Trophies of War: U.S. Troops and the Mutilation of Japanese War Dead, 1941-1945

Abstract

A cartoon published in the Chicago Tribune three days after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor depicted a muscular and grim-faced U.S. sailor carrying powder charges to a naval gun aimed at the distant Japanese home islands. From one of the charges dangled a tag reading War without Mercy on a Treacherous Foe.' Indeed, the war which the United States waged against Japan from December 1941 until August 1945 was characterized by a degree of savagery unmatched by the war being fought simultaneously against the European Axis. The explanation for this goes far beyond the fact that the United States had been the victim of a Japanese surprise attack, whereas Germany and Italy initiated war by means of formal and gentlemanly declarations. To a much greater degree than Germans (and certainly Italians), Japanese became dehumanized in the minds of American combatants