History lesson: Why did we intern the Japanese?

[Extra Stout]

Answer: because of the Germans.

Before the United States entered World War I, East Coast cities like New York were teeming with German spies.

The catch: these spies were American citizens.

Even before the U.S. entered the war, it was sending supplies to Britain, Russia, and France. Germany of course sought to disrupt these supplies. They even took it so far as to carry out an attack on the U.S. mainland.

On July 30, 1916, German-Americans acting as spies for the Kaiser, conspiring with German navy men stranded in America by the British blockade of Germany, carried out an attack on a munitions depot on Black Tom Island in New York Harbor, causing an explosion of 2 to 4 million pounds of ammunition which could be heard and felt as far away as Baltimore.

Much of this particular load was bound for Russia. Soon after, Russia had to pull out the war on account of lack of supplies, and the Czar fell.

Anybody remember the reconstruction work that had to be done on the Statue of Liberty in the 1980's? It was to repair at long last the damage done in the Black Tom explosion (and that's why they wouldn't let people into the torch!)

Anyway, the suspicion against the Japanese-American in WWII sprung from the treasonous behavior of German-Americans 25 years earlier. Of course, the Japanese-Americans turned out to be a lot more loyal to America, and the internment became a national shame.

Damn Germans.

[101A]

Damn Germans.

This belongs in the Spurs forum.

[boutons_]

The German-American spies/sympathisizers in WWI were still around in their 40s to 60s in WWII, whiich was also fought against Germans.

Why weren't they interned along with the Japanese-Americans?

[101A]

Using the criteria we used to intern the Japanese Americans on Germans? Because some Congressman would have been included.

[Nbadan]

Eh, I don't know how much of this is true, but the justification at the time, of course, was much more insidious.


Their property will be carefully protected by the Federal Government, their food and shelter will be provided to the extent they are not able to provide it for themselves, and they will be furnished plenty of entertainment and recreation. That is not according to the pattern of the European concentration camp by any means.

Real danger would exist for all Japanese if they remained in the combat area. The least act of sabotage might provoke angry reprisals that easily could balloon into bloody race riots.

We must avoid any chance of that sort of thing. The most sensible, the most humane way to insure against it is to move the Japanese out of harm’s way and make it as easy as possible for them to go and to remain away until the war is over.

San Francisco Museum (http://www.sfmuseum.org/hist8/editorial1.html)

U.S. goverment, protecting you since 1942!

[jman3000]

I always thought Russia pulled out of WWI due to the communist revolution and the downfall of czarist Russia.... maybe my time tables are off.

oops.

[Nbadan]

http://memory.loc.gov/pnp/pan/6a02000/6a02400/6a02458r.jpg

See? It's like camping!

[Nbadan]

http://memory.loc.gov/pnp/fsa/8a31000/8a31100/8a31159r.jpg
The 'relocation' was very orderly

[Nbadan]

Life in relocation camp...

http://memory.loc.gov/pnp/ppprs/00200/00220r.jpg

[Nbadan]

http://memory.loc.gov/pnp/ppprs/00100/00196r.jpg

[Nbadan]

http://memory.loc.gov/pnp/ppprs/00200/00211r.jpg

[BeerIsGood!]

At least they weren't being gassed and cooked in giant ovens. But it was still wrong.

[Nbadan]

Since information about the German concentration camps was so scarce at the time, maybe something like the Japanese internment camps is what the Americans expected to find at Autzwich? I'm sure they never expected the horrors that awaited.

[gtownspur]

Answer: because of the Germans.

Before the United States entered World War I, East Coast cities like New York were teeming with German spies.

The catch: these spies were American citizens.

Even before the U.S. entered the war, it was sending supplies to Britain, Russia, and France. Germany of course sought to disrupt these supplies. They even took it so far as to carry out an attack on the U.S. mainland.

On July 30, 1916, German-Americans acting as spies for the Kaiser, conspiring with German navy men stranded in America by the British blockade of Germany, carried out an attack on a munitions depot on Black Tom Island in New York Harbor, causing an explosion of 2 to 4 million pounds of ammunition which could be heard and felt as far away as Baltimore.

Much of this particular load was bound for Russia. Soon after, Russia had to pull out the war on account of lack of supplies, and the Czar fell.

Anybody remember the reconstruction work that had to be done on the Statue of Liberty in the 1980's? It was to repair at long last the damage done in the Black Tom explosion (and that's why they wouldn't let people into the torch!)

Anyway, the suspicion against the Japanese-American in WWII sprung from the treasonous behavior of German-Americans 25 years earlier. Of course, the Japanese-Americans turned out to be a lot more loyal to America, and the internment became a national shame.

Damn Germans.


Damn,

You are the best armchair quarterback on the planet. But you're suggestion that the sole reason for japanese internment was because of a generalization springing from the past actions of german loyalist, guised under the title of being american citizens, is lazy at best and idiotic being the most reasonable.

As if German americans were the first ethinicity prone to actively spy on america and treated with suspicion is another example of your "pulled it out of my ass" logic and reasoning capablities. Did you not remember that in the Revolution, then recent British colonialist were tarred and feathered and being blamed for being torries. And during the war with MExico waged by Polk we afforded the same suspicion to mexican americans in the southwest.

and now back to the asian theatre.....

I mean, the fact that the Japanese navy obliterated the whole US fleet in the pacific in one day at pearl harbor, which lead to the west coast being vulnerable, had nothing to do with the enforcement of the internment idea and didn't cross your mind is another perfect example.

Or that the fact that most of the japanese americans were issei- born in Jap-
and had loyalties to the emperor of Japan, be another reason.

I'm sorry Extra Stout, but if you claim to be the sole source of reason thought in this forum, and the mouthpiece of the conservative movement, stop feeding your lazy irish fat ass with bacon and cheetos and spare us another pointless thread.

[dirk4mvp]

This belongs in the Spurs forum.


:lmao

[willie]

Damn,

You are the best armchair quarterback on the planet. But you're suggestion that the sole reason for japanese internment was because of a generalization springing from the past actions of german loyalist, guised under the title of being american citizens, is lazy at best and idiotic being the most reasonable.

As if German americans were the first ethinicity prone to actively spy on america and treated with suspicion is another example of your "pulled it out of my ass" logic and reasoning capablities. Did you not remember that in the Revolution, then recent British colonialist were tarred and feathered and being blamed for being torries. And during the war with MExico waged by Polk we afforded the same suspicion to mexican americans in the southwest.

and now back to the asian theatre.....

I mean, the fact that the Japanese navy obliterated the whole US fleet in the pacific in one day at pearl harbor, which lead to the west coast being vulnerable, had nothing to do with the enforcement of the internment idea and didn't cross your mind is another perfect example.

Or that the fact that most of the japanese americans were issei- born in Jap-
and had loyalties to the emperor of Japan, be another reason.

I'm sorry Extra Stout, but if you claim to be the sole source of reason thought in this forum, and the mouthpiece of the conservative movement, stop feeding your lazy irish fat ass with bacon and cheetos and spare us another pointless thread.

funny shit. extra stout makes a strong argument that it wasnt about race but rather nationality and gtown rips that to shreds. much like his liberty cabbage.

[Duff McCartney]

All I know is I never saw any German or Italians getting put in internment camps.

[Duff McCartney]

I always thought Russia pulled out of WWI due to the communist revolution and the downfall of czarist Russia.... maybe my time tables are off.

oops.

It was...but lack of supplies had something to do with it too. Russia was suffering because their men were all fighting the war and they had nobody to farm or work food stuffs.

[thispego]

that's what womens for

[Extra Stout]

Damn,

You are the best armchair quarterback on the planet. But you're suggestion that the sole reason for japanese internment was because of a generalization springing from the past actions of german loyalist, guised under the title of being american citizens, is lazy at best and idiotic being the most reasonable.

As if German americans were the first ethinicity prone to actively spy on america and treated with suspicion is another example of your "pulled it out of my ass" logic and reasoning capablities. Did you not remember that in the Revolution, then recent British colonialist were tarred and feathered and being blamed for being torries. And during the war with MExico waged by Polk we afforded the same suspicion to mexican americans in the southwest.

and now back to the asian theatre.....

I mean, the fact that the Japanese navy obliterated the whole US fleet in the pacific in one day at pearl harbor, which lead to the west coast being vulnerable, had nothing to do with the enforcement of the internment idea and didn't cross your mind is another perfect example.

Or that the fact that most of the japanese americans were issei- born in Jap-
and had loyalties to the emperor of Japan, be another reason.
What the hell was the point of your little diatribe? I post a vignette about Black Tom Island, which was still fresh on the government's mind by 1941, so much that one of the rationalizations given for the internment policy was "We can't afford another Black Tom Island," and you feel it necessary to explode?

Most Americans know about Pearl Harbor, and Japanese-American ties to the emperor, etc. But the mainstream narrative we're always "taught" is "The U.S. government was racist for not understanding that Japanese immigrants would be loyal to America."

Little known is that lily-white German-American immigrants 17 years earlier had helped carry out a military attack on U.S. soil. That little episode got wiped clean from the history books because it didn't fit the indoctrination scheme. Your points about British colonialists and southwestern Mexicans are well noted, though neither group really could be considered contemporaneously "immigrants," since during the Revolutionary War everyone was a colonist, and in the Mex-Am war, Texas had only recently come under American control, and the SW was still part of Mexico.

The U.S. had assumed leading up to America's entry in WWI that German immigrants posed no threat, and got burned. It was not going to make the same mistake in WW2.


I'm sorry Extra Stout, but if you claim to be the sole source of reason thought in this forum, and the mouthpiece of the conservative movement, stop feeding your lazy irish fat ass with bacon and cheetos and spare us another pointless thread.
:lmao What does a history vignette have to do with being the "sole source of reason thought [sic]" or the "mouthpiece of the conservative movement?" Have I so gotten under your skin that you go foaming at the mouth whenever I post something? That's pretty funny. Calm down, take a siesta, watch a couple telenovelas, mow four or five neighbors' yards, then come back.


All I know is I never saw any German or Italians getting put in internment camps.
During WW2, 11,000 German-Americans were placed in internment camps, or relocated. The same was true for 10,000 Italian-Americans.

[gtownspur]

What the hell was the point of your little diatribe? I post a vignette about Black Tom Island, which was still fresh on the government's mind by 1941, so much that one of the rationalizations given for the internment policy was "We can't afford another Black Tom Island," and you feel it necessary to explode?

Most Americans know about Pearl Harbor, and Japanese-American ties to the emperor, etc. But the mainstream narrative we're always "taught" is "The U.S. government was racist for not understanding that Japanese immigrants would be loyal to America."

Little known is that lily-white German-American immigrants 17 years earlier had helped carry out a military attack on U.S. soil. That little episode got wiped clean from the history books because it didn't fit the indoctrination scheme. Your points about British colonialists and southwestern Mexicans are well noted, though neither group really could be considered contemporaneously "immigrants," since during the Revolutionary War everyone was a colonist, and in the Mex-Am war, Texas had only recently come under American control, and the SW was still part of Mexico.

The U.S. had assumed leading up to America's entry in WWI that German immigrants posed no threat, and got burned. It was not going to make the same mistake in WW2.


:lmao What does a history vignette have to do with being the "sole source of reason thought [sic]" or the "mouthpiece of the conservative movement?" Have I so gotten under your skin that you go foaming at the mouth whenever I post something? That's pretty funny. Calm down, take a siesta, watch a couple telenovelas, mow four or five neighbors' yards, then come back.


During WW2, 11,000 German-Americans were placed in internment camps, or relocated. The same was true for 10,000 Italian-Americans.

This is only a morsel of the big cookie. THe internment idea was that of the general who was in charge of safeguarding the west coast.

THe fact is that there were rumors that the japanese in Hawaii helped orchestrate the attacks on pearl harbor. And fresh off this info the general along with his racist attitude and ignorance push forward the idea and insured it happened.

I just find it funny how idiotic you really are and how big of an arrogant ass you come out to be.

And it's funny how you say that i'm ticked off by your prescence on this board. When if one were actually were to chart your activities, one would know that it's you that always jumps at me after everyone of my post in which you are not the subject.

So seriously, go back to your assembly line and beat your wife to the taste of cheap whiskey. And go back on the potatoe boat you were smuggled.

[Extra Stout]

This is only a morsel of the big cookie. THe internment idea was that of the general who was in charge of safeguarding the west coast.

THe fact is that there were rumors that the japanese in Hawaii helped orchestrate the attacks on pearl harbor. And fresh off this info the general along with his racist attitude and ignorance push forward the idea and insured it happened.

I just find it funny how idiotic you really are and how big of an arrogant ass you come out to be.

And it's funny how you say that i'm ticked off by your prescence on this board. When if one were actually were to chart your activities, one would know that it's you that always jumps at me after everyone of my post in which you are not the subject.

So seriously, go back to your assembly line and beat your wife to the taste of cheap whiskey. And go back on the potatoe boat you were smuggled.
I don't think there is any event in history that can be whittled down to simple cause-and-effect. There is always a "big cookie." That's sort of assumed when talking about history. I presented it from a different angle. A lot of these angles get omitted from the mainstream presentation of history, and these omissions color people's interpretation of the past in ways that suit the agenda of those doing the presentation.

Another thing to take into account is that the U.S. had been wary of a Japanese attack dating back almost 30 years, which played into the response to Pearl Harbor. Leading up to WWI, Germany tried to play off those fears to induce the U.S. into a war with Mexico, in order to forestall U.S. involvement in the European theater. We went so far as to realign our Pacific fleet to protect the Phillipines and Hawaii, a move which might have made a lot of sense in 1913, but with the emergence of air power, made the fleet a sitting duck by 1941.

If you think about it, U.S. unpreparedness to Japanese attack was really shocking in light of the fact we had been expecting it for so long. Perhaps that just goes to show the lengths to which we will stick our heads in the sands to be dovish until there is no other option but war.

Now, if you want to beat into the ground what an arrogant ass you think I am, it would be preferrable to wait for an example when I actually am acting like an arrogant ass. Presumably there would be plenty of opportunities. In this thread, since you appear to have some knowledge of this subject, in spite of my visceral distaste for you, I would have demurred to a constructive contribution to the thread sans the bile.

Enjoy your day picking tomatoes.