Comments by "Arthur Mosel" (@arthurmosel808) on "The Front" channel.

Soviets never did anything wrong, just ask them.
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I noticed that thr French aid in the Nazi roundup of the Jews was not commented on. They were among the greatest enablers.
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The Thai Royral family had one prince who was pro-Japanese and one pro-Allied. Thailand kept friendly to both sides favoring whoever had the greater power.
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@Wehrmacht nazi deutschland I'm not sure if you are saying the Soviets deserved Nazi crimes or that the Germans deserved Soviet crimes.
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@ハハいいえ Where did I say communism was any good? Outside of war dead the communists in Russia caused the deaths of up to 50 million of the Soviet Union's citizens. Mao and his successors caused the death of up to 100 million other than in the actual fighting during the civil war there. Pol Pot killed 1.5 million, not many by communist standards, until you realize that was about one third of the entire population. Communism was directly or indirectly caused the deaths of up to 150 million people or more, not even counting war deaths. As to places like Poland, Katyn Forest started the removal of potential opposition to them, but remember the uprising against the Nazis by the supporters of the government in exile in Britain? For some strange reason. The Soviets stopped 50 miles short of Warsaw while the Germans eliminated the non-communists as well as weakened their own forces. A two for one deal for the Soviets. I can go into the trestment of the Baltics and others, but it would be redundant. As horrible as he was, Hitler was less murderous than Stalin. The world would have been much better if neither ever existed. Oh toss in Mao as well.
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@User-eb7my Question what is to laugh at? Horror is horror and crime is crime, no matter how ovef looked it is. I have been studying military history for almost 60 years, and there is a great deal out there that hasn't made it into text books. The comment on the First Sino-Japanese War was from a British reporter who actually compared the Japanese response favorably to European troops. As an aside, during the Boxer Rebellion what was done to Chinese Christians, foreign missionaries and their families beggers description; but today only the European and Japanese response is recognized. Man's inhumanity to man hasn't changed.
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You omitted Carson's Marine Raiders operztion. It was the first attack on a Japanese Island. They landed from a submarine on rubber boats and attacked a remote radio station on one atoll. The raid went well and the station was captured, part of the detachment there were captured and bound. These men at some point were killed (still bound), and the Japanese dead were than mutilated and a portion of their anatomy removed (that sack made tobacco pouches for some of the raiders). Unlike the landings and raid they exfiltration went badly and several men were left behind and captured. These men were executed as war criminal by the Japanese garrison, which considering the murder of prisoners and the mutilation of the dead actually was probably a legitimate decision. After the war the Japanese officer responsible was tried as a war criminal and convicted; however his defense attorney was not allowed to mention the Raiders violation of the rules of war. Carlson and his men received awards and acclaim for their action. There was a great deal more on both sides from War Without Mercy that would have shown neither side in good light.
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The initial German troops were a result of the Reichwher programs of the 20's which with a 100,000 man limit could pick and chose the voluntary enlistees. Tactics were based on the infiltration tactics used during WW1's last offensive and their successful use of artillery and airpower. Aircraft were seen as a tactical.entity however which was why no strategic bombers were built (the one General who sought their development died in a plane crash and with him the Ural bomber project). Those 100,000 men were to be the seed element of a 300,000 man army with short notice; each was trained to do the job of the next level. Squad leaders were very meanr to become platoon commanders, platoon leaders company commanders, and on up the line. Mission tasking not attack planning was the point. Take point A was a mission, the commander given the order wasn't told how to do it; he was to determine,b given the actual conditions (weather, terrain, etc.), how to do it. A definite advantage.
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Another is the 240 mile death march of Stalingrad prisoners without much food and after liberating war clothing and medical supplies from them. Once th e y reached the railhead on to Siberia, only about 30,000 survived the war to return home. As to Manchuria, Mao's communists were even worse than the Soviets; and the complaints about Japanese war crimes in China hide the ChiCom crimes against their own people and the Japanese. Although not related to the video, research the behavior of the Chinese during the Civil wars starting in the late 1910s and officially ending with the Nationalists taking power. Ever war crime listec against the Japanese except for the biological experimentation will be found. War in East Asia was greatly different than Europe; in fact during the 1894/1895 Sino-Japanese war, foreign observers commented on restraint of the Japanese after finding captured Japanese troops murdered and mutilated by the Chinese. Chinese troops fighting in civilian clothing during the WW2 rape of Naking was a factor in that action (not to excuse the event, but to indicate nothing is ever just right and wrong).
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You have to realize somethings about Japanese culture prior to WWII. It was highly hierarchical, remember that today Japan has a high suicide rate largely based on feelings of shame, an important element in their make-up. Marriages (especially in elite portions of society) were arranged by parents with little or no involvement by the couple; this was not necessarily true at the bottom of the social structure; but even there obedience to the parents, those considered above their place in society, and of course the government was mandatory. Compliance had been drilled in by the period of Tokugawa dominance. At the lowest level, the Father or eldest male member was responsible for reporting crimes or dereliction to their superior. Failure to do so could result in the entire family being punished.. Depending on position, one family in every five or ten was responsible for everyones' conduct in that group and again failure to report problems could result in the group leader and his family being punished. This leads to a society highly responsive to authority figures. Japanese military law was extremely strict and disobedience (failure at a task could be called disobedience) was strictly punished. Surrender in battle was considered a military crime and was severely punished, which by extension affected the man's family. This may explain (not excuse) some of the treatment of POWs. For example, the "Bataan Death March", they actually had food and water at specified locations; but not enough, they had expected fewer prisoners based on their own culture. They didn't account for the loss of discipline and control where the first troops at a site fought over food, spoiling some and leaving nothing for late arrivals. As Japanese units passed the column of prisoners, you saw acts of kindness and brutality; one unit might do nothing, another give food, while another mocked and beat prisoners; this depended to a great deal on the leaders control and attitude. In other words the treatment mirrored the nature of Japanese society. As to the Geneva Convention, remember it was and still is (at least to see extent) a shame based society; violating the convention was a crime to many, but was only a shame when they were held accountable. My point is, we must always consider how an opponent thinks. Our worse failing as a nation today is thinking everyone is like us. Remember many believe everyone wants the same thing. Take happiness for instance; we define happiness one way; a society made of head hunters would define it differently. While an extreme example, think of how a shame based society (mostly Asian) and a guilt based society (essentially European) would view the same thing; there would be grossly different opinions.
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The Baltic states joined the Nazis willingly because of deportations and the elimination of political enemies. Easy to get allies from people oppressed by your enemy.
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@saphixs9372 Who were the Soviets? They were Russians. What wer re the gulag, pleasure camps? What happened at Katyn, a slumber party? Why did only about 30,000 of well over 150,000 who surrendered at Stalingrad return from the camps in Siberia? Saphixs, because you want to ignore history doesn't make it so.
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Ch d ck out the expulsion of ethnic Germans from Eastern Europe after WWII (these were not Germans who the Germans moved there during the war; but rather people living there for centuries. This isn't including the Germans moved from what had been Germany because the Russian kept the ex-Czarist portions of Poland and gave they German territory instead. I was happy to hear even a brief mention of what happen to Japanese in Manchuria and Korea in particular. While those civilians in Northern China were mostly new comers, Japanese in the other two areas had been there for forty years at least, and had children born there.
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@User-eb7my I wish I could say the comment is false, but it isn't. I have read British, French, and German material and translations of other sources, including Japan and Chinese. What is true, that I have found, is that all nations like to stress what is favorable to the and ignore or suppress that which is unfavorable. Try the book "War Without Mercy" (I am working from memory so I hope the title is correct); the book covers a great deal of the hate on all sides. A BBC video ,"1945 a Savage Peace", is eye opening also (you may have trouble finding it though, very disliked by the left). It details some of what was done following the war.
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@ハハいいえ By the where are you from? Obviously not Eastern Europe given the characters used as you identifier. Either Chinese or Japanese given how the characters look. They appear to be Kanji mixed with Katakana, or perhaps Chinese pictographs, hard to determine since I am not used to computerized versions of those languages. Either way where did you get your expertise on the area? I acknowledge that mine is from books written in English or translated into primarily English. I can deal with German and Romance languages to some degree, but Eastern European are not in my play book, especially those using the Cyrillic alphabet.
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Rommend that you read "War Without Mercy" which deals with this subject. One incident mentioned was the Makin Island Raid where the Marine Raiders murdered bound prisoners and then took a particular portion of the anatomy to make tobacco pouches. This was unfortunate because raiders were left behind in the botched withdrawal of the Raiders. These men were executed as war criminal due to what had been done. After the war, the Japanese involved in the execution were tried as war criminals and executed. No side was innocent. By the way Japan had been an ally of Britain, and the Japanese industrialized rapidly to supply goods to the Far Eastern areas (including European colonies) that were not available from Europe due to World War I. After that war, the Japanese were denied access to these markets putting the Japanese into a depression; while at the same time immigration from Japan was limited. This was a factor in the Japanese expansion into Manchuria and Northern China.
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McNamara was a disaster, he was a low ranking enlisted man when he served, and was a always looking for a cheap way of doing something. The F111 is a good example, originally intended to be a carrier fighter/strike aircraft, a fighter/strike fighter for the Marines, and a fighter/strike/strategic bomber for the Air Force, it was too big for carrier ops, too complicated to maintain for the Marines, too unwieldy to be a fighter, it finally became a decent bombing aircraft (not ground support) for the Air Force once the bugs were fixed. Check the loss rate when initially deployed. By the way, the Navy's F4 became the Air Forces fighter. Both services then worked on replacements. Designing an aircraft for the purpose is always better. The F15 was the Air Force replacement and it is still a viable aircraft today.
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All three services had people under this program. People involved included those who didn't meet mental standards, had emotional issues or criminal records. By around 1971 few were left, I had one transferred into my unit in that year, he should have been removed earlier instead d someone at his previous base reenlisted him. He was the only man that I ever had to order to take a bath because of complaints of people working with him. He wouldn't maintain a clean room and everyone assigned to the same room requested different room. It took me six months to get this man discharged. No one missed him.
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@herkusmantas2641 I believe we don't disagree. Perhaps join is what causes the problem. As can be said, you will fight alongside someone who shares an enemy. I did not mean they joined the party or became Germans.
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Some would be too short. Others like Russia and Germany would take hours. Germany, and Rusdian institutionalized murder camps. The Japanese camps and actions included terrible things, but not on the scale of those two.
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@fabovondestory Could you explain?
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@HaHaeTs Nice. Post, but let's be real, a camp where people are intentionally starved, over worked on insufficient food and in a hostile environment without adequate clothing is intended to kill them. Yes , not an extermination facility, but definitely a death camp. Talking about people starving in the 1930s, one of the bigger reason was the forced collectivization of the previously privately owned land and then the Soviet Government selling large amounts of grain and other farm goods which could only be obtained by siezing everything produced. An excellent book on this was released last year in the US. I suspect that you are in a country that doesn't have it available. Another example was a railroad that was constructed where. The Soviets themselves admit to one dead person per rail tie. An extermination camp at least killed quickly, slowly starving to death is even more inhuman; and the extermination camps were horrendously inhuman..
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I forgot to add about the mass graves of political enemies and often their families in the Soviet Union. I notice that you pointedly ignored the Katyn f Orestes massacre. Similar mass Graves existed in the Baltic states. You forgot the forced expulsion of Baltic peoples after the Soviet take over and before the Gefrmans took the region. Selection memory?
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@HaHaeTs As to the POWs, far more joined German ranks than German POWs joined Russian ranks; strange isn't it. Both sides midtreated prisoners in the East to far greater degree than in the West. So if Soviet citizens were sent to death c a mps what would you call POW camps where the people were treated worse. I find your comments about ethnicity very enlightening. Until the breakup of the Soviet Union, the government considered the entire and as Russian and every effort was made to stamp out nationalism. So you are saying that all those people aren't Russians, perhaps your being a little too ethnic centric or in some cases even possibly racist. You can't claim a national identity and then rate people as being different. The US had that problem and was trying to fix it until the "progressives" brought it back to the front. Strange the strongest "progressives are communiists/socialists.
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@HaHaeTs Finally, the trail of rape and murder across Eastern Europe was well before than. The mass rapes in Berlin started well before than since Berlin fell on 15 April 1945. Nothing like issuing an order after your troops had their fun. It also may explain rape victims were murdered in many cases, a dead victim can't complain or identify attackers. Also, the order would not apply to the NKVD (still the name at the time if I remember). You know the sam÷ people who killed the Poles and Baltic peoples and oversaw the expulsion of various ethnic groups. Another of their exploits was to man machineguns behind attacking Russian troops to ensure that they didn't turn around.
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@saphixs9372 Nice try, first they were marched, in a Russian winter, around 240 miles after a prolonged siege. This included malnurished, sick and injured men. Second what warm clothing, food and medical supplies were ta,en from them on that March. At the camps, as you said disease, malnutrition and cold killed them. That was murder done on the cheap. Why waste a bullet. The US tried the Japanese for the Bataan Death March and their prison camps which except for the cold (substitute excessive heat and humidity) c a used death the same way. The way that the camps were run was considered a war crime. What was the Soviet excuse.
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@camm8642 I suggest that you review Chinese history starting from around 1911 to 1932. Most of what the PRC and Chinese complain about the Japanese they complained about against other Chinese during that period. The whole moral construct that we view things from is European, war was historically a much nastier thing in East Asia. That does not justify Japanese conduct, but places it in context. By the way, we tried Germans for doing what we did to German and Japanese cities. In their case, we called it war crimes. The Russian essentially had a death march of the Axis forces surrendered at Stalingrad. Only around 30,000 survived the March and camps. Closer research on the Bataan Death March will show that it was never intended for that purpose; however the number of prisoners was higher than expected and discipline among the prisoners had broken down leading to spoilage of what food and water that was available. Japanese troops were inconsistent in their treatmentent of prisoners as well with some passing units actually giving them food and others beating them. In other words inconsistency, Soviet treatment of Axis troops was exceedingly consistent and bad. German u-boat warfare was bad, but our unrestricted submari e warfare was good even though they were the something. Propaganda and victory often determine who is seen as a villain. Stretch your imagination. a minute and think of a German victory tribunal judging FDR and Churchill for the deliberate fire bombing of German cities; or the Japanese trying Us leaders for things like the intentional fire bombing of Tokyo which killed at least 100,000 in a single night.
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One of worst examples in "War Without Mercy" occurred during Carson's Raid. The Raiders killed tied and captured Japanese prisoners and mutilated the using a portion of the male anatomy as tobacco pouches. This happened early in 1942, in plenty of time to be told to Japanese troops. When the Japanese reinforcements arrived, they found several marine raiders left behind in the poorly executed and rushed withdrawal. They were executed immediately for war crimes, which they may or may not have done. After the war, the Japanese officer was tried for that act. The marine misconduct wasn't allowed in as evidence. How many lives on both sides were lost due to racist propaganda and atrocities can only be guessed at; however the suicides of Japanese civilians on Saipan and Okinawa show that fear of mistreatment was very real.
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The truly forgotten war was the Soviet war against the Manchurian warlord in 1928. The Soviets got concessions after they won that war. Since the Japanese have actually been hostile to Russia (Imperial and Soviet) since 1700. The Japanese actions in Manchuria in 1931 needs to be viewed not just in reference to hostility with Japan but also fear of further Russian advances.
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The Soviet conduct during their initial control was ignored, This conduct was part of its attitude toward the Nazis.
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I was talking about the Baltic states.
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You covered the invasion, but starving Japan out was the third option. If the invasion was almost genecidal, this option was truly genicidal. While the official standard for civilians was 1500 calories per day, the actual in many areas was under 1000. The US bombing and naval gunfire had broken much of Japan's rail and road nets, meaning moving supplies around the country was difficult to impossible(my wife's mother survived Hiroshima because the family was out in the ountry side that day bartering for food). We had also been destroying coastal shipping (transport) and fishing vessels (food). You mentioned no one was left to work in factories; but we had destroyed almost the entire industrial capacity of Japan including that manufacturing medical supplies. Various diseases were endemic, and the death toll from starvation and disease would have been as great or greater than the losses of the invasion. As an aside, while radiation injured many from the A Bombs; many of those who died might have survived if they weren't malnurished and diseased. Radiation reduce immune response, so infections, burns and diseases that a healthy well nurished person would have survived proved fatal (My wife's family had goods that they could trade for food, and were healthier, and did not suffer (to my knowledge) from radiation affects despite helping clear rubble and bodies) . Additionally, many died from the uncontrolled and uncontrollable fires. Besides destroying gas mains and the water systems, blast damage caused building collapses or knocked down wooden panels and paper screens in homes. Since open fires existed since breakfast had recently ended, these plus straw mats common in Japanese homes made for great fires. Also killing people who might otherwise survived. These results would have been magnified by a prolonged siege and been fatal to far more.
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@ハハいいえ Watashi wa Nihon go hanashimasu. Out of practice but I used to speak more of it. Katakana, Hiragana and Kanji are really a pain. I knew the characters weren't Korean or Thai (which is closer to Indian). I also used to speak some Thai, although that is a nation I do not wish to revisit any more than the Philippines (a very long year in Thailand near the Laotian border, and stop overs in the Philippines. I like Japan and lived there for a couple of years and visited as well, my wife worked on a Masters here where I met her. So, unlike many younger Us types I either have lived elsewhere or at least have gone through there. Your right you did fool me about where you are from, I am not used to seeing Asian characters from non-Asian peoples. Good luck on your studies. Are you planning on going there? I was never sent to Europe, although someday I would like to see Germany, most of my family originated from there either in the late 1860s or early 1870s. I didn't get curious about where until it was too late to ask family members from exactly where, although the indications are the Mosel valley.
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@realtruth2757 Nice try, but the Nazis weren't fighting in China. As to the other figures, how many were actually killed by the Nazis in Poland or Romania. I guess Katyn Forest wasn't done by Ru s dia forexample.
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Actually the history of the entire Baltic region is interesting. Parts were part of the Polish Kingdom which included part of the Ukraine (my favorite units were the Winged Hussars), at other times part of Sweden, or the Teutonic Knights and Germany. If I remember at one point Lithuania actually had overseas colonies before it fell. Russia kept trying to move westward and eventually ate up most of the region, until the Soviets came and they regained independence. A very checkered history of ups and downs surrounded by larger nations always interested in expanding.
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I guess this guy was Euro-Centric. There was additional Airborne Division in the Pacific as well as US Marine corp Para Marine Regiments. As uual mostl6 used as assault infantry.
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