Quote (Caedus @ Apr 2 2014 09:32am)
That is not why Japan was sanctioned. Japan was sanctioned because the they were America's rival in the pacific and the US couldn't fight back. And America was doing just as bad things to Fillipino's.
The Philippine rebellion had been surpressed, the United States government won over the Philippino population by investing in education and anti-poverty measures, as well as by implementing the rule of law.
Meanwhile Japan was militarizing, engineering false-flags to occupy foreign territory, and promptly launched a brutal invasion of mainland China which would cost millions of lives. Public opinion in the United States was with the Chinese, and Japanese militarism threatened American national security interests in the region.
There's a reason 85% of the Philippino population is pro-American today, and why Japan is still loathed in broad swathes of Asia today; its not because they were morally equivalent actors.