Flunking history

 

 

As a student of history, Philippine President Benigno Aquino III gets a failing mark.

 

Recently, President Aquino compared China’s conduct of foreign relations on the simmering South China dispute with Hitler’s acquisition of the Sudetenland from Czechoslovakia in 1938. Aquino said the Sudetenland “was given in an attempt to appease Hitler to prevent World War II.”



Philippine President Benigno Aquino III. Photo by AFP.

Aquino’s statement was only partly correct insofar as the European powers at that time, Great Britain and France, agreed to let Czechoslovakia give up the Sudetenland to Nazi Germany in order to avert another war in the continent. This was against the position of the US commission to the Paris Peace Conference which unanimously supported the unity of Czech lands, including the area of the Sudetenland that was occupied by ethnic Germans. Of course, Hitler eventually invaded and annexed Czechoslovakia to the Third Reich.

 

But where is the parallel between Hitler’s Sudetenland with China and the South China Sea dispute that President Aquino was alluding to?

 

The Sudetenland was inhabited by German-speaking ethnic groups and was driven by local nationalist sentiment to join the German republic. There was an impulse in the Sudetenland to rejoin Germany, unlike the islands and various rock formations in the South China Sea which are largely uninhabited by any distinct population or ethnic group. In fact, after the Second World War, hundreds of thousands of ethnic-speaking Germans escaped Sudetenland and resettled in West Germany. On the other hand, most of the islands being claimed by the Philippines, China and four other Asian countries remain submerged under water during high tide and are practically uninhabitable by people.

 

The South China dispute is a territorial conflict among several Asian countries which claim competing sovereignty over islands and rock formations, primarily because of their potential rich oil and mineral deposits. No claimant country is eager about going to war for the sole reason of asserting sovereignty rights. The dispute could be considered a flashpoint for a wider armed conflict, but that’s all there is to it—not necessarily an impetus for war.

 

Comparing China with Hitler’s aggressiveness in acquiring the Sudetenland is obviously inflammatory and contrary to negotiating a settlement through diplomacy. President Aquino is simply fanning the flames and outrage against China’s aggressiveness in the South China Sea. Again, as a loyal American boy himself, Aquino is serving the interests of the United States for being the spokesperson for containing China’s rising hegemony in Asia and the Pacific.

Crisis in the South China Sea. Photo by UNCLOS and CIA.

President Aquino is emboldened by a mistaken belief in the illusion that the Mutual Defence Treaty between the Philippines and the United States will save him from his belligerent rhetoric against China. This defence agreement is a moribund instrument, signed by the two countries at the height of the Cold War in 1951, for the sole purpose of limiting the spread of communism in Asia. But with the fall of the Soviet Union and the decline of the threat of communism in the 1990s, the menace of communism has totally receded, even in the face of the local communist-inspired insurrection by the New People’s Army (NPA).

 

Like the former US bases in the Philippines, the Mutual Defence Treaty between the Philippines and the United States serves only as a magnet to foreign aggression. Instead of seeking accommodation and modus vivendi, President Aquino has been animated by the US commitments expressed in this 1950s vintage Cold War origin security treaty, which is backed by US-Philippines joint military exercises under the US Visiting Forces Agreement.

 

During her visit to Manila on November 11, 2011, former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton declared on the 60th anniversary of the Mutual Defence Treaty that “the US will always be in the corner of the Philippines. We will always stand and fight with you to achieve the future we seek.”

 

It was the most gratuitous, yet unconstructive declaration by the former Secretary of State, that could be deemed provocative and ill-conceived given the practice of the United States not to take sides and be involved in regional conflicts in Asia and the Pacific.

Former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during her visit to the Philippines
which coincided with the 60th anniversary of the nations' Mutual Defence Treaty.

But the US mutual obligation under the treaty in the event of a foreign invasion is more illusory than real. Reading the fine print of the 1951 Mutual Defence Treaty would show that it is not automatic for the United States to come to the defence of the Philippines in case of hostilities with China. Under Article IV of the treaty, in case of an armed attack in the Pacific, both parties must act in accordance with their constitutional processes before introducing their armies into any hostility. Thus, the treaty is not “self-executing” or binding on the United States unless its Congress enacts an implementing law to commit the US military.

 

Besides, the treaty expressly refers to an armed attack in the Pacific, and the South China Sea, arguably, is not part of the Pacific.

 

President Aquino would not have the audacity to rile China with his blunt, careless, and undiplomatic statements if not for the mirage of the US military coming to defend the Philippines in case of war. This is also true in the case of Japan. The Japan-China dispute would probably not have escalated to its current level by Japan provoking nationalization of the disputed Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands in the East China Sea, if not for assurances of applicability of the U.S. defense commitment to the disputed islands.

 

North Korea’s provocative development of nuclear weapons and other acts of belligerence are also clear examples of how these US defence treaties operate in escalating conflict rather than promoting détente. The presence of U.S. forces on the Korean Peninsula serves in limiting China’s willingness and ability to exert pressure on North Korea to denuclearize.

 

At present, US servicemen join the Armed Forces of the Philippines on a rotating basis throughout the year, not only in military exercises but also in the latter’s campaigns against NPA and Muslim secessionist rebels. The U.S. also maintains some 28,500 servicemen and women in South Korea and some 34,000 uniformed personnel plus dependents in Japan. Two major U.S. air force bases and the Futenma Marine Air Base occupy a large part of Okinawa. The U.S. Seventh Fleet is also headquartered in Yokosuka, Japan.

 

To the eyes of any intelligent observer, the presence of U.S. military in Asia and the Pacific has therefore become more of an attraction for foreign aggression and an irresponsible shield used by leaders of these countries in promoting belligerence and a rationale for going to war.

 

The alliances built by the United States with the Philippines, Japan, and Korea clearly represent a dangerous remnant of the Second World War, and particularly the Cold War that has long since ceased to be justifiable under any reasonable scenarios. All countries in the region would probably enjoy greater stability and security if these alliances were dismantled and U.S. military forces withdrawn.

 

These mutual defence commitments, and the ongoing negotiations between the United States and the Philippines in Washington for a new military framework agreement, are stoking the bluster in President Noynoy Aquino’s immature broadsides against China, even to the extent of misinterpreting history. While the Aquino government has been proclaiming the need for a rules-based and peaceful settlement of the South China Sea dispute, it continues to undermine this process by unnecessarily portraying China as a bully and Hitler-like in dealing with its smaller and less powerful neighbours.

Burden of remembrance

 

 

Asahi Shimbun, a major Japanese national newspaper, reported recently that the Japanese government deliberately avoided the “comfort women” issue in Southeast Asia because of the negative public attention it might generate. The report was based on diplomatic documents the newspaper obtained through Japan’s information disclosure law.

 

When the comfort women issue became hot news in 1992 and 1993, Japan decided to interview alleged victims in South Korea and issued a pledge to launch similar probes in other countries. But according to diplomatic documents dated July 30, 1993, which Asahi Shimbun was able to obtain, the Japanese government’s official policy was not to conduct interviews with former comfort women in the Philippines, Indonesia and Malaysia.

Lola Fidencia David was forced to be a sex slave for Japanese soldiers who
invaded the Philippines during World War II. Now 86, she is still campaigning
for an apology from Japan. Photo by Rick Madonik/Toronto Star. Click link
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ojJrohHRp0k to view "Forgotten Slaves: The
Comfort Women of the Philippines."

A telegram from the Japanese government to its embassies in the said three countries stated that “we want to avoid (interviews) as much as possible also from the viewpoint that we should ward off a situation in that we only end up fanning public interest unnecessarily.”

 

Last October 23 in Manila, the Japanese ambassador to the Philippines Toshinao Urabe said that Japan had already settled the demands of Filipino wartime sex slaves for an official apology and just compensation. The ambassador was apparently referring to a 2001 letter of apology issued by former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and the Asian Women‘s Fund, a charitable organization established in 1995 with Japanese government financial assistance for the purpose of collecting donations from the public as “atonement money” and carrying out programs to help the victims.

 

Most of the former comfort women in South Korea refused the 2 million yen ($20,618) in atonement money, demanding Japanese government compensation instead. The group of comfort women in the Philippines dismissed the apologies of Japanese government officials for not being the government's official apology, and the assistance from the Asian Women's Fund which was donated from the Japanese people, and not from the government. The said fund was eventually dissolved in 2007.

 

Only about 130 Filipino comfort women are believed to be still alive today. One of them, Lola Fidencia David, now 86 years old, continues to campaign for an official apology from the Japanese government. Lola Fidencia visited Toronto recently to speak about the harrowing details of sexual abuse she suffered from the hands of Japanese soldiers when she was only 14.

 

After the war was over, Lola Fidencia married young but it wasn’t a successful union. She scavenged from garbage dumps to provide for her children. The children never became aware of the abuse she suffered during the war although they noticed sometimes that she would be uncommunicative when she had flashbacks of her traumatic experience.

 

When a group of Korean comfort women came out in 1990, Lola Fidencia found the courage to tell her children about her sexual abuse. She also joined a group of survivors called Lolas Kampanyera Survivors Organization, which has persevered in demanding an official apology and just compensation from the Japanese government.

 

It would be easier today to condemn and indict any government for war crimes under existing international law which now recognizes war rape, sexual slavery, forced prostitution, forced pregnancy, forced sterilization, or any other form of sexual violence of comparable gravity as a crime against humanity if the action is part of a widespread or systematic practice. The comfort women forced to become sex slaves by the Japanese military during World War II unfortunately did not have the same kind of protection. Although the sexual abuses they suffered are appalling and inexcusable, the most they have demanded the Japanese government is an official admission that they were forced to become purveyors of sexual comfort to their soldiers and a genuine apology for this shameful wrong.

 

According to Lola Fidencia’s testimony before a crowd of students at the University of Toronto last week, she was abducted from her home and lured with the promise of work in a factory, just like the other comfort women she knew. This story would be repeated by similar testimonies from other comfort women from South Korea, China, Indonesia and Malaysia.

 

Once the women were recruited, they were then interned by the Japanese in “comfort stations” where soldiers took turns raping and abusing them day and night. The testimonies from these women bore the fact that the practice was both systematic and organized with the singular aim to treat them as slaves for the sexual gratification of Japanese soldiers. 

Korean comfort women who were rescued and were protected in Lameng, Yunan,
September 3, 1945. Photo courtesy of  the US National Archives.

Prostitution was open and well-organized in Japan before the war so it was considered logical that there should be organized prostitution to serve the Japanese Armed Forces to provide comfort to soldiers and prevent discontent among them. This was clearly the argument used by the Japanese government in justifying the existence of military brothels and hiring of prostitutes for the army.

 

The Japanese even referred to military brothels the Nazis established in concentration camps for the sexual gratification of German soldiers and officers. Ironically, military brothels that provided sexual services to soldiers also existed during and after the Korean War where separate “comfort stations” were maintained for U.N./U.S. and South Korean soldiers.

 

This is the undeniable truth: comfort women kept by the Japanese army during the war were not prostitutes. They were lured and forced to provide sexual services to soldiers against their will. But the Japanese government maintains that there was no evidence that these women were forced and kept as sex slaves. They insist that these comfort women lived in military brothels attached to the army and were treated well because their food was not rationed and they had plenty of money to buy articles they wanted such as clothes, shoes, cigarettes and cosmetics.

 

In other words, these women were prostitutes to the eyes of the Japanese government. Hence, why they are called “comfort women,” a translation of the Japanese ianfu which is a euphemism for shōfu, whose meaning is prostitute. In the words of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, "The fact is, there is no evidence to prove there was coercion.”

 

Except for admitting that military brothels existed, the continuing denial by the Japanese government that comfort women were forced to provide sexual services to soldiers is a clear attempt to diminish the crimes they committed during the war. In fact, this is part of a greater scheme among contemporary Japanese revisionists to spread the big lie that Japan’s invasion of China and Southeast Asia were justified responses to Western imperialism at that time.

 

Historical revisionism is the most convenient last resort of those who wish to deny and avoid the enormous burden placed on them by the truth and the wrongs they committed. We see this in those who deny the holocaust. Omission by the Japanese of their military aggression and atrocities during World War II in history classes taught in schools is a clear minimization of their war crimes. Conspiracies are born every minute catastrophic events happen, like presidential assassinations, the 9/11 attack, or the Boston marathon bombing, which are all designed to blur the truth in the collective consciousness.

 

That comfort women were not forced as sex slaves during the war amounts to defiance by the Japanese government of the existential cruelty of the Japanese military. That only military brothels existed where prostitutes were allowed to escape the war’s hardships in exchange for their sexual services only obfuscates reality, an illegitimate distortion of an actual historical record. This is revisionist Japan understanding Plato’s dictum that “those who tell the stories also hold the power."

 

There are limits to remembrance, especially when the victims are powerless like these comfort women. When a mighty country like Japan re-interprets history to make it more palatable and less culpable and inhuman, the pain, anguish and indignity that comfort women suffered are diminished. Japan’s intransigence to be pious to the facts and events of the war they aggressively pushed and their deliberate attempts to revise the interpretation of those events make history the antithesis of remembrance.

 

There is neither a physical monument nor space in the collective consciousness to memorialize the suffering of all comfort women. In the long run when the last survivors of the comfort women have died, nothing else will be remembered, and this is an unpleasant truth.

 

The campaign for an official apology from the Japanese government is weakened by the lack of support from the national governments of these comfort women, with the exception of South Korea. Politics play a major role for this muted response from these governments, not to mention access to foreign loans and assistance from Japan.

 

In the end, all the comfort women can hope for is to dwell on George Santayana’s warning that “those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” But to those of us who wish to learn from history, there is always the assumption that remembrance has the ethical superiority over forgetting. For to remember is to be responsible while to forget is not only irresponsible but the precursor to a descent into an abyss of moral cowardice and into believing that nothing is ever worthwhile.