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| China-Japan-Koreas |
| Air force boss faces sack over comments |
| 2008-10-31 |
| APAN'S defence ministry plans to sack its air force chief of staff for comments that Japan was ensnared into World War II by the United States and was not an aggressor, according to the Kyodo news agency. General Toshio Tamogami's essay, posted on the website of a Japanese hotel and apartment developer, was expected to rouse anger in China and South Korea, where memories of Tokyo's wartime acts and colonisation run deep. |
| Posted by:tipper |
| #6 "No F-22s for you, Toshi." Just a short sword. |
| Posted by: Minister of funny walks 2008-10-31 20:13 |
| #5 Hell, it's more likely the One will apologize for the absence of the carriers. |
| Posted by: .5MT 2008-10-31 19:20 |
| #4 And I expect The One to also apologize to Japan for the US to have mistakenly parked all its battleships in the Pearl Harbor Bombing Range back in December 1941. |
| Posted by: USN, Ret. 2008-10-31 14:38 |
| #3 No F-22s for you, Toshi. |
| Posted by: ed 2008-10-31 14:04 |
| #2 Well, Japan wasn't necessarily ensnared into it, but it definitely came into its era of military strength way too late. Without Western incursions into the region, Japan would probably have replaced China as the biggest - geographically-speaking - land power in the Far East. Of course, without Western incursions, Japan wouldn't have had the Meiji Restoration and the technological leaps - made by copying the West's advancements - that followed it. |
| Posted by: Zhang Fei 2008-10-31 13:57 |
| #1 Woah. That was fast... JAPAN has sacked its air force chief after he wrote an essay in which he denied the country was an aggressor in World War II, a stance likely to anger its Asian neighbours. China, the two Koreas and other Asian nations still have searing memories of Japan's aggression and colonial rule, and there had been speculation that General Toshio Tamogami's comments would create antipathy. "What he said was inappropriate for an air chief of staff. He should not remain in the job," Defence Minister Yasukazu Hamada told a news conference announcing his dismissal. |
| Posted by: tu3031 2008-10-31 13:51 |