Why people need to be educated...

A recent opinion piece from the Tri-City Herald is making the rounds among Japanese Americans (JA) and JA-related groups on Facebook.  An associate professor of philosophy and political science at Columbia Basin College in the state of Washington wrote an opinion piece in which he states that "racism" was not one of the reasons for the incarceration of people of Japanese ancestry during the Second World War.  He cites evidence to support his position.  As I read this piece, I was saddened that an academic, whose expertise is supposedly in philosophy and political science, would present such a biased and poorly documented opinion piece.  In essence, he should know better.

Much of what he presents is one-sided, misleading, or just wrong.  I thought I'd just point out some examples.

•  He cites Japanese aggression, atrocities, and war crimes as part of America's prejudice against Japanese.  He notes this is not racist per se, but simply anger directed at Americans of Japanese ancestry, simply because of guilt by association.  However, this is actually racism.  It's also funny that some of the aggression and atrocities he cites occurred after the incarceration began, so those things could not have been a factor in the incarceration.
• He concludes a part of his opinion piece with "Before pontificating about American mistreatment in the relocation camps, critics should acknowledge the horrendous war crimes perpetrated by Imperial Japan."  First, most "critics" do acknowledge that what the Japanese did during the war was horrific and did constitute war crimes.  However, what do things Japan did during the war have to do with the way we treated our own citizens?  The statement he makes simply comes across as seeing just dark hair and slanted eyes.  Remember, two-thirds of the individuals incarcerated during the war were US citizens.  What others did should have no bearing on how we treat our own citizens, who were supposed to have rights.
• rticle129076019.html#storylink=cpy
  He presents numbers of individuals incarcerated from the "glass half full" perspective.  He notes the low number of individuals incarcerated in Hawaii, some left camps to attend college, others to work, and some served in the US military.  These statements show he does not understand Executive Order 9066 (EO9066) and its implications.  EO9066 essentially carves up America and its territories into military districts and give local military commanders the authority to decide who could or could not remain in these districts.  Essentially gave those military commanders carte blanche authority to do what they thought was necessary to protect their military installations.  Lt. Gen. Delos Emmons decides not to do mass incarceration of people of Japanese ancestry in Hawaii.  This accounts for the relatively low numbers of individuals who were incarcerated, mostly due to the ABC list and other secret govt. initiatives.  In contrast, Lt. Gen. John DeWitt of the Western Defense Command declares individuals of Japanese ancestry to be a threat and creates exclusion zones along the west coast.  DeWitt is quoted as saying "A Jap's a Jap, makes no difference if the Jap's a citizen or not."  I would say, that's a bit racist.  In fact, in many of his declarations, Lt. Gen. DeWitt included individuals of German and Italian ancestry, but also afforded those groups exceptions.  In all cases, he was careful to state that his declarations applied to "all persons of Japanese ancestry," meaning no exceptions were granted to them.  Again, I'd say that's a bit racist.  Also, the Federal Govt chose some of the camp locations with the intention of leveraging the camp populations for labor.  This was especially true in farm country like Wyoming, where the govt expected young men to leave either to join the military or work in war industries in the cities.  This would leave a labor gap, which the local farmers were happy to fill with the young men of Japanese ancestry at the nearby War Location Authority Camps.  These individuals didn't just get to leave camp, they had to be vetted and obtain a pass. 
• He cites the "thousands" of people of German and Italian ancestry that were incarcerated during the war.  This statement is only partly true.  The 1940 Census counted a little over 127,000 individuals of Japanese ancestry, two-thirds of them US citizens, in the 48 contiguous states.  Of those, approximately 123,000 were incarcerated in various camps.  The same census counted a little over 5.2 million individuals of German ancestry and about 4.6 million individuals of Italian ancestry.  Of those, approximately 12,000 individuals of German ancestry and less than 500 individuals of Italian ancestry were incarcerated into various camps.  I would say the glass isn't quite half full.  I should emphasize that EO9066 was not specific to people of Japanese ancestry nor did it specifically say people would be incarcerated.  However, EO9066 was issued to facilitate the incarceration of people for any reason.
• He cites spy activity as partial justification.  He cites the one Japanese naval officer assigned to the Japanese Consulate in Hawaii prior to the war who provided much of the intelligence on Pearl Harbor prior to the attack.  The US knew of this individual and one individual spy hardly constitutes the wave of spy activity cited immediately after the war began.  He also cites the Niihau incident, which arguably could be a case for locals aiding a downed Japanese pilot, but it's a complex story that tends to be diluted down to a locals being Japanese sympathizers.  Finally, he cites activities in the Philippines, which has little to no relevance to the situation in the US.  In fact, the US intelligence apparatus had a pretty good tab on what was going on in terms of spy and espionage activity and Japan's plans for these here in the homeland.  As cited in one govt report, "Japanese are hampered as spies and saboteurs, because of their easily distinguishable physical appearance."  There are govt documents supporting the notion that the govt knew there was no real concern for espionage activity.
• He cites that loyalties were "vetted" in camp and that some proportion essentially failed the test.  Yes, there were some who renounced their American citizenship, mostly because their country had abandoned them, not because they had an affection for Japan.  Yes, some of the Japanese nationals thought Japan would win the war and were supporters.  But, again, two-thirds of those incarcerated were US citizens.  The two questions he cites, known as questions 27 and 28, were the key questions in the so-called loyalty questionnaire.  Question 27 essentially asked if you'd be willing to serve in the US armed forces and defend American anywhere and anyhow.  Some took pause at this question, fearing they may be sent to the Pacific theater of war and could end up shooting at relatives on the other side.  So they would answer "no."  Question 28 was more complicated.  The phrase in the middle "...will you forswear any allegiance to the Japanese Emperor or any other foreign government or power?" was problematic.  Some answered "no," because they had no allegiance to the Japanese Emperor or other foreign power.  How could they forswear something they didn't have?  They were Americans.  Others were more cynical and thought if they answered "yes," then the govt would use that as justification to arrest them, since they would essentially be admitting to having an allegiance to the Japanese Emperor, which they didn't.  Sadly, the only correct answer to these two questions were "yes" and providing any other answer had serious implications.  I wonder how the writer of the opinion piece would handle such a questionnaire under similar circumstances?

As a final point, in the research conducted for the coram nobis cases of Minoru Yasui, Fred Korematsu, and Gordon Hirabayashi and for the reparations movement, previously private or secret govt documents became public.  Among them, the Munson Report, which concluded there was no need to incarcerate people of Japanese ancestry if we went to war with Japan, a draft copy of Lt. Gen. John DeWitt's request to exclude and incarcerate people of Japanese ancestry from his command that clearly showed his justification was mostly race-based, and other memos and documents showing the govt was careful not to look racist in its policy toward people of Japanese ancestry during the war.  In fact, there is documentation of a phone conversation between Lt. Gen. John DeWitt and Justice Department officials telling DeWitt to tone down his language in his request, because the Federal Govt could not appear to be racist.

So, I would like to invite the professor who wrote this opinion piece to visit the Japanese American National Museum here in Los Angeles.  I'm a volunteer docent at the museum and would be happy to give you a tour.  Learn about the Japanese American experience and learn why much of what you wrote is misinformed.  Learn that what happened 75 years ago is relevant to today's national dialog.  Just because politicians and national leaders supported the incarceration back in 1941 didn't make it right back then, and it doesn't make it right today.  In fact, the parallels with today are somewhat uncanny and are an embodiment of the phrase "history repeats itself."  At the end of the day, we can't just live in our bubbles and yell at each other.  Educating people is the most important thing, so we don't repeat that part of our history that was not the best of America.

#EO9066   #LetsMakeAmericaBuenoAgain