Letters From Iwo Jima movie

[mustangdriver]

I don't have to like it. AND in a recent car commercial VW advertised, "We have been building cars for 50 years!" It is true. IT is the commercial with a kid driving an R.C. car around a real one. I saw and heard it myself. I am not that nuts about it, but I can't say I blame my relatives that fought them for not buying their cars. Would you like to buy a car built in the middle east?

[DaveM2]

I don't have to like it. AND in a recent car commercial VW advertised, "We have been building cars for 50 years!" It is true. IT is the commercial with a kid driving an R.C. car around a real one. I saw and heard it myself. I am not that nuts about it, but I can't say I blame my relatives that fought them for not buying their cars. Would you like to buy a car built in the middle east?

You wouldn't buy a car from there, but your happy to put the oil that comes from there in your car? Two sides of the same coin, and really it is a head in the sand scenario if anyone thinks they don't rely on products from former, and current enemies, whether they realize it or not

Dave

[ww2John]

I wonder from time to time, what if:

a. I had been born in the late 1920's in Germany, would I have been raised a "good little Nazi"?

b. I had been born in the late 1920's in Japan, would I have been raised as an Emperor Worshipper & follower of Tojo?

I do thank God that I was fortunate to have been born post-WWII, white male, middle class, in the Northeast USA, but I do wonder how it might otherwise have turned out...

When I think about that, I tend to become a little less judgemental, a little less hateful and whole lot more thankful.

[Ollie]

In the same vein, I thoroughfully refuse to use anything from Ontario, home of the Maple Leafs. As a Montréal Habs fan, I just can't do it...

[DaveM2]

Ollie

Not really much chance for the human race is there

Dave

[BLR]

In the same vein, I thoroughfully refuse to use anything from Ontario, home of the Maple Leafs. As a Montréal Habs fan, I just can't do it...

Didn't the Canucks wipe the floor clean with the Habs the other week

[Ollie]

Yeap.

BC's off limit now.

[mustangdriver]

Well speaking for myself, I am not hateful toward Japanese or German people. But i agree that I don't like that people want to portray the WWII Japanese or German soldier as just one of us. That was my whole point of my post.

[Simcoe Warrior]

Well speaking for myself, I am not hateful toward Japanese or German people. But i agree that I don't like that people want to portray the WWII Japanese or German soldier as just one of us. That was my whole point of my post.

Why? Because it shatters stereotypes?

If you ever get the chance watch the video of "last Flight to Berlin" where a man meets the German nightfighter pilot that shot down his father's Halifax.

The leaders at the top are the ones that are to be reviled, the average soldier was pretty much just doing his job, no matter how brutal it may have been.

[Simcoe Warrior]

You wouldn't buy a car from there, but your happy to put the oil that comes from there in your car? Two sides of the same coin, and really it is a head in the sand scenario if anyone thinks they don't rely on products from former, and current enemies, whether they realize it or not

Dave

Brilliantly put.

[PhantomAce08]

Another issue today with the whole car thing is that a "Toyota" isn't reallya Japanese car. Yes it is owned by the Japanese company but Americans build them. So how do you view that? Don't buy it because it is Japanese or buy it because it gives jobs to Americans?

[mustangdriver]

It shatters stereotypes? Oh yeah, by all means Japanese were fine upstanding soldiers that all followed the Geneva Convention. Never mind I must be mistaken. I am sure that the Death march was made up. My grandfather told me stories of Japanese soldiers that would go through town, and shoot babies for fun. Not one or two, but a good bit of them. Please don't insult my intelligence with the idea that the Japanese soldier was just a good ol' figthing man just like our guys. Ask a person that was in a Japanese P.O.W. camp how nice they were. As for cars built here. My brother in law bought a Toyota--99% built in Hiroshima japan. I didn't say it, the sticker on the window did. Now for the Germans. I cna believe that maybe, MAYBE the regular enlisted man was a normal guy. but the S.S. and units like that? No way. They were a bunch of bastards as well. It is not a stereotype if it is a fact.

[Ollie]

It is a well known fact that all German soldiers were in the SS.

[Taylor Stevenson]

I saw the movie last night and I thought that they did a good job of portraying the mentality of the average japanese soldier, contrasting it with one who thought for himself. It was interesting seeing the battle from their perspective. Living in a miserable, hot, bug infested tunnel waiting for the American military might to show up. I was lucky enough to travel to Iwo in 1999 and I can tell you one thing, those Japanese soldiers were miserable. Does anyone know if these parts of the movie are based on fact...did they ever find Kuribayashi's letters / documents, or was that part made up? Is the story of this surviving Japanese soldier true? It all made for a decent storyline, but I wonder how much is fact and how much is fiction. My guess is fiction...

Taylor

[Roger Cain]

I should have worded that better, as I certainly was aware of the horrific brutality perpetrated by the Japanese.

What I meant was that the Japanese and Germans both were horrifically brutal, and it seems that often the Japanese get more longterm revulsion than the Germans, and it's always intrigued me.

I've always wondered about this, is it because the Germans were tried (sp?) for their war crimes, and the Japanese basically got off scott-free by trading research they learned during WWII?

It is a well known fact that all German soldiers were in the SS.