Essay On Japan The Us And Race In Ww2

Japan, the US, and Race in WWII

In the year 1941 during the midst of World War II, Harvard professor Edwin O. Reischauer wrote in “Memorandum on Policy Towards Japan,” that “Japan is attempting to make her war against the United Nations into a holy crusade of the yellow and brown peoples for freedom from the white race” (2). It seems unfair, however, to place the primary blame on Japan for the incorporation of racial ideology and propaganda into the war, as many other countries did this, including the United States to a large extent. Ultimately, in dire situations, people will attempt to rally their troops and garner support in any way possible, and using race happens to be a very effective method. In regards to the racialization of the war

From the early 1900s up to WWII, Japanese writers often brought up America’s mistreatment of “Orientals” as a major criticism of the West and their attitudes towards the East. They also used this fact to strategically sway public opinion and provide reason for their animosity towards America, and America did in fact make it very obvious that they hated the Chinese and the Japanese. Even Reischauer, who originally argued that Japan was at fault for the racialization of the war, admits that “we have also unwittingly contributed to Japan’s dangerous propaganda campaign. The removal from the West Coast of the American citizen of Japanese ancestry along with the Japanese aliens was no doubt a move made necessary by immediate military considerations, but it provided the Japanese with a powerful argument in their attempt to win

President Theodore Roosevelt echoes this sentiment in his 1921 letter “The Threat of Japan,” describing the Japanese as having a unique perception of themselves and their race, and ideology he warns would be dangerous should a war arise. “To permit the Japanese to come in large numbers into this country would be to cause a race problem and invite and insure a race contest.” Roosevelt states that the exclusion of Japanese immigrants “means not that they are inferior to us - in some ways they are superior - but that they are different; so different that, whatever the future may hold, at present the two races ought not to come together in masses.” Despite acknowledging the possible risks in inciting Japan to violence through these restrictions, Roosevelt still claims that the exclusion is the best course of action, citing irreconcilable racial differences. Though some claimed the issue of Asian exclusion was more of an economic problem than a racial one, it is clear that both the Americans and Japanese racialized these conflicts and continued to racialize further conflicts. Baron Goto Shimpei’s 1921 article, “What Japan Thinks” supports the idea that the act was race-related, stating that “if the question [of exclusion] is an economic one, the remedy is simple and is just what the Japanese desire it to be” (194). Goto says that