The following picture of the Pacific War has caused great controversy.
Scene of Americans shooting Japanese prisoners of war
The picture shows a set of real shots from the Western World War II documentary "Pacific War". It chronicles the capture of several U.S. troops in the 1944 Battle of Iwo Jima in the Pacific War against a Japanese soldier in a cave. We can see the Americans first throwing white phosphorus grenades into the cave and then waiting for the Japanese troops who could not bear the fire and smoke to run out of the cave.
And when a wounded Japanese soldier instinctively ran out of the hole, an unexpected scene occurred: an American soldier did not hesitate to shoot and kill the Japanese soldier who had no ability to resist in front of the camera of the American reporter.
Although the image was once a huge controversy, the U.S. military only released the footage decades after the end of the Pacific War. However, Orange Peel believes that this scene just reveals a well-known truth within the US army at the end of the Battle of Iwo Jima: that is, the US army that was stimulated by the "non-martial arts" Japanese army to "get annoyed and angry" has completely lost patience, no longer wants to take Japanese prisoners, only wants to put every Japanese soldier to death.
Why did the U.S. military, which has always claimed to strictly abide by the Geneva Conventions, shoot and kill prisoners in the Battle of Iwo Jima? In fact, it was precisely the Japanese troops stationed on Iwo Jima who caused all these consequences to brew their own bitter wine.
Americans playfully bomb Japanese caves
First of all, the U.S. army suddenly realized at the end of the protracted campaign that the Japanese troops who insisted on Iwo Jima did not aim to win the battle, but at the "instigation" of Japanese commanders such as Kuribayashi Tadao to kill as many American troops as possible. Japan's strategy at that time had retreated from dominating Asia to causing as many casualties as possible on the local battlefield and discouraging the US military from invading and occupying the Japanese mainland. The Japanese army's style of play, which is regarded as a "dead skin" in the eyes of the US military, is completely different from the US military's concept of war. At the same time, the Japanese strategy also received a counterproductive effect, that is, after the Battle of Iwo Jima, the United States began to seriously assess the heavy price to be paid to land on the Japanese mainland, and finally caused the United States to decide to use atomic bombs to attack the Japanese mainland!
Japanese soldiers who were asked by the U.S. military to strip naked and surrender
Second, the Japanese often lured and killed the approaching American troops in Iwo Jima and other battles by deception and deception. What's more, many American medical soldiers were shot by Japanese snipers hiding nearby when they tried to rescue the Japanese wounded. Moreover, the Japanese snipers in the Pacific Theater focused on shooting American medical personnel (which is unique in the history of world wars), so that the American medical soldiers who began to use Red Cross helmets and logos to distinguish them would be safer not to wear these symbols in the later period. To sum up, the Japanese army still lacks "martial virtue" in the eyes of the US military.
U.S. troops watched a Japanese prisoner disinfecting potion on Halsey's flagship
Third, the bad deeds of the Japanese army in the Pacific War at this time have spread in the US military, such as the Japanese army's mistreatment of the Allied prisoners of war batain death march, the Japanese army cooking and eating US prisoners of war and other vicious abuses have completely intensified the mood of the US army. The Japanese never looked down on prisoners of war on the battlefield because their soldiers' manuals listed surrender as a disgrace, much less as a human being. Interestingly, in the Pacific War, the soldiers of the United States and Japan were inferior to each other, and the battlefield was full of racial discrimination and prejudice. The wanton maiming of prisoners of war by the Japanese army on the grounds that they did not accede to the Geneva Conventions further aroused the hatred of the US military against the Japanese army. Since the Battle of Guadalcanal, the shooting and killing of Japanese prisoners of war by various units of the Us army, and the deliberate absence of japanese troops has become an upward trend.
The U.S. military interrogated surviving Japanese prisoners of war
Fourth, the Battle of Iwo Jima was protracted, and for the first time in the Pacific Campaign, the total number of U.S. casualties exceeded that of the Japanese army (the number of deaths was lower than that of the Japanese army), and a large part of this casualty was completely caused by the Despicable and despicable tactics of the Japanese army in the eyes of the U.S. army, which was a typical "victory without force." It is not surprising that the so-called new hatred and old hatred are superimposed, and the US military finally retaliated against the Japanese prisoners on the battlefield.
The American army surrounded and suppressed the Japanese army in front of the cave
For all these reasons, the practice of the U.S. military shooting Japanese prisoners of war on Iwo Jima and no longer catching live mouths was prevalent, and commanders turned a blind eye and there was no way. However, it is extremely rare for the U.S. military to shoot prisoners directly in front of the camera, as in this picture. After the American soldier shot the prisoner, the prisoner was still moving, and there was still a breath, and the American soldier could not wait to collect the booty. #谣零零计划 #