The treatment of American and allied prisoners by the Japanese is one of the abiding horrors of World War II. Prisoners were routinely beaten, starved and abused and forced to work in mines and war-related factories in clear violation of the Geneva Conventions.
The reasons for the Japanese behaving as they did were complex. The Imperial Japanese Army (IJA) indoctrinated its soldiers to believe that surrender was dishonourable. POWs were therefore thought to be unworthy of respect. The IJA also relied on physical punishment to discipline its own troops.
Believing themselves to be of divine origin, they treated all other races as inferior; therefore, the POWs suffered cruelties as sub-humans. The Japanese inflicted punishment and torture in the name of their emperor, believing that they did so through divine instruction.
Unlike the prisoners held by China or the western Allies, these men were treated harshly by their captors, and over 60,000 died. Japanese POWs were forced to undertake hard labour and were held in primitive conditions with inadequate food and medical treatments.
According to Holmes's research, approximately 25,000 U.S. POWs were forced to labor for Japanese companies. POWs reportedly were sent to work in the Japanese home islands, Formosa (Taiwan), northeast China, Manchuria (Manchukuo), and Korea.
Unprepared for coping with so many captured European prisoners, the Japanese held those who surrendered to them in contempt, especially the women. The men at least could be put to work as common laborers, but women and children were "useless mouths." This attitude would dictate Japanese policy until the end of the war.
Crucifixion was a form of punishment, torture and/or execution that the Japanese military sometimes used against prisoners during the war.
The Chichijima incident (also known as the Ogasawara incident) occurred in late 1944. Japanese soldiers killed eight American airmen on Chichi Jima, in the Bonin Islands, and cannibalized four of the airmen.
7 Answers. Show activity on this post. If you are asking about people who were prisoners of the Germans, then British and Americans did the best, although this was certainly no joyride.
The treatment of American and allied prisoners by the Japanese is one of the abiding horrors of World War II. Prisoners were routinely beaten, starved and abused and forced to work in mines and war-related factories in clear violation of the Geneva Conventions.
Large numbers of the Russian prisoners ended up in special sections of German POW camps. Held by the Nazis to be racially and politically inferior, they were starved and brutalised. The appalling suffering of these POWs was witnessed by British and Commonwealth prisoners held in separate compounds.
Japan signed the 1929 convention but failed to ratify it. However, in 1942, Japan indicated it would follow the Geneva rules and would observe the Hague Convention of 1907 outlining the laws and customs of war. That Japanese forces did not strictly follow the Geneva Conventions is hardly a matter of debate.
Shigematsu Sakaibara, commander of the Japanese garrison on the island, orders the execution of 96 Americans POWs, claiming they were trying to make radio contact with U.S. forces.
Most prisoners of war (POWs) existed on a very poor diet of rice and vegetables, which led to severe malnutrition. Red Cross parcels were deliberately withheld and prisoners tried to supplement their rations with whatever they could barter or grow themselves.
In addition to the central Tokyo trial, various tribunals sitting outside Japan judged some 5,000 Japanese guilty of war crimes, of whom more than 900 were executed.
At least initially, Germans regarded British and American soldiers (especially Americans) as somewhat amateurish, although their opinion of American, British, and Empire troops grew as the war progressed. German certainly saw shortcomings in the ways the Allied used infantry.
During World War II, the Germans held American POWs in a system of nearly 100 camps spread throughout German-occupied territory. Major camps, as well as camps mentioned throughout the exhibit, are indicated on this map.
Although Allied prisoners of war complained of the scarcity of food within German POW camps, they were treated comparatively well. For example, ordinary soldiers who were made to work were compensated, and officers were exempt from work requirements.
In some instances, the soldiers' supply lines were indeed cut off and they were genuinely hungry. But in other cases, officers ordered troops to eat human flesh to give them a “feeling of victory.”
As the Allied liberation of the Philippines was underway, Japanese commanders acted on orders to annihilate American POWs rather than allow them to assist enemy efforts, and in December 1944 cruelly executed 139 American POWs on Palawan.
The battle is known for claims that many Japanese soldiers were killed by crocodiles in the mangrove swamps of Ramree. Some editions of the Guinness Book of World Records have attributed the highest number of fatalities in a crocodile attack to the battle; zoologists and military historians have debunked this.
CENTURIES OF SUPPRESSION
Jesuits brought Christianity to Japan in 1549, but it was banned in 1614. Missionaries were expelled and the faithful were forced to choose between martyrdom or hiding their religion.
However in 1587, in an era of European conquest and colonization, including in the Philippines near Japan, Toyotomi Hideyoshi issued an edict banning missionaries from the country due to the religion's political ambitions, intolerant behavior towards Shinto and Buddhism, and connections to the sale of Japanese people ...
Generally, the Japanese view Christianity as a foreign, western religion. Reader (1993) stated that Christianity is still rather alien to most Japanese. That is why Japanese Christians often feel it hard to reconcile their belief in Christianity with their own cultural traditions.