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Nickrobl t1_iy1ldj6 wrote

Reply to comment by Seienchin88 in On April 2, 1941, a Japanese foreign minister asked Pope Pius XII to speak to U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt, so as to avert "a war of mutual destruction” by marketrent

I agree. It wasn't about picking a good choice, Japan just picked what they thought was the "least bad" out of a number of even worse/unacceptable options.

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huntimir151 t1_iy1r1yq wrote

Yeah, and their arithmetic included butchering civilians throughout southeast Asia as part of their delusions regarding their own superiority. Like nothing justified those choices it was Nazi level insanity, not pure realpolitik.

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Nickrobl t1_iy3nxcq wrote

I'm not saying it is a moral or correct choice, just that leaving China was a non-starter for their government. As a result, the leadership felt they only had bad choices left and picked the least bad one from their point of view.

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