The Amazing Race > The Amazing Race Discussion
TAR20 Leg 11: Best showcasing of Japan ever?
DrRox:
--- Quote from: kenchan on May 10, 2012, 01:40:51 AM ---There are two references I'd like to share.
* A Japanese book titled 「おじいちゃん、戦争のこと教えて」 (http://amzn.to/jNaHiA) or "Grandpa, Tell Me About the War" (that's my translation of the Japanese title), in which Asahi Breweries Board Member Takanori Nakajo (who was a Japanese Army cadet in training at the time of surrender but never went to battle) receives a letter from his granddaughter asking for help with her history project on WWII, while attending the Masters School in New York. He then painstakingly AND rather objectively recalls the events before, during, and after the war, from several view points, and answers his granddaughters 16 or so questions. The result is what he published. This book filled in a lot of blanks for me and completely changed my view of the war. I wish this book would get translated to other languages.
* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_bomb_debate -- I think this Wikipedia article not only sheds light on various angles regarding the use of the a-bomb in Japan, it also makes us think about more recent military events. Were they necessary?
--- End quote ---
I hope that book gets translated also. The closest I have seen to something like that is "Letters from Iwo Jima" that Clint Eastwood made into a film.
On the Wikipedia reference, it is nice to note the approximate dates of all those quotes. I suspect that they were all within 6 months of the bombings.......and also interesting to look at each person's agenda. If you were one of the miltary commanders at the time......if you drop the bomb.......you job is over. If you do not drop the bomb, you get to command troops in war for another year........everyone of those people quoted were just "feather-bedding" for whatever their job was at the time......better to stay emplyed than out of work. It is interesting that there were no quotes from any privates, corporals or sargents that would have had to land on the beaches and fight for another year, don't you think? How do you thnk they would have voted if asked? Harry Truman was an interesting man. He had been an enlisted man in WWI, so he really identified and thought about the common soldier. He made the decision to drop the bombs......no one else. Estimates are that it shortened the war by one full year, than if the Allies had invaded. Also US casuaties in an invasion were estimated at 1 million soldiers killed and up to 5 million wounded. Japanese casualties were estmated to be about 20 million killed and I have never seen any number about how many wounded. Now the intelligence people that came up with those numbers also predicted the casualties for most of the other battles that the US was involved in the Pacific Theater of war......they grossly UNDER estimated every single battle. So I doubt that they actually came up with a correct figure for the planned invasion of Japan. As bad as the casualties for the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings........an invasion would have made them look angelic. This is what Dave Brown was referencing when he made those remarks......dropping the bombs actually saved lives.
If Harry Truman had not ordered the dropping the bombs.......I might not even be here today.....along with a lot of other children of WWII veterans and the same is true of Japanese children born after the war. No one every seems to think of that. My father was a fighter pilot in Europe, survived VE day and was in the process of deploying to Okinawa to fly missions over Japan...He never got there before the war was over. Over 1 million US soldiers had been deplyed from Europe to the western Pacific between VE day and Aug of 1945 with approximated 4 million more on the way.
DrRox:
--- Quote from: kenchan on May 10, 2012, 02:28:28 AM ---And folks, please feel free to bring up other parts of this leg too!
* How long did it take from Cochin to Hiroshima? What route did they take? Did they fly via Incheon? (I ask because getting from India to Japan isn't as simple as it seems. There used to be a Delhi--Narita flight on JAL, but no more)
* That 700 series Shinkansen "Nozomi" - how cool was that?
* Why in the world did Phil and crew decide to hide in the bushes near the Osaka-jo castle?
* Who were those rocker greeters?
--- End quote ---
1) Well they left Kochi about 11:30 one night and arrived in Hiroshima about 8 pm the next night....so about 20.5 clock hours minus how ever many time zones they crossed. Well at the travel agency in Kochi, they made it pretty clear that teams were scheduled to arrive at 8:10 pm in Hiroshima. That is the Shanghai connection. The Taipei connection was scheduled to arrive at 8:05pm and the Incheon connection was scheduled to arrive at 8:00 pm. Also they showed some pretty strage footage of all the teams getting on a completely empty Eastern China airliner.......where did that come from......LOL When they showed teams actually on the flight with a full planeload of people........the Eastern China Airlines logo was on the seat behind Rached R's head.........so I am going to have to just go with the Kochi>Singapore>Shanghai>Hiroshima route......call me crazy!!!
2) I rode the orginal "Bullet" train back in the 70s......but I would think that the N700 would be just as cool!!
3) Since the pit stop was only 2 hours approx, maybe they were checking teams in and out at the same time....lol
4) I have no idea.........hahahaha Not my generation.
redskevin88:
--- Quote from: topaz on May 11, 2012, 06:59:50 AM ---
--- Quote from: redskevin88 on May 11, 2012, 05:14:35 AM ---90,000 - 166,000 people died in the bombings of Hiroshima & Nagasaki
100,000 people died in the bombings of Tokyo during WWII
Japan killed 30 million Asians during World War II.
Which is the bigger tragedy?
--- End quote ---
The Japanese killed more than the Nazi Germans which they'd killed 6 million Jews, Gypsies, Communists, gays, etc. during the war? That's surprising. :gaah:
--- End quote ---
The 30 million was a rough estimate but China alone had 10-20 million civilian deaths during World War II.
SuperTux:
--- Quote from: redskevin88 on May 11, 2012, 08:22:43 AM ---
--- Quote from: topaz on May 11, 2012, 06:59:50 AM ---
--- Quote from: redskevin88 on May 11, 2012, 05:14:35 AM ---90,000 - 166,000 people died in the bombings of Hiroshima & Nagasaki
100,000 people died in the bombings of Tokyo during WWII
Japan killed 30 million Asians during World War II.
Which is the bigger tragedy?
--- End quote ---
The Japanese killed more than the Nazi Germans which they'd killed 6 million Jews, Gypsies, Communists, gays, etc. during the war? That's surprising. :gaah:
--- End quote ---
The 30 million was a rough estimate but China alone had 10-20 million civilian deaths during World War II.
--- End quote ---
The data here shows China had 18 million deaths, and 17 million injured.
DrRox:
--- Quote from: redskevin88 on May 11, 2012, 08:22:43 AM ---
--- Quote from: topaz on May 11, 2012, 06:59:50 AM ---
--- Quote from: redskevin88 on May 11, 2012, 05:14:35 AM ---90,000 - 166,000 people died in the bombings of Hiroshima & Nagasaki
100,000 people died in the bombings of Tokyo during WWII
Japan killed 30 million Asians during World War II.
Which is the bigger tragedy?
--- End quote ---
The Japanese killed more than the Nazi Germans which they'd killed 6 million Jews, Gypsies, Communists, gays, etc. during the war? That's surprising. :gaah:
--- End quote ---
The 30 million was a rough estimate but China alone had 10-20 million civilian deaths during World War II.
--- End quote ---
I had no problems at all with your numbers. They were all pretty close for this forum. One thing I will ad. The US gov and Japanese gov followed most all of the documented casulties from Hiroshima and Nagasaki. As far as I can tell, the last published report from 1950 showed that deaths were about 200,000 for each event up to the reprort time in 1950. That was for people that died during the explosion and people that died as a result of the amount of radiation they received afterwards. The scientists and medical community had said that something like 99.99% of deaths would occur withing 5 years. After that, I know that I read in newspapers and watching news on TV when I was growing up, that every now and then a death would be reported here in the US. It was always a sad moment for me.
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