Japanese Canadian Internment During The Beginning Of Wwii

The initial reaction to Pearl Harbor was to take cautious emergency actions to avert civil unrest. Soon, the Canadian government passed the War Measures Act. It gave permission to intern all undesirable Japanese, tie up every Japanese-owned fishing boat in British Columbia, close all Japanese language schools, forbid the publishing of newspapers in Japanese, and seize all Japanese property. All of which were subsequently carried out. In 1941, there were twenty-three thousand five hundred Japanese persons in Canada, residing mainly on the coast of British Columbia. Of that, six thousand seven hundred were Canadian born, seven thousand were naturalized citizens, and the rest were nationals of Japan. However, nothing could make any difference. To the typical, white British Columbian, the Japanese were all lower-class citizens. Five hours after the attack on Pearl Harbour, forty-eight Japanese planes bombed Hong Kong where two Canadian battalions were stationed, and were inflicted with heavy casualties. The “problem” of the resident Japanese in British Columbia was then quickly set into the mainstream focus. Prior to declaring war on Japan, Mackenzie King had stated that the “enemy country” had “wantonly and treacherously” attacked British territory, and that “Japan’s actions [were] a threat to the defence and freedom of Canada.”

In February of 1942, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066; this gave the foundation for the mass relocation of more than 110,000 persons of Japanese ancestry to internment camps. This mass relocation caused Japanese Americans -on the West Coast- to be removed from their homes for the majority of World War II. After a year of surviving in addition to waiting in the camps, the Japanese Nisei were allowed to join the 442nd Regimental Combat Team. Making up the entirety of the regiment, the Japanese Nisei fought for their country during the events of World War II. During these events, the Japanese Nisei compromised their self-pride along with their lives for their country. Notwithstanding the fact of facing the battle on two fronts -the prejudice at home plus the fight on the enemy’s front- the Japanese Nisei of the 442nd RCT (Regimental Combat Team) came back from the war as Japanese American citizens, not “Japs.”

They moved the Japanese-Americans for a reason. After the bombing of Pearl Harbor, America wanted to take every precaution they could to ensure the United States safety. In doing so, the army and government took the precaution to create the internment of Japanese-Americans. They moved them to camps that they would keep them in and provide decent living conditions. The United States was justified in moving the Japanese Americans because some lived near vital naval bases that they could have infiltrated, there was no problem in doing so, and it would protect all citizens of America.

Shortly after the first bombs were dropped on Pearl Harbor on December 7th, 1941, the American people’s fear of the Japanese grew dramatically, especially for those Japanese living in America. Almost every Japanese American was seen as a threat to the country. On February 19th, 1942, Executive Order 9066 was issued by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, authorizing the relocation of Japanese Americans to camps further inland. Over 175,000 Japanese Americans were affected in some way by the order, even though more than 70,000 of them were born in the United States and were American citizens. The common perspective of the American people was shown through their use of the expression “A Jap’s a Jap,” virtually destroying the thought that any

His family had a military background, his relatives held such roles as governor of Taiwan and before Japan was opened for trade his family was of the Samurai Class.Her father moved to the united states from Japan when he was 17 after dropping out of Military school. Having moved to America after living in Japan for 17 years he still had loyalties to both countries, and seeing them fight tore him apart, when asked the question “Who do you want to win the war” while being interrogated he responded “When your Mother and Father are having a fight, do you want them to kill each other? Or do you just want them to stop fighting?” ~ Farewell to Manzanar, Page 64. Because of suspicion that Papa assisted the Japanese military he was taken in for questioning before joining his family in Manzanar, and because he got back earlier than the others under suspicion he was suspected by the others to be a traitor, and they called him out as such, and “For a man raised in Japan, there was no greater Disgrace.”. This humiliation, brought him face to face with his own vulnerability, and being a very proud man he hated his own vulnerability. The disgrace and to a certain extent loathing eventually caused papa to exile himself to his barracks and start to drink more and more and become more and more emotionally unstable, at one point even threatening to kill his own wife while his children looked on in fear. While his internal conflict affected himself foremost, it also had a toll on his

In many times throughout history groups of people have been discriminated against based on race or religion. These people receive inferior rights because of the discrimination. In some cases they do not get citizenship, in others they are segregated from others, and physically harmed. Two groups of people that faced discrimination near World War II (WWII) were the Jewish people and Japanese Americans. Both groups faced very different types of discrimination by different oppressors with different motives yet their treatment was very similar and many events paralleled each other. The treatment of Japanese in WWII internment camps was as harsh as the Holocaust's treatment of the Jewish people.

Canada is presently known for welcoming many racial groups into the country. However, the Canadian government is not always giving out warm welcomes to different ethnicities. During World War Two, the country rejects many Japanese and Italians who are already Canadian. The treatment of the Japanese and Italians in the Second World War is very unjust. The two groups face being put into internment camps against their own will, the government separates families and force men to work on farms with little pay. The government of Canada also mistreat the Japanese and Italian Canadians because they are full of fear and superstition.

When Franklin Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066 on February 19, 1942,1 thousands of Japanese-American families were relocated to internment camps in an attempt to suppress supposed espionage and sabotage attempts on the part of the Japanese government. Not only was this relocation based on false premises and shaky evidence, but it also violated the rights of Japanese-Americans through processes of institutional racism that were imposed following the events of Pearl Harbor. Targeting mostly Issei and Nisei citizens, first and second generation Japanese-Americans respectively,2 the policy of internment disrupted the lives of families, resulting in a loss of personal property, emotional distress,

Japanese internment camps from 1942 to 1946 were an exemplification of discrimination, many Japanese Americans were no longer accepted in their communities after the Bombing of Pearl Harbor. They were perceived as traitors and faced humiliation due to anti-Japanese sentiment causing them to be forced to endure several hardships such as leaving behind their properties to go an imprisoned state, facing inadequate housing conditions, and encountering destitute institutions. The Bombing of Pearl Harbor occurred on December 7, 1941 (Why I Love a Country that Once Betrayed Me). This led president Roosevelt to sign the executive order 9066, which authorized the army to remove any individual that seemed as a potential threat to the nation (“Executive Order 9066”) This order allowed the military to exclude “‘any or all persons from designated areas, including the California coast.”’ (Fremon 31). Many Japanese opposed to leave the Pacific Coast on their own free will (Fremon 24) . Japanese Americans would not be accepted in other areas if they moved either.Idaho’s governor stated, Japanese would be welcomed “only if they were in concentration camps under guard”(Fremon 35). The camps were located in Arizona, Arkansas, Wyoming, Idaho, Utah, Colorado, and California where thousands of Japanese Americans eventually relocated. (“Japanese Americans at Manzanar”) The internment lasted for 3 years and the last camp did not close until 1946. (Lessons Learned: Japanese Internment During WW2)

On December 7, 1941, the Empire of Japan attacked the United States naval base at Pearl Harbor, bringing the United States into World War II (Prange et al., 1981: p.174). On February 19, 1942, United States President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066 authorizing the Secretary of War and Military Commanders to prescribe areas of land as excludable military zones (Roosevelt, 1942). Effectively, this order sanctioned the identification, deportation, and internment of innocent Japanese Americans in War Relocation Camps across the western half of the United States. During the spring and summer of 1942, it is estimated that almost 120,000 Japanese Americans were relocated from their homes along the West Coast and in Hawaii and

When the Japanese Americans migrated to the United States they were not welcomed with open arms. The Japanese Americans faced many hardships. The biggest hardships they faced were their treatment by the American people as well as by the American government after the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. Japanese Americans were taken from their homes and placed in internment camps for years with little to no explanation as to why. According to the United States government the Japanese Americans placement in internment camps “were justified on national security grounds” (Brooks), but the truth is Japanese Americans were placed in internment camps because of fear and racial prejudice. This event in history is important because it

While World War II had been ongoing since 1939, Japan had been fighting for the Axis powers, against the United States. In 1941, when Japan had attacked Pearl Harbor, the United States government had assumed the viewpoint that the Japanese were not to be trusted, and that the Japanese-American citizens of the United States were much the same. As such, they had resorted to establishing internment camps, or preventive labor prisons, so as to keep them in check and ostensibly to prevent further Japanese sabotage. However, the government’s actions were not fully justified, as several factors had interplayed into the circumstances that directly contradicted the intentions and visible results of the internment of the Japanese-Americans, in the social, political, economical, and cultural aspects. On the whole, the internment camps served as drastic measures which were not wholly without reasoning; contrarily, those factors in support of the internment camps did not override those which had gone against it, since the United States’ own legislation, in the form of the Constitution and other laws, had explicitly prevented the depriving of human rights, privileges, and pursuits, which had doubtless applied in light of the Japanese-Americans’ universal citizenship along the Pacific Coast in the early 1940s. As such, while the internment camps were not completely unjustified and without purpose from the viewpoint of the government, they did not align with standards of law and

As a nation, Canada is known to the rest of the world for being thoughtful, polite, and generally very accepting of all ethnicities and people. However, the treatment of Canada’s Indigenous population, Japanese Canadians, African American and Indigenous slaves seems to suggest otherwise. Canada's dark past may not be talked about often, but there are three main events that targeted specific ethnic groups which still affect those people today. Residential Schools led to major negative cultural consequences, as well as psychological and sociological effects. Japanese-Canadian Internment Camps were used to strip Japanese Canadians of their rights because of the World War II bombing of Pearl Harbor. And finally, for two centuries slavery was legal in New France, and in Lower Canada under British rule. Human beings were being held captive and were owned by many people, including governors, bishops, military officers, priests, and blacksmiths. All of these terrible consequences can be accredited to Canada’s imperialistic policies.

December 7th, 1941, the Imperial Japanese Army successfully pulled of the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor. After this attack the government of Canada used the war measures act to remove all Japanese Canadian citizens that live 160km from the Pacific Coast and put them in internment camps until 1949, four years after WW2. Fast Forward to 1988 and the Canadian government gives an apology to the Japanese, however the apology was for more than just Japanese Internment it was for the pain and suffering, discrimination, and for leaving Japanese citizens with nothing.

During World War II, approximately 120,000 people of Japanese descent who lived on the Pacific Coast of the US were sent to internment camps after the bombing at Pearl Harbor by Japan on December 7th, 1941. American citizens made up 62% of those who were interned. And even though these American citizens were being unconstitutionally blocked off from the rest of society, the majority of these citizens still declared that they remained forever loyal to America. Some of the recollections left behind by the internees of their experiences at these camps include letters to their loved ones, diaries, pictures, and even full plays. And while living in often cramped, and poorly maintained conditions, the internees still tried to lead normal lives