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World War II Question

Loxd4

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After WWII we rebuild Germany and Japan, right? Ok, after the rebuilds ion was complete why was Germany allowed to have a military while Japan was not? Can anyone tell me this answer and give me some evidence to back it up please?
 
Loxd4 said:
After WWII we rebuild Germany and Japan, right? Ok, after the rebuilds ion was complete why was Germany allowed to have a military while Japan was not? Can anyone tell me this answer and give me some evidence to back it up please?

Well, neither has a strong army. Neither one has the equipment to Attack other nations. However, present day Japan is building up its army because of the Chinese threat.

I don't know for sure, but I can speculate that Germany was allowed an Army because of the Soviet Aggression.
 
Loxd4 said:
After WWII we rebuild Germany and Japan, right? Ok, after the rebuilds ion was complete why was Germany allowed to have a military while Japan was not? Can anyone tell me this answer and give me some evidence to back it up please?

Japan has a military. Its budget is constitutionally limited to 1% of its GDP. We are bound by treaty to do whatever we can to defend the Japanese.

Germany was indeed 'allowed' a military because of the Soviet threat, and as far as I know, there is no constitutional limit on its size.
 
M14 Shooter said:
Japan has a military. Its budget is constitutionally limited to 1% of its GDP. We are bound by treaty to do whatever we can to defend the Japanese.

Germany was indeed 'allowed' a military because of the Soviet threat, and as far as I know, there is no constitutional limit on its size.


Once again I think you're dead on in regards to your facts.
 
also, other facts could be factors in that too. one was that Germany was split into different zones and eventually into 2 seperate countries, with the one in the west being democratic and the one in the east being communist.

with regards to Japan, remember that they bombed Pearl Harbor so the limiting of the military could have been due, in part, because of that fact.
 
t125eagle said:
also, other facts could be factors in that too. one was that Germany was split into different zones and eventually into 2 seperate countries, with the one in the west being democratic and the one in the east being communist.

with regards to Japan, remember that they bombed Pearl Harbor so the limiting of the military could have been due, in part, because of that fact.

Also due in part, was that the Japanese who took over the government after WWII, themselves insisted on limiting the military.
 
with regards to Japan, remember that they bombed Pearl Harbor so the limiting of the military could have been due, in part, because of that fact.
The military had a good amount of control over the Japanese government at WWII, and there was a fair amount of corruption. I think that there was a world wide feeling that everyone should have a smaller military, and Japan had been a main aggressor in WWII, so the size of the army was limited.

That's not to say that Europe and the US dumped foreign aid money into Japan to build it up to stand against communism. Really the western world was getting Japan ready to be a buffer nation between the Soviets and the US. This is similar to the Marshal plan that dumped millions of dollars into eastern European countries, hoping that they could stand against communism as well.

As for the larger army in Germany (at least western Germany)...
1. Europe had always been getting into wars. They were fairly separated from the world then, and left to fight among each other. WWII wasn't any different really, just another European war, and they never limited their armies before.

2. Germany had been completely invaded, destroyed, and built up again (whereas Japan merely surrendered). The government in place during WWII in Germany was completely dismantled, most people in that government were tried for crimes to humanity, and a whole new government constructed. It wasn't their army size that made them the aggressors in WWII, it had been the government.

3. Western Germany was largely controlled by Allied forces after WWII anyway. Western Germany was being watched over (and being controlled) by the rest of Europe really (and the US), but Japan was not.

4. Western Germany was needed for a buffer zone against Eastern Germany and the Soviet Union, whereas the Pacific was as much a buffer as Japan on the east side.
 
General MacArthur wrote the Japanese Constitution personally following WW II. I don't really know if they have since written their own, but in any case economies can really mushroom without the burden of military spending dragging it down, so, if a country had the choice whether to avoid spending their own money on a large military or letting the U.S. taxpayers pick up the bill, guess which option they would pick ...
 
I found this for you:

http://www.germanculture.com.ua/library/history/bl_rearmament.htm

It's a more complete picture if you read up on Adenaur first, though:

http://www.germanculture.com.ua/library/history/bl_west_germany.htm

From the first link:

Adenauer's decision to turn down the Soviet proposal was convincing evidence that the FRG intended to remain firmly anchored in the Western defense community. After plans for the EDC had failed because of the French veto, negotiations were successfully concluded on the Treaties of Paris in May 1954, which ended the Occupation Statute and made the FRG a member of the Western European Union and of NATO. On May 5, 1955, the FRG declared its sovereignty as a country and, as a new member of NATO, undertook to contribute to the organization's defense effort by building up its own armed forces, the Bundeswehr.

The FRG contributed to NATO's defense effort by building up the Bundeswehr, an undertaking that met with considerable opposition within the population. For many, the memories of the war were still too vivid. To avoid separating the army from the country's civilian and political life, as was the case during the Weimar Republic, laws were passed that guaranteed civilian control over the armed forces and gave the individual soldier a new status. Members of the conscription army were to be "citizens in uniform" and were encouraged to take an active part in democratic politics. Although West Germans generally remained less than enthusiastic about their new army, the majority accepted the responsibility of sharing the burden of defense with the United States and the other members of NATO.
 
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Loxd4 said:
After WWII we rebuild Germany and Japan, right? Ok, after the rebuilds ion was complete why was Germany allowed to have a military while Japan was not? Can anyone tell me this answer and give me some evidence to back it up please?

Well actually the U.S. wanted the Japanese to rebuild an army to help in the fight of the expansion of Communism in Asia, however, the Japanese themselves decided to renounce war and built into their Constitution themselves that they would never again have a standing army so as they would never again allow the country to come under the control of the Shogunite and the heavily militarist samurai class. Allthough, they may have amended their Constitution to allow for a military as a defensive measure and that's why they have a small military force now, on that however I'm not to sure about.
 
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The background for the Japanese Postwar Constitution:

On July 26, 1945, Allied leaders Winston Churchill, Harry S. Truman, and Joseph Stalin issued the Potsdam Declaration, which demanded Japan's unconditional surrender. This declaration also defined the major goals of the postsurrender Allied occupation: "The Japanese government shall remove all obstacles to the revival and strengthening of democratic tendencies among the Japanese people. Freedom of speech, of religion, and of thought, as well as respect for the fundamental human rights shall be established" (Section 10). In addition, the document stated: "The occupying forces of the Allies shall be withdrawn from Japan as soon as these objectives have been accomplished and there has been established in accordance with the freely expressed will of the Japanese people a peacefully inclined and responsible government" (Section 12). The Allies sought not merely punishment or reparations from a militaristic foe, but fundamental changes in the nature of its political system. In the words of political scientist Robert E. Ward: "The occupation was perhaps the single most exhaustively planned operation of massive and externally directed political change in world history."

The wording of the Potsdam Declaration--"The Japanese Government shall remove all obstacles..."--and the initial postsurrender measures taken by MacArthur, the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers (SCAP), suggest that neither he nor his superiors in Washington intended to impose a new political system on Japan unilaterally. Instead, they wished to encourage Japan's new leaders to initiate democratic reforms on their own. But by early 1946, MacArthur's staff and Japanese officials were at odds over the most fundamental issue, the writing of a new constitution. Prime Minister Shidehara Kijuro and many of his colleagues were extremely reluctant to take the drastic step of replacing the 1889 Meiji Constitution with a more liberal document. In late 1945, Shidehara appointed Matsumoto Joji, state minister without portfolio, head of a blue-ribbon committee of constitutional scholars to suggest revisions. The Matsumoto Commission's recommendations, made public in February 1946, were quite conservative (described by one Japanese scholar in the late 1980s as "no more than a touching-up of the Meiji Constitution"). MacArthur rejected them outright and ordered his staff to draft a completely new document. This was presented to surprised Japanese officials on February 13, 1946.

The MacArthur draft, which proposed a unicameral legislature, was changed at the insistence of the Japanese to allow a bicameral legislature, both houses being elected. In most other important respects, however, the ideas embodied in the February 13 document were adopted by the government in its own draft proposal of March 6. These included the constitution's most distinctive features: the symbolic role of the emperor, the prominence of guarantees of civil and human rights, and the renunciation of war. The new document was approved by the Privy Council, the House of Peers, and the House of Representatives, the major organs of government in the 1889 constitution, and promulgated on November 3, 1946, to go into effect on May 3, 1947. Technically, the 1947 constitution was an amendment to the 1889 document rather than its abrogation.

http://countrystudies.us/japan/110.htm

By googling 'Japanese Postwar Constitution", you find a copy of it in English, as well as amendments to it, including the 1997 amendents to increase their defense budget. It hasn't changed much since MacArthur wrote it for them in 1946.
 
Trajan Octavian Titus said:
Well actually the U.S. wanted the Japanese to rebuild an army to help in the fight of the expansion of Communism in Asia, however, the Japanese themselves decided to renounce war and built into their Constitution themselves that they would never again have a standing army so as they would never again allow the country to come under the control of the Shogunite and the heavily militarist samurai class. Allthough, they may have amended their Constitution to allow for a military as a defensive measure and that's why they have a small military force now, on that however I'm not to sure about.

Despite the fact that their military isn't the greatest, their economy is doin fairly well and their public school systems are also great.
 
Loxd4 said:
After WWII we rebuild Germany and Japan, right? Ok, after the rebuilds ion was complete why was Germany allowed to have a military while Japan was not? Can anyone tell me this answer and give me some evidence to back it up please?

The post-war occupation of Germany and Japan by the Allies lasted 10+ and
7 years respectively. Both countries were almost totally disarmed. Their
navies were scrapped and reduced to coastal defense forces. Their armies
were transformed into self-defense forces with little or no attack/offensive
capability.

The occupation forces are still there to this day, though in a reduced
capacity. We have maintained naval and air forces in Japan as well
as air and ground forces in Germany since the end of WWII. Though the
reasoning was forward basing to counter the "red" menace (Russia and
China). We pretty much had to maintain these forces because the
respective constitutions of both countries didn't allow for offensive
forces to be created or maintained (due in no small part to Allied
insistence of the same).

http://www.japan-guide.com/e/e2124.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II

http://www.reference.com/browse/wiki/World_War_II

I hope this helps to answer some of your question.
 
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