From: Lee Corbin (lcorbin@tsoft.com)
Date: Sun Aug 04 2002 - 13:35:07 MDT
Charles Hixson writes
> > > rather then embrace the fiasco of interring loyal Japanese Americans
> >
> > It worked splendidly. The Black Dragons never got a chance
> > to go into action, which, especially if there had been a Japanese
> > invasion, might have been crippling. Not only that, but the intense
> > racial hatred following Pearl Harbor among some of the white Americans
> > had no local outlet.
>
> In the cases of which I am aware, it worked perfectly in that local whites
> were able to buy up the property of the Japanese for pennies on the dollar.
> No problem occurred in Hawaii, which had a large Japanese population, and
> didn't interr any of them.
Yes, the Japanese got only what the free market would give them.
There were one or two cases where a Jap was selling a car or
something, and several people would show up to take advantage
of his having to sell it, and he'd get quite a good price.
But most often, a lot of Japanese property was suddenly dumped
on the market, and they got incredibly little even with bidding.
Democracies should be proud that so far as I know, it was never
just confiscated the way it always would be in most countries.
But America should be ashamed that at war's end no complete
restitution was made.
I don't understand exactly why Hawaii was treated differently.
In both cases, the military made all the decisions. Maybe since
the military had such a vastly greater per-capita presence in
Hawaii, it was judged that the sabotage possibilities were
non-existent, or they were sure they'd got all the fifth columnists,
or that the local whites weren't going to get out of control. My
best guess is all three.
Lee
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