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Post by Joe Cocker on Nov 14, 2011 19:34:04 GMT -5
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Post by Joe Cocker on Dec 4, 2011 11:51:21 GMT -5
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Post by subdjoe on Dec 5, 2011 11:09:21 GMT -5
That is odd. I have no idea.
Ah...some quick research:
"The only special flag that was there was a flag which Commodore Perry had flown on his ship out in that same location 82 years before [sic: the actual number of years was 92]. It was flown out in its glass case from the Naval Academy Museum. An officer messenger brought it out. We put this hanging over the door of my cabin, facing forward, on the surrender deck so that everyone on the surrender deck could see it."
That special flag on the veranda deck of the Missouri had been flown from Commodore Matthew Perry's flagship in 1853–1854 when he led the US Navy's Far East Squadron into Tokyo Bay to force the opening of Japan's ports to foreign trade. MacArthur was a direct descendant of the New England Perry family and cousin of Commodore Matthew Perry.
Photographs of the signing ceremony show that this flag is displayed backward — reverse side showing (stars in the upper right corner). The reason being is that flags being shown on the right of an object plane, ship, or person are set to have the stars on the upper right corner. The reason for that is that it looks like it is heading into battle; as if it was attached to a pole and someone was carrying it and the wind blowing it so flag was unfurled and flying. If it had the stars in the upper left corner while being displayed on the right side of the object it would look like it was going away from such battle. The cloth of the historic flag was so fragile that the conservator at the U.S. Naval Academy Museum directed that a protective backing be sewn on it, leaving its "wrong side" visible; and this was how Perry's 31-star flag was presented on this unique occasion.[14]
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Post by Joe Cocker on Dec 6, 2011 12:02:23 GMT -5
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Post by subdjoe on Dec 6, 2011 17:45:37 GMT -5
Things weren't quite as set in stone back in the 1850s as they are now.
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Post by Joe Cocker on Jul 30, 2012 19:09:50 GMT -5
World War Two
The end of hostilities
When Emperor Hirohito made his first ever broadcast to the Japanese people on 15 August 1945, and enjoined his subjects 'to endure the unendurable and bear the unbearable', he brought to an end a state of war - both declared and undeclared - that had wracked his country for 14 years.
He never spoke explicitly about 'surrender' or 'defeat', but simply remarked that the war 'did not turn in Japan's favour'. It was a classic piece of understatement. Nearly three million Japanese were dead, many more wounded or seriously ill, and the country lay in ruins.
To most Japanese - not to mention those who had suffered at their hands during the war - the end of hostilities came as blessed relief. Yet not everybody was to lay down their arms. Tens of thousands of Japanese soldiers remained in China, either caught in no-man's land between the Communists and Nationalists or fighting for one side or the other.
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