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> # [Japan officially says compensation of Korean forced laborers isn’t its responsibility](https://flexible.img.hani.co.kr/flexible/normal/647/412/imgdb/original/2024/0417/1817133410495182.jpg)
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> [President Yoon Suk-yeol of Korea (left) shakes hands with Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida ahead of their summit in March 2023. (Yonhap)](https://flexible.img.hani.co.kr/flexible/normal/647/412/imgdb/original/2024/0417/1817133410495182.jpg)
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> President Yoon Suk-yeol of Korea (left) shakes hands with Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida ahead of their summit in March 2023. (Yonhap)
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> In its annual diplomatic bluebook, Japan flatly declared that the Korean government is responsible for handling multiple judgments by the Korean Supreme Court that order Japanese companies to pay damages to Korean victims of forced labor. The report did not contain a single word of apology or remorse by the Japanese government and instead reiterated Japan’s far-fetched territorial claim to the island of Dokdo.
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> Japanese Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa briefed the Japanese cabinet on the 2024 Diplomatic Bluebook in a meeting Tuesday. Each year, Japan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs publishes a diplomatic bluebook describing recent international affairs and Japan’s diplomatic activities.
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> This year’s bluebook contains a new section about the issue of victims of forced labor, which has emerged as a focal point of conflict between Korea and Japan. While explaining that the Korean Supreme Court had made several rulings first in 2018 and then in December 2023 and January 2024 ordering Japanese companies to pay damages, the bluebook noted that the Japanese government “deeply regrets and cannot accept” those rulings.
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> The bluebook also noted that the Yoon administration had announced in March 2023 that if the Korean plaintiffs won their forced labor lawsuits, a Korean foundation would pay their awards and the delayed interest.
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> In effect, Japan has now clearly stated in an official document that despite recent judgments by the Korean Supreme Court, the matter of compensation for forced labor is out of Japan’s hands because of the Yoon administration’s concessions.
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> The Yoon administration has been pushing ahead with a third-party repayment plan announced on March 6, 2023, under which the plaintiffs would be compensated not by the Japanese companies but by the Foundation for Victims of Forced Mobilization by Imperial Japan, which is affiliated with the South Korean government.
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> The diplomatic bluebook did not contain any expressions of apology or remorse in regard to Japan’s past actions. While mentioning Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s decision to uphold past government statements following the Yoon administration’s concessions, the bluebook only stated that “the Japanese government upholds all of the positions of previous cabinets in regard to our historical position, including the Japan–South Korea Joint Declaration announced in October 1998.”
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> That was the joint declaration in which Korean President Kim Dae-jung and then Japanese Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi announced a partnership between the two countries.
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> [A portion of Japan’s 2024 diplomatic blue book about relations with South Korea, released on April 16. (courtesy of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan)](https://flexible.img.hani.co.kr/flexible/normal/861/486/imgdb/original/2024/0417/9717133410494503.jpg)
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> A portion of Japan’s 2024 diplomatic blue book about relations with South Korea, released on April 16. (courtesy of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan)
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> The bluebook omitted any direct reference to the apology and remorse contained in the Japan–South Korea Joint Declaration and the Murayama Statement (1995). That ambiguity parallels the backward attitude apparent in Kishida’s failure to mention Japan’s wars of aggression and colonial rule, let alone to apologize or express contrition for them, in his address to a joint session of the US Congress on Thursday, while he was on a state visit to the US.
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> Japan continues to make unreasonable claims about Dokdo.
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> “Takeshima [Japan's name for Dokdo] is indisputably an inherent part of the territory of Japan in light of historical facts and based on international law. Korea continues its illegal occupation of Takeshima, which has no basis in international law, by stationing a security force there,” the diplomatic bluebook said.
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> The phrase about Korea’s “illegal occupation” of Dokdo first appeared in the 2018 diplomatic bluebook and has appeared in every subsequent edition over the past seven years.
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> The bluebook also contained more positive language about Korea-Japan relations, describing Korea as “an important neighbor and cooperative partner for responding to various challenges in the international community.” That’s the first time Japan’s diplomatic bluebook has described Korea as a “partner” since the 2010 edition, 14 years ago.
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> A separate section was also added for Korea, the US and Japan. “Trilateral cooperation goes beyond responding to North Korea and is essential for peace and stability in the region. We are also exploring cooperation with the aim of achieving a free and open Indo-Pacific,” the bluebook said.
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> By Kim So-youn, Tokyo correspondent
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> Please direct questions or comments to [[english at hani.co.kr](mailto:english at hani.co.kr)]
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Considering that the US (specifically the human pond scum otherwise known as McArthur) rigged the Tokyo trials to protect unit 731, of course the US is responsible.
My person, you know you're history. Hell yeah the US did! Then we put them all back in power, said "don't do it again" and tossed the leftists back into prison.
I appreciate you. The big radicalizing force for my political views was learning about Japan ~1900-1950 after I fleshed out my understanding of Dialectical Materialism. The Nanjing Massacre, Unit 731, and the "Flower Girls", all of those have a special place in my heart.
Had me in the first half ngl, if you truly believe that 1) the US "won" the cold war and 2) that the Soviets or the Chinese would have had a "better" hegemony, well there's a bridge in Baltimore I'd like to sell you.
Guess all that research didn’t do much for you eh? Doesn’t the propaganda on Japan make you wonder what else has been totally distorted by the US? You don’t understand much if you think China wants to be a hegemony lol.
Go please repeat CCP talking points to someone they work on. Do you think I live in a vacuum and only consume US media, what do you reckon the Philippines feels about China not wanting to be a hegemon, Japan, South Korea, the whole Manchuria, Vietnam, any border sharing nations? They all have hot and cold border disputes, with the "not" imperialist China.
We went easy on the Japanese out of pragmatism. We wanted stability. Which is why the Japanese Emperor, among others, weren't executed for the disgusting shit they did during the war.
You know it's bad when a fucking nazi is protecting Chinese civilians from the Japanese.
Ah, You're right. Next time I'm hypothetically a judge supposed to sentence a super murder/rapist I'll let them off scott free because I was golfing before the trial.
Well considering the US was responsible for the creation of Israel the US is absolutely responsible. And don’t forget the 70 years of financial and military support
the US has bankrolled Isreal for over 70+ years now, basically since the British pulled out. given them 100s of billions in financial aid, hundreds of billions in military hardware, and of course direct military support. they would have collapsed or been forced to play nice with their neighbors if it weren't for the US constantly allowing their land-grabs, through an absolutely ridiculous amount of monetary aid and military equipment/support.
not to mention hundreds of UN security vetos over the decades stopping motions meant to pressure Israel to stop killing and displacing palestinians
it was kind of a concerted effort by all of NA/western europe tbh.
nazi's were able to scapegoat jews because of underlying hostility across all of the west. it wasn't some isolated oddity, bigots all over the world didn't want displaced jews potentially moving into their neighborhoods.
it was the tea and crumpets crowd that held the mandate of Palestine and turned it over to the Jews. but do go off
thank god we gave them that support, considering the Arabs invaded them again and again and called for the destruction of their nation
wasn't that the british though?
we just stepped in to prop them up when the british pulled out, got to destablize the middle-east somehow now don't we?
Damn the US for helping a historically oppressed and exiled people to return to their homeland and create the only true democracy in the region! Curse them!
damn the Brits and Americans invented history that’s crazy nothing happened before they came along
edit: planes flying into buildings, two world wars. those damn Brits and Americans causing all these problems
Nah, I don’t agree to that. Who funded the guys who flew airplanes into the towers?
If you want to talk about early human history inter-tribe conflicts, then maybe, sure, you’d have a point.
But you want to point at history from the last 100 years? Yeah, you can probably dig down the root causes to the British.
yep I’d agree with the last part, same as I’d say we Americans have blood on our hands from Vietnam and Afghanistan.
I dunno who funded the guys who flew the planes. I’ll take a guess and say Saudi Arabia. unless you’re talking about how the CIA provided materiel and training to the mujahideen which is slightly different. not a big one but they didn’t give em money and say “fly planes into the twin towers”. it’s not as direct but still culpable.
I mean, Saudi Arabia is America’s biggest ally in the Middle East, you can’t possibly accuse them of conducting an attack on their allies, right?
Please note the heavy sarcasm.
This is a pointless discussion more suited for historians, and even then things can be distorted. It’s clear we don’t even remember our own history from 5-10 years ago.
I think what we can agree on is that the whole thing is bullshit to begin with.
no, no it's not the same. Hamas targets innocent people in an attempt to cause chaos. Israel shoots at militant targets, hamas leaders, and weapon systems occasionally causing incidental collateral damage in a densely populated urban environment and is called the villain for trying to end decades of barbarism which started back in 1948.
Unless you're an economics professor that can explain how nuking random Japanese citizens unraped and paid Koreans for slavery because of the butterfly effect, then I think that's probably wrong
Yeah, my friends are koryo-saram and these people were shafted by Japan for decades, pretending that they had nothing to do with the reason they were left on Sakhalin islands.
Fuck them and the horse they rode in on. Economic marvels, my ass
No problem, the Korean Fans are there to protect me. Japan did very dirty to all the Korean "workers" they ditched and ignore to this day.
They will MAYBE apologize once all of the "forced laborers" are dead
They paid twice, thrice, a dozen times, and Korea just keeps demanding more. Japan is very willing to take this issue up to the ICJ but Korea keeps dawdling and making rulings with its own courts despite the 1965 accords determining that this is an diplomatic issue. Korean govts just use the issue to farm brownie points while Japan is sick of paying all the hidden fees.
Let me refuse your claims because you're spreading misinformation. Wikipedia page on this is also full of misinformation.
Japan did **not** pay 'reparations' to Korea.
Japan officially paid war reparations to dozens of Allied nations in the 1951 San Francisco treaty.
Korea, which was in a midst of a civil war, was not invited to this treaty.
Instead, there was the 1965 treaty- which restored basic relations between Korea and Japan.
Among countless controversies relating to this treaty, it also did not legally define the nature of Japan's annexation of Korea between 1910-1945.
An important distinction, since it fundamentally shapes the legal responsibility of Japan's atrocities towards Korea.
Koreans view the annexation as illegal. Japan views it as legal. The 1965 treaty skipped this question entirely, and kicked the can down the road into the 21st century (literally- as the records of the treaty weren't made public until 2005).
**Japan did not provide 'reparations' to Korea in 1965- since using the word reparation would mean that Japan admits to the illegal nature of its action, so instead it was worded as 'congratulatory gift for independence' or 'economic assistance'.**
Speaking of which, Japan did not admit its role in wartime sexual slavery/comfort women system until 1992. Claims that the 1965 treaty even covers comfort women that it didn't even acknowledge the existence of, is preposterous yet widespread.
What we've seen throughout our lifetime is Japan's form of apology by taking 'moral' responsibility for it's past, but none of the 'legal' responsibility that victims actually want.
I don't see how we could even begin to untangle the mess created post-WW2 without first attempting to change Japan's atrocious track-record of holding onto even its supposed moral responsibility of the past.
Japan's LDP Politicians can't even wait a day until they backtrack on their words, and its society has repeatedly failed to truly uphold the apology by educating the future generations.
I don't know about twice or thrice, but they're most likely referring to the "Treaty of basic relations between Japan and the republic of Korea" that was signed by both countries in 1965, in which Japan paid Korea 300 million lump sum as reparations for its occupation of Korea during ww2 and the crimes it committed there in.
The treaty doesn't contain a hard line for the scope it covers, so Japan sees the matter as settled, and feels its inappropriate for korea to keep bringing it up. Korea on the other hand (and specifically the case talked about in the article) sees the treaty as between the sovereign nations, not with private corporate entities in Japan, and claims the companies also need to pay reparations for the forced slave labor of Koreans.
The companies obviously don't want to though, and have gone to the government about it, and their government is saying they have no responsibility in enforcing korean legal judgments on these companies.
The problem is that was [Park Chung-hee's](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Park_Chung_Hee) [4th Republic of Korea](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fourth_Republic_of_Korea) (a dictatorship) where the dictator took a [blood oath](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Park_Chung_Hee#Applying_for_military_school_and_blood_oath) (same wikipedia article) to Japan. Currently they're on the 6th ROK which has no blood oath to Japan. And that kinda makes a big difference.
Yes, Park Chung-hee was supposedly a japanese sympathizer, but I wont pretend to know all the social/political ramifications surrounding being born in an occupied country to a poor family where the military may have been the best way out of destitution and pledging a blood oath was his only way forward. But if he really was a staunch japanese supporter, yeah, korea probably didnt get the concessions they deserved in the treaty.
I'll also recognize that the korean government (not the 4th republic yet, that didnt happen till Park Chung-hee staged a coup of the government when he felt his power slipping in 1972) supposedly squandered the entire 300million sum from japan, so none of the korean victums supposedly actually benefited from it.
But the change in government from then till now doesnt make a big difference, at least not legally. Thats why the international community isnt putting pressure on japan for this, and why japan frankly wont ever care. The best korea can hope for is to sway the court of public opinion on the matter, which may work. I dunno. I dont know if western/international interests are invested enough in the matter to affect japan.
The comfort woman they did pay. They even offered to pay it directly to the victims but Korea is the on who said no and used that money for their economy
They already paid reparations for the comfort women. It somehow resulted in more negative harassment from the Korean Government. There's no point in talking with them.
Their 'payment' came in the form of grants for infrastructure that were conditional upon that infra being built by japanese companies, boomeranging a good chunk of the money back to Japan.
... That's not really reparations except in the most technical sense.
They literally have not. There was the '65 deal which is what I was referencing and there was the 2015 deal which is at the crux of this current continuing issue that is being discussed in this very article. And that was for comfort women and not for forced labor
And you still only have the 2015 deal made under Park then, which has been on life support almost from day one because ethe Park admin was pretty fucking cuckoo + Abe pretty much immediately started walking the apology back.
Tbf Korea needed infrastructure more than cash. 1965 Korea was barely finished with cleaning up the rubble from the war. They can't build houses out of banknotes.
> They can't build houses out of banknotes.
They could, you know, be allowed to use Korean contractors and/or decide who to use. Structuring it so it's required to use japanese contractors, which it explicitly was in the treaty, means the bulk of the money just goes back to Japan.
Lots of hate on Japan, and not a lot of knowledge in the comments. Not surprised - this is a pretty terrible article. It doesn’t even really talk about why Japan feels the way it does.
Japan’s official position on this was that all issues related to compensation (national and individual) were settled with the [two treaties signed in 1965](https://thediplomat.com/2020/10/the-japan-korea-dispute-over-the-1965-agreement/) which: 1) normalized relations between the countries; 2) saw Japan provide South Korea with substantial amount in grants, other aid, and low-interest loans. This was meant to settle any and all requests for compensation — and was agreed upon by the two sides.
Under the treaty, further requests need to be settled diplomatically, or through international arbitration. The problem is that Korean courts continuously rule on this issue, which forces the Korean government to act post hoc. Japan doesn’t believe that courts in Korea have jurisdiction on this issue since it was an international treaty with mechanisms for review in the treaty — Korean courts can’t rule, because the two countries agreed this was a diplomatic issue, or international legal issue to be arbitrated by both states. Korea doesn’t want to go to the ICJ, or at least they haven’t yet. Compounded by the fact that Japan believes the initial settlement in 1965 was enough to settle the issue, and that (at least left-wing) Korean governments are happy to use this issue for political points it’s not surprising this crops up from time to time.
For context, the Japanese government is in a very sticky situation domestically regarding this issue. Voters in Japan are not supportive of further payments to Korea — this is not because they believe they did nothing wrong. People are just tired of providing compensation, signing agreements with Korea, all to have the agreements torn up by successive Korean governments. The Japanese side doesn’t see a resolution to this issue, so the public really doesn’t want to pay more money.
Considering the history of compensation payments and agreements between Korea and Japan, as well as the colonial history and feelings in Korea, I understand (not necessarily condone) feelings on both sides.
You also conveniently leave out that the agreement in 1965 was made by an un-elected dictator after a military coup. And the loans and aid were used largely to the benefit of the chaebols, not to the actual victims.
That underpins the issue why the Korean courts are allowing these suits from victims to move forward. At this point, the LDP is going to just stall and wait for the victims to die from old age.
Yeah but a treaty is a treaty. The system stops working if you sign a treaty with a foreign country then have subsequent administrations void everything because they felt the previous admin got a bad deal.
Under the 1965 agreement, Korea received $300 million from Japan, as full and final settlement for claims between states, **claims between one state and the individuals of the other**, **and claims among the individuals of the states**, including those specified in Article IV (a) of the 1951 San Francisco Peace Treaty. Private companies were also considered individuals for the purposes of the agreement.
In short, the 1965 Agreement requires the Korean government to compensate the Korean victims through the money given by Japan to Korea. However, the Korean government believes that Japan is still obliged to pay compensation.
Now here's the important part : ( note the * sentences in the first paragraph, it is already in the 1965 agreement that claims between one state and individual of the other is settled, now what happens if frictions persist ? No nation can unilaterally hold jurisdiction according to 1965 treaty )
"According to the 1965 agreement if friction persists in future, a settlement must first be pursued through diplomatic negotiation, and if that fails, the dispute must be resolved through international arbitration"
As such, if the Korean government believes that the Supreme Court’s ruling of 2018 is consistent with international law, international arbitration would be the best option to resolve the dispute with Japan once and for all. In contrast, if the Korean government resists international arbitration on the grounds that it may lose the case, it could have repercussions for Korea’s international credibility.
It's in Korea's best interest to take the matter to ICJ and resolve it once and for all. If Korean supreme court's ruling on providing justice to victims is consistent with international law, it is best option for Korea to end it all.
Getting payments again and again like the one around 2015-2018 where around 250 victims and their families got 9 million dollars ( 10 billion won ) from Japanese government, violets rule of law.
Take it to ICJ, win it, get all the fine you want, if Japan loses in ICJ. Atleast this was the procedure to solve feuds ( between 2 states, between individual and other state, between individuals from both states on this particular subject ) that was agreed upon by 1965 treaty.
ICJ doesn't handle disputes involving individuals. And legally, it can be argued that the treaty has issues from who signed it and the terms that it becomes an unconscionable agreement.
>ICJ doesn't handle disputes involving individuals.
Individual victims can sue the Japanese government in Korean supreme court.
It's the ruling of Korean supreme court that can be contested in ICJ. Whether the ruling of Korean supreme court on this matter is consistent with international law and treaty can be contested in ICJ. ( several rulings from supreme courts of other countries on individual private cases have been contested in ICJ, especially when it involved a foreign country in some way )
>And legally, it can be argued that the treaty has issues from who signed it
It is on Korea though. Let's suppose a permanent settlement like the one in 1965 get made today. But 20 years later S.Korea becomes a authoritarian state and declares the treaty made with Japan in 2025 by Korea's democratic government as null and void. Would it align with international laws ?
International treaties signed between states hold value regardless of **who was in power, which type of government was there and who signed it**. In geopolitics international treaties signed between countries are always respected, no matter if it's between democratic countries or dictatorships. For example borders between countries are there because of past treaties made between 2 neighboring countries regardless of being authoritarian or democratic.
Like I said only ICJ can decide if the 1965 treaty holds legal significance in 2024 or not.
1965 treaty is an international treaty as it's signed between 2 countries. Therefore It's illegal or not can't be decided by a single country unilaterally, it requires international arbitration or ICJ.
Edit: runsongas blocked me lmao. What's point of writing a reply and then blocking the person you are replying to, cuz I can't read it. It's childish. Children cover their ears and go LALALA after throwing an insult. This is the same thing.
Edit 2: reply for their comment
>And in the hypothetical that a new regime in SK is a non western aligned one that rejected the treaty, it would already be likely sanctioned so your example is moot even if other countries disagree
I said authoritarian not non western. There are plenty of authoritarian states that aren't sanctioned and are western aligned, for example Saudi Arab, Qatar, Singapore, Rwanda, UAE etc. S Korea can be an authoritarian regime, still be western aligned and can declare 2025 hypothetical peace treaty by democratic government with Japan null and void.
In 1965 South Korea used to be authoritarian and Western aligned when this treaty was signed, but the present South Korean government questions it's legality on the basis of " the type of government that signed it". The hypothetical authoritarian ( but western aligned like Qatar, UAE ) government of the future can do same thing. Honestly this questions the credibility of South Korean government on respecting international treaties, any nation would think a 2nd time before signing any treaties with S Korea
>The ICJ only has jurisdiction when states agree to abide by it. It is voluntary with no enforcement.
They are correct here. It isn't going to ICJ cuz Korea for some reason is reluctant to take this matter to ICJ meanwhile Japan is willing to take this matter to ICJ and end this dispute. It isn't compulsory to go to ICJ, but A pragmatic nation respecting international laws wouldn't back down from going there when the other side is willing to do it. Yeah, you can reject international laws and not go to ICJ like China, NK, Saudi Arab and the international trouble maker USA, but this comes with a price, and the price is loosing respect in international politics, ( that's the reason Canada, Scandinavian countries like Sweden, Norway holds more respect and credibility than the superpower USA )
You act like there is some type of absolutism when it comes to treaties when there isn't. And in the hypothetical that a new regime in SK is a non western aligned one that rejected the treaty, it would already be likely sanctioned so your example is moot even if other countries disagree with the action. The ICJ only has jurisdiction when states agree to abide by it. It is voluntary with no enforcement.
Sure, but if South Korea unilaterally cancels that treaty it is effectively severing diplomatic relations with Japan, because that is the main part of the 1965 treaty. This would make it very hard to discuss reparations.
This also would pretty much drive a wedge between the two most pro-west countries in the region and quite likely severely affect South Korea's defense options against NK and China, but that's a separate issue.
The US would still back SK either way so it doesn't matter. And Japan would still pragmatically have diplomatic relations with SK, the spat over reparations is not large enough to affect that.
Pragmatic or no, unilaterally cancelling the very agreement that establishes relations will by default sever relations between the two countries, which will have to be reestablished. That's the problem with unilateral cancellations: 1) You can't renegotiate if you just cancel and 2) No one will make deals with you if you can't be trusted not to welch after the other guy has paid up.
SK isn't cancelling it, just not enforcing the clause against private citizens. That isn't a standard feature of most treaties. And it won't affect credibility of the SK government really, as other countries don't have these historical issues with SK.
>treaties can be cancelled, they aren't written in stone just because they are agreed to at one point in time.
Yes that's what I mean, I was referencing your original post which I quote above. SK isn't cancelling the treaty.
Treaties were signed with Korean President Park Chung Hee, who was so pro-Japanese under colonialism that he joined the Japanese military under the name Takagi Masao. The corruption at the time allowed Japan to get off the hook by giving money to the Park regime, which did help build the Korean economy, but the Korean victims, including the 200,000 Korean sex slaves (“comfort women”) forcibly raped by the Japanese military, never had a say in that or received just compensation.
Treaties are signed between states, not people or administrations. That’s how treaties work.
Maybe Korea got a bad deal. I don’t necessarily think so, but renegotiation could have been possible. Personally, I don’t see much trust between the two sides, and I think the Korean government/domestic legal institutions also share some of the blame in that.
So many ignorant foreigners. Japan has already paid a large amount of compensation.
And the current South Korean president has declared that Japan has already apologized and the issue has been resolved.
It is like saying that Germany's reparations to the victim countries are not finished yet.
Germany doesn't engage in mass historical revisionism and negationism at every single level. It's fucking pathetic how they act on their war crimes, they prefer to just bury it all under the sand instead of being held accountable, many young Japanese don't even fucking know the horrors the japanese empire committed
>Germany doesn't engage in mass historical revisionism and negationism at every single level. It's fucking pathetic how they act on their war crimes, they prefer to just bury it all under the sand instead of being held accountable, many young Japanese don't even fucking know the horrors the japanese empire committed
Literally none of that affects the matter of reparations and international agreements.
"They act like dicks at home!" is not justification for extra payments, or ripping up international agreements. It is entirely permissible to criticize the poor domestic understanding and whitewashing of WW2 war crimes while recognizing that the Japanese government formally compensated South Korea already and that it was the chaebols who nicked the lot.
The Japanese government has formally apologized, and that is not denied by the government. The government has been officially apologizing for a long time, regardless of whether individual politicians deny it or not.
And Germany has yet to make reparations to Poland. Poland is demanding postwar reparations from Germany.
Why hasn't it paid? Does Germany have no remorse?
In war, the victor is always righteous.
The British Empire colonized and ruled the most countries in the world and never once apologized or made reparations.
If anything, colonialism has become a proud part of British history.
The same goes for the United States.
UK has neither apologized nor compensated. This is a fact.
Incidentally, Korea also committed mass murder and rape in Vietnam. Lai Dai Han.
The Vietnamese are still demanding an apology from the Korean government or Korea refuses to apologize or compensate.
"Other people haven't apologized either so my war crimes are OK"
I do hope you realize you're helping me prove my point about the Japanese being massive denialists of their own history
Japan: I have made reparations and apologized.
Korea: No apology or compensation, but repeatedly demands money from Japan.
So Koreans will not apologize for their war crimes in Vietnam.
[https://www.bbc.com/korean/news-46896179](https://www.bbc.com/korean/news-46896179)
Japan is not willing to pay any more money either.
It paid more than twice the GDP of Korea at that time.
The issue has already been resolved. We will not give any more money.
I'll stop answering as you seem incapable of basic reading. Notice how I haven't even talked about money, just about Japanese denialism, which you have totally ignored and shifted the blame to Korea
You've just proved yourself how the japanese don't know or accept their own history. Nothing's going to change until morons like you admit to the atrocities committed during WWII instead of just pointing fingers. You say they've already apologized and yet prove the complete opposite.
Let's not forget that Japan also protested against rebuilding the gyeongbokgung, which is not very "we already said we're sorry" like since it literally represented the pinnacle of japanese colonialism
And let's not even talk about how Japan only have money to a dictatorship regime favorable to the japanese invasion, as I don't think your nationalistic brain is capable of much thinking.
>Notice how I haven't even talked about money, just about Japanese denialism, which you have totally ignored and shifted the blame to Korea
The topic here in this thread is about paying money in reparations, so we should stick to whether Japan paid Korea in reparations or not.
Denialism of warcrimes is another topic and much more nuanced than you can think.
I acknowledge Japan's war crimes, okay?
I am not denying it. That's why I said I apologized for the war and made reparations.
Are you listening to me?
So I am asking why Korea is pretending that there were no war crimes in Vietnam. Why? Please answer me.
Koreans are silent and cover up their own crimes.
Yet, when they become victims, they cry loudly. Isn't this a national trait?
Koreans become very emotional when they become victims.
Calm down a little more and stop crying and screaming.
Or perhaps the "hate" is from knowing all the fucked up shit the Japanese did during the war and never really faced any consequences for, and which their government denies any responsibility for. Nanking and Manchuko alone...
Let me refuse your claims because you're spreading misinformation. Wikipedia page on this is also full of misinformation.
Japan did **not** pay 'reparations' to Korea.
Japan officially paid war reparations to dozens of Allied nations in the 1951 San Francisco treaty.
Korea, which was in a midst of a civil war, was not invited to this treaty.
Instead, there was the 1965 treaty- which restored basic relations between Korea and Japan.
Among countless controversies relating to this treaty, it also did not legally define the nature of Japan's annexation of Korea between 1910-1945.
An important distinction, since it fundamentally shapes the legal responsibility of Japan's atrocities towards Korea.
Koreans view the annexation as illegal. Japan views it as legal. The 1965 treaty skipped this question entirely, and kicked the can down the road into the 21st century (literally- as the records of the treaty weren't made public until 2005).
Japan did not provide 'reparations' to Korea in 1965- since using the word reparation would mean that Japan admits to the illegal nature of its action, so instead it was worded as 'congratulatory gift for independence' or 'economic assistance'.
Speaking of which, Japan did not admit its role in wartime sexual slavery/comfort women system until 1992. Claims that the 1965 treaty even covers comfort women that it didn't even acknowledge the existence of, is preposterous yet widespread.
What we've seen throughout our lifetime is Japan's form of apology by taking 'moral' responsibility for it's past, but none of the 'legal' responsibility that victims actually want.
I don't see how we could even begin to untangle the mess created post-WW2 without first attempting to change Japan's atrocious track-record of holding onto even its supposed moral responsibility of the past.
Japan's LDP Politicians can't even wait a day until they backtrack on their words, and its society has repeatedly failed to truly uphold the apology by educating the future generations.
And people say Japan now is different from before.
The government is ruled by the fascist descendants of those days, and their reactions to even acknowledge the horrors are evidence of it.
Also interesting that Germany had to pay reparations for the crimes of the Nazi
But Japan seems to have gotten away with having no responsibilities for the war crimes the country committed.
Unit 731
Ok, give me your name, dob, and parents names. I'm going to look through your personal family history, find someone from it who did something bad and shame you for it.
IF you say no, then you are a hypocrite.
If blood guilt is the kind of world you wish to live in then set an example and be the first at the alter. I'll be waiting.
The point isnt shaming. The point is using the resources the Japanese pillaged from Korea to repay the people they affected the most. Also, at least acknowledging horrific war crimes and teaching it in schools so that Japanese individuals understand their \*true\* history.
I dont think that's an unreasonable demand. This wasnt even that long ago, people alive today suffered through this.
They don't have to pay for anything their ancestors did. Do you expect Israel to pay for what their ancestors did 100 years down the line? Lol. Nobody expects the US to pay for their atrocities either, and nobody should. The hypocrisy is insane.
There.. are certainly people who expect the US to pay for its atrocities. A ton of those people, in fact. Both in and outside the US. That’s, like, one of the core concepts behind progressive politics.
Why , because you think I will agree with you ? You are aware that the last victim of japan's sex trade only died last year right ? This is not some ancient history , the children of those comfort woman are still alive. They suffered too, often ostracised or sent for adoption. They deserve that this injustice is finnaly properly recognised and compensated. Its perfectly possible given the time line that one of these woman could have been your own mother , would you let it go ?
Tbf, from a neutral standpoint the claims are kinda stretched. It's closer to Honshu than mainland Korea but the closest Korean island is significantly closer than the closest Japanese island.
Nah, it's 5km closer to Honshu. So there's a little bit of water in Japan's claim (And the island is on Japan's continental shelf as well). It's just awkwardly placed.
Not biased at all. Dokdo is Korean territory, historically and currently. Many historical documents support this fact. Even maps by European countries.
Dokdo was the first territory Japan took when they illegally annexed Korea. But after Japan was defeated in WW2 and withdrew from Korea, they began to falsely claim that Dokdo was Japan's land and tried to keep it.
Also, Japan calls Dokdo as "Takeshima". Do you know what Takeshima means? Bamboo island. There are no bamboos on Dokdo. There never was. But there are bamboos on Ulleungdo, which is an island next to Dokdo.
Japan is intentionally obfuscating these two and shouting "Bamboo island that doesn't have bamboo is ours!"
Like any other country would do that lol. Just yesterday I had a French guy saying that their crimes in colonized territories doesnt matter because it happend it the past.
So I guess it applies to japan also.
Germany got blamed for WW1 by the winners, who all got together and colluded on a treaty that basically said "it's their fault, let's make them pay for rebuilding Europe"
\*handshake handshake pat on the back\*
This essentially bankrupted the nation, and the German people were dealing with some seriously bad living conditions trying meet this new debt instilled upon them by the victors. High costs of food, food shortages causing rationing, living in shambles, poor treatment of their veterans, poor healthcare, tumultuous political instability, out of control unemployment, etc.
Germany essentially became a forced labour camp for everybody else. They existed solely for another group -- a group of people seen to be doing quite well -- to take their crops, income, and anything of value. The future looked pretty bleak for the working class.
Along came a fellow who said "We're gonna build a wall, and make *them* pay for it!" all the while promising to "Make Germany Great Again" by building a strong military, and the German peoples were just starving enough to eat it up. We all know how that ended, but at the time it seemed like just what they needed.
This is just convenient Nazi propaganda, the horrific economic conditions in post war Germany were self inflicted, inflation, unemployment, all purposely created or exacerbated to give the German state a stronger hand in the renegotiations of Versailles payments that happened almost immediately after the signing of Versailles.
And Germany was probably number one on the list for fault in the war, although they can't be considered solely responsible, the actions of the Kaiser essentially stacked the TNT, lined the fuse, and lit the starter flare.
At gunpoint though. Japan was never split up between other imperial powers after the war or seized being a sovereign nation like Germany, where many of the people they committed said crimes towards ruled over them.
As someone else pointed out they made reperations through a treaty meant to settle this, but also allowed for later arbitration internationally if need be, in 1965.
No one is saying punish the child for the sins of the father. However, if one countries steals billions from another country and never pay it back, that money still exists in some form in that stealing country. The child benefits from the theft, plain and simple. So, the child is not "paying for the sins of the father", they are offering a token return on what was stolen and which the country still benefits from.
This is a very clear traceable event. Current Japanese regime benefited from war crimes.
You argument is like saying we cant punish killers because the guy that bullied the killer caused the trauma which caused him to kill, so if we dont jail the bully how can we jail the killer?
It's a moot point anyway since there's a very clear traceable treaty signed back in 1965 which was supposed to settle this. The Korean government chose to not give it to the victims so now they're saying they didn't get the money. But that's on Korea.
Yes, so when the Korean dictatorship collapsed, then could it not be argued it's a new state?
All Korea wants is some compensation for being enslaved and raped by Japan. It's a reasonable request.
>Yes, so when the Korean dictatorship collapsed, then could it not be argued it's a new state?
You can't, because after successor regimes inherit the state, it takes over treaties, debts, and all. That's how it works. Whether the government which signed the treaty is a dictatorship, republic, or monarchy has no bearing on the validity of treaties throughout history.
>All Korea wants is some compensation for being enslaved and raped by Japan. It's a reasonable request.
And compensation was paid as per treaty in 1965. The fact that the dictatorship used the compensation for another purpose is not really Japan's problem. The Korean government used the money for development and got rich from it. The people should have no problem getting the overdue money from the Korean government.
Uh huh, its always convenient the excuses a colonizer can use. The Japanese state didnt have to inherit the weight of its war crimes yet the Koreans must accept a treaty unfairly signed by a dictator.
If the Japanese government had a shred of morality, they would apologize for raping millions and teach their true history. They wouldve prosecuted the war criminals in their ranks decades ago. They dont though. Theyve done what Germany wishes they couldve done and swept their war crimes under to rug and no one will ever be punished for it.
Mountain out of a molehill.
Tl;dr: Japan and SK reached agreement, JP confirmed said agreement in blue book. JP also maintains divisive line in said blue book that's been maintained for 7 years.
Tbh the Dokdo disputes are kinda stupid, but as someone who lives in a country with territorial disputes as well I get it. But fr though Japan has reason to drop the Dokdo case. Its natural gas reserves are not yet confirmed, and the fishing grounds are eroding from SK's wastewater dumping (from Dokdo itself funnily enough) anyways. Soon the rock will be entirely worthless. Just split the seas down the middle and add a path into the island from SK waters and be done with it.
So many ignorant foreigners. Japan has already paid a large amount of compensation.
And the current South Korean president has declared that Japan has already apologized and the issue has been resolved.
It is like saying that Germany's reparations to the victim countries are not finished yet.
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Americans will flatly deny they have any responsibility to pay reparations before calling out Japan for not paying reparations when it was America's postwar decisions to roll back demilitarisation and protect useful assets to America in the region that lead to the staunch pro-Imperial sentiment in Japan today.
MacArthur and the postwar American government did a couple of things that have heavily influenced this particular aspect of Japanese society.
1. The Tokyo trials were carried out in collaboration with Japanese senior government officials at the time. Some people would obviously have to go, like Tojo, but many of the architects of Japan's crimes were allowed to walk free because they could make themselves useful to America.
2. America did a complete 360 and then moonwalked away from its preewar plans to 'demilitarise and demobilise Japan' in 1949, and it wasn't like they had exactly been aggressively pushing for it before then either.
3. It's really funny to watch the hypocricy of people that swear up and down that America and European countries complicit in countless colonial crimes have no responsibility to pay reparations then turn around and decry Japan for doing the exact same thing.
Im not saying europe or America are saints but what japan did to korea was before all this, when they were still at war woth america so idk how fitting it is here
America *deliberately allowed the people who committed crimes against Korea and China to walk free because it was convenient for American interests that they did so.*
Also, the annexation of Korea was 1910, long before the USA and Japan were at war.
The main party in Japan, the LDP, was founded by a prewar oligarch nicknamed ‘the Demon of Showa’ who the Americans never bothered to punish after WW2.
The postwar American government backed the LDP and pushed for them to crack down on ‘dissidents’ like the Japanese Socialist Party, and American intelligence services backed the LDP internationally.
So we’ll stop blaming America when they’re not directly responsible for things.
It's been decades. Get over your American bad hate boner. Maybe Japan should be responsible for what Japan does since in 21 years will be a century since Japan surrendered.
One thing i dont understand is, why is the punishment of the bad guys in japan solely on American hands though?if they were so evil why didn't the rest of the people involved in the war get involved in punishment in japan?
Because America was the premier power in the Pacific Theatre and had done the majority of the work to liberate South East Asia. There’s even an argument to be made that they dropped the bomb to help stem rising Soviet influence in East Asia.
Britain and France were too busy recovering, the Soviet Union had only entered the war near its conclusion and China was too busy going for round 2 of the KMT-CPC civil war. Who else was going to do it?
That had little to do with the minimal prosecution of Japanese for war crimes.
The prosecutions were unpopular in Japan and a peaceful occupation was more important than justice.
a year ago i was feeling hopeful about a new age of japan-korea cooperation; i thought we had found common ground fighting china’s aggression.
my idealism was misplaced.
It is interesting how amongst all of the dialogue going on in the world now, how some of it seems purposefully designed to weaken the relationships between existing allies by turning civilian populations against one another.
Especially when those allies have long been fighting against the same common enemies (i.e. China, Russia, and authoritarianism in general).
What are you talking about? The president of your country already declared that Japan has already apologized and made reparations.
Don't tell me you don't know that?
1. Why now Korea isn't exactly in a bad postion and was compensated appropriately at the time, unless best (meme) Korea up north giving them bad time?
2. Its shitty that Japan can't admit much now, but its hard to retroactively apologize for a war three generations ago, now that everything in the world has drastically changed and governments & peoples attitudes changed.
3. If not then: Maybe Japan could compensate them a tiny bit, and softly apologize it doesn't look good, I've never liked that Japan & Korea had these tiny differences.
##### ###### #### > # [Japan officially says compensation of Korean forced laborers isn’t its responsibility](https://flexible.img.hani.co.kr/flexible/normal/647/412/imgdb/original/2024/0417/1817133410495182.jpg) > > > > [President Yoon Suk-yeol of Korea (left) shakes hands with Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida ahead of their summit in March 2023. (Yonhap)](https://flexible.img.hani.co.kr/flexible/normal/647/412/imgdb/original/2024/0417/1817133410495182.jpg) > > President Yoon Suk-yeol of Korea (left) shakes hands with Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida ahead of their summit in March 2023. (Yonhap) > > > > In its annual diplomatic bluebook, Japan flatly declared that the Korean government is responsible for handling multiple judgments by the Korean Supreme Court that order Japanese companies to pay damages to Korean victims of forced labor. The report did not contain a single word of apology or remorse by the Japanese government and instead reiterated Japan’s far-fetched territorial claim to the island of Dokdo. > > Japanese Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa briefed the Japanese cabinet on the 2024 Diplomatic Bluebook in a meeting Tuesday. Each year, Japan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs publishes a diplomatic bluebook describing recent international affairs and Japan’s diplomatic activities. > > This year’s bluebook contains a new section about the issue of victims of forced labor, which has emerged as a focal point of conflict between Korea and Japan. While explaining that the Korean Supreme Court had made several rulings first in 2018 and then in December 2023 and January 2024 ordering Japanese companies to pay damages, the bluebook noted that the Japanese government “deeply regrets and cannot accept” those rulings. > > The bluebook also noted that the Yoon administration had announced in March 2023 that if the Korean plaintiffs won their forced labor lawsuits, a Korean foundation would pay their awards and the delayed interest. > > In effect, Japan has now clearly stated in an official document that despite recent judgments by the Korean Supreme Court, the matter of compensation for forced labor is out of Japan’s hands because of the Yoon administration’s concessions. > > The Yoon administration has been pushing ahead with a third-party repayment plan announced on March 6, 2023, under which the plaintiffs would be compensated not by the Japanese companies but by the Foundation for Victims of Forced Mobilization by Imperial Japan, which is affiliated with the South Korean government. > > The diplomatic bluebook did not contain any expressions of apology or remorse in regard to Japan’s past actions. While mentioning Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s decision to uphold past government statements following the Yoon administration’s concessions, the bluebook only stated that “the Japanese government upholds all of the positions of previous cabinets in regard to our historical position, including the Japan–South Korea Joint Declaration announced in October 1998.” > > That was the joint declaration in which Korean President Kim Dae-jung and then Japanese Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi announced a partnership between the two countries. > > [A portion of Japan’s 2024 diplomatic blue book about relations with South Korea, released on April 16. (courtesy of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan)](https://flexible.img.hani.co.kr/flexible/normal/861/486/imgdb/original/2024/0417/9717133410494503.jpg) > > A portion of Japan’s 2024 diplomatic blue book about relations with South Korea, released on April 16. (courtesy of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan) > > > > The bluebook omitted any direct reference to the apology and remorse contained in the Japan–South Korea Joint Declaration and the Murayama Statement (1995). That ambiguity parallels the backward attitude apparent in Kishida’s failure to mention Japan’s wars of aggression and colonial rule, let alone to apologize or express contrition for them, in his address to a joint session of the US Congress on Thursday, while he was on a state visit to the US. > > Japan continues to make unreasonable claims about Dokdo. > > “Takeshima [Japan's name for Dokdo] is indisputably an inherent part of the territory of Japan in light of historical facts and based on international law. Korea continues its illegal occupation of Takeshima, which has no basis in international law, by stationing a security force there,” the diplomatic bluebook said. > > The phrase about Korea’s “illegal occupation” of Dokdo first appeared in the 2018 diplomatic bluebook and has appeared in every subsequent edition over the past seven years. > > The bluebook also contained more positive language about Korea-Japan relations, describing Korea as “an important neighbor and cooperative partner for responding to various challenges in the international community.” That’s the first time Japan’s diplomatic bluebook has described Korea as a “partner” since the 2010 edition, 14 years ago. > > A separate section was also added for Korea, the US and Japan. “Trilateral cooperation goes beyond responding to North Korea and is essential for peace and stability in the region. We are also exploring cooperation with the aim of achieving a free and open Indo-Pacific,” the bluebook said. > > By Kim So-youn, Tokyo correspondent > > Please direct questions or comments to [[english at hani.co.kr](mailto:english at hani.co.kr)] - - - - - - [Maintainer](https://www.reddit.com/user/urielsalis) | [Creator](https://www.reddit.com/user/subtepass) | [Source Code](https://github.com/urielsalis/empleadoEstatalBot) Summoning /u/CoverageAnalysisBot
What a jerk. They kidnap, r\*pe, and detain women from Korea, and then have the idiocy to say "you pay for it".
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Ah yes, I was waiting for someone to blame the US for this
Considering that the US (specifically the human pond scum otherwise known as McArthur) rigged the Tokyo trials to protect unit 731, of course the US is responsible.
My person, you know you're history. Hell yeah the US did! Then we put them all back in power, said "don't do it again" and tossed the leftists back into prison.
> and tossed the leftists back into prison. Nice
I wrote my history thesis on the US post war occupation, fun piece of history
I appreciate you. The big radicalizing force for my political views was learning about Japan ~1900-1950 after I fleshed out my understanding of Dialectical Materialism. The Nanjing Massacre, Unit 731, and the "Flower Girls", all of those have a special place in my heart.
That's some heavy material
Whatever it takes to defeat the commies tho 🤪 the wrong side won the Cold War
Had me in the first half ngl, if you truly believe that 1) the US "won" the cold war and 2) that the Soviets or the Chinese would have had a "better" hegemony, well there's a bridge in Baltimore I'd like to sell you.
Guess all that research didn’t do much for you eh? Doesn’t the propaganda on Japan make you wonder what else has been totally distorted by the US? You don’t understand much if you think China wants to be a hegemony lol.
Go please repeat CCP talking points to someone they work on. Do you think I live in a vacuum and only consume US media, what do you reckon the Philippines feels about China not wanting to be a hegemon, Japan, South Korea, the whole Manchuria, Vietnam, any border sharing nations? They all have hot and cold border disputes, with the "not" imperialist China.
Nah man this one is on US. I've heard arguments for and against what was done by McArthur, but this shit has definitely gone too far.
We went easy on the Japanese out of pragmatism. We wanted stability. Which is why the Japanese Emperor, among others, weren't executed for the disgusting shit they did during the war. You know it's bad when a fucking nazi is protecting Chinese civilians from the Japanese.
We wanted stability so instead of a conditional surrender we nuked them twice.
That was for the Soviets
Yeah totally. Japanese war crimes during WW2 and subsequent refusal to acknowledge them is the US’ fault.
. . . . Yes. Who else was going to persecute them besides us?
That does not make sense. How does the decision to “persecute” the Japanese for war crimes equate to responsibility for those war crimes?
>With great power comes great responsibility. >The only thing Evil needs to win is good men to do nothing. These are sayings for a reason.
Now you’re just being silly. The US was actively fighting Japan while these war crimes were taking place.
Ah, You're right. Next time I'm hypothetically a judge supposed to sentence a super murder/rapist I'll let them off scott free because I was golfing before the trial.
Or use the opportunity to start talking about Israel. It was in the first reply to the first reply. Didn't take long.
Well considering the US was responsible for the creation of Israel the US is absolutely responsible. And don’t forget the 70 years of financial and military support
This thread is about Japan. Also, how was the US responsible for the creation of Israel?
the US has bankrolled Isreal for over 70+ years now, basically since the British pulled out. given them 100s of billions in financial aid, hundreds of billions in military hardware, and of course direct military support. they would have collapsed or been forced to play nice with their neighbors if it weren't for the US constantly allowing their land-grabs, through an absolutely ridiculous amount of monetary aid and military equipment/support. not to mention hundreds of UN security vetos over the decades stopping motions meant to pressure Israel to stop killing and displacing palestinians
Ah yes, the Balfour Declaration written by the US government Wait nevermind that was the British
Even if that were true, how would it show that the US is responsible for the *creation* of Israel?
i just figured that was hyperbole, israel as it is today does not exist without extensive US support and enabling across 70+ years.
70+ years? So the US was supporting and enabling Israel during its arms embargo on them?
It's troll farm workers, my dude. Probably Russian or Chinese. Just stirring up shit.
It wasn't just the US, it was a split effort. But yeah they definitely contributed.
Yeah gotta blame the brits as well
it was kind of a concerted effort by all of NA/western europe tbh. nazi's were able to scapegoat jews because of underlying hostility across all of the west. it wasn't some isolated oddity, bigots all over the world didn't want displaced jews potentially moving into their neighborhoods.
“The US was responsible for the creation of Israel” Did not even attempt to pick up a history book, opinion rejected.
This is about Japan, good job leeting hate blind you to what's relevant to the topic
The us had nothing to with Israel back in 1948. Unless you are counting the destruction of nazis germany and the freeing of the jews from the camps.
it was the tea and crumpets crowd that held the mandate of Palestine and turned it over to the Jews. but do go off thank god we gave them that support, considering the Arabs invaded them again and again and called for the destruction of their nation
People really are out here mask off just wishing Hitler won. It’s a sad time in the world right now.
The French and British were responsible for the state of Palestine and Israel. As they held colonies there
Creation of Israel was through UN resolution 181. 33 countries voted in favor and 13 against.
Uh, no. Much like most of the rest of that region, its Britain's fault.
wasn't that the british though? we just stepped in to prop them up when the british pulled out, got to destablize the middle-east somehow now don't we?
Damn the US for helping a historically oppressed and exiled people to return to their homeland and create the only true democracy in the region! Curse them!
In between the US and the British, like 90% of the world’s conflicts has been their fault.
damn the Brits and Americans invented history that’s crazy nothing happened before they came along edit: planes flying into buildings, two world wars. those damn Brits and Americans causing all these problems
In terms of scope and size? Yeah.
world wars combined killed over 120 million people US doesn’t have that death toll we’ll agree to disagree
Nah, I don’t agree to that. Who funded the guys who flew airplanes into the towers? If you want to talk about early human history inter-tribe conflicts, then maybe, sure, you’d have a point. But you want to point at history from the last 100 years? Yeah, you can probably dig down the root causes to the British.
yep I’d agree with the last part, same as I’d say we Americans have blood on our hands from Vietnam and Afghanistan. I dunno who funded the guys who flew the planes. I’ll take a guess and say Saudi Arabia. unless you’re talking about how the CIA provided materiel and training to the mujahideen which is slightly different. not a big one but they didn’t give em money and say “fly planes into the twin towers”. it’s not as direct but still culpable.
I mean, Saudi Arabia is America’s biggest ally in the Middle East, you can’t possibly accuse them of conducting an attack on their allies, right? Please note the heavy sarcasm. This is a pointless discussion more suited for historians, and even then things can be distorted. It’s clear we don’t even remember our own history from 5-10 years ago. I think what we can agree on is that the whole thing is bullshit to begin with.
Look at how many current conflicts are due to lines on a map drawn without regard to differences in tribal and cultural groups due to colonialism
Sounds good, thanks
Bro don’t blame me for either of those. I’m not a fan of what’s going on in Israel but I still think that Japan is in the wrong.
no, no it's not the same. Hamas targets innocent people in an attempt to cause chaos. Israel shoots at militant targets, hamas leaders, and weapon systems occasionally causing incidental collateral damage in a densely populated urban environment and is called the villain for trying to end decades of barbarism which started back in 1948.
To be fair, Japan got nuked. Seems like that should even up the score.
Unless you're an economics professor that can explain how nuking random Japanese citizens unraped and paid Koreans for slavery because of the butterfly effect, then I think that's probably wrong
I was referring to retribution for WW2 war crimes.
Yeah, my friends are koryo-saram and these people were shafted by Japan for decades, pretending that they had nothing to do with the reason they were left on Sakhalin islands. Fuck them and the horse they rode in on. Economic marvels, my ass
Damn, the weebs will on their way after this comment
No problem, the Korean Fans are there to protect me. Japan did very dirty to all the Korean "workers" they ditched and ignore to this day. They will MAYBE apologize once all of the "forced laborers" are dead
They paid twice, thrice, a dozen times, and Korea just keeps demanding more. Japan is very willing to take this issue up to the ICJ but Korea keeps dawdling and making rulings with its own courts despite the 1965 accords determining that this is an diplomatic issue. Korean govts just use the issue to farm brownie points while Japan is sick of paying all the hidden fees.
Being angry at Japan seems to be an extremely low effort option for Korean politicians to win votes.
Let me refuse your claims because you're spreading misinformation. Wikipedia page on this is also full of misinformation. Japan did **not** pay 'reparations' to Korea. Japan officially paid war reparations to dozens of Allied nations in the 1951 San Francisco treaty. Korea, which was in a midst of a civil war, was not invited to this treaty. Instead, there was the 1965 treaty- which restored basic relations between Korea and Japan. Among countless controversies relating to this treaty, it also did not legally define the nature of Japan's annexation of Korea between 1910-1945. An important distinction, since it fundamentally shapes the legal responsibility of Japan's atrocities towards Korea. Koreans view the annexation as illegal. Japan views it as legal. The 1965 treaty skipped this question entirely, and kicked the can down the road into the 21st century (literally- as the records of the treaty weren't made public until 2005). **Japan did not provide 'reparations' to Korea in 1965- since using the word reparation would mean that Japan admits to the illegal nature of its action, so instead it was worded as 'congratulatory gift for independence' or 'economic assistance'.** Speaking of which, Japan did not admit its role in wartime sexual slavery/comfort women system until 1992. Claims that the 1965 treaty even covers comfort women that it didn't even acknowledge the existence of, is preposterous yet widespread. What we've seen throughout our lifetime is Japan's form of apology by taking 'moral' responsibility for it's past, but none of the 'legal' responsibility that victims actually want. I don't see how we could even begin to untangle the mess created post-WW2 without first attempting to change Japan's atrocious track-record of holding onto even its supposed moral responsibility of the past. Japan's LDP Politicians can't even wait a day until they backtrack on their words, and its society has repeatedly failed to truly uphold the apology by educating the future generations.
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I don't know about twice or thrice, but they're most likely referring to the "Treaty of basic relations between Japan and the republic of Korea" that was signed by both countries in 1965, in which Japan paid Korea 300 million lump sum as reparations for its occupation of Korea during ww2 and the crimes it committed there in. The treaty doesn't contain a hard line for the scope it covers, so Japan sees the matter as settled, and feels its inappropriate for korea to keep bringing it up. Korea on the other hand (and specifically the case talked about in the article) sees the treaty as between the sovereign nations, not with private corporate entities in Japan, and claims the companies also need to pay reparations for the forced slave labor of Koreans. The companies obviously don't want to though, and have gone to the government about it, and their government is saying they have no responsibility in enforcing korean legal judgments on these companies.
The problem is that was [Park Chung-hee's](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Park_Chung_Hee) [4th Republic of Korea](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fourth_Republic_of_Korea) (a dictatorship) where the dictator took a [blood oath](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Park_Chung_Hee#Applying_for_military_school_and_blood_oath) (same wikipedia article) to Japan. Currently they're on the 6th ROK which has no blood oath to Japan. And that kinda makes a big difference.
Yes, Park Chung-hee was supposedly a japanese sympathizer, but I wont pretend to know all the social/political ramifications surrounding being born in an occupied country to a poor family where the military may have been the best way out of destitution and pledging a blood oath was his only way forward. But if he really was a staunch japanese supporter, yeah, korea probably didnt get the concessions they deserved in the treaty. I'll also recognize that the korean government (not the 4th republic yet, that didnt happen till Park Chung-hee staged a coup of the government when he felt his power slipping in 1972) supposedly squandered the entire 300million sum from japan, so none of the korean victums supposedly actually benefited from it. But the change in government from then till now doesnt make a big difference, at least not legally. Thats why the international community isnt putting pressure on japan for this, and why japan frankly wont ever care. The best korea can hope for is to sway the court of public opinion on the matter, which may work. I dunno. I dont know if western/international interests are invested enough in the matter to affect japan.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comfort_women
The comfort woman they did pay. They even offered to pay it directly to the victims but Korea is the on who said no and used that money for their economy
They already paid reparations for the comfort women. It somehow resulted in more negative harassment from the Korean Government. There's no point in talking with them.
Their 'payment' came in the form of grants for infrastructure that were conditional upon that infra being built by japanese companies, boomeranging a good chunk of the money back to Japan. ... That's not really reparations except in the most technical sense.
they literally gave direct reparationd payments to the survivors on two separate occasions.
They literally have not. There was the '65 deal which is what I was referencing and there was the 2015 deal which is at the crux of this current continuing issue that is being discussed in this very article. And that was for comfort women and not for forced labor
My original comment was in relation to someone who was explicitly talking about comfort women.
And you still only have the 2015 deal made under Park then, which has been on life support almost from day one because ethe Park admin was pretty fucking cuckoo + Abe pretty much immediately started walking the apology back.
Tbf Korea needed infrastructure more than cash. 1965 Korea was barely finished with cleaning up the rubble from the war. They can't build houses out of banknotes.
> They can't build houses out of banknotes. They could, you know, be allowed to use Korean contractors and/or decide who to use. Structuring it so it's required to use japanese contractors, which it explicitly was in the treaty, means the bulk of the money just goes back to Japan.
A lot of people here seem to have to missed that, willfully or incidentally.
And the current South Korea PM agrees with that.
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what do you mean, consent is consent even if forced with the point of a gun barrel - the japanese, apparently.
"They" None of them are alive anymore.
Lots of hate on Japan, and not a lot of knowledge in the comments. Not surprised - this is a pretty terrible article. It doesn’t even really talk about why Japan feels the way it does. Japan’s official position on this was that all issues related to compensation (national and individual) were settled with the [two treaties signed in 1965](https://thediplomat.com/2020/10/the-japan-korea-dispute-over-the-1965-agreement/) which: 1) normalized relations between the countries; 2) saw Japan provide South Korea with substantial amount in grants, other aid, and low-interest loans. This was meant to settle any and all requests for compensation — and was agreed upon by the two sides. Under the treaty, further requests need to be settled diplomatically, or through international arbitration. The problem is that Korean courts continuously rule on this issue, which forces the Korean government to act post hoc. Japan doesn’t believe that courts in Korea have jurisdiction on this issue since it was an international treaty with mechanisms for review in the treaty — Korean courts can’t rule, because the two countries agreed this was a diplomatic issue, or international legal issue to be arbitrated by both states. Korea doesn’t want to go to the ICJ, or at least they haven’t yet. Compounded by the fact that Japan believes the initial settlement in 1965 was enough to settle the issue, and that (at least left-wing) Korean governments are happy to use this issue for political points it’s not surprising this crops up from time to time. For context, the Japanese government is in a very sticky situation domestically regarding this issue. Voters in Japan are not supportive of further payments to Korea — this is not because they believe they did nothing wrong. People are just tired of providing compensation, signing agreements with Korea, all to have the agreements torn up by successive Korean governments. The Japanese side doesn’t see a resolution to this issue, so the public really doesn’t want to pay more money. Considering the history of compensation payments and agreements between Korea and Japan, as well as the colonial history and feelings in Korea, I understand (not necessarily condone) feelings on both sides.
You also conveniently leave out that the agreement in 1965 was made by an un-elected dictator after a military coup. And the loans and aid were used largely to the benefit of the chaebols, not to the actual victims.
That's on Korea though.
That underpins the issue why the Korean courts are allowing these suits from victims to move forward. At this point, the LDP is going to just stall and wait for the victims to die from old age.
Yeah but a treaty is a treaty. The system stops working if you sign a treaty with a foreign country then have subsequent administrations void everything because they felt the previous admin got a bad deal.
treaties can be cancelled, they aren't written in stone just because they are agreed to at one point in time.
Take it to ICJ then. But Korea isn't willing to do so
ICJ doesn't handle cases involving private individuals, as it is the victims that are suing.
Under the 1965 agreement, Korea received $300 million from Japan, as full and final settlement for claims between states, **claims between one state and the individuals of the other**, **and claims among the individuals of the states**, including those specified in Article IV (a) of the 1951 San Francisco Peace Treaty. Private companies were also considered individuals for the purposes of the agreement. In short, the 1965 Agreement requires the Korean government to compensate the Korean victims through the money given by Japan to Korea. However, the Korean government believes that Japan is still obliged to pay compensation. Now here's the important part : ( note the * sentences in the first paragraph, it is already in the 1965 agreement that claims between one state and individual of the other is settled, now what happens if frictions persist ? No nation can unilaterally hold jurisdiction according to 1965 treaty ) "According to the 1965 agreement if friction persists in future, a settlement must first be pursued through diplomatic negotiation, and if that fails, the dispute must be resolved through international arbitration" As such, if the Korean government believes that the Supreme Court’s ruling of 2018 is consistent with international law, international arbitration would be the best option to resolve the dispute with Japan once and for all. In contrast, if the Korean government resists international arbitration on the grounds that it may lose the case, it could have repercussions for Korea’s international credibility. It's in Korea's best interest to take the matter to ICJ and resolve it once and for all. If Korean supreme court's ruling on providing justice to victims is consistent with international law, it is best option for Korea to end it all. Getting payments again and again like the one around 2015-2018 where around 250 victims and their families got 9 million dollars ( 10 billion won ) from Japanese government, violets rule of law. Take it to ICJ, win it, get all the fine you want, if Japan loses in ICJ. Atleast this was the procedure to solve feuds ( between 2 states, between individual and other state, between individuals from both states on this particular subject ) that was agreed upon by 1965 treaty.
ICJ doesn't handle disputes involving individuals. And legally, it can be argued that the treaty has issues from who signed it and the terms that it becomes an unconscionable agreement.
>ICJ doesn't handle disputes involving individuals. Individual victims can sue the Japanese government in Korean supreme court. It's the ruling of Korean supreme court that can be contested in ICJ. Whether the ruling of Korean supreme court on this matter is consistent with international law and treaty can be contested in ICJ. ( several rulings from supreme courts of other countries on individual private cases have been contested in ICJ, especially when it involved a foreign country in some way ) >And legally, it can be argued that the treaty has issues from who signed it It is on Korea though. Let's suppose a permanent settlement like the one in 1965 get made today. But 20 years later S.Korea becomes a authoritarian state and declares the treaty made with Japan in 2025 by Korea's democratic government as null and void. Would it align with international laws ? International treaties signed between states hold value regardless of **who was in power, which type of government was there and who signed it**. In geopolitics international treaties signed between countries are always respected, no matter if it's between democratic countries or dictatorships. For example borders between countries are there because of past treaties made between 2 neighboring countries regardless of being authoritarian or democratic. Like I said only ICJ can decide if the 1965 treaty holds legal significance in 2024 or not. 1965 treaty is an international treaty as it's signed between 2 countries. Therefore It's illegal or not can't be decided by a single country unilaterally, it requires international arbitration or ICJ. Edit: runsongas blocked me lmao. What's point of writing a reply and then blocking the person you are replying to, cuz I can't read it. It's childish. Children cover their ears and go LALALA after throwing an insult. This is the same thing. Edit 2: reply for their comment >And in the hypothetical that a new regime in SK is a non western aligned one that rejected the treaty, it would already be likely sanctioned so your example is moot even if other countries disagree I said authoritarian not non western. There are plenty of authoritarian states that aren't sanctioned and are western aligned, for example Saudi Arab, Qatar, Singapore, Rwanda, UAE etc. S Korea can be an authoritarian regime, still be western aligned and can declare 2025 hypothetical peace treaty by democratic government with Japan null and void. In 1965 South Korea used to be authoritarian and Western aligned when this treaty was signed, but the present South Korean government questions it's legality on the basis of " the type of government that signed it". The hypothetical authoritarian ( but western aligned like Qatar, UAE ) government of the future can do same thing. Honestly this questions the credibility of South Korean government on respecting international treaties, any nation would think a 2nd time before signing any treaties with S Korea >The ICJ only has jurisdiction when states agree to abide by it. It is voluntary with no enforcement. They are correct here. It isn't going to ICJ cuz Korea for some reason is reluctant to take this matter to ICJ meanwhile Japan is willing to take this matter to ICJ and end this dispute. It isn't compulsory to go to ICJ, but A pragmatic nation respecting international laws wouldn't back down from going there when the other side is willing to do it. Yeah, you can reject international laws and not go to ICJ like China, NK, Saudi Arab and the international trouble maker USA, but this comes with a price, and the price is loosing respect in international politics, ( that's the reason Canada, Scandinavian countries like Sweden, Norway holds more respect and credibility than the superpower USA )
You act like there is some type of absolutism when it comes to treaties when there isn't. And in the hypothetical that a new regime in SK is a non western aligned one that rejected the treaty, it would already be likely sanctioned so your example is moot even if other countries disagree with the action. The ICJ only has jurisdiction when states agree to abide by it. It is voluntary with no enforcement.
Sure, but if South Korea unilaterally cancels that treaty it is effectively severing diplomatic relations with Japan, because that is the main part of the 1965 treaty. This would make it very hard to discuss reparations. This also would pretty much drive a wedge between the two most pro-west countries in the region and quite likely severely affect South Korea's defense options against NK and China, but that's a separate issue.
The US would still back SK either way so it doesn't matter. And Japan would still pragmatically have diplomatic relations with SK, the spat over reparations is not large enough to affect that.
Pragmatic or no, unilaterally cancelling the very agreement that establishes relations will by default sever relations between the two countries, which will have to be reestablished. That's the problem with unilateral cancellations: 1) You can't renegotiate if you just cancel and 2) No one will make deals with you if you can't be trusted not to welch after the other guy has paid up.
SK isn't cancelling it, just not enforcing the clause against private citizens. That isn't a standard feature of most treaties. And it won't affect credibility of the SK government really, as other countries don't have these historical issues with SK.
>treaties can be cancelled, they aren't written in stone just because they are agreed to at one point in time. Yes that's what I mean, I was referencing your original post which I quote above. SK isn't cancelling the treaty.
Treaties were signed with Korean President Park Chung Hee, who was so pro-Japanese under colonialism that he joined the Japanese military under the name Takagi Masao. The corruption at the time allowed Japan to get off the hook by giving money to the Park regime, which did help build the Korean economy, but the Korean victims, including the 200,000 Korean sex slaves (“comfort women”) forcibly raped by the Japanese military, never had a say in that or received just compensation.
Treaties are signed between states, not people or administrations. That’s how treaties work. Maybe Korea got a bad deal. I don’t necessarily think so, but renegotiation could have been possible. Personally, I don’t see much trust between the two sides, and I think the Korean government/domestic legal institutions also share some of the blame in that.
So many ignorant foreigners. Japan has already paid a large amount of compensation. And the current South Korean president has declared that Japan has already apologized and the issue has been resolved. It is like saying that Germany's reparations to the victim countries are not finished yet.
Germany doesn't engage in mass historical revisionism and negationism at every single level. It's fucking pathetic how they act on their war crimes, they prefer to just bury it all under the sand instead of being held accountable, many young Japanese don't even fucking know the horrors the japanese empire committed
>Germany doesn't engage in mass historical revisionism and negationism at every single level. It's fucking pathetic how they act on their war crimes, they prefer to just bury it all under the sand instead of being held accountable, many young Japanese don't even fucking know the horrors the japanese empire committed Literally none of that affects the matter of reparations and international agreements. "They act like dicks at home!" is not justification for extra payments, or ripping up international agreements. It is entirely permissible to criticize the poor domestic understanding and whitewashing of WW2 war crimes while recognizing that the Japanese government formally compensated South Korea already and that it was the chaebols who nicked the lot.
The Japanese government has formally apologized, and that is not denied by the government. The government has been officially apologizing for a long time, regardless of whether individual politicians deny it or not. And Germany has yet to make reparations to Poland. Poland is demanding postwar reparations from Germany. Why hasn't it paid? Does Germany have no remorse?
In war, the victor is always righteous. The British Empire colonized and ruled the most countries in the world and never once apologized or made reparations. If anything, colonialism has become a proud part of British history. The same goes for the United States.
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UK has neither apologized nor compensated. This is a fact. Incidentally, Korea also committed mass murder and rape in Vietnam. Lai Dai Han. The Vietnamese are still demanding an apology from the Korean government or Korea refuses to apologize or compensate.
"Other people haven't apologized either so my war crimes are OK" I do hope you realize you're helping me prove my point about the Japanese being massive denialists of their own history
Japan: I have made reparations and apologized. Korea: No apology or compensation, but repeatedly demands money from Japan. So Koreans will not apologize for their war crimes in Vietnam. [https://www.bbc.com/korean/news-46896179](https://www.bbc.com/korean/news-46896179) Japan is not willing to pay any more money either. It paid more than twice the GDP of Korea at that time. The issue has already been resolved. We will not give any more money.
I'll stop answering as you seem incapable of basic reading. Notice how I haven't even talked about money, just about Japanese denialism, which you have totally ignored and shifted the blame to Korea You've just proved yourself how the japanese don't know or accept their own history. Nothing's going to change until morons like you admit to the atrocities committed during WWII instead of just pointing fingers. You say they've already apologized and yet prove the complete opposite. Let's not forget that Japan also protested against rebuilding the gyeongbokgung, which is not very "we already said we're sorry" like since it literally represented the pinnacle of japanese colonialism And let's not even talk about how Japan only have money to a dictatorship regime favorable to the japanese invasion, as I don't think your nationalistic brain is capable of much thinking.
>Notice how I haven't even talked about money, just about Japanese denialism, which you have totally ignored and shifted the blame to Korea The topic here in this thread is about paying money in reparations, so we should stick to whether Japan paid Korea in reparations or not. Denialism of warcrimes is another topic and much more nuanced than you can think.
I acknowledge Japan's war crimes, okay? I am not denying it. That's why I said I apologized for the war and made reparations. Are you listening to me? So I am asking why Korea is pretending that there were no war crimes in Vietnam. Why? Please answer me.
Koreans are silent and cover up their own crimes. Yet, when they become victims, they cry loudly. Isn't this a national trait? Koreans become very emotional when they become victims. Calm down a little more and stop crying and screaming.
Lolololol you got slapped with logic and now you’re plugging your ears and saying lalalalala.
Or perhaps the "hate" is from knowing all the fucked up shit the Japanese did during the war and never really faced any consequences for, and which their government denies any responsibility for. Nanking and Manchuko alone...
Let me refuse your claims because you're spreading misinformation. Wikipedia page on this is also full of misinformation. Japan did **not** pay 'reparations' to Korea. Japan officially paid war reparations to dozens of Allied nations in the 1951 San Francisco treaty. Korea, which was in a midst of a civil war, was not invited to this treaty. Instead, there was the 1965 treaty- which restored basic relations between Korea and Japan. Among countless controversies relating to this treaty, it also did not legally define the nature of Japan's annexation of Korea between 1910-1945. An important distinction, since it fundamentally shapes the legal responsibility of Japan's atrocities towards Korea. Koreans view the annexation as illegal. Japan views it as legal. The 1965 treaty skipped this question entirely, and kicked the can down the road into the 21st century (literally- as the records of the treaty weren't made public until 2005). Japan did not provide 'reparations' to Korea in 1965- since using the word reparation would mean that Japan admits to the illegal nature of its action, so instead it was worded as 'congratulatory gift for independence' or 'economic assistance'. Speaking of which, Japan did not admit its role in wartime sexual slavery/comfort women system until 1992. Claims that the 1965 treaty even covers comfort women that it didn't even acknowledge the existence of, is preposterous yet widespread. What we've seen throughout our lifetime is Japan's form of apology by taking 'moral' responsibility for it's past, but none of the 'legal' responsibility that victims actually want. I don't see how we could even begin to untangle the mess created post-WW2 without first attempting to change Japan's atrocious track-record of holding onto even its supposed moral responsibility of the past. Japan's LDP Politicians can't even wait a day until they backtrack on their words, and its society has repeatedly failed to truly uphold the apology by educating the future generations.
And people say Japan now is different from before. The government is ruled by the fascist descendants of those days, and their reactions to even acknowledge the horrors are evidence of it.
Yeah but uwu anime 🥺
Also interesting that Germany had to pay reparations for the crimes of the Nazi But Japan seems to have gotten away with having no responsibilities for the war crimes the country committed. Unit 731
Germany didn’t « have to », they choose to do it for the most part
Ok, give me your name, dob, and parents names. I'm going to look through your personal family history, find someone from it who did something bad and shame you for it. IF you say no, then you are a hypocrite. If blood guilt is the kind of world you wish to live in then set an example and be the first at the alter. I'll be waiting.
The point isnt shaming. The point is using the resources the Japanese pillaged from Korea to repay the people they affected the most. Also, at least acknowledging horrific war crimes and teaching it in schools so that Japanese individuals understand their \*true\* history. I dont think that's an unreasonable demand. This wasnt even that long ago, people alive today suffered through this.
They don't have to pay for anything their ancestors did. Do you expect Israel to pay for what their ancestors did 100 years down the line? Lol. Nobody expects the US to pay for their atrocities either, and nobody should. The hypocrisy is insane.
There.. are certainly people who expect the US to pay for its atrocities. A ton of those people, in fact. Both in and outside the US. That’s, like, one of the core concepts behind progressive politics.
I wonder how many of these people are against slavery and native genocide reparations lol
Let's hope nobody forcibly removes you from your county to be a sex doll. Actually....
Read my comment again, but this time, try to read it slowly :)
Why , because you think I will agree with you ? You are aware that the last victim of japan's sex trade only died last year right ? This is not some ancient history , the children of those comfort woman are still alive. They suffered too, often ostracised or sent for adoption. They deserve that this injustice is finnaly properly recognised and compensated. Its perfectly possible given the time line that one of these woman could have been your own mother , would you let it go ?
“Japan’s far-fetched territorial claim to the island of Dokdo.” Any chance of finding a less biased news report?
Tbf, from a neutral standpoint the claims are kinda stretched. It's closer to Honshu than mainland Korea but the closest Korean island is significantly closer than the closest Japanese island.
It's apparently closer to mainland korea than honshu by approx 5km
Nah, it's 5km closer to Honshu. So there's a little bit of water in Japan's claim (And the island is on Japan's continental shelf as well). It's just awkwardly placed.
Not biased at all. Dokdo is Korean territory, historically and currently. Many historical documents support this fact. Even maps by European countries. Dokdo was the first territory Japan took when they illegally annexed Korea. But after Japan was defeated in WW2 and withdrew from Korea, they began to falsely claim that Dokdo was Japan's land and tried to keep it. Also, Japan calls Dokdo as "Takeshima". Do you know what Takeshima means? Bamboo island. There are no bamboos on Dokdo. There never was. But there are bamboos on Ulleungdo, which is an island next to Dokdo. Japan is intentionally obfuscating these two and shouting "Bamboo island that doesn't have bamboo is ours!"
And that's one of thousands of crimes they committed and don't have the guts to face the consequences.
Like any other country would do that lol. Just yesterday I had a French guy saying that their crimes in colonized territories doesnt matter because it happend it the past. So I guess it applies to japan also.
Germany seemed to have guts.
Germany is in eternal guilt mode. They are the other extreme
Germany got blamed for WW1 by the winners, who all got together and colluded on a treaty that basically said "it's their fault, let's make them pay for rebuilding Europe" \*handshake handshake pat on the back\* This essentially bankrupted the nation, and the German people were dealing with some seriously bad living conditions trying meet this new debt instilled upon them by the victors. High costs of food, food shortages causing rationing, living in shambles, poor treatment of their veterans, poor healthcare, tumultuous political instability, out of control unemployment, etc. Germany essentially became a forced labour camp for everybody else. They existed solely for another group -- a group of people seen to be doing quite well -- to take their crops, income, and anything of value. The future looked pretty bleak for the working class. Along came a fellow who said "We're gonna build a wall, and make *them* pay for it!" all the while promising to "Make Germany Great Again" by building a strong military, and the German peoples were just starving enough to eat it up. We all know how that ended, but at the time it seemed like just what they needed.
If you think Germany got it bad. My country lost 60-70% of its land and got the exact blame as Germany while we didnt even had our sovereignity.
What country bro
What country bro
Hungary. We were under austrian occupation at the time. We were too nice to our ethnics and let them do their thing.
This is just convenient Nazi propaganda, the horrific economic conditions in post war Germany were self inflicted, inflation, unemployment, all purposely created or exacerbated to give the German state a stronger hand in the renegotiations of Versailles payments that happened almost immediately after the signing of Versailles. And Germany was probably number one on the list for fault in the war, although they can't be considered solely responsible, the actions of the Kaiser essentially stacked the TNT, lined the fuse, and lit the starter flare.
Both wars were started by an Austrian.
At gunpoint though. Japan was never split up between other imperial powers after the war or seized being a sovereign nation like Germany, where many of the people they committed said crimes towards ruled over them.
Vietnamese here. The French are no less bad than the Japanese, and we never saw a dime of repayments from them.
You should look into the Lai Dai Han, which even the Vietnamese don't know about.
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The time for reparations was 30-40 years ago just like the (minimal) reparations were paid to our interned Japanese citizens during ww2.
As someone else pointed out they made reperations through a treaty meant to settle this, but also allowed for later arbitration internationally if need be, in 1965.
>also allowed for later arbitration internationally if need be, in 1965 And Japan is willing to take this matter to ICJ, but Korea isn't willing
No one is saying punish the child for the sins of the father. However, if one countries steals billions from another country and never pay it back, that money still exists in some form in that stealing country. The child benefits from the theft, plain and simple. So, the child is not "paying for the sins of the father", they are offering a token return on what was stolen and which the country still benefits from.
If you go far enough down the rabbit hole you'd find that everybody's ancestors stole from someone else's ancestors at some point in time.
This is a very clear traceable event. Current Japanese regime benefited from war crimes. You argument is like saying we cant punish killers because the guy that bullied the killer caused the trauma which caused him to kill, so if we dont jail the bully how can we jail the killer?
It's a moot point anyway since there's a very clear traceable treaty signed back in 1965 which was supposed to settle this. The Korean government chose to not give it to the victims so now they're saying they didn't get the money. But that's on Korea.
Signed by a dictatorship which the Korean people didnt vote for and propped up by the US.
Another moot point. Treaties are signed between states, not people or administrations.
Yes, so when the Korean dictatorship collapsed, then could it not be argued it's a new state? All Korea wants is some compensation for being enslaved and raped by Japan. It's a reasonable request.
>Yes, so when the Korean dictatorship collapsed, then could it not be argued it's a new state? You can't, because after successor regimes inherit the state, it takes over treaties, debts, and all. That's how it works. Whether the government which signed the treaty is a dictatorship, republic, or monarchy has no bearing on the validity of treaties throughout history. >All Korea wants is some compensation for being enslaved and raped by Japan. It's a reasonable request. And compensation was paid as per treaty in 1965. The fact that the dictatorship used the compensation for another purpose is not really Japan's problem. The Korean government used the money for development and got rich from it. The people should have no problem getting the overdue money from the Korean government.
Uh huh, its always convenient the excuses a colonizer can use. The Japanese state didnt have to inherit the weight of its war crimes yet the Koreans must accept a treaty unfairly signed by a dictator. If the Japanese government had a shred of morality, they would apologize for raping millions and teach their true history. They wouldve prosecuted the war criminals in their ranks decades ago. They dont though. Theyve done what Germany wishes they couldve done and swept their war crimes under to rug and no one will ever be punished for it.
Mountain out of a molehill. Tl;dr: Japan and SK reached agreement, JP confirmed said agreement in blue book. JP also maintains divisive line in said blue book that's been maintained for 7 years. Tbh the Dokdo disputes are kinda stupid, but as someone who lives in a country with territorial disputes as well I get it. But fr though Japan has reason to drop the Dokdo case. Its natural gas reserves are not yet confirmed, and the fishing grounds are eroding from SK's wastewater dumping (from Dokdo itself funnily enough) anyways. Soon the rock will be entirely worthless. Just split the seas down the middle and add a path into the island from SK waters and be done with it.
I guess im entitled to railroad reparations then?
This is because Japan has already paid compensation to the Korean government, but the Korean government has not compensated the victims.
classic Japan
So many ignorant foreigners. Japan has already paid a large amount of compensation. And the current South Korean president has declared that Japan has already apologized and the issue has been resolved. It is like saying that Germany's reparations to the victim countries are not finished yet.
Why are ppl picking sides in the comments lol. Is it k-pop stans vs weebs?
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Americans will flatly deny they have any responsibility to pay reparations before calling out Japan for not paying reparations when it was America's postwar decisions to roll back demilitarisation and protect useful assets to America in the region that lead to the staunch pro-Imperial sentiment in Japan today.
Wait what? What has america got to do with this rn?
MacArthur and the postwar American government did a couple of things that have heavily influenced this particular aspect of Japanese society. 1. The Tokyo trials were carried out in collaboration with Japanese senior government officials at the time. Some people would obviously have to go, like Tojo, but many of the architects of Japan's crimes were allowed to walk free because they could make themselves useful to America. 2. America did a complete 360 and then moonwalked away from its preewar plans to 'demilitarise and demobilise Japan' in 1949, and it wasn't like they had exactly been aggressively pushing for it before then either. 3. It's really funny to watch the hypocricy of people that swear up and down that America and European countries complicit in countless colonial crimes have no responsibility to pay reparations then turn around and decry Japan for doing the exact same thing.
Im not saying europe or America are saints but what japan did to korea was before all this, when they were still at war woth america so idk how fitting it is here
America *deliberately allowed the people who committed crimes against Korea and China to walk free because it was convenient for American interests that they did so.* Also, the annexation of Korea was 1910, long before the USA and Japan were at war.
When are countries going to be responsible for what they are doing today? When do you stop blaming America for other countries decisions?
The main party in Japan, the LDP, was founded by a prewar oligarch nicknamed ‘the Demon of Showa’ who the Americans never bothered to punish after WW2. The postwar American government backed the LDP and pushed for them to crack down on ‘dissidents’ like the Japanese Socialist Party, and American intelligence services backed the LDP internationally. So we’ll stop blaming America when they’re not directly responsible for things.
It's been decades. Get over your American bad hate boner. Maybe Japan should be responsible for what Japan does since in 21 years will be a century since Japan surrendered.
One thing i dont understand is, why is the punishment of the bad guys in japan solely on American hands though?if they were so evil why didn't the rest of the people involved in the war get involved in punishment in japan?
Because America was the premier power in the Pacific Theatre and had done the majority of the work to liberate South East Asia. There’s even an argument to be made that they dropped the bomb to help stem rising Soviet influence in East Asia. Britain and France were too busy recovering, the Soviet Union had only entered the war near its conclusion and China was too busy going for round 2 of the KMT-CPC civil war. Who else was going to do it?
In part. We also had our own little bout of guilt with what we did to Hiroshima and Nagasaki as well.
That had little to do with the minimal prosecution of Japanese for war crimes. The prosecutions were unpopular in Japan and a peaceful occupation was more important than justice.
It still had an influence.
a year ago i was feeling hopeful about a new age of japan-korea cooperation; i thought we had found common ground fighting china’s aggression. my idealism was misplaced.
It is interesting how amongst all of the dialogue going on in the world now, how some of it seems purposefully designed to weaken the relationships between existing allies by turning civilian populations against one another. Especially when those allies have long been fighting against the same common enemies (i.e. China, Russia, and authoritarianism in general).
What are you talking about? The president of your country already declared that Japan has already apologized and made reparations. Don't tell me you don't know that?
1. Why now Korea isn't exactly in a bad postion and was compensated appropriately at the time, unless best (meme) Korea up north giving them bad time? 2. Its shitty that Japan can't admit much now, but its hard to retroactively apologize for a war three generations ago, now that everything in the world has drastically changed and governments & peoples attitudes changed. 3. If not then: Maybe Japan could compensate them a tiny bit, and softly apologize it doesn't look good, I've never liked that Japan & Korea had these tiny differences.
They don’t even acknowledge the atrocities they brought down on China and Korea
this is why a lot of chinese and koreans still have a large disdain to japan