Talk:Japanese war crimes

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Japanese imperialism should be distinct from Japanese militarism

In this article the hyperlink 'Japanese imperialism' in the opening para redirects to 'Japanese Militarism'. The two are different and nor does the article on the latter claims to use the terms synonymously. Please make the necessary changes.

Fatalities

The source for the upper limit of the fatalities count, 30,000,000 , in the fatalities section of the key info box is a Mark Felton YouTube video. This video doesn’t contain any source for that number. The number is sourced later from an interview by Mark Felton and a book. The mark felton interview also does not include any source for the claim. Can the source Felton uses to ce come to that number be found? Removed the interview citation since there is already a second citation anywayDogsrcool420 (talk) 17:25, 1 May 2023 (UTC)

Agree on this point. It was added very recently without reference on early May 2023. Could be fabricated and the figure of 30 million casualties have been propaganda point by the Chinese media recently citing source from Wiki. 2406:3003:2073:3202:C455:7510:F8E3:9F9B (talk) 07:24, 11 June 2023 (UTC)

Mark Felton is a leading scholar on the subject (and he has a PhD in history). See Mark Felton, Japan's Gestapo: Murder, Mayhem and Torture in Wartime Asia (Casemate Publishers, 2009) and Felton, "The Perfect Storm: Japanese military brutality during World War Two." The Routledge History of Genocide (Routledge, 2015) pp. 105-121. His You-tube and interviews are based on his published reliable sources. Rjensen (talk) 09:44, 11 June 2023 (UTC)

I checked the cited material and Felton didn’t provide a source for the 30,000,000 claim or give any explanation of how it was reached. The Hawaii edu source used for the lower estimate gives information about how the numbers were reached. If you have citations from Felton’s work where he does provide an a source for the number or more depth of how he reached that number then feel free to add that instead. Dogsrcool420 (talk) 09:54, 11 June 2023 (UTC)

Also: I checked the route ledge history of genocide and while the work as a whole is reliable the specific number claim also contains no source or explanation beyond stating it even though the claims before and after are sourced. This isn’t to say that this number itself is inaccurate, but that the citations were insufficient and conflicted with the more reliable citation used previously. If the page number was incorrect and there was a better explanation to the claim than add it with the correct page number Dogsrcool420 (talk) 10:01, 11 June 2023 (UTC)

So far, we have no RS for the claim and we should be very careful about this. Dogsrcool420 raised a good point. — Sadko (words are wind) 12:32, 21 June 2023 (UTC)

I looked over the listed sources and agree with @Dogsrcool420, the claim is dubious and I feel it should be removed. Lostsandwich (talk) 22:29, 23 June 2023 (UTC)

The claim has been reasserted with a different source and no explanation. Since consensus looks like it's on the remove side, I'm going to take it out until someone can verify in detail, hopefully with multiple sources. Also, I feel like the casualty count relies too much on Rummel his "Democide," which is not a mainstream concept. It's possible that the article could have a strongly constructed narrative bias. --IronMaidenRocks (talk) 20:11, 1 July 2023 (UTC)

Here's a source that says 30,000,000 million in mainland China alone:

American Museum of Asian Holocaust WWII (1931-1945). Chinese American Forum. 2002;18(2):42. Accessed July 1, 2023. https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=f6h&AN=8632131&site=eds-live&scope=site --IronMaidenRocks (talk) 20:55, 1 July 2023 (UTC)

A user added a new source for the 30,000,000 figure without description of the text. It's not a publically available source. Anyone have it on Jstor or something? I don't appreciate that a user is circumventing discussion. Here is the source: Carmichael, Cathie; Maguire, Richard (2015). The Routledge History of Genocide. Routledge. p. 105. ISBN 9780367867065. User Salfanto added the source with little explanation, even though the information it was sourcing was in contest on the talk page and had been removed several times. IronMaidenRocks (talk) 07:35, 4 August 2023 (UTC)

The line used in the contested source is "Japanese troops killed up to, according to some estimates, 30 million people during the war, most of them civilians." In my view, this fails verification, as I believe this figure is used for the number of people killed in the war overall, and not the number of people killed as a result of war crimes. Loafiewa (talk) 10:08, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

Sounds like it. Even the article from the Chinese forum doesn't specify that the number was killed by Japanese war crimes. I think it's dubious to claim that all civilian deaths in a war are due to war crime. Such diffuses the meaning of war crimes and distracts from the targeted and systematic nature of Japanese war crimes. --IronMaidenRocks (talk) 02:55, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

provided sources to books. just in case google is down.

(https://archive.org/details/imperialjapanswo00unse/page/84/mode/2up) ~ 8.2 million civilian deaths in China alone.

https://books.google.ca/books?id=6rvlCAAAQBAJ&pg=PA15&source=gbs_selected_pages&cad=3#v=onepage&q=30%20million&f=false) 30 million, most of them civilians, puts total death toll to at least 15 million.

"Japanese troops killed up to, according to some estimates, 30 million people during the war, most of them civilians." how is killing a civilian not a war crime? LilAhok (talk) 04:20, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

Your tone with "google being down" is beyond what I'm going to accept here. It does not say 30 million people killed by Japanese war crimes. Have you read the discussion above? The previous posts before yours are discussing whether killed civilians implies war crimes. Furthermore, a vague, offhand remark with no known context in one book doesn't feel like enough to justify such an exceptional claim in regard to a sensitive subject. My impression here is that no editor involved has read the full text, but merely searched for something like "30,000,000 casualties of Japanese war crimes" and picked a source that looks like it fit. Shoehorning existing information is not how we should source things; it's from the source or nothing. --IronMaidenRocks (talk) 21:55, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

I found several articles that say Rummel says 30 million, but I can't find their sources. Maybe it's just Wikipedia feedback, or maybe he says it elsewhere in the cited document. That seems dubious, given that Rummel decisively gives 10 million as the upper limit, and explains why in some detail. The fact that Rummel here was used as a source for the 30 million casualties claim on Wikipedia, apparently for a long time, makes me think we're really reaching here. --IronMaidenRocks (talk) 05:48, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

I don't think we're going to find more information on the 30 million. I think consensus here is that the claim is dubious. We know a few people have said that figure, but we don't know why they said it. Considering that the casualty rate puts the Asian Holocaust into a comparison with the Jewish Holocaust, and potentially many other reasons related to pov or article interpretation, we could safely call the casualty figure "over 3 million" in the infobox. Although, I think casualty rates in infoboxes enables users to scroll to a figure and move on, rather than reading and gaining some nuance from the article. I think articles about genocide should limit themselves from a reliance on statistics to show the gravity of crimes against humanity, because even numerically small genocides are terrible. They should not be statistically compared for which is "worse," although doing so is human nature. --IronMaidenRocks (talk) 20:55, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

Looking over the article again, while Felton doesn't include sources, he is an accredited historian. I don't think he needs sources for Wikipedia's critera, he is the source. He's also sourced later in the article anyway for saying the same thing. But it is a bit dubious to use him alone for such an extraordinary claim. I want to change some of the wording, because so far he is the singular credible source here. But saying things like "some historians" when we mean "Mark Felton" and "as high as" when we mean "without evidence, Mark Felton said as high as" seems to violate some POV style points. IronMaidenRocks (talk) 04:41, 21 August 2023 (UTC)

I agree. Felton is a credible source but because we don’t currently have any source of him explaining the claim it should be accurately cited and contextualised like you describe Dogsrcool420 (talk) 17:23, 21 August 2023 (UTC)

So we need to find a source of him saying it in order to add it into the info box? Salfanto (talk) 15:15, 13 November 2023 (UTC)

The sources used just have him stating it when there are other sources that at least have a breakdown of the numbers and where they came from. If there is a source of him backing up his claim then that could be added in with context. It’s not appropriate imo to have the overall number that comes up immediately based on one historian just saying it in an interview or YouTube video. Dogsrcool420 (talk) 15:22, 13 November 2023 (UTC)

Hello. I intended to add a second citation on the bare minimum of how many people were killed by the Japanese empire during and before world war 2. The articles seem to want to include only one estimate however I respectfully insist that at least a varied estimate ranging from 10 million to 30 million be included. Obviously RJ Rummels estimate is way too low, but for the sake of Wikipedia standards. The source seems to be said to be broken down into statistics and detail however there is speculation I have that includes not only those killed via state policy via massacres, state sanctioned famine, diseases spread from field testing of bio weapons, vs non preventable famine and non intentional diseases(not from bio weapons units). Considering that Japan launched these invasions I can empathize somewhat on the decision to take into account the number dead from non state causes, but there is a discussion and debate over that. The citation I added that was removed was from a forum interview on Sterling Seagrave on his book Gold Warriors(second citation below). In the interview he puts Japans causality count at 10-14 million.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Japanese_war_crimes#Fatalities

http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=9196

While one could make the argument that no direct citations are used, Seagrave is a well respected historian and he isn't the only historian with an estimate on Japans body count. The one and only estimate included on this page is by Bryan Mark Rigg whom aside from being somewhat controversial I somehow are uncertain on what his book, Japan's Holocaust: History of Imperial Japan's Mass Murder and Rape During World War II actually says contextwise. Can anyone upload a few pictures of what his book says on the tally? It's worth mentioning that in China's case 15 to 22 million died from all causes with the later estimate common among Chinese historians with even Mark Felton mentioning this in his book, however it includes not just those killed in state policy, but also the total dead from famine whether preventable or otherwise, and combat deaths with 5 to 10 million being from famine and disease. The casualties on Japans body count from state policy generally run from 10-20 million which is provided by M.D.R Foot with the later of the estimate being that of Werner Gruhl, Herbert Flix, and John Dower. I also watched a live stream from Richard B. Frank whom, in the interview cited his book, Tower of Skulls that Japans body count is from 18 or 19 million to 25 million(citation 5 below). May we discuss this

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bryan_Mark_Rigg#Criticism

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties#Japanese_war_crimes

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties#Total_deaths_by_country

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DrTS3lsjLWA Undeadmerc3 (talk) 02:41, 18 July 2024 (UTC)

3 days and no update. I'm trying to contact the admins over this. It's really unnerving that this is harder than it should be. I say this as politely as I can. Undeadmerc3 (talk) 21:06, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

I think your comment has a lot of good information I appreciate. I feel like someone else should weigh in. I don't think it's anything to be unnerved about though wikipedia talk sections can be slow? There's a lot of articles on the site lol Dogsrcool420 (talk) 07:32, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Thanks. I'm new to Wikipedia. One thing that annoys me is that while it's one thing to include multiple estimates on the body count, Bryan Mark Riggs book on the Japans aggression is referanced too much on this article despite his book receiving mostly negative reviews on Amazon and Goodreads. I don't mind the 30 million estimate if it's shown alongside other estimates, but i've been hearing shady things about Bryan Riggs considering that he relies on sensationalism over accuracy. For example,

https://www.dallasobserver.com/news/in-the-wolfs-mouth-6386054

https://www.chronicle.com/article/were-there-jews-in-the-nazi-army/

https://networks.h-net.org/node/35008/reviews/43906/fine-rigg-hitlers-jewish-soldiers-untold-story-nazi-racial-laws-and-men

One example is the following:

Compared to the German Einsatzgruppen, which carried out mass shootings on the Eastern Front in Europe and who suffered from psychological issues as a result, no such problems occurred with Japanese soldiers, as the vast majority of soldiers participated in murder and rape and seemingly enjoyed it.

Unquote

While it's undeniable that the vast majority of Japanese soldiers enjoyed the atrocities they commited, it's safe to say also that many had mental health issues in the process considering how poorly fed they were with many Japanese soldiers dying from famine. There are other variables that contributed to the atrocities, but this was overlooked quite a bit.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ocUV8Pgo22Y&pp=ygUfaW1wZXJpYWwgamFwYW4gZmVlZCBpdCdzIHRyb29wcw%3D%3D Undeadmerc3 (talk) 11:29, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

I seriously think we should include multiple estimates on the number of people killed. Maybe ranging from 10 million to 30 million even if the latter is questionable. Personally I think it doesn't go much past 20 million, but the numbers are all over the place. The middle way would be to show various estimates.

uncited since 2009 is long enough

cite it or live without it. Elinruby (talk) 04:56, 6 February 2024 (UTC)

Until the 1970s, Japanese war crimes were considered a fringe topic in the media. In the Japanese media, the opinions of the political center and left tend to dominate the editorials of newspapers, while the right tend to dominate magazines. Debates regarding war crimes were confined largely to the editorials of tabloid magazines where calls for the overthrow of "Imperialist America" and revived veneration of the Emperor coexisted with pornography.

In 1972, to commemorate the normalisation of relationship with China, Asahi Shimbun, a major liberal newspaper, ran a series on Japanese war crimes in China including the Nanjing massacre. This opened the floodgates to debates which have continued ever since. The 1990s are generally considered to be the period in which such issues become truly mainstream, and incidents such as the Nanjing Massacre, Yasukuni Shrine, comfort women, the accuracy of school history textbooks, and the validity of the Tokyo Trials were debated, even on television.

As the consensus of Japanese jurists is that Japanese forces did not technically commit violations of international law, many right wing elements in Japan have taken this to mean that war crimes trials were examples of victor's justice. They see those convicted of war crimes as "Martyrs of Shōwa" (昭和殉難者, Shōwa Junnansha), Shōwa being the name given to the rule of Hirohito.

This interpretation is vigorously contested by Japanese peace groups and the political left. In the past, these groups have tended to argue that the trials hold some validity, either under the Geneva Convention (although Japan had not signed it), or under a general concept of international law or consensus. Alternatively, they have argued that, although the trials may not have been technically valid, they were still just, somewhat in line with popular opinion in the West and in the rest of Asia.

By the early 21st century, the revived interest in Japan's imperial past had brought new interpretations from a group which has been labelled both "new right" and "new left". This group points out that many acts committed by Japanese forces, including the Nanjing Incident, were violations of the Japanese military code. It is suggested that had war crimes tribunals been conducted by the post-war Japanese government, in strict accordance with Japanese military law, many of those who were accused would still have been convicted and executed. Therefore, the moral and legal failures in question were the fault of the Japanese military and the government, for not executing their constitutionally defined duty.

The new right/new left also takes the view that the Allies committed no war crimes against Japan, because Japan was not a signatory to the Geneva Convention, and as a victors, the Allies had every right to demand some form of retribution, to which Japan consented in various treaties.

Member of the right-wing negationist group "Japanese Society for History Textbook Reform" putting up a banner reading "[Give] the children correct history textbooks" in front of the Yasukuni Jinja

Under the same logic, the new right/new left considers the killing of Chinese who were suspected of guerrilla activity to be perfectly legal and valid, including some of those killed at Nanjing, for example. They also take the view that many Chinese civilian casualties resulted from the scorched earth tactics of the Chinese nationalists. Though such tactics are arguably legal, the new right/new left takes the position that some of the civilian deaths caused by these scorched earth tactics are wrongly attributed to the Japanese military.

Similarly, they take the position that those who have attempted to sue the Japanese government for compensation have no legal or moral case.

The new right and new left also take a less sympathetic view of Korean claims of victimhood, because prior to annexation by Japan, Korea was a tributary of the Qing dynasty and, according to them, the Japanese colonisation, though undoubtedly harsh, was "better" than the previous rule in terms of human rights and economic development.

They also argue that the Kantōgun (also known as the Kwantung Army) was at least partly culpable. Although the Kantōgun was nominally subordinate to the Japanese high command at the time, its leadership demonstrated significant self-determination, as shown by its involvement in the plot to assassinate Zhang Zuolin in 1928, and the Manchurian Incident of 1931, which led to the foundation of Manchukuo in 1932. Moreover, at that time, it was the official policy of the Japanese high command to confine the conflict to Manchuria. But in defiance of the high command, the Kantōgun invaded China proper, under the pretext of the Marco Polo Bridge Incident. The Japanese government not only failed to court martial the officers responsible for these incidents, but it also accepted the war against China, and many of those who were involved were even promoted. (Some of the officers involved in the Nanjing Massacre were also promoted.)

Whether or not Hirohito himself bears any responsibility for such failures is a sticking point between the new right and new left. Officially, the imperial constitution, adopted under Emperor Meiji, gave full powers to the Emperor. Article 4 prescribed that "The Emperor is the head of the Empire, combining in Himself the rights of sovereignty, and exercises them, according to the provisions of the present Constitution" and article 11 prescribed that "The Emperor has the supreme command of the Army and the Navy".

For historian Akira Fujiwara, the thesis that the emperor as an organ of responsibility could not reverse cabinet decisions is a myth (shinwa) fabricated after the war. Others argue that Hirohito deliberately styled his rule in the manner of the British constitutional monarchy, and he always accepted the decisions and consensus reached by the high command. According to this position, the moral and political failure rests primarily with the Japanese High Command and the Cabinet, most of whom were later convicted at the Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal as class-A war criminals, absolving all members of the imperial family such as Prince Chichibu, Prince Yasuhiko Asaka, Prince Higashikuni, Prince Hiroyasu Fushimi and Prince Takeda.

Correction, the section has one reference right at the end. I will come back to that paragraph to see if I can re-integrate it. Elinruby (talk) 04:56, 6 February 2024 (UTC)

The reference is only for one sentence of the last paragraph. This sentence is only relevant when discussing whether Hirohito had involvement in war crimes. Akira Fujiwara is cited in the article elsewhere and there's no mention in the (current) article that Hirohito didn't have authority so it's inclusion isn't needed.

Also putting the Japanese translation of myth as in a lie or false story reeks of Orientalism. Traumnovelle (talk) 05:18, 6 February 2024 (UTC)

References

Crimes against humanity category removal

Crimes against humanity is a specific legal concept. In order to be included in the category, the event (s) must have been prosecuted as a crime against humanity, or at a bare minimum be described as such by most reliable sources. Most of the articles that were formerly in this category did not mention crimes against humanity at all, and the inclusion of the category was purely original research. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 07:49, 14 February 2024 (UTC)