I'm disappointed in everyone in the comments who aren't treating this as a propaganda film. It was never intended to be an accurate depiction of Japan, and was in fact intended to be an INaccurate depiction of the nation.
15:15 “Never an inventive or creative people, the Japanese have always relied on the scientific and industrial knowledge of the Western world.” That doesn’t sound very accurate, but I could be wrong
You are wrong. The Japanese were/are known for the same behavior China is now famous for. Original thought leading to invention has never been an Asian thing. Look at their game, Chinese checkers. They prefer to use _your_ pieces to advance theirs, all the while blocking your progress. That's their thinking... The way they see things.
I appreciate making the documentary video with the well-analyzed hypotheses, though they forget to mention that this was after Japan had fought in WW1, plus it had had a huge earthquake in Tokyo in 1923. I know our ancestors hadn't been the savages as the narrator said. The Japanese indeed adopted European studies and cultures in the Meiji era not to be colonized by Westerners. Japan hired a bunch of foreigners that were mostly from England and Germany to learn European (British, German, some French, and Holland) cultures. I just feel like I need to correct the mistakes in the video for the honor of our ancestors, but don’t worry, we all know that this type of video is American propaganda or justification :)
It was not a propaganda but an attempt at trying to understand Japanese mindset and motivations of that time. It tried to make US soldiers understand how and why the Japanese fought so fiercely to the death without surrendering by explaining how they were brainwashed from early childhood into believing that it is good to fight to the death for their emperor. It explains how they used Shintoism to make them believe that fighting and dying for their emperor was honorable and a way to become immortal minor gods. It does not say the ancestors was savages but Believing such outdated things like this is what made their minds like a primitive savages.
The one error I found egregious was in depicting the Japanese motivation as world conquest. Everything I ever found showed they wanted a regional empire that could rival the empire of Britain, a fellow island nation. One could argue Britain had achieved "world conquest" with the empire where "the sun never sets". And from there the parallels become clear. But the point was to tell the American isolationist, "this isn't something you can ignore. its not an 'over there' problem." That said, when the narrator refers to the Japanese as being savage its always in context of the efforts of the war machine, and when spoken of as primitive it is in reference to the Shinto religion and the deification of the emperor and the war dead.
Believe it or not, the Restricted films, made for our American Troops were far more accurate than general release public films. Those films gave Japan and their war fighters the credit they deserve for technology and training. The soldiers needed accurate assessment of the people they would face. The tone of the orientation films for troops occupying Germany was quite harsh. The tone of these films for troops in Japan was not harsh and, in fact, far more respectful. I studied jiu jitsu from a Rikkusentai. He, in his seventies at the time was one of the most kind, considerate and thoughtful individuals I have ever met. He combined this with a severe and difficult system of training that was extremely demanding. His physical condition in his seventies was unbelievable and his skill with weapons and unarmed was unbelievable. In other words, nothing like the propaganda in the 1940s. A very educated and cultured man, he lived till he was 94. He is missed. Japan and Japanese culture are truly admired by Americans. Japanese food, entertainment, martial arts and technology are such a part of American Life that these things are have become a part of us. Wartime Propaganda presents things in a distorting light. It was said in Japan that American Marines were recruited from Jails and Insane Asylums for bloodthirstiness. Some Japanese may have even believed this. Of all of the Nations on Earth, Japan is one of the very few that I respect and admire above others.
It’s never a straightforward comparison when comparing one time and place so distant, along with the complex issues surrounding those times, with the sensibilities of the present...esp. when one considers the weaker intellectual/emotional, i. e. “p c” sensibilities and lack of balls of americans today....
there were no such ¨complex¨ issues during time, just diffenet affilitaions , econimic developmnet and education , just to make it easy, japanies were wokers, no work no wroght.
...I have a tendency to disagree with you....looking at the historical documentation without re-writing history (which is very much going on today) the issues were complex....if one only looks at Pearl Harbor or the nazi invasion of Poland from the west with the soviet invasion of Poland from the east, then yes, the issues don’t seem complex...but lift the cover of history and study the documentation and this seeming “simple set of circumstances” becomes highly charged....shalom my friend.....
From the 4:00 minute mark on a few minutes pay close attention. - Sounds a lot like what China is doing right now. If you don't pay attention to history it is bound to repeat itself.
Except North Korea can't feed itself and is a total starving basket case except for its military and its handpicked elite who get the perks the vast majority of North Koreans never hope to ever see. You can't even live in Pyongyang unless Kim and his secret police vouch for your loyalty. Nor does it produce anything of value the rest of the world would want unlike Japan then and now.
Japanese soldiers would still fight like this but China is showing similar war like activity. If China unleashes Japan into war over Taiwan they will make a big mistake.
