I can hear everyone say, "NO! Japan attacked the USA first!"
If you mean that the Japanese bombed the military base of Pearl Harbor, before the US ever bombed the Japanese, then that is not exactly true. If you mean that Japan committed acts of war against the United States first, before Pearl Harbor, then the answer is a definitive, "No!"
The United States committed at least two acts of war under international law against Japan before December 7, 1941. They were:
US military pilots — 40 from the Army Air Corps and 60 from the US Navy and Marine Corps — in a clandestine operation organized by and funded by the Whitehouse — flying bombing missions against Japanese forces in the famed Flying Tigers as early as 1937.* These people did “volunteer” to fly for the Flying Tigers but they were paid employees of the US government. US pilots flying bombing missions for the Chinese was an act of war under international law by America against Japan. Even with the weak argument that these professional military men were “volunteers” (when they were actually sent & paid by the US government), under international law, a nation is responsible for the actions of its nationals. To claim otherwise is hypocritical and completely irresponsible.
US initiated oil embargo against Japan. This is an act of war under international law. The US was also totally hypocritical on this point as they forced the British and the Dutch to uphold the embargo, yet secretly allowed Japan oil from the United States as a way to spy on Japanese shipping. See: Day of Deceit by Robert Stinnett.
Counting the above two, then President Roosevelt had a total of eight plans to incite hostilities with the Japanese. The rest, as they say "is history." There are a great many excellent books and articles on what really happened in World War II. The serious student (and professor) would do themselves and their country good to seek out the truth. Things are not as black and white as US public schooling and US history books would lead us to believe. The true causes of the Pacific War were the clash of the US empire in Asia and the Japanese empire.
* See: Wikipedia, "Claire Lee Chennault": Chennault retired in 1937, went to work as an aviation trainer and adviser in China, and commanded the "Flying Tigers" during World War II
In spite of US government claims to the contrary, US government policy towards Iran and North Korea cannot be described as anything but pushing those two countries into a corner to start a shooting war. The USA hypocritically claims to want peace and to be working towards peace, but the policies the USA pursues can only lead to war.
Japanese bank
A fair observer of these US policies cannot come to the conclusion that US actions are designed for peace. No! A fair and objective observer could only come to the conclusion that US policy is designed to start a war and make it look like the other side started the shooting.
As in many wars of the past, the US government acts like an innocent. But actions show the US government to be merely performing tricks and lying to maneuver the "other side" to take the first shot! Then the USA can claim, "they started it!" in some cynical attempt to gain some moral high ground.
Despite already being engaged in drone wars in Pakistan, Somalia, Yemen, and still occupying Afghanistan, the U.S. is being duped into yet another war based on shaky evidence and at the behest of deep-pocketed special interests. This is coming even while a secretive cyber war already being waged to damage Iran’s nuclear capability. According to the Pentagon, “computer sabotage coming from another country can constitute an act of war.” Not only that, but the draconian sanctions thus far placed on Iran are doing enormous harm to the citizens who hardly have a say in what their government does. The Belgium-based SWIFT payment system that facilitates most international payments has already denied service to many Iranian banks. With the imposing of an oil embargo from the European Union just around the corner (July 1st) that will all but make it impossible for oil tankers to be insured by Lloyd’s of London, an actual naval blockade is being floated by U.S. lawmakers. Much like the Antebellum South and Japan, Iran too is being pushed into a corner.
What makes the campaign to extend the War on Terror to Iran is that the anti-American sentiment in the higher echelons of its government are only a consequence of previous meddling. After Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh nationalized the oil industry in 1953, British Petroleumused the CIAto overthrow the popular leader and putthe Shahback in power whose authoritarian rule would be financially supported by the U.S. up to the Islamic Revolution of 1979.
Then and now, wealthy special interests are a driving force behind American imperialism. Lies will be spun till they are seen as facts. When the truth comes out, the irreparable damage will already be done. Like anything the state lays its filthy hands on, war is a racket. The beneficiaries of the ruling class’s gleeful foray into mass murder are few in number. The masses, still brainwashed into feverish nationalism, end up paying the costs with their pilfered income, eroded liberty, and, ultimately, their own lives.
The levels of US criminality and hypocrisy are astounding.
Now, for the first time in my life, I have seen with my own eyes how these sanctions against Iran and North Korea are affecting the lives of normal people. I have seen it in the last two weeks in running a business in Japan.
The view is not pretty.
On May 29th, I founded a new company in Tokyo. I can't go into too many details but this company is a strong supporter of independent and small businesses - the lifeblood of a nation's economy. The business plan for this company has been presented to the Japanese government and they were so happy and impressed with the plan that we were given a government grant to proceed.
I have even presented the business plan and projections to investors and have brought on board two in this short time.
But Japanese banks? So sorry!
The Japanese banks have been a totally different story! The banks don't seem to want new businesses. In fact, Mizuho Bank, one of Japan's mega-banks has rejected our application twice. This, in spite of the fact that I founded another company that has an account at Mizuho bank and that company runs a fair amount of money (not a massive sum, but respectable) through that account and it is in a partnership with one of the biggest corporations in all of Japan! No matter!
New account? Nope. No dice.
I find out later that it's because of new stricter rules on Japanese banks concerning money laundering.
Past track records and other companies started and ran for profit don't matter. What does matter is "new accounts." "New business idea?!" That smells like money laundering!!!! If they don't understand at the banks (trust that drones don't understand anything but traditional business styles) then they will reject your company bank application!
Talk about ruining the environment for new businesses!
When I complained to one of my friends who runs one of the biggest multi-national companies in the world, he told me that it was because of the "USA enforced Oil embargo against Iran and sanctions on North Korea... Just like the USA did to Japan in WWII, US policy is pushing these countries into war."
I replied, "Why can't the USA just leave these people alone?"
He threw his hands in the air and shrugged his shoulders.
Good News! Centuries of American hegemony and imperialism have just been given a black eye. Japan, following China's and South Korea's announcement, has stated that it will not abide by an oil embargo against Iran. It is the right choice.
I think that Japan would know a thing or two about how oil embargoes lead to war. The USA under Franklin Delano Roosevelt instituted an oil embargo against Japan that lead to the moderate Japanese government of the time being ousted for a more hard line militarist government that soon lead Japan into total war.
We have US presidential candidate Ron Paul repeatedly stating that embargoes lead to war and we have history as proof that embargoes lead to war too. Japan was the victim of a US led embargo in July 1941 which lead to the ouster of the then moderate Japanese government of Fumimaro Konoe to the hard core right wing nationalist government of Hideki Tojo that lead Japan to war with the United States and England. The militarists insisted, with good evidence, that the Americans were unreasonable and impossible to be dealt with. They came to power and the rest is, as they say, history.
Here is what Ron Paul says about embargoes:
Embargoes and blockades are acts of war under international law. Americans should know this. That's why, in the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, Kennedy did not call the blockade of Cuba a "blockade" but called it a "Quarantine."
Considering embargoes, the following information came out at the Tokyo War Crimes Trials - the defense of Japan by court appointed US lawyers - and meetings with lawyers in Washington. These transcripts and points were covered up by subsequent US governments for decades.
On December 7, 1928, a group of distinguished Senators gathered in the Capital Building at Washington D.C. to discuss ratification of the Briand-Kellogg Peace Pact, an instrument whose purpose was to “abolish aggressive war”.
Among those present was the author of the Pact, Secretary of State Frank B. Kellogg.
During the course of the recorded discussions, the following exchange took place:
“Q: Suppose a country is not attacked - suppose there is an economic blockade...?
A: There is no such thing as a blockade [unless] you are in war.
Q: It is an act of war?
A: An act of war absolutely... as I have stated before, nobody on earth, probably, could writean article defining 'self defense' or 'aggressor' that some country could not get around; and I made up my mind that the only safe thing for any country to do was to judge for itself within its sovereign rights whether it was unjustly attacked and had a right to defend itself and it must answer to the opinion of the world.”
The above was quoted during the Tokyo Trial by American defense council to show that Japan's War of the Pacific, according to the very terms of the Brian-Kellogg Pact itself, did not and could not constitute "aggression".
Like I mentioned Japan has seen with her own eyes (China and Korea too) what happens when a nation is backed into a corner with an embargo. That's probably the biggest reason they want no part of it.
Japan’s War of the Pacific was a war of self-defense for the following reasons:
- blockade is an act of war (p. 43,051);
- every nation is the judge of what constitutes self-defense (ibid);
- self-defense is not limited to defense of the national territory (p. 42,239);
- Japan was provoked into a war of self-defense (pp. 43,050-175);
The Americans froze Japanese assets (in violation of a treaty) and began to embargo oil. It was demanded, as a condition to restoring normal relations, that Japan sign an agreement with various other nations who had never before been party to the negotiations, including Thailand and Soviet Russia (pp. 43,678-98).
To obtain agreement with the other nations in accordance with this demand could have taken months or years; and might never have been possible. Japan had enough oil for a few months only. A conference was held at which it was decided that if there was to be war, it must come now; by spring Japan would be too weak to fight. In any case, the attack on Pearl Harbor was an act of utter desperation. The oil embargo meant the destruction of Japan’s independence and perhaps survival as a nation.(emphasis mine)
(Through an oil embargo) Japan faced immediate military defeat in China; total industrial collapse at home; and destruction through coastal shelling of all the major cities by any one of five traditional enemies (America, Britain, China, the Netherlands, and particularly the Soviets).
Oil had been supplied to Japan for two years in the teeth of hostile public opinion. It was believed essential to keep war out of the Far East;
When this did not work, Japan was forced into war, crushed with atomic bombs, and her leaders hanged for “aggression”. (Read more here).
Could anyone in the world be so naive to think that the USA isn't just itching for a war with Iran and is hoping that, with sanctions and illegal embargoes, that they can trick Iran into firing the first shot - like the USA did to Japan - even if it would be legally justified as "self-defense" under international law? Law or no law, you know the USA (a government who has ignored international law for years) would try to claim the moral high ground by saying, "But they fired first!"
One guess which is the US navy? How dare the Iranians
threaten us with their mighty dreadnoughts off the shores of their own country?
This information needs to become common knowledge for people, especially Americans (who will never be taught the truth in school or on American mass media), to realize that these sorts of actions, namely economic war in the form of things like oil embargoes, by the US government are acts of war and we the people must rise up and stop this madness. It seems that the USA is just waiting for an excuse to turn Tehran into a gravel parking lot. This must be stopped.
That China, Japan and Korea have put their collective foot down and said, "No!" is a great sign that the US empire is finally deflating; especially when you realize that, since 1945, Japan and South Korea have been the staunchest of American allies. This rejection of US will is a total embarrassment for the US government.
It couldn't have happened to a nicer bunch of folks.
Japan's foreign minister said Monday that his country would not stop imports of Iranian oil, striking a rare note of divergence with the United States during a visit to Washington.
After talks with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton (war-mongerer) that focused mostly on North Korea, Japan's Foreign Minister Koichiro Gemba highlighted Japan's sanctions imposed on Iranian institutions due to concerns over its nuclear program.
But Gemba said: "I conveyed my view that there is a danger of causing damage to the entire global economy if the imports of Iranian crude oil stop."
Think about it. Of course Japan has to say "No!" Not only do embargoes start wars, Japan just suffered through the nightmare of March 11, 2011. The earthquake, tsunami and then Fukushima nuclear disasters leading to half of all of Japan's electrical needs being stopped due to nuclear power plant's termination of service. Throw on top of that reconstruction costs and you have a Japan that cannot afford to pay higher bills for oil!
Oil is already over $102 dollars a barrel today! What will happen to Japan's economy if oil hits $250 a barrel as some analysts have predicted?
This is the kind of propaganda Americans are fed. What? How dare the Iranians taunt US warships off the coast of Iran! I wonder how Americans would feel if Chinese warships were buzzing the coastline of California?
Thank god that, like I said, Japan finally has the guts to stand up the the USA. Or, as Americans would say, finally Japan has, "Grown some balls!" I wonder if Obama will make ridiculous statements like Bush did with his "Coalition of the Willing" that included about 8 minor countries that were paid off to support the invasion of Iraq?
UPDATE: What timing! Zerohedge confirms my thesis on the USA pushing Iran towards war with this report on Iran this morning in Hyperinflation Comes to Iran:
Hyperinflation has struck again, this time at ground zero of the most sensitive geopolitical conflict in ages: Iran. EA WorldView reports:
An EA source reports that a relative in Tehran ordered a washing machine for 400,000 Toman (about $240) this week. When he went to the shop the next day, he was told that --- amidst the currency crisis and rising import costs --- the price was now 800,000 Toman (about $480). Another EA source says that the price of an item of software for a laptop computer has tripled from 50,000 Toman to 150,000 Toman within days.
, and gave America the green light to enter the war.
And so the opportunity cost for the Ahmedinejad regime to preserve its status quo gradually grinds to zero, as the entire economy implodes (courtesy of a few strategic financially isolating decisions) making further escalation virtually inevitable, in a 100% replica of the US-planned Japanese escalation that led to the Pearl Harbor attack.
...Need I say more? The military industrial complex (and criminal government) of the United States must be stopped from constantly destabilizing regions and causing wars. The true terrorists of our times are easy to identify... And they don't live in caves in Afghanistan... Washington D.C. is their mailing address.
