Pearl Harbor and the Consequences of Denying History

For some years, American prisoners of war who were enslaved by private Japanese firms during WWII have been pursuing both claims and apologies from the firms that committed inhuman atrocities during the war. In the San Francisco Peace Treaty, John Foster Dulles seemed to trade away the rights of these citizens to pursue these claims -- but recent evidence has emerged that arguably alters the rights of POWs to pursue their claims. Both the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate voted overwhelmingly that the State Department and Justice Department not be allowed to oppose the court actions of American POWs in U.S. courts, as they have previously done.

In an extremely rare move, the conferees on the respective bill in question dropped the provision which received such strong support in the Congress. This kind of killing of an amendment nearly never happens when both houses have expressed their will. The State Department, which has recently argued that it had nothing to hide and had no concern about the evidence that had recently emerged about the deal making surrounding the San Francisco Peace Treaty, has put up new, arguably illegal roadblocks in making available any of its internal documentation related to how it has read (in the past) various articles of the San Francisco Peace Treaty which may bear on the rights of POWs. America and other nations have often criticized Japan for its inability to deal with its past -- but it seems clear that the U.S. is as complicit as any other actors in keeping Japan from dealing with its history.

Related Links

• POW Forced Labor Lawsuits Against Japanese Companies, by Kinue Tokudome
• U.S. Role in Japan's Amnesia, by Steven C. Clemons
• Recovering Japan's Wartime Past -- And Ours, by Steven C. Clemons