Thanks for all the fun, USA, we'll take over from here...

[Yeager]

How as it that post WWII Japan was successfully occupied and restructured, and this place, from what it seems, cannot be?
====
Japan had the **** kicked out of it.  Iraq, even with all the pain and suffering saddam caused, has in no way whatsoever suffered in 40 years what Japan suffered in 4 years.  Just wait.  Islam is headed for an asskicking of biblical proportions....and the west is going to bleed severely as a result.  The whole world is headed for a spinal adjustment of intense proportions.

Yay

[Sandman]

Originally posted by Neubob
A Modest Proposal...Peace, liberty and amnesty for the insurgents.

How as it that post WWII Japan was successfully occupied and restructured, and this place, from what it seems, cannot be?  

Hmmm... wasn't their government and utility infrastructure left largely intact?

[Pongo]

japan intact? are you serios?

[Rolex]

The infrastructure was devasted and Japanese were starving, Sandman.

The government deck was reshuffled, but MacArthur knew the only way he could get action and results to rebuild the infrastructure was to put the same people who wielded power before and during the war in power again. And that he did. So the deck was shuffled, but the same cards were at the top.

[WhiteHawk]

Originally posted by Neubob
Somehow, I don't think that democracy is something that they need, understand or even want. Democracy, at least in theory, allows the people to have serious sway over the direction their governments take. I firmly believe that given this right, they'll just put themselves under the command of another dictator within a generation or so, and yes, as stated above, all democractic checks and balances will be removed and the net progress will be zero.

Trying to impose our beliefs on them is a mistake. Either they identify a problem and proceed to fight and die for their own freedom, or they continue to live and die under their own tyranny. We will never successfully win liberty for them.

The democracy thing is a pile of rubbish anyway you look at it.  What if we spent half a trillion dollars in iraq to install a democracy and they elected a pro Iran govt?  Not gonna happen.

[Neubob]

Originally posted by WhiteHawk
The democracy thing is a pile of rubbish anyway you look at it.  What if we spent half a trillion dollars in iraq to install a democracy and they elected a pro Iran govt?  Not gonna happen.

Like I said before, I'd rather see what would happen if we spent half a trillion developing and implementing alternative fuel technologies.

[WhiteHawk]

Originally posted by Neubob
Like I said before, I'd rather see what would happen if we spent half a trillion developing and implementing alternative fuel technologies.

My exact thoughts nuebob.   .  Kinda makes a guy wonder wtf!

[Neubob]

Originally posted by WhiteHawk
My exact thoughts nuebob.   .  Kinda makes a guy wonder wtf!

I hate to say it, but I think that there are just too many people in power who have a lot to profit from maintaining the status quo when it comes to our dependance on oil.

[WhiteHawk]

Originally posted by Neubob
I hate to say it, but I think that there are just too many people in power who have a lot to profit from maintaining the status quo when it comes to our dependance on oil.

Yea, its called world domination.  The oil people wouldnt be able to squeeze our baIIs if there was any competition .

[lazs2]

Don't really care much about democracy... Only a strong bill of rights that only allows the government very few powers and less money.

lazs

[Neubob]

Originally posted by WhiteHawk
Yea, its called world domination.  The oil people wouldnt be able to squeeze our baIIs if there was any competition .

Well, they're gonna need to find a way to dominate the world using hydrogen, or ethanol, or cold fusion, or liquidified cow flatulence, because as it is, their handing the camel ****ers too big a piece of the pie... Hell, these very same oil people, if they could only dislodge their heads from their rectums, could stand to profit from a much needed, and soon to be inevitable change in the way we power our vroom-vrooms.

[uvwpvW]

Originally posted by Neubob
Trying to impose our beliefs on them is a mistake. Either they identify a problem and proceed to fight and die for their own freedom, or they continue to live and die under their own tyranny. We will never successfully win liberty for them.

Stop making so much sense! You’re bound to get your head ripped off by the Shuckins and Mavericks on this bbs. And Eagle Eye might just bring his whole infantry platoon (lol) and KILL YOU! (They love freedom you see.)

Originally posted by Sandman
Hmmm... wasn't their government and utility infrastructure left largely intact?

Only if rice paper is rad proof.

[Sandman]

Originally posted by Rolex

The government deck was reshuffled, but MacArthur knew the only way he could get action and results to rebuild the infrastructure was to put the same people who wielded power before and during the war in power again. And that he did. So the deck was shuffled, but the same cards were at the top.

That was my understanding. The government was left in place. The reshuffling was to go back to the parliamentary politics that existed before the military took control.

[Toad]

Left in place?

Certain aspects of the U.S. occupation policy carried out by MacArthur were very harsh. Wartime Prime Minister Tojo and six other leaders were tried and hanged for war crimes. The policies dismantled and abolished the Japanese military establishment and banned 200,000 military and civilian leaders from holding any public office, including the majority of existing Diet members. The large industrial monopolies that had fueled the war effort were broken up. Even government support for the official Japanese religion, Shinto, was eliminated.

At the same time, MacArthur promoted the development of democracy in Japan. He suspended Japanese laws restricting political, civil and religious liberties. He ordered the release' of political prisoners and abolished the secret police. He announced a general election to be held in April 1946, only seven months following the surrender. He also called for the Japanese Diet to pass a new election law to provide for free democratic elections, including, for the first time in the history of Japan, the right of women to vote. In addition, under MacArthur's direction, the growth of labor unions was encouraged, large landholdings were broken up and the education system was reformed.

Surprisingly, all of these developments were accepted and in some cases even welcomed by the Japanese. Of course, Japan was under the control of armed U.S. troops. Still, the ordinary Japanese, seeing death and destruction all around, seemed to conclude that the old way of doing things had failed. War and a humiliating defeat had made Japan ripe for revolutionary change.

A New Constitution

The Meiji Constitution of 1889 concentrated actual political power in the hands of a small group of government leaders responsible to the emperor, not the people. From 1930 to the end of the war this governing group was dominated by the military.

Before 1945, democracy as we know it had little chance to develop in Japan. No free elections or real political parties existed. Women were denied equal rights. From an American viewpoint, although the Meiji Constitution listed a number of individual liberties, few were meaningful. For example, even though free speech was protected by the constitution, the government prohibited what it considered "dangerous thoughts."

Early in the occupation MacArthur saw the need to drastically change the Meiji Constitution. In his autobiography, MacArthur argued:

We could not simply encourage the growth of democracy. We had to make sure that it grew. Under the old constitution, government flowed downward from the emperor, who held the supreme authority, to those to whom he had delegated power. It was a dictatorship to begin with, a hereditary one, and the people existed to serve it.

MacArthur communicated his views to the leaders of the Japanese government who formed a committee to rewrite the Meiji Constitution. After four months' work, by February 1, 1947, the committee had produced a revision with only minor word changes. For instance, in the rewrite the emperor became "supreme" rather than "sacred" as in the old constitution.

MacArthur refused to accept the Japanese revision. He gave his own people the task of writing a "model constitution" which would then be used by the Japanese in preparing another revision, which he wanted completed before the Japanese general. election scheduled just two months away. He saw the election as a test of whether the Japanese people would accept democratic changes in their political system.

Bringing Democracy to Japan

[Neubob]

Originally posted by uvwpvW
Stop making so much sense! You’re bound to get your head ripped off by the Shuckins and Mavericks on this bbs. And Eagle Eye might just bring his whole infantry platoon (lol) and KILL YOU! (They love freedom you see.)
 

Actually, I'm waiting for red26 to show up and tell me that I, along with everyone else carrying a US passport, should enlist and give my country 2 years of military service before opening my big fat mouth. Seems that my being a contributing citizen and taxpayer haven't earned me jack **** as far as voicing opinions.

 Took a real revelation to understand that not every cause our leaders adopt is actually worth the sacrifice of young American lives. In fact, few causes are. There's nothing patriotic about someone who regurgitates the same old slogans, and is ready to vehemently and mindlessly support military action, and inevitably, the loss of servicemen, at the drop of a hat.