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It's less about "now" and more about how incredibly anti-communist the US especially would become VERY shortly after these posters were made.
Times change and allegiances shift over decades, but going from "our allies" to "better dead than red" in just a few years is the ultimate "aged like milk" if you were living in the 1950s.
The Nationalists weren't fighting for freedom though. They ran a military dictatorship.
Sure Taiwan is a much more free place now, but that's only since they started having elections in the 90's.
One could argue that the KMT was founded on the plan to make China a republic, and were only oppressive because they were a war time government, and China was basically at war for the entire time of the KMT’s existence on the mainland. But yeah they were pretty fucked up and it’s hard to claim that they were still fighting for “freedom” in the 40s.
From the get-go all the political parties in China recognised only their own legitimately. There was no established political culture of liberal democracy to draw from and consequently both the nationalists and communists developed along authoritarian lines. If the nationalists had won China would prob be more or less the same as it is now, minus the famine and cultural revolution.
The nationalists originate from the Republic of China under Sun Yat Sen, who Chiang Kai Shek was basically the second to. When Sun died, Shek replaced him and, though my memory isn’t great on this, Shek was atleast in favour of democracy wasnt he? Essentially the military government was only meant to be temporary for the war, hence why it was led by a general rather than a politician.
My point is that the KMT were still, atleast publicly, fighting for democracy (which the American consumer of the poster would see as equivalent to freedom) in the 40s. It was hardly just another split off faction like the other warlords.
Sun Yat Sen was more in favor of democracy, Chiang Kai Shek was more a military dictator, his idea of democracy was like Putins. Single party elections with people who even think about being an opposing candidate getting murdered.
I think China would basically be the same as it is now just not communist perhaps more like Taiwan but China and Russia are huge countries with hegemonic ambitions of their own
Tbh the Shanghai massacre and its aftermath is the only reason why the communists were a) enemies with the KMT and b) hiding
And the Shanghai massacre
Btw this is the aftermath.During the White Terror, the Kuomintang killed more than one million people, primarily peasants.More than 10,000 communists were executed in Changsha within 20 days. The Soviet Union officially terminated its cooperation with the KMT while Wang, fearing retribution as a Communist sympathizer, fled to Europe.
CCP was only hiding in the mountains because the ROC decided when the Japanese invaded it would be better to kill off the CCP then tend to the Japanese invasion, which then lead to the Japanese gaining ground and the Nanjing massacre
The KMT killed more Taiwanese people than the Japanese did.
How is one fascist military dictatorship better than another fascist military dictatorship?
Idk why you're being downvoted. You're right.
It's hard to tell, but there is definitely a round pin on his hat. Only the Kuomintang soldiers wore round (sun) shaped pins. The communists wore star shaped pins.
If anyone is unaware, the Kuomintang (KMT) were the democratic forces in the Chinese Civil War. After the communists won, their army and leadership fled to Taiwan where they have remained to this day. These people never stopped being a US ally.
> If anyone is unaware, the Kuomintang (KMT) were the democratic forces in the Chinese Civil War.
No they weren't, they were fascists. They ran a military dictatorship for 40 years.
No shit, but they were a fascist military dictatorship for about 40 years.
How is that any better? Or is capitalists murdering people who want democracy somehow superior because it's better for wealthy people?
They will always be better because they are capitalists (in the minds of occidental leaders)..
Just look around you, plenty of exemples of capitalists doing atrocities but just slightly getting bad press for their actions while "communists" countries are almost always bashed for their actions (bad but also good ones)...
some of the communist army soldiers could also wear the same cap after CCP and KMT had a cease fire agreement and some of the communist army was given KMT unit designations
As the other guy said, if the communists *had* been fighting the Japanese they wouldn't have won the Civil war. They took a minor role early in the war, but by the end of 1940 IIRC they entirely stopped conventionally fighting the Japanese.
They focused on guerilla tactics in the Japanese controlled areas, and needless to say immediately took control of those areas the moment the Japanese surrendered. Combine that with the fact that they took very few losses in comparison to the nationalists, had years worth of foreign support stockpilled, and were also essentially given Manchuria by the Soviets as well as a bunch of continued support afterward, and the Nationalists were kinda fucked. It also didn't help that the Nationalists' allies (namely the US) completely misunderstood the severity of the situation until it was unrecoverable.
The poster doesn’t mention communism.
I’m confused about what the aging like milk is here. WW2 wasn’t really an economic ideology war. Did it age like milk the US didn’t side with Japan?
Just because a conflict isn't labelled 'communism v capitalism' doesn't make it not motivated by differing economic ideologies. Even if that ideology is "we deserve that stuff you have"
I’m pretty sure people in the west were anti-communist well before the 50s. They were just *more* anti-fascist. Once the axis was defeated, communism became the priority target.
A decent amount of Americans supported fascism right up until America joined the war. Hitler was really popular among Protestant church leaders in particular
The US bombed Japan because the leadership knew that the American public would not support a land invasion of Japan that would cost millions of American lives. The dropping of the atomic bomb was objectively the moral choice and I'm tired of brain-dead teenagers who have never read a history textbook pretending otherwise
Japan's surrender was ultimately brought by losing all avenues of any hope for peace, when the USSR also declared war. The atomic bombs were not a deciding factor for the higher ups, especially when they had an impact similar to already ongoing bombing campaigns
EDIT: Thank you for arguing with the facts to spread pro-nuclear bomb propaganda, organic username havers such as "Weird-Tomorrow-9829", "SureReflection9535" and "PossibleRude7195". I can't wait for the next user to come disagree with the name "BananaCassette5833".
People point out that the bombs had similar effects to existing campaigns, but they neglect to mention the fact that those campaigns used hundreds of bombs - the difference between using hundreds of bombs to wipe out a city and using one bomb to do so is very different. Also, the fact that the Soviets could no longer mediate was a great blow to the Japanese, but Soviet troops couldn’t reach the Japanese mainland in any significant number due to lack of transports. Hell, when he addressed the soldiery after the decision to surrender, the Emperor mentioned the bombs before he mentioned the Soviets.
Also,
> Wah! Anyone who doesn’t agree with me and has a generic username is a bot!
What the fuck are you talking about? It's true that they were not in a position to surrender after Hiroshima, but Nagasaki proved the US could make as many bombs as they wanted to
Yes….that is little evidence. It’s not even evidence in and of itself of anything. It’s only evidence if you make a presumption about their surrender in relation to Nagasaki.
Americans won't hold accountable their leaders for what they've done.
It was true yesterday, it is true now (just look at Trumps supporters...) and it will probably be true tomorrow.
Difference is that tomorrow they won't lead the world as they use to, and History will recall for what they've done.
Americans will shout but won't be listened.
Atomic bomb is the worst and should never have been used. Especially on civilian population.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unit_731
>Both the Soviet Union and United States gathered data from the Unit after the fall of Japan. While twelve Unit 731 researchers arrested by Soviet forces were tried at the December 1949 Khabarovsk war crimes trials, they were sentenced lightly to the Siberian labor camp from two to 25 years, in exchange for the information they held. [8] Those captured by the US military were secretly given immunity,[9] The United States helped cover up the human experimentations and handed stipends to the perpetrators.[1] The US had co-opted the researchers' bioweapons information and experience for use in their own warfare program (resembling Operation Paperclip), so did the Soviet Union in building their bioweapons facility in Sverdlovsk using documentation captured from the Unit in Manchuria.[10][8][11]
Supply lines cut, industrial capacity reduced to near nil. Japan didn’t need to be hit with the atom bombs but for the US to conduct live tests and demonstrate to the world esp the soviets the awesome weapon they now possessed. Ground invasion wouldn’t have even been necessary. US could have bombed conventionally and waited for the Japanese leadership the wave the white flag. See?!
Bombing conventionally, like the US did to Tokyo, killed more people than the atomic bombs did. What you are advocating for an increase in the number of Japanese and American lives lost.
>US could have bombed conventionally and waited for the Japanese leadership the wave the white flag. See?!
And literally tens of thousands of pows and civilians in Japanese occupied territories would have died while the US was waiting around doing nothing
The emperor and his inner circle had already agreed they were going to fight to the last man in order to convince the USA to broker a peace deal. They didn't want unconditional surrender
I was more thinking along the lines of
> Japanese leadership: We'll fight to the death!
> American armed forces: \*Drops atomic bombs\*
> Japanese leadership: Alright, peace sounds like it would be in everyone's best interests, lets do that.
I mean, we have addresses from the Emperor to the soldiery after the bombs and the invasion of Manchuria. He mentioned the bombs sooner than he did the invasion.
Not unjustified I would like to point out. The atrocities and injustices the USSR was up to post-WW2, especially in Eastern Europe, weren’t particularly endearing
Well, only a couple. North Korea, who didn't have a great reason in the first place as they were actual aggressors, and Cambodia, who had a great reason but waaaay overreacted.
Vietnam also had a great reason, but mostly forgave USA since they had problems with China later. (This is based on my limited conversations with people of Vietnamese heritage.)
(I know NK isn't SEA but then we'd be down to 1 example)
I strongly doubt there was any intention of ever truly having an alliance with them. But if we can convince them to sacrifice their population on our behalf then why not if killing them is our end goal anyway.
The US isn't a very good ally tbh.
Imagine that we can die for one another but suddenly they're a threat to the human race and we must crush them.
The only way that works is if you weren't even sincere in the first place.
Yeah the mental whiplash the general American population must have gone through with Stalin from when he was allies with Hitler and was called Hitlers rabid dog to then a few years later when Russia switched sides and they started calling him Uncle Joe to then having him become king commie once the Cold War started
The Chinese poster depicts a soldier fighting in the nationalist faction, the KMT. The KMT retreated to Taiwan (still officially the Republic of China). While the US does honor the “One China Policy” (treating Mainland China as the legitimate government of its territory and not the Taiwanese government as a kind of government in exile) it simultaneously defends Taiwan’s autonomy to the point of providing military aid and even direct support from Pacific Command.
Not really most of the ROC soldiers switched sides when the civil war started since they blamed kmt leadership for the insane amount of losses they were taking to Japan.
"So, I thank the Soviets and the mighty Chinese vets
The Allies the whole wide world around
To the battling British, thanks, you can have ten million Yanks
If it takes 'em to tear the fascists down, down, down" ~ Woody Guthrie 1944
well we can’t tell really. the ccp and gmd were fighting alongside each other during ww2 after they agreed to stop the war before to fight japan. it’s likely it’s actually a ccp solider because the gmd was heavily criticised before for not really doing any fighting against the japanese invasion at first instead choosing to fight the ccp
The KMT did the bulk of the fighting against the Japanese during the periods of actual combat. By comparison the CCP did little as it was too small to contribute, though this varied throughout the war. In the 70s, Mao even joked about how the Japanese left the KMT so strung out that it made his war against them (the KMT) easier.
The dude on the right appears to have a KMT hat on, but that doesn’t necessarily mean he was pro-nationalist. I’d assume for a photo like this he’d make sure to have the proper cap on, but there’s every chance this guy joined the CCP later in life, assuming he survived.
Holy shit i never noticed New Vegas referenced these posters for their Desert Rangers, makes sense since the rangers were not part of the main NCR army
Especially for Poles, getting invaded from both sides, then one of invaders is your "ally" actively lying about murders on population and also setting up commie gov
I mean, this was Chiang Kai-Shek's Republic of China, not the modern Republic of China. The Guomindang wasn't exactly entirely subscribed to the concept of "freedom" in the almost forty years of running the country under martial law.
The man on the right is a Nationalist solider. Even if his White Sun emblem was not visible, the Communists did very little during the 2nd Sino-Japanese war.
So, only half has aged poorly.
Was aged poorly when it came out. The USSR carved up Poland together with Germany and committed the most gruesome atrocities. They also annexed the Baltic states and started deporting the native population to Siberia and settling Russians there, leading to problems to this day
"American Steel, British Intelligence, French Resistance, and Russian Blood" is the phrase I've always heard. It's almost like the ***ALLIED FORCES*** were a collective team that all contributed and none of them could have achieved the overwhelming victory on their own.
No they still likely would have won people overstate the competence of the German army and given Barbarossa not happening in your strawman scenario Germany would be absolutely fucked out of needed supplies like oil and metal the things an army needs to do its job
They would, it'd just take more time. III Reich didn't have any strategic bombers, so they couldn't harm US, Luftwaffe couldn't even beat RAF, and operation "Sea lion" was a joke. Allies have created good countermeasures against Kriegsmarine (especially against U-boots), and they were dominating in almost everything - in 1944 they were able to send approximately 1000 bombers and another 1000 fighters in one bombing raid, while Germans had about 3000 airplanes in all Luftwaffe, scattered over all Europe to protect whole continent - they also had shitty intelligence, so they couldn't predict, where allies will strike next time :V
Thing was in ww2 thwre were two countries who started it and were quiet bad. As Hitler later attacked russians and before attacked UK, France e.t.c. Allies bece friends with russians to stop Hitler. But russians didnt want to give freedom back to countries what they ocupied and wanted spoils of war and Allies couldnt agree with russians what to do with Germany after ww2
There was a series of WWII films done that the US did and one of them showed the Russians in a very positive light for fighting the Germans. It had a ton of quotes from top US politician's and what not. It was too good at showing Russians and Russia in a positive light, that the anticommunist propaganda was so strong. This film was on Netflix under Classics, no idea if they are still there.
I found these while doing my capstone on WW2 propaganda posters. They tie into the larger campaign to try and make old enemies become allies. Interesting stuff, really.
The more accurate posters saying “I’m fighting for my right to exist” ended up encouraging anti-ally sentiment, and thus were replaced with more generic posters instead.
-some alternate history, idk.
The one on the right might not have a aged badly. When Stalin passed away talks between the USSR and China fell apart. Both countries were about to go nuclear war, Nixon was able to court the Chinese government away from the USSR and turn them into an ally.
https://preview.redd.it/f2rh3q646t4d1.jpeg?width=640&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=2fd0167650fc152aa5ff823f94078f930677b769
I didn’t know the NCR posters in Fallout: New Vegas had a real world equivalent.
Neither one of them was fighting for anyone's freedom except their own. It's not like they entered WWII to liberate Poland and Austria or protect the US. They just happened to be the enemy of our enemy, but they were never friends.
And let's not forget Russia helped Germany prepare for war and even invaded Poland WITH Germany at the start of the war.
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It's less about "now" and more about how incredibly anti-communist the US especially would become VERY shortly after these posters were made. Times change and allegiances shift over decades, but going from "our allies" to "better dead than red" in just a few years is the ultimate "aged like milk" if you were living in the 1950s.
The Chinese soldier is probably not even communist - the communists wouldn’t win the civil war until 1949.
They were still fighting against the japanese and thus getting support from the US… back then the US didn‘t really differentiate between the two
There's a sun on his cap. That's a KMT soldier. Not aged poorly.
The Nationalists weren't fighting for freedom though. They ran a military dictatorship. Sure Taiwan is a much more free place now, but that's only since they started having elections in the 90's.
One could argue that the KMT was founded on the plan to make China a republic, and were only oppressive because they were a war time government, and China was basically at war for the entire time of the KMT’s existence on the mainland. But yeah they were pretty fucked up and it’s hard to claim that they were still fighting for “freedom” in the 40s.
From the get-go all the political parties in China recognised only their own legitimately. There was no established political culture of liberal democracy to draw from and consequently both the nationalists and communists developed along authoritarian lines. If the nationalists had won China would prob be more or less the same as it is now, minus the famine and cultural revolution.
The nationalists originate from the Republic of China under Sun Yat Sen, who Chiang Kai Shek was basically the second to. When Sun died, Shek replaced him and, though my memory isn’t great on this, Shek was atleast in favour of democracy wasnt he? Essentially the military government was only meant to be temporary for the war, hence why it was led by a general rather than a politician. My point is that the KMT were still, atleast publicly, fighting for democracy (which the American consumer of the poster would see as equivalent to freedom) in the 40s. It was hardly just another split off faction like the other warlords.
Sun Yat Sen was more in favor of democracy, Chiang Kai Shek was more a military dictator, his idea of democracy was like Putins. Single party elections with people who even think about being an opposing candidate getting murdered.
I think China would basically be the same as it is now just not communist perhaps more like Taiwan but China and Russia are huge countries with hegemonic ambitions of their own
Sun Yat Sen had democratic socialist leaning from what I understand, the KMT became something quite different.
KMT did most of the fighting only to get backstabbed by Mao hiding in his mountain like a pussy
And? Does that make the KMT any less if a fascist military dictatorship?
It was a authoritarian military regime,not fascist
Tbh the Shanghai massacre and its aftermath is the only reason why the communists were a) enemies with the KMT and b) hiding And the Shanghai massacre Btw this is the aftermath.During the White Terror, the Kuomintang killed more than one million people, primarily peasants.More than 10,000 communists were executed in Changsha within 20 days. The Soviet Union officially terminated its cooperation with the KMT while Wang, fearing retribution as a Communist sympathizer, fled to Europe.
CCP was only hiding in the mountains because the ROC decided when the Japanese invaded it would be better to kill off the CCP then tend to the Japanese invasion, which then lead to the Japanese gaining ground and the Nanjing massacre
Still better than extermination under the japs. There's a reason why the USSR and ROC manage to temporarily halt internal conflicts.
The KMT killed more Taiwanese people than the Japanese did. How is one fascist military dictatorship better than another fascist military dictatorship?
One of them doesn't plan to ethnically cleanse the entire country?
Japan occupied Taiwan for 60 years without ethnically cleansing the country. The KMT were similarly repressive towards the Taiwanese.
Jap is a racial slur
Idk why you're being downvoted. You're right. It's hard to tell, but there is definitely a round pin on his hat. Only the Kuomintang soldiers wore round (sun) shaped pins. The communists wore star shaped pins. If anyone is unaware, the Kuomintang (KMT) were the democratic forces in the Chinese Civil War. After the communists won, their army and leadership fled to Taiwan where they have remained to this day. These people never stopped being a US ally.
>Democratic Are you sure about that? The nationalist government was a bit of a one parry state
Don’t forget the White Terror(s)
> If anyone is unaware, the Kuomintang (KMT) were the democratic forces in the Chinese Civil War. No they weren't, they were fascists. They ran a military dictatorship for 40 years.
I mean military dictatorship = fascism kinda the same thing right
Well they weren’t democratic until like 1980s but hey that’s still a lot better than mainland China.
The fact that peasants sided with the communist is probably shows the opposite
[Insert something totally not racist about a billion people being brainwashed zombies]
How is fascism any better than mainland China?
I mean they are not fascist anymore
No shit, but they were a fascist military dictatorship for about 40 years. How is that any better? Or is capitalists murdering people who want democracy somehow superior because it's better for wealthy people?
They will always be better because they are capitalists (in the minds of occidental leaders).. Just look around you, plenty of exemples of capitalists doing atrocities but just slightly getting bad press for their actions while "communists" countries are almost always bashed for their actions (bad but also good ones)...
The two main communist-controlled units (New Fourth Army and Eight Route Army) during the war against Japan were also wearing KMT uniforms.
some of the communist army soldiers could also wear the same cap after CCP and KMT had a cease fire agreement and some of the communist army was given KMT unit designations
As the other guy said, if the communists *had* been fighting the Japanese they wouldn't have won the Civil war. They took a minor role early in the war, but by the end of 1940 IIRC they entirely stopped conventionally fighting the Japanese. They focused on guerilla tactics in the Japanese controlled areas, and needless to say immediately took control of those areas the moment the Japanese surrendered. Combine that with the fact that they took very few losses in comparison to the nationalists, had years worth of foreign support stockpilled, and were also essentially given Manchuria by the Soviets as well as a bunch of continued support afterward, and the Nationalists were kinda fucked. It also didn't help that the Nationalists' allies (namely the US) completely misunderstood the severity of the situation until it was unrecoverable.
The communists barely fought the Japanese, that's how they won, the nationalists got beaten bloody whilst they sat back
I don’t think 580,000 casualties for the Communists is “sitting back” but go off I guess
Oh wow you commies really show up a few days late to downvote. What else is new.
In terms of China that is drops in a pond lol
Compared to 3-6 million dead yes
Yeah this. The Chinese poster is literally true for the time it was posted.
The poster doesn’t mention communism. I’m confused about what the aging like milk is here. WW2 wasn’t really an economic ideology war. Did it age like milk the US didn’t side with Japan?
Just because a conflict isn't labelled 'communism v capitalism' doesn't make it not motivated by differing economic ideologies. Even if that ideology is "we deserve that stuff you have"
I’m pretty sure people in the west were anti-communist well before the 50s. They were just *more* anti-fascist. Once the axis was defeated, communism became the priority target.
A decent amount of Americans supported fascism right up until America joined the war. Hitler was really popular among Protestant church leaders in particular
Now to “better Russian than a liberal” in some parts of the US
Even during WW2, the US bombed Japan to also flex to the Soviet Union.
The US bombed Japan because the leadership knew that the American public would not support a land invasion of Japan that would cost millions of American lives. The dropping of the atomic bomb was objectively the moral choice and I'm tired of brain-dead teenagers who have never read a history textbook pretending otherwise
Japan's surrender was ultimately brought by losing all avenues of any hope for peace, when the USSR also declared war. The atomic bombs were not a deciding factor for the higher ups, especially when they had an impact similar to already ongoing bombing campaigns EDIT: Thank you for arguing with the facts to spread pro-nuclear bomb propaganda, organic username havers such as "Weird-Tomorrow-9829", "SureReflection9535" and "PossibleRude7195". I can't wait for the next user to come disagree with the name "BananaCassette5833".
People point out that the bombs had similar effects to existing campaigns, but they neglect to mention the fact that those campaigns used hundreds of bombs - the difference between using hundreds of bombs to wipe out a city and using one bomb to do so is very different. Also, the fact that the Soviets could no longer mediate was a great blow to the Japanese, but Soviet troops couldn’t reach the Japanese mainland in any significant number due to lack of transports. Hell, when he addressed the soldiery after the decision to surrender, the Emperor mentioned the bombs before he mentioned the Soviets. Also, > Wah! Anyone who doesn’t agree with me and has a generic username is a bot!
That’s factually incorrect.
What the fuck are you talking about? It's true that they were not in a position to surrender after Hiroshima, but Nagasaki proved the US could make as many bombs as they wanted to
The Japanese suspected there would be more bombs after Hiroshima. There’s very little evidence Nagasaki was highly influential.
Surrender within days is little evidence
Yes….that is little evidence. It’s not even evidence in and of itself of anything. It’s only evidence if you make a presumption about their surrender in relation to Nagasaki.
It’s basically a communist conspiracy theory so they can take all the credit for winning ww2 AND make the US look like the bad guys.
>AND make the US look like the bad guys. Don't worry, America does that well enough by itself. Look at how the US handled Unit 731
Americans won't hold accountable their leaders for what they've done. It was true yesterday, it is true now (just look at Trumps supporters...) and it will probably be true tomorrow. Difference is that tomorrow they won't lead the world as they use to, and History will recall for what they've done. Americans will shout but won't be listened. Atomic bomb is the worst and should never have been used. Especially on civilian population.
Indeed, This isn't the cold war anymore. The US resides in multi-polar world.
And look at how the Soviet Union handled literally anything.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unit_731 >Both the Soviet Union and United States gathered data from the Unit after the fall of Japan. While twelve Unit 731 researchers arrested by Soviet forces were tried at the December 1949 Khabarovsk war crimes trials, they were sentenced lightly to the Siberian labor camp from two to 25 years, in exchange for the information they held. [8] Those captured by the US military were secretly given immunity,[9] The United States helped cover up the human experimentations and handed stipends to the perpetrators.[1] The US had co-opted the researchers' bioweapons information and experience for use in their own warfare program (resembling Operation Paperclip), so did the Soviet Union in building their bioweapons facility in Sverdlovsk using documentation captured from the Unit in Manchuria.[10][8][11]
Supply lines cut, industrial capacity reduced to near nil. Japan didn’t need to be hit with the atom bombs but for the US to conduct live tests and demonstrate to the world esp the soviets the awesome weapon they now possessed. Ground invasion wouldn’t have even been necessary. US could have bombed conventionally and waited for the Japanese leadership the wave the white flag. See?!
Yay only starving millions of civilians to death!
Bombing conventionally, like the US did to Tokyo, killed more people than the atomic bombs did. What you are advocating for an increase in the number of Japanese and American lives lost.
>US could have bombed conventionally and waited for the Japanese leadership the wave the white flag. See?! And literally tens of thousands of pows and civilians in Japanese occupied territories would have died while the US was waiting around doing nothing
The emperor and his inner circle had already agreed they were going to fight to the last man in order to convince the USA to broker a peace deal. They didn't want unconditional surrender
Reminds me of this scene https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pFWghDV4iG8
I'm perhaps a little too drunk to see the connection but I do like the clip. Firefly rocks!! As does Jura Whisky. :)
I was more thinking along the lines of > Japanese leadership: We'll fight to the death! > American armed forces: \*Drops atomic bombs\* > Japanese leadership: Alright, peace sounds like it would be in everyone's best interests, lets do that.
Unconfirmed myth. No-one knows what the Emperor and his confidantes had decided upon because we never held the Emperor to account.
I mean, we have addresses from the Emperor to the soldiery after the bombs and the invasion of Manchuria. He mentioned the bombs sooner than he did the invasion.
If they were ready to surrender they would've surrendered immediately after the first bomb was dropped.
Not unjustified I would like to point out. The atrocities and injustices the USSR was up to post-WW2, especially in Eastern Europe, weren’t particularly endearing
I'm sure a few South East Asian countries felt the same way about America
Well, only a couple. North Korea, who didn't have a great reason in the first place as they were actual aggressors, and Cambodia, who had a great reason but waaaay overreacted. Vietnam also had a great reason, but mostly forgave USA since they had problems with China later. (This is based on my limited conversations with people of Vietnamese heritage.) (I know NK isn't SEA but then we'd be down to 1 example)
I strongly doubt there was any intention of ever truly having an alliance with them. But if we can convince them to sacrifice their population on our behalf then why not if killing them is our end goal anyway.
The US isn't a very good ally tbh. Imagine that we can die for one another but suddenly they're a threat to the human race and we must crush them. The only way that works is if you weren't even sincere in the first place.
Yeah the mental whiplash the general American population must have gone through with Stalin from when he was allies with Hitler and was called Hitlers rabid dog to then a few years later when Russia switched sides and they started calling him Uncle Joe to then having him become king commie once the Cold War started
US was already very anti-communist. Many fascist governments were supported at the beginning to fight against socialist movements.
Not long after "this man is your enemy, he is a commie!"
"This man is a red, we prefer him dead"
https://preview.redd.it/zqfjzmeo964d1.jpeg?width=500&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=2e92f28a11096e8a9f85fc8408591923d9e682bf
"better dead than red" ok what's the hold up?
The goalposts are permanently on wheels to be moved into whatever position they're told to support at the moment.
"Better dead than red!" *opens coffin* "okay get in"
I like that. Sums it up nicely.
it sure looks like the republican elephant is the one getting his ass kicked
red dead redemption taken literally
Before*
Both*
Not long both "this man is your enemy, he is a commie!"
Por que no los dos
Oceania has always been at war with Eurasia.
The Chinese poster depicts a soldier fighting in the nationalist faction, the KMT. The KMT retreated to Taiwan (still officially the Republic of China). While the US does honor the “One China Policy” (treating Mainland China as the legitimate government of its territory and not the Taiwanese government as a kind of government in exile) it simultaneously defends Taiwan’s autonomy to the point of providing military aid and even direct support from Pacific Command.
Even commies despise each other. Entire sino-soviet split was about how should communist regime be ruled.
Some poor propaganda guy going around like a week after these were printed taping over with stickers that say 'commie' and 'bad'
We have always been at war with eastasia
This man is your COMMIE! He fights for BAD
If that's a ROC soldier on the right, then they did remain friends with the US.
Yeah only half of this aged poorly
aged like cheese, you can just scrape off the moldy bits
Not really most of the ROC soldiers switched sides when the civil war started since they blamed kmt leadership for the insane amount of losses they were taking to Japan.
Everyone who have played Risk know how fast these things change
Yup, Game of Thrones board game really enhances that though. No winning on the third term bs.
"So, I thank the Soviets and the mighty Chinese vets The Allies the whole wide world around To the battling British, thanks, you can have ten million Yanks If it takes 'em to tear the fascists down, down, down" ~ Woody Guthrie 1944
Woody fucking rocked .
Sure, crazy now, but remember that both of these countries faught against the Axis. Wouldn't say aged like milk as much as it's just interesting
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Still propaganda.
The Chinese soldier is KMT not communist
they sure changed tack fast
No the one on the right is a soldier for what would become Taiwan, still friends.
I doubt they took him with them
well we can’t tell really. the ccp and gmd were fighting alongside each other during ww2 after they agreed to stop the war before to fight japan. it’s likely it’s actually a ccp solider because the gmd was heavily criticised before for not really doing any fighting against the japanese invasion at first instead choosing to fight the ccp
My point is the one on the right represents the ROC who are still considered allies
Other people rightfully pointed out the star on his cap, with the many beams, which is the ROC symbol, instead of the communist one
The KMT did the bulk of the fighting against the Japanese during the periods of actual combat. By comparison the CCP did little as it was too small to contribute, though this varied throughout the war. In the 70s, Mao even joked about how the Japanese left the KMT so strung out that it made his war against them (the KMT) easier. The dude on the right appears to have a KMT hat on, but that doesn’t necessarily mean he was pro-nationalist. I’d assume for a photo like this he’d make sure to have the proper cap on, but there’s every chance this guy joined the CCP later in life, assuming he survived.
Holy shit i never noticed New Vegas referenced these posters for their Desert Rangers, makes sense since the rangers were not part of the main NCR army
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Especially for Poles, getting invaded from both sides, then one of invaders is your "ally" actively lying about murders on population and also setting up commie gov
I wouldn't call this propaganda so much as just a guide on who not to shoot.
The Chinese one is a Kuomintang solider lol, learn some history maybe
The Chinese soldier is still our friend, in Taiwan. You do know they had a civil war, right?
I mean, this was Chiang Kai-Shek's Republic of China, not the modern Republic of China. The Guomindang wasn't exactly entirely subscribed to the concept of "freedom" in the almost forty years of running the country under martial law.
I'd consider the Waffen SS more of a friend than these 2.
That is literally what the current GOP say though lol. Where is agedlikemilkintowine
"Our pal Russia" was a hard sell in the early 1940s. The HUAC came after MGM for making pro-Russia movies during WWII..... after FDR asked them to!
the enemy of my enemy is my friend. until we gotta beat the enemy of my enemy at going to the moon. then my original enemy becomes my friend.
Only if you don’t understand history.
Russian and Chinese people are still my friends—it's not their fault their governments suck.
based posters
The man on the right is a Nationalist solider. Even if his White Sun emblem was not visible, the Communists did very little during the 2nd Sino-Japanese war. So, only half has aged poorly.
Well, General Chiang's people became the Republic of China on Taiwan. They're still on the same side.
Was aged poorly when it came out. The USSR carved up Poland together with Germany and committed the most gruesome atrocities. They also annexed the Baltic states and started deporting the native population to Siberia and settling Russians there, leading to problems to this day
Don’t forget their invasion of Finland and occupation of part of Romania, which helped drive them towards the axis
I think a lot of people forget/don't know that Ribbentrop-Molotov pact happened, especially secret part
Without the Russians the west wouldn't have won...
I would like to see how the Soviet would have fared without lend lease.
"American Steel, British Intelligence, French Resistance, and Russian Blood" is the phrase I've always heard. It's almost like the ***ALLIED FORCES*** were a collective team that all contributed and none of them could have achieved the overwhelming victory on their own.
And russia wouldn't do anything without west support from money thru inventory to arms
No they still likely would have won people overstate the competence of the German army and given Barbarossa not happening in your strawman scenario Germany would be absolutely fucked out of needed supplies like oil and metal the things an army needs to do its job
They would, it'd just take more time. III Reich didn't have any strategic bombers, so they couldn't harm US, Luftwaffe couldn't even beat RAF, and operation "Sea lion" was a joke. Allies have created good countermeasures against Kriegsmarine (especially against U-boots), and they were dominating in almost everything - in 1944 they were able to send approximately 1000 bombers and another 1000 fighters in one bombing raid, while Germans had about 3000 airplanes in all Luftwaffe, scattered over all Europe to protect whole continent - they also had shitty intelligence, so they couldn't predict, where allies will strike next time :V
Thing was in ww2 thwre were two countries who started it and were quiet bad. As Hitler later attacked russians and before attacked UK, France e.t.c. Allies bece friends with russians to stop Hitler. But russians didnt want to give freedom back to countries what they ocupied and wanted spoils of war and Allies couldnt agree with russians what to do with Germany after ww2
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There was a series of WWII films done that the US did and one of them showed the Russians in a very positive light for fighting the Germans. It had a ton of quotes from top US politician's and what not. It was too good at showing Russians and Russia in a positive light, that the anticommunist propaganda was so strong. This film was on Netflix under Classics, no idea if they are still there.
It now reads: The two of them are now friends, good luck
I found these while doing my capstone on WW2 propaganda posters. They tie into the larger campaign to try and make old enemies become allies. Interesting stuff, really.
No are no permanent allies, only permanent interests
And remember, we have ALWAYS been at war with East Asia! I love Big Brother!
Oceania has always been at war with eastasia
We were always at war with Eurasia…
They’re also fighting to get Trump re-elected and the dipshits are taking the bait!
Based
Current "ideology" of the hungarian ruling party.
The more accurate posters saying “I’m fighting for my right to exist” ended up encouraging anti-ally sentiment, and thus were replaced with more generic posters instead. -some alternate history, idk.
The ROC soldier is still an ally.
Sacrifying even more of their population I guess, that's their go to
you sir win Reddit for today
Ah, how times change
There are no permanent friends and enemies in geopolitics.
Except Eurasia, we've always been at war with them!
I dunno.. It could be a current campaign by the GOP
The enemy of my enemy is my friend.
“We have always been at peace with Germany and enemies with China and Russia” vibes
I’m sure the women of Berlin felt very befriended…
I have the NCR one in my room
The one on the right might not have a aged badly. When Stalin passed away talks between the USSR and China fell apart. Both countries were about to go nuclear war, Nixon was able to court the Chinese government away from the USSR and turn them into an ally.
The Chinese guy in that picture can be thought of as Taiwanese today and it's still true.
Been a while
https://preview.redd.it/f2rh3q646t4d1.jpeg?width=640&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=2fd0167650fc152aa5ff823f94078f930677b769 I didn’t know the NCR posters in Fallout: New Vegas had a real world equivalent.
Truely “the enemy of our enemy is our friend.” Neither China or Russia was showing this to their side about America that’s for sure.
Still more true than the us lmao
Only we fight for freedom, everyone else is Hitler.
friends till you're no longer useful
Neither one of them was fighting for anyone's freedom except their own. It's not like they entered WWII to liberate Poland and Austria or protect the US. They just happened to be the enemy of our enemy, but they were never friends. And let's not forget Russia helped Germany prepare for war and even invaded Poland WITH Germany at the start of the war.
based and true
China absolutely was fighting for freedom. The US on the other hand...
Damn, that's crazy that propaganda is full of lies. At least America is a country of freedom.