scholarly journals Wartime Wilsonianism and the Crisis of Empire, 1941–43

2018 ◽  
Vol 53 (04) ◽  
pp. 1278-1311
Author(s):  
JEREMY A. YELLEN
Keyword(s):  
Second World War ◽  
Self Determination ◽  
Pacific War ◽  
World War ◽  
Joint Declaration ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
Foreign Policies ◽  
Imperial Japan ◽  
War Aims ◽  
Second World

AbstractOne striking feature of the Pacific War was the extent to which Wilsonian ideals informed the war aims of both sides. By 1943, the Atlantic Charter and Japan's Pacific Charter (Greater East Asia Joint Declaration) outlined remarkably similar visions for the postwar order. This comparative study of the histories surrounding both charters highlights parallels between the foreign policies of Great Britain and Imperial Japan. Both empires engaged with Wilsonianism in similar ways, to similar ends. Driven by geopolitical desperation, both reluctantly enshrined Wilsonian values into their war aims to survive a gruelling war with empire intact. But the endorsement of national self-determination, in particular, gave elites in dependent states a means to protest the realities of both British and Japanese rule and to demand that both empires practise what they preach. This comparative analysis of Britain and Japan thus sheds light on the part Wilsonian ideology played in the global crisis of empire during the Second World War.

Japan's Position before the Outbreak of the European War in September 1939

1980 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 129-143
Author(s):  
Kyozo Sato
Keyword(s):  
North China ◽  
Second World War ◽  
Pacific War ◽  
Military Operations ◽  
World War ◽  
War Of Attrition ◽  
The North ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
Second World ◽  
Made In

In the years leading up to the outbreak of war in Europe in early September 1939 Japan had been busy tackling the commitments she had made in North China at first and then in the whole of China. Although war was not declared, Japan had been at war with China since July 1937. It was a war of attrition; both Japan and China claimed to be winning, yet neither could, on any occasion, see any prospect of a final and definite victory. So long as Japan's military operations were confined to the area of North China, the war was named the ‘North China Incident.’ It was called the ‘China Incident’ after her successive and more or less successful operations had spread to Central and South China. And when a war broke out in the Pacific in December 1941 the Sino-Japanese war became an inseparable part of the ‘Greater East Asia War’ (Dai-tōa sensō), a name rarely heard by now, since it soon gave way to the ‘Pacific War’ (Taiheiyō sensō) in the sense of Japan waging the war of the Ocean, or to the ‘Second World War’ in the global sense.

The Pacific War and the Second Golden Age

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ian W. McLean
Keyword(s):  
Korean War ◽  
Second World War ◽  
Pacific War ◽  
World War ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
The Korean War ◽  
Australian Economy ◽  
Per Capita ◽  
Positive Shock ◽  
Second World

This chapter details how the Second World War imparted a more favorable shock to the economy than the First. The postwar international economic environment was much more conducive to raising incomes than it had been after 1919. In the 1950s, prosperity was further underpinned by the Korean War wool boom, and by an intensification of the process of import substituting industrialization. In further narrowing the focus to civilian consumption, the massive diversion of resources into the defense sector predictably resulted in a decline in consumption expenditure per capita during both wars, but by less during the Second World War. With this caveat, it seems appropriate to describe the Second World War as delivering on balance a positive shock to the Australian economy.

scholarly journals A “Monument to the American and Filipino Alliance for Freedom”: The Pacific War Memorial and Second World War Remembrance

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-27
Author(s):  
KIMBERLEY LUSTINA WEIR
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Philippines ◽  
Second World War ◽  
United States Government ◽  
Pacific War ◽  
World War ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
Second World ◽  
Independent Country

The Pacific War Memorial on Corregidor Island in the Philippines was erected by the United States government to commemorate Filipino and American soldiers who had lost their lives during the Second World War. Inaugurated in 1968, it was the first American memorial on Philippine soil since the United States had recognized the Philippines as an independent country in 1946, following almost fifty years of colonial rule. This article interprets the monument and the wider Corregidor memoryscape. It examines how the United States, the Philippines and the Second World War are depicted both within and around the memorial and what this suggests about the creation and persistence of colonial memory. The article explores the tensions between colonial and decolonized remembrance, and the extent to which the Pacific War Memorial serves as a historical marker for the United States’ achievements in the Philippines.

scholarly journals The Fallacy of Contract in Sexual Slavery: A Response to Ramseyer's "Contracting for Sex in the Pacific War"

2021 ◽  
pp. 291
Author(s):  
Yong-Shik Lee ◽  
Natsu Saito ◽  
Jonathan Todres
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
War Crimes ◽  
Second World War ◽  
Japanese Government ◽  
Human Rights Violations ◽  
Pacific War ◽  
World War ◽  
Sexual Slavery ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
Second World

Over seven decades have passed since the end of the Second World War, but the trauma from the cruelest war in human history continues today, perpetuated by denial of responsibility for the war crimes committed and unjust attempts to rewrite history at the expense of dignity, life, and justice for the victims of the most serious human rights violations. The latest such attempt is a troubling recharacterization of the sexual slavery enforced by Japan during the Second World War as a legitimate contractual arrangement. A recent paper authored by J. Mark Ramseyer, entitled “Contracting for Sex in the Pacific War,” mischaracterizes forced sexual slavery as a contractual process by which the victims freely participated in prostitution in return for a substantial reward, denying the responsibility of the Japanese government and its military for the atrocious human rights violations committed. The argument of that paper is flawed and disregards a breath of evidence, including numerous testimonies of survivors, and the findings of scholars, NGOs, and intergovernmental organizations, including the United Nations Human Rights Commission, that the victims were coerced, deceived, or otherwise manipulated into sexual servitude with the direct or indirect involvement of the Japanese government or the military, as admitted by Japan in the 1993 Kono Statement. This article discusses the critical flaws in the arguments advanced by the paper, the traumatic impact of such arguments on survivors of these war crimes, and the broader implications of these (and other similar) justifications for sexual exploitation.

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