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Exposing Imperial Japan

Exposing Imperial Japan

Viewing the suffering of colonized people through the lens of the colonizer's propaganda

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In 1942 Busan, Korean pastors and foreign...
This 1942 stuttering correction seminar for Korean...
A Korean father spent 8 years looking...
In 1942, Matsumoto Chitei reportedly became the...
U.S. soldiers guard the Gyeongseong Ilbo (Keijo...
1943 Editorial: nature is an object of...
Korean rice farmers barely survived eating grass...
This is the only known bilingual Japanese-Korean...
As a child, one Korean father was...
In June 1944, the Japanese military gave...
21-year-old Kamikaze pilot Han Jeong-sil (한정실, 韓鼎實)...
Ms. B.F. Starkey, blue-eyed American missionary featured...
In June 1945, Imperial Japan announced a...
Imperial Japan called Seoul residents the laziest...
Imperial Japan waged an aggressive Japanese language...

Month: January 2022

Uncategorized

Editorial says the unity of god and man realized by the Japanese Imperial Way cannot be found anywhere else in the world, so Imperial Japan must ‘turn the world into a single realm, let all nations take their places, and let all people rest in peace’ starting with the colonization of Korea

2022-01-30

620

909

  (Translation) Gyeongseong Ilbo (Keijo Nippo) March 6, 1943 The True Meaning of National Identity and the Righteous Peninsula By

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Model Korean Family

As a child, one Korean father was tormented by Japanese teachers who berated him as ‘an idiot who can’t understand Japanese’, so he and his wife imposed the Japanese language on their six children to make sure they did not suffer the same trauma that he did (Seoul, 1942)

2022-01-28

762

642

  Notes: (Top row right-to-left): father Kametsuru (41), mother Su-in (37), daughter Ranhime/Ran-hee (4). (Bottom row right-to-left): daughter Eihime/Young-hee (14),

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Uncategorized

Part 1 – Thousands of young Korean men were recruited to guard Allied POWs, and guards were told to teach the POWs to “recognize the superiority of the Japanese people and to make them respect the Japanese Empire from the bottom of their hearts”

2022-01-24

793

773

  Notes: Some 3000 young Korean men were recruited by Imperial Japan as civilians to work as civilians to guard

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Prisoners of War

Part 2 – Thousands of young Korean men were recruited to guard Allied POWs, who were called “masses of materialism with little spiritual cultivation” and “mentally retarded people” whom the guards had to “splendidly guide and subdue”

2022-01-24

757

953

  Notes: Some 3000 young Korean men were recruited by Imperial Japan as civilians to work as civilians to guard

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Uncategorized

1943 editorial calls for Korean language to be wiped out, says Korean comfort women were touched by the noble appearance and hearts of the Imperial Japanese soldiers, and the women offered heartfelt comfort in response as their chests filled with excitement, their sincere hearts touching each other

2022-01-18

644

2070

  Notes: This editorial article from 1943 explicitly and blatantly calls for the Korean language to be “wiped out”. Here

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Uncategorized

In 1942, one pro-Imperial Japan Korean family went to great lengths to force Japanese on their children, scolding a son for informally learning some basic Korean at school, making sure their Korean-speaking grandmother visiting them in Seoul from Kaesong did not influence them too much

2022-01-14

683

739

  Notes: I think the family may have provided an older photo of themselves, because the children look much younger

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Uncategorized

In 1942, Matsumoto Chitei reportedly became the first Korean woman ever to earn a Medical Ph.D., all while raising three children; she discovered at Seoul University that the midbrain of the toad had a cardiovascular center which regulated heart rate

2022-01-11

716

1063

  Notes: This article says that Dr. Matsumoto Chitei became the first Korean woman to earn a Medical Ph.D. degree.

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Uncategorized

President Franklin D. Roosevelt and Prime Minister Winston Churchill crying over the Fall of Singapore in 1942, “If we had only listened to Japan during last fall’s negotiations, we wouldn’t be in such grief”

2022-01-10

705

647

Notes: The sign on the right says “New version of Sankatsu and Hanshichi at the Bar”. This refers to an

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Model Korean Family

In 1942, pro-Imperial Japanese Korean parents boasted that their six children born and raised in Korea could not understand a word of Korean, because they ‘bit to death’ any Korean words which might accidentally slip out of their mouths, for which they were laughed at by other Koreans

2022-01-06

685

1128

  Mr. Minami, who is mentioned in this article as the Governor and the Father of the Korean peninsula, refers

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Recent Posts

  • “Demonic Americans”: How Imperial Japan Tried to Turn Koreans Against U.S. Missionaries in 1944
  • A Rare 1944 Korean–Japanese Bilingual Propaganda Poster Promoting Forced Labor Conscription
  • Terrified by rumors of forced labor conscription under the Imperial Army, young Korean women rushed into marriages to escape, prompting officials to hold April 1944 press conference to deny and deflect
  • Koreans tried to bribe their way out of Imperial Japan’s forced labor conscription, but patriotic student informants turned them in (June 1945)
  • In 1944, Imperial Japan launched an “all-out campaign” to erase Hangul from public life, mobilizing teachers and Korean youth to destroy Korean signs, books, and even phonograph records

Recent Comments

  • vong quay on Imperial officials fanned out across rural Korea visiting townships one by one to indoctrinate villagers in Imperialist ideology in ‘Grassroots Penetration’ Campaign (March 1944)
  • act-two on Koiso’s 1943 ‘Great Leader’ Strongman Tours: Surprise village inspections to intimidate local leaders and impose Japanese language and culture all over the Korean countryside
  • laser marking machine on Koiso’s 1943 ‘Great Leader’ Strongman Tours: Surprise village inspections to intimidate local leaders and impose Japanese language and culture all over the Korean countryside
  • zorse on April 1945 Seoul dining: the public endured price-gouging and scraps, while privileged Japanese and Korean collaborator elites drank and feasted behind closed doors

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  • Imperial Japanese penal official said Korean 'ideological criminals' (independence activists) were 'not well made as human beings', but 'if only their thoughts could be corrected, then they will get better' so they can be 'used' for wartime labor, but 'this is not the case with ordinary criminals'
  • Nostalgia for Imperial Japan and its undercurrents in Kishi Nobusuke's legacy in postwar Japan, in Park Chung-hee and Chun Doo-hwan's legacy in South Korea, and why access to wartime newspapers of Japan-occupied Korea is important to combat historical misinformation by the far-right in both countries
  • Simon Young Kim (김영근), a South Korean violin virtuoso and disciple of famous violinist Jascha Heifetz, Simon was once my teacher and mentor, and his son was my best friend in elementary school
Exposing Imperial Japan
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