals” involved in “planning the war”, including war-time leader General Hideki Tojo executed by the US in 1948. 

Official history

Sad but true: when a country wins a war, not only does it automatically acquire full territorial rights over the vanquished nation, but also full and arbitrary control over cities, land, population, resources, plants, patents, military gear, international rights, etc.

It also acquires the “right” to (re)write the history of the conflict that led them to war in the first place. It acquires the right to impose its own views and reasons as “the truth”, accusing the vanquished country of being “false, evil, wrong, criminal, ambitious,” etc.

It’s as old as mankind: “we’re the good guys; the others are the bad guys.” “Our boys are heroes; the others are devils that deserve to be killed, right down to the last 2-year old toddler.” As 70 years of post-World War Two propaganda has clearly shown, the 20th and 21st centuries are no different.

Japan sticks to its guns

Yes, and they should be admired for that. Compare this to ever self-effacing Germany asking for the world’s forgiveness again and again and again, even though she knows quite well that no matter how many apologies are made, those who run today’s world call the shots in the media, publishing houses and education, will never ever forgive Germany.

Rather than commit historical hara-kiri as the Germans do, Japan prefers to keep a stiff upper lip, stand tall and continue to bear the consequences of military defeat, without descending into moral defeat.

Sure, the Allied Victor’s International Military Tribunal for the East – a Nuremberg-like court aka the“Tokyo Trials” – branded many of Japan’s top military and political leaders “Class A” criminals. However, as far back as in October 2006, Mr Abe’s ideas were voiced in The Japan Times: “[The] 14 Class-A war criminals honored at Yasukuni Shrine are not war criminals under Japanese law, but the country had to accept the outcome of the Tokyo Tribunal to become an independent nation. Abe told the Lower House that because the relatives of the convicted men receive war pensions and one of them - wartime Foreign Minister Mamoru Shigemitsu - received a first class award from the post-war government, "they are not war criminals under domestic laws." The International Military Tribunal, which the Allies conducted between May 1946 and November 1948, put 28 political and military leaders on trial as Class-A war criminals, 14 of whom are now enshrined in Tokyo's Yasukuni Shrine. Abe said they stood trial for crimes against peace and humanity, which were concepts, created by the allies after the war and not enshrined in law.”

Bravo, Japan! If we sincerely wish to punish the war crimes committed by all countries – winners and losers - then we would need a heck of a large International Military and Political Tribunal, free of double-standards and censorship.
Double standards (again!)

Talk about “war crimes” what are we to make, for example, of Britain’s World War II Royal Air Force Commander Arthur Harris (aka, “Bomber Harris” and “Butcher Harris”) who invented and imposed “area bombing” over precision bombing, euphemistically calling it “strategic bombing”; which was just another way of saying, if “it moves on enemy territory just bomb it out of existence!”

Bomber Harris was very successful in unleashing fire storms over Hamburg, Germany in July 1943 (“Operation Gomorrah”) that were later repeated over all major German cites. In Harris’s own words,“the aim of the Combined Bomber Offensive...should be unambiguously stated [as] the destruction of German cities, the killing of German workers, and the disruption of civilized life throughout Germany. ... the destruction of houses, public utilities, transport and lives, the creation of a refugee problem on an unprecedented scale, and the breakdown of morale both at home and at the battle fronts by fear of extended and intensified bombing, are accepted and intended aims of our bombing policy. They are not by-products of attempts to hit factories.”

Wow! Was Bomber Harris ever tried and executed for his crimes?

Not quite. Instead, in 1992 Britain’s Queen Mother personally unveiled a statue honoring him outside St. Clement Danes’ Church in London, whilst many protesters jeered shouting: "Harris was a war criminal!”

South Korean conservative activists burn placards during a protest to lodge a complaint against Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe visiting the Yasukuni war shrine to mark the first anniversary of his taking office, in Seoul on December 27, 2013. (AFP Photo/Woohae Cho)

The historical truth is that hundreds of thousands of German men, women and children – civilian and military – died or were maimed for life thanks to Bomber Harris’s creative thinking.

And what about “democratic” politicians like US Franklin Roosevelt, Britain’s Winston Churchill and their military leaders who joined forces to destroy the German open city of Dresden in February 1945, when Germany’s defeat was only weeks away and that city had become a meeting point for hundreds of thousands of civilian refugees fleeing the fast-advancing Red Army?

On 13th February 1945, the UK sent a first wave of 244 RAF four-engine Lancaster heavy bombers, followed by a second wave of 529 bombers. The next day, the US dispatched over 300 B17 bombers over Dresden. An estimated 300,000 people – mostly civilians including tens of thousands of children – burned to death.

I know, I know… The US and UK had no choice but to murder millions in Hamburg, Dresden, Berlin, Munich, Hannover, Frankfurt, Cologne, Ulm, Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It was the only way to end that ghastly war. They did it all in the name of “peace”, right? So, Germans and Japanese: don’t complain and say “Thank you” to the allies.

Interestingly, the destruction of Dresden began 24 hours after Roosevelt and Churchill ended their meeting with Soviet leader, Joseph Stalin, in Yalta, where the coming post-war New World Order was beginning to be mapped out. Might the destruction of Dresden have been on the agenda?

OK. But that was back during World War Two.

South Korean conservative activists shout slogans during a protest to lodge a complaint against Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe visiting the Yasukuni war shrine to mark the first anniversary of his taking office, in Seoul on December 27, 2013. (AFP Photo/Woohae Cho)

Then what about the 1.5 million dead in Iraq since March 2003, after that martyred country was invaded, raped and destroyed by modern history’s worst liars: Baby Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Perle, Douglas Feith, Condoleeza Rice and their nice friends at the Project for a New American Century think-tank and AIPAC lobby, all based on the most blatant and obscene political lie ever told: “weapons of mass destruction” that were never there.

And what about, the complacent blood-thirsty “NATO Allies” with the UK’s poodle prime minister –“Tony BLIAR” as many call him in his own country – tagging along?

And what about the daily murder, humiliation, maiming and house demolitions by the “good” Israelis against the “bad” Palestinians? What, no “International Tribunals”?

The West’s logic is really very simple. So simple, that even George W. Bush and Barack Obama can act out their roles as required by the global power masters.

A guide to war for the modern political Tarzan

For the benefit of millions of Western readers, I’d like to briefly flesh out in “basic Tarzan” how this“logic” works in practice; just to make sure they don’t miss the point: when it comes to “good guys” and“bad guys”, it’s all in the eye of the beholder.

This does not mean that Japan should not be more political and understand the bigger picture of its own interest in closing ranks with China and the region as was mentioned in a recent RT article.

Let’s face it, this is a sensitive issue. The Koreans said PM Abe’s visit to the shrine was a "deplorable" act; Beijing labeled the visit "absolutely unacceptable" and summoned Japan's ambassador. These two countries see the Yasukuni Shrine as a symbol of Japanese militarism during and before World War Two, and it was they who suffered the full impact of the Japanese onslaught.

Shinzo Abe said, "It is not my intention at all to hurt the feelings of the Chinese and Korean people,"claiming his visit was an anti-war gesture. He convinced nobody.

He did, however, make it clear that his visit was in a private capacity, not representing the government. He believes the trials that convicted Japan's wartime leaders were "victors' justice". His own grandfather, Nobusuke Kishi, served in the war cabinet and was arrested by the Americans on suspicion of being a Class-A war criminal, although he was later released without charge. Mr Abe is known to be a nationalist and a historical revisionist.

Which ‘history’: Yours or mine?

Revisionism: perhaps here lies the key to a better understanding amongst nations, if we can begin doing away with victors’ “official history” that hides, waters-down, justifies, explains and forgives its own horrendous crimes, whilst at the same time it underlines, over-emphasizes and demonizes the actions of its vanquished enemies. And it often adds two, or maybe even three zeroes here and there as part of its historical genocide cosmetic kit.

There’s certainly irrationality to it all when you consider that this state of affairs assumes as given, that every time there’s war, the good guys (us) always win, whilst the bad guys (them) always lose (otherwise “they” would be in charge, right?): whether it’s World War I, World War 2, Vietnam, Korea, the Middle East, Africa, Central Europe, Latin America…

South Korean conservative activists set fire to effigies of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe during a protest to lodge a complaint against Abe visiting the Yasukuni war shrine to mark the first anniversary of his taking office, in Seoul on December 27, 2013. (AFP Photo/Woohae Cho)

A concept almost impossible to sustain and swallow, especially since it’s obvious that all wars are won by the more powerful party in the conflict, which are those nations having the greatest fire-power to kill, maim, destroy, blow-up, murder, terrorize, bomb, shoot, torture, and have the will to do it without wavering.

If wars are won by the stronger, more violent side, where does that leave the victors morally? Do they win every war because they “love peace”? I don’t think so.

In addition, demonizing the enemy also serves to sooth one’s own conscious, dark fears and guilt. In order for the citizens of the US, UK or France to sleep tight at night, better for them not to grasp the horror their governments and military have unleashed upon millions of Iraqis, Libyans, Syrians, Palestinians, Koreans, Vietnamese, Latin Americans, Africans, Afghanis, Serbians, Pakistanis over the decades.

It’s so much easier to just say, “Oh, they’re all a bunch of Hitlers. The whole defeated lot got what they deserved: Saddam, Gadhafi, the Taliban, Chavez, Milosevic, Ho Chi Minh, Nasser, Peron etc…”

Now do you see why in some countries – Belgium, France, Austria, Germany, Canada – it’s even illegal to dare to utter revisionist views of certain historical events? They call such revisionism “hate literature”.

In my own native land of Argentina, back in 1982 a very good documentary was produced on the life and times of Evita Perón and her violently-ousted husband, President Juan Domingo Perón. He was the only true statesman that ever came to power in modern Argentina.

The lyrics of that film’s theme song repeated the following phrase (sorry, it rhymes in Spanish though not in English): “If history is written by those who win wars, that means that there’s another history – TRUE HISTORY – Let those who wish to hear, listen-up…”

Adrian Salbuchi is a political analyst, author, speaker and radio/TV commentator in Argentina.www.asalbuchi.com.ar