mtfester@netMAPSONscape.net wrote:

> > Are the deaths and killings of Okinawan non-combatants to be called "mistakes"?
>
> In some cases, yes.

And the others, in which killing of non-combatants was not a "mistake"?

> > Is that
> > because the term "collateral damage" had not been coined yet?
>
> No, because it is war, and not an exact laboratory procedure.

I know innocents die in war. The issue is how or why they died or were killed.

> >> > Always? So why did Americans need to approach or to use translators, to even find
> >> > out if people were within?
> >>
> >> Um, not sure what this means; if they were gassing caves without finding
> >> out if people were in there, then there seems little intent to hurt
> >> them, yes?
>
> > Am I reading you that they were gassing caves with little intent to hurt any who may
> > have been inside?
>
> No, you are reading that they didn't intend to kill civilians if they
> didn't even know anyone was in there.
>
> As I said, I really have no idea what you meant by that.

Ernest appears to justify methods such as pouring flaming gasoline down into caves into
which civilians were hiding, because of fierce armed resistance from caves. I am saying
enemies were not in every cave, nor was there resistance from every cave. I don't even know
that soldiers were in every cave holding civilians.

> > So why the bombings of the cities?
>
> Gosh, that's tough. How 'bout:
> that's were industry and communications centers are? That's where the
> Japanese military were?

All those cities? In all bombed areas of those cities?

Would Americans have been any more upset if the Japanese bombed all of Honolulu, than if
they had focused their attack on Pearl Harbor? Would Japanese feel less sorry for
themselves if there had been a more conventional bombing of the army headquarters in
Hiroshima (modest marker near Hiroshima Castle), that a claimed 70% of casualties were not
civilian?

Have you read of the "forgotten Hiroshimas"?

http://www.godhatesjanks.org/forgotten-hiroshimas.html

> >Just this month, I read the estimate of over 600,000
> > deaths nationwide (don't know if that included the A-bombs). Even Fukuyama was bombed,
>
> I read that a long while ago.

Hard to tell by your lack of reaction.

> >> BTW, the Japanese
> >> criticize the Japanese/JIA for their actions in Okinawa far more strongly
> >> than I've ever heard them criticize the US (or more strongly than they
> >> criticize Japanese actions in China.)
>
> > Yet another reason to downplay American killings of Japanese/Okinawans.
>
> Sorry, who's downplaying it?

You, apparently.

I will feel the same remorse or outrage over unnecessary deaths of Japanese, as for victims
of Japan, including Asians who died indirectly and not intentionally killed, as through
starvation or secondary disease. I do not blame Japanese dead or hold them responsible for
simply being in the way, as you seem to suggest doing.

Note to Ernest: I do not call for equal responsibility or punishment for unintentional or
accidental deaths, nor are those the ones I call war crimes or atrocities.

> > I am still waiting for some criticism of American killings, even those of just
> > civilians. Something a little stronger than "mistake".
>
> The "mistake" applied to the bizarre situational you gave above.
>
> Unless you can show deliberate killings of civilians with no intent to
> take out militarily significant targets, you can continue to wait.

Gifu, near Ernest, is one.

> Point of fact, even during the war crimes' trials, no Axis member was charged
> with killing civilians in a combat area, even if that area was a city.
>
> Mike

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