fyi.. >X-From_: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Thu Sep 13 18:28:48 2001 >Delivered-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >Approved-By: H-Japan Editor <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >Date: Thu, 13 Sep 2001 21:28:41 -0400 >Reply-To: H-NET/KIAPS List for Japanese History <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >Sender: H-NET/KIAPS List for Japanese History <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >From: H-Japan Editor <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >Subject: H-Japan (E): Pearl Harbor, a dangerous analogy >To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > H-JAPAN > September 13, 2001 > > > >From: Stephen Vlastos [[EMAIL PROTECTED]] >Subject: Pearl Harbor, a dangerous analogy > >Yesterday I felt strongly the need to respond to the misuse of Pearl >Harbor in relationship to the terrorist attacks of September 11. I paste >in the guest column I sent in the University of Iowa student newspaper, >The Daily Iowan. > > > >"Recalling Roosevelt's Day of Infamy" > > Echoing the most memorable quote from President Roosevelt's >address to Congress on December 8, 1941, the banner headline in today's >Daily Iowan proclaimed "A Day of Infamy." The Iowa City Gazette featured >on its front page Senator Charles Hagel's (R-Nebraska) statement, "This is >the second Pearl Harbor." > >Almost as a reflex, politicians, television pundits and many ordinary >Americans likened the attack on the World Trade Center to Pearl Harbor. It >is a dangerous use of historical analogy. At Pearl Harbor the perpetrator >was a nation state; the attack was by uniformed armed forces; the object >of the attack was a prime military target; U.S. leaders knew an attack >was imminent; and the appropriate and necessary response was crystal >clear: mobilization for total war. None of these conditions hold in the >World Trade Center attack. > >But if Pearl Harbor is now at the forefront of political discourse, then >Americans need to be reminded of the surge of hate and hysteria against >Japanese Americans that followed December 7, 1941. Two months after Pearl >Harbor President Roosevelt recorded his own personal "day of infamy." On >February 19, 1942 he issued Executive Order 9066, which set in motion the >gravest abuse of human rights perpetrated by the federal government in the >20th century: the incarceration of more than 70,000 American citizens and >50,000 resident aliens who were guilty of nothing but being of Japanese >ancestry. > >It is widely assumed that the perpetrators of yesterday's abominable >attacks were Islamic terrorist affiliated with the Saudi exile Osama bin >Laden. Conditions are ripe for compounding yesterday's tragedy by >condemning all Arabs (and Muslims) through guilt by association. The >parallels between the situations of Japanese Americans prior to Pearl >Harbor and Arab Americans today are frightening. Four decades of >discrimination and virulent "yellow peril" media representations preceded >Executive Order 9066. In the decade prior to Pearl Harbor Japanese >American bore the onus of public condemnation of Japan's military >aggression in China. No wonder Roosevelt could order Japanese Americans >into concentration camps virtually without public dissent. > >Particularly since the oil embargo following the 1973 Arab-Israeli war, >Arabs as a people have been uniquely demonized in America. For decades >Arab Americans have been subjected to a degree of negative ethnic >profiling and discrimination simply not tolerated (at least publicly) for >any other population. Grotesque media distortions of Arab culture, >religion and politics reinforce stereotypes of Arab Americans as uniquely >threatening and un-American: insular, treacherous, unfathomable. > >History does not need to repeat itself. Sixty years after Pearl Harbor let >us hope it is possible for Americans to rise above guilt by association, >disavow ethnic stereotyping, and condemn only those individuals and groups >that perpetrated yesterday's tragedy. > >Stephen Vlastos >Professor of Japanese History & Director of the University of Iowa Center >for Asian and Pacific Studies. >335-2221 (o) >338-8337 (h) > > >******************************************************** >H-Japan encourages authors to append a summary of their >message in Japanese when writing in English and in English >when writing in Japanese. >******************************************************** ------------------------ Yahoo! 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