Regarding the April 5 TimeOut story headlined "Okinawa: In the cross hairs of war," it is a pity that the pigheaded Yamato revisionists from Tokyo will not allow the Okinawan people to remember Japan's wartime atrocities as they themselves witnessed them.
Okinawa should not have to bow to the will of Tokyo historians and their revised false glorification of the defunct Imperial Japanese Army.
Gyakusatsu, or massacre, is not remotely related in meaning to the term gisei, or sacrifice. Few if any Okinawans willingly sacrificed themselves during the Battle of Okinawa for the sake of the Emperor or his rapacious, banzai-shouting troops.
Wasn't it enough that the Okinawan natives didn't take up arms against their Japanese colonial oppressors? Small wonder that so many Okinawans expressed sympathy for all Vietnamese during America's brutal bombing campaign over Vietnam in the 1960s and early 1970s! They could empathize with their Asian brothers and sisters in Hanoi and Saigon.
Ironic, isn't it, that the Okinawans were a gentle, peace-loving people just 200 years ago and never carried arms or waged war?
Now their islands represent a major military staging area in Asia, one that has obviously been targeted by Chinese and Russian missiles if war should erupt between Japan and its old foes.
Will the next time be another massacre or a patriotic sacrifice for Okinawa's overlords in Tokyo?
And to think that many of the Yamato race on the main islands (Kyushu, Honshu, Shikoku and Hokkaido) don't even consider the lowly Okinawan to be truly Japanese. What a terrible sacrifice indeed for these hapless island people.
Pity that a hundred years ago the Okinawan and Hawaiian islands weren't declared international parks and/or wildlife sanctuaries and kept off-limits to all military or commercial development, much like Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming.
The local native populations could have been trained to be the caretakers of the parks, full-time rangers and guides.
There could have been tourist accommodations built for a very restricted number of visitors to protect the natural beauty and wildlife of both these island regions.
The opinions expressed in this letter to the editor are the writer's own and do not necessarily reflect the policies of The Japan Times.