It's funny how there are no doujins abbout the ships detesting the crimes commited byt their crews during the war.
It's a really sensitive topic in Japan. There are those, especially in the generation after the war, that refuse to believe that they even committed war crimes, and vocally protest the seeming injustice of their JSDF not having the capacity to proactively declare war. (Plus they point to the fact that America didn't really get hit with war crimes trials when they did some of their more brutal actions... and kind of have a point. Only the losing side typically faces trial.) If you were running a business, would you want to include references to war crimes guaranteed to piss of people on both sides of the issue? It's like having an cartoon in America that features happy abortion time. (Well... aside from Family Guy...)
Meanwhile, of course, there's also the fact that there are some countries out there that really, REALLY have sore feelings about the fact that Japan hasn't really admitted to many of their crimes.
That said, most of the atrocities you hear about were committed by the Army, not the IJN. There are some exceptions: (I-8, after swapping out her crew from the famous voyage to Germany, went on a war crime spree, murdering whole civilian shipping crews with swords. Kind of ruins the ability to get affectionate with the goofball that says "Guten Morgen" every 7AM or other gratuitous german.)
Comparatively, most of the ships, however, had honorable service records, so feel free to squee over Inazuma's talking about wanting to see peace or rescuing crews of other ships. (She participated in the sinking of 6 destroyers, including some of the ones whose crews she rescued... of course, Japanese POW treatment wasn't the best...)
Kitakami herself survived the whole war, including being in many major Japanese defeats with no or relatively light damage. (She got out of Midway unscathed, thanks to the carriers being the real target.) As a torpedo cruiser in a carrier war, however, she never sank a single ship. (She might as well have been built for AA, like Isuzu was...) Kitakami never fired a Kaiten suicide-torpedo. (And one of her lines is exactly what is depicted here - begging the admiral to never make her fire one.) Hence, feel free to make KTKM your waifu guilt-free.
She got out of Midway unscathed, thanks to the carriers being the real target.) As a torpedo cruiser in a carrier war...
Kitakami (together with Ooi) was assigned to the Aleutians Screening Force which will provide cover to the invasion force for Opeartion AL (Invasion of Aleutians) which began a day before the Battle of Midway (Operation MI). So Kitakami did not seen action during Midway.
It's a really sensitive topic in Japan. There are those, especially in the generation after the war, that refuse to believe that they even committed war crimes, and vocally protest the seeming injustice of their JSDF not having the capacity to proactively declare war. (Plus they point to the fact that America didn't really get hit with war crimes trials when they did some of their more brutal actions... and kind of have a point. Only the losing side typically faces trial.) If you were running a business, would you want to include references to war crimes guaranteed to piss of people on both sides of the issue? It's like having an cartoon in America that features happy abortion time. (Well... aside from Family Guy...)
Meanwhile, of course, there's also the fact that there are some countries out there that really, REALLY have sore feelings about the fact that Japan hasn't really admitted to many of their crimes.
That said, most of the atrocities you hear about were committed by the Army, not the IJN. There are some exceptions: (I-8, after swapping out her crew from the famous voyage to Germany, went on a war crime spree, murdering whole civilian shipping crews with swords. Kind of ruins the ability to get affectionate with the goofball that says "Guten Morgen" every 7AM or other gratuitous german.)
Comparatively, most of the ships, however, had honorable service records, so feel free to squee over Inazuma's talking about wanting to see peace or rescuing crews of other ships. (She participated in the sinking of 6 destroyers, including some of the ones whose crews she rescued... of course, Japanese POW treatment wasn't the best...)
Kitakami herself survived the whole war, including being in many major Japanese defeats with no or relatively light damage. (She got out of Midway unscathed, thanks to the carriers being the real target.) As a torpedo cruiser in a carrier war, however, she never sank a single ship. (She might as well have been built for AA, like Isuzu was...) Kitakami never fired a Kaiten suicide-torpedo. (And one of her lines is exactly what is depicted here - begging the admiral to never make her fire one.) Hence, feel free to make KTKM your waifu guilt-free.
The concept of war crimes is really retarded. Its like people want to make a game out of war with rules. What are you going to do if someone violates the rules? Go to war with them? Ridiculous in my opinion. If something is worth going to war for, utilize absolute warfare, end it quickly, and be done with it.
79248cm/s said: The concept of war crimes is really retarded. Its like people want to make a game out of war with rules. What are you going to do if someone violates the rules? Go to war with them? Ridiculous in my opinion. If something is worth going to war for, utilize absolute warfare, end it quickly, and be done with it.
Well, there is the concept of a "Gentlemans War". After all, it wouldn't be just to just pilaging and stealing everything in sight and killing off civilians even if 1 country was at war with another.
The concept of war crimes is really retarded. Its like people want to make a game out of war with rules. What are you going to do if someone violates the rules? Go to war with them? Ridiculous in my opinion. If something is worth going to war for, utilize absolute warfare, end it quickly, and be done with it.
By that logic America should've just nuked the entirety of Japan and left the survivors to starve.
The concept of war crimes is really retarded. Its like people want to make a game out of war with rules. What are you going to do if someone violates the rules? Go to war with them? Ridiculous in my opinion. If something is worth going to war for, utilize absolute warfare, end it quickly, and be done with it.
You do raise a good point: why would any nation stick to the rules when engaged in mass killings (of enemy soldiers)? The answer is not ethics or civility, but the very practical reason of possibility of reciprocity. One prime example is the use of chemical weapons. In the WW2, Italy sprayed Ethiopia with mustard gas because the Ethiopians had no chemical weapons to fight back with, while Germany and UK did not use their stockpiles of chemical weapons for the fear of retaliation with the same.
In the end it's the same reason why people would agree, in a fight, not to hit each other's face: because there is a mutual deterrent.
You do raise a good point: why would any nation stick to the rules when engaged in mass killings (of enemy soldiers)? The answer is not ethics or civility, but the very practical reason of possibility of reciprocity. One prime example is the use of chemical weapons. In the WW2, Italy sprayed Ethiopia with mustard gas because the Ethiopians had no chemical weapons to fight back with, while Germany and UK did not use their stockpiles of chemical weapons for the fear of retaliation with the same.
In the end it's the same reason why people would agree, in a fight, not to hit each other's face: because there is a mutual deterrent.
Actually, sorry for commenting back this late, but Hitler actually forbade, is that the right Word?, any use of Chemical weapons by the Wehrmacht, since he had not only witnissed the horrors of Chemical warfare, he had been hit by it himself. It was one of his few redeeming values. Well, not so much redeeming...
Actually, sorry for commenting back this late, but Hitler actually forbade, is that the right Word?, any use of Chemical weapons by the Wehrmacht, since he had not only witnissed the horrors of Chemical warfare, he had been hit by it himself. It was one of his few redeeming values. Well, not so much redeeming...
I haven't looked into it directly myself, but I've heard fear that the Allies would retaliate in kind mostly drove that decision.
I haven't looked into it directly myself, but I've heard fear that the Allies would retaliate in kind mostly drove that decision.
Yep, he was on the trenches on WWI, experienced the mustard gas hell by himself, so i do believe he did not wanted his soldiers to suffer the same fate
The concept of war crimes is really retarded. Its like people want to make a game out of war with rules. What are you going to do if someone violates the rules? Go to war with them? Ridiculous in my opinion. If something is worth going to war for, utilize absolute warfare, end it quickly, and be done with it.
yer right!! might as well say "WOOHOO FOR GENOCIDE!!!!!"
Non barbaric war doesn't work that way. There is a reason there are treaties in every war. The units involved, weapon types, reward bounties, temporal territory occupation, etc. It's what every high command does to set the rules straight and to make clear the purpose (after failed negotiations).
If you want to see it at a smaller scale, you wouldn't like a SWAT team to enter a building and kill everything alive because of a phone joke or an unknown number of armed people. War is a complex scenario the lowest units can't understand. They are simply manipulated to believe everything they do is for "freedom" and sometimes the higher ups need to kick the beehive for that purpose. Yes, that includes for example letting a big scale terrorist attack slip by. I think I've heard many stories about opposite sides' generals friendly playing cards, chess or whatever before the battle of any civil war to believe it's true.
EDIT: There's also the thing of giving up. There must be a rule for that, otherwise it would be an endless war with more deaths (including civilians) than necessary.
That said, most of the atrocities you hear about were committed by the Army, not the IJN. There are some exceptions: (I-8, after swapping out her crew from the famous voyage to Germany, went on a war crime spree, murdering whole civilian shipping crews with swords. Kind of ruins the ability to get affectionate with the goofball that says "Guten Morgen" every 7AM or other gratuitous german.)
There's a reason I decided my I-8 was going to be modernization fodder. Same with Tone.
Admiral, I've got a request. ...You can load me with anything, except those weapons. I'm begging you. In 1945, in preparation for the final mainland battle, a surface fleet focused on surprise attacks was formed. Kitakami was modified into a Kaiten mother-ship and assigned to said fleet.
Among the ships in that fleet who carried Kaiten, Kitakami had the largest displacement and number of launchers.
From (Japanese) Wikipedia
