It's Georgia

[GuyJean]

Yeah. That's F*cked! Visiting the Hiroshima Peace Park was one of the best 'learning' experiences for me. I'm sure the high school kids were interested; It's the parents. And you also have to consider where this is; Georgia... Enough said.

One thing to think about though; I'm not defending the cancellation of the 'tour', but do you think something similar would've EVEN BEEN considered for the Japanese high school punks? Let's say, a visit from the survivors of Nanking?..

Later,

GJ

[cstaylor]

...is that they end, and both the victims and aggressors eventually pass away.

The worst thing about wars is that the "reasons" become less complex as they fade into memories. How many Americans or Japanese understand that the oil embargo (which many Japanese apologists claim as "an act of war" that permitted a military strike on Pearl Harbor) was placed only after Japan had been warned to remove itself from (at that time) french indochina? How many Americans know that the natural resources Japan lacked were waiting for them in the jungles of Burma and in the machine shops of Manchuria, and that imperialism was only beginning to fade in the early 1930's (China's Nationalist and Communist movements were a revolution against both the their Imperial system and the colonial European powers) on the main continent?

Instead, the pacific war gets boiled down to two events: Pearl Harbor for Americans, and for Japanese the atomic bombing of two Japanese cities. People bellow out their "beliefs" on both sides, even though those that fought and died during the war are long gone.

[cstaylor]

...who was a fighter pilot during the war. He was 15 years old in 1945, and on his second mission covering Kyuushu, he was shotdown by a destroyer.

The Americans rescued him, fed him, and kept him as a prisoner until the war was over.

Eventually he became a driver in Kyoto, and had the privilege of chauffering a couple of American presidents (or their entourage... my Japanese wasn't good enough at the time to understand everything he was saying) when they came to visit the old capitol.

He was a very cool guy, and probably represents the majority of men who fought during the war: they did what their country and emperor asked of them.

Oh yeah, here's a picture. The pasty white guy is me:


Damn, Kyoto is cold during the winter!