Re: Conquering nationsfroglartbgeFebruary 5 2010, 05:05:32 UTC
There is enough material in making an accurate comparison for a book, but painting in fairly broad strokes, I'll say this:
-Japan was utterly exhausted by June of 1945 and when considering how they might continue hostilities, they leaned heavily towards a conventional all-out defense rather than guerilla operations. Iraq by contrast knew that they were asymmetrically outclassed and almost immediately (despite orders from Saddam to hold their ground) large portions of the army began 'melting away' to plan an insurgency. Far from being exhausted militarily and despite more than a decade of crippling sanctions, there were weapons caches crisscrossing Iraq, literally in the thousands, from which militants could draw supplies. I recall reading that the existence of these stockpiles were even noted during Desert Storm.
-While Japan did surrender, there was an attempted coup, known as the kyujo incident, in which several high ranked military officials attempted to overthrow the government with the intention of continuing the war. It failed, and the ringleaders, who could very well have formed the backbone of the resistance, chose instead to take the Japanese route of suicide. There were, of course, a number of holdouts elsewhere, on various islands and (previously) colonial territories, but they never formed anything that could be called an organized resistance. Some of them may have refused to surrender out of pride, while others just never got the message because communications had been severed in the conflict. Indeed, the most famous holdouts, hung around waiting for orders for decades (the last one was repatriated in 1974, if I recall).
-Japan, being a island country, has a good bit of distance between itself and its nearest neighbors, none of whom share that much cultural simularity with them and all of whom had recently been occupied (and just wanted to be left alone). Iraq is flush with regional troublemakers Syria and Iran and has an incredibly porous border and cultural leanings towards both riven through their society. Both regimes have vested interest in certain outcomes and found it relatively easy to project their power within Iraq. This alone, I think, makes it pretty dissimilar from the Japanese surrender. The United States could assert its rules within Japan's borders and nobody could meddle too easily (well, Russia certainly tried (they wanted Hokaido) but they weren't, strictly speaking, locals). If Iraq had been some island somewhere, that could well have made all the difference.
-There was one relatively unified culture in Japan, whereas the Iraqis, Sunni, Shia, Kurd (and to a lesser extent Assyrian, Alawite, Druze, Yazidi and a whole bunch of other sects I'm probably not even aware of) have, to a greater or lesser extent depending on the time period, lived in opposition to each other. You can talk accurately about a Japanese nation, with a national identity, whereas Iraq is less a nation than a big group of tribes which nominally followed a strongman for a while because he had the biggest stick. When the Japanese emperor spoke, the Japanese populace listened and obeyed the government. Most Iraqis put tribal and family affiliations first, and government loyalties second. There is some preliminary evidence to suggest this is changing, and a real national identity is forming there, but in Japan, that had existed solidly since the Meiji period and weakly for at least a few hundred years into the Tokugawa era.
Re: Conquering nationsfroglartbgeFebruary 5 2010, 05:05:51 UTC
So, all that said, I don't think there are many similarities at all. To top it off, there was a horrific famine in 1946 that basically made the Japanese totally dependent on US aid. I have heard descriptions of conditions that GIs encountered when first arriving there as part of the reconstruction... and it is as horrifying as anything I've ever heard. I think this aspect of post-war history gets glossed over a little in deference to Japanese complicitness with the occupation. That is to say, history remembers the United States wrote them a constitution, there's no need to rub their noses in the fact that they were reduced to subhuman conditions and forced to rely on their enemies for salvation. Sometimes a little selective memory goes really far in smoothing things over...
...just like the Iraqis, if they ever get their act together (and it seems as though they may), will talk about how they 'kicked out the U.S.' and we'll quietly hold our tongues. There's a reason they call them 'founding myths' after all. It turns out, sometimes, in order to win, it has to seem as though you lost. Fascinating stuff, I tell you.
Re: Conquering nationsfroglartbgeFebruary 5 2010, 07:31:17 UTC
All this is true, but I don't think it answers the original point, which is the idea that before Iraq you never had a country invade with the idea of eventually leaving before. Sure, the specifics of the invasions and occupations were/are different, but the basic idea is the same; we did not intend to occupy Japan indefinitely and we do not (I hope) intend to occupy Iraq indefinitely.
Re: Conquering nationsfroglartbgeFebruary 5 2010, 19:12:37 UTC
Interesting information about post-war Japan, but as the poster above mentions, I was really wondering more about comparing US attitudes towards Japan and towards Iraq as far as their post-occupation status. All the individual differences in the respective situations may add up to results that cannot be easily compared, but as soon as the US invasion of Iraq started I was wondering about what lessons the occupation of Japan might offer as far as what our next steps would be.
-Japan was utterly exhausted by June of 1945 and when considering how they might continue hostilities, they leaned heavily towards a conventional all-out defense rather than guerilla operations. Iraq by contrast knew that they were asymmetrically outclassed and almost immediately (despite orders from Saddam to hold their ground) large portions of the army began 'melting away' to plan an insurgency. Far from being exhausted militarily and despite more than a decade of crippling sanctions, there were weapons caches crisscrossing Iraq, literally in the thousands, from which militants could draw supplies. I recall reading that the existence of these stockpiles were even noted during Desert Storm.
-While Japan did surrender, there was an attempted coup, known as the kyujo incident, in which several high ranked military officials attempted to overthrow the government with the intention of continuing the war. It failed, and the ringleaders, who could very well have formed the backbone of the resistance, chose instead to take the Japanese route of suicide. There were, of course, a number of holdouts elsewhere, on various islands and (previously) colonial territories, but they never formed anything that could be called an organized resistance. Some of them may have refused to surrender out of pride, while others just never got the message because communications had been severed in the conflict. Indeed, the most famous holdouts, hung around waiting for orders for decades (the last one was repatriated in 1974, if I recall).
-Japan, being a island country, has a good bit of distance between itself and its nearest neighbors, none of whom share that much cultural simularity with them and all of whom had recently been occupied (and just wanted to be left alone). Iraq is flush with regional troublemakers Syria and Iran and has an incredibly porous border and cultural leanings towards both riven through their society. Both regimes have vested interest in certain outcomes and found it relatively easy to project their power within Iraq. This alone, I think, makes it pretty dissimilar from the Japanese surrender. The United States could assert its rules within Japan's borders and nobody could meddle too easily (well, Russia certainly tried (they wanted Hokaido) but they weren't, strictly speaking, locals). If Iraq had been some island somewhere, that could well have made all the difference.
-There was one relatively unified culture in Japan, whereas the Iraqis, Sunni, Shia, Kurd (and to a lesser extent Assyrian, Alawite, Druze, Yazidi and a whole bunch of other sects I'm probably not even aware of) have, to a greater or lesser extent depending on the time period, lived in opposition to each other. You can talk accurately about a Japanese nation, with a national identity, whereas Iraq is less a nation than a big group of tribes which nominally followed a strongman for a while because he had the biggest stick. When the Japanese emperor spoke, the Japanese populace listened and obeyed the government. Most Iraqis put tribal and family affiliations first, and government loyalties second. There is some preliminary evidence to suggest this is changing, and a real national identity is forming there, but in Japan, that had existed solidly since the Meiji period and weakly for at least a few hundred years into the Tokugawa era.
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...just like the Iraqis, if they ever get their act together (and it seems as though they may), will talk about how they 'kicked out the U.S.' and we'll quietly hold our tongues. There's a reason they call them 'founding myths' after all. It turns out, sometimes, in order to win, it has to seem as though you lost. Fascinating stuff, I tell you.
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