In every nation I have so far seen, there has been a strong sense of patriotism, at best, and dogmatism at worst.
So many people have an enourmous capacity to either not hear of their side's atrocities... or not dissapprove of them.
THen, these same people will point the finger and shout about the warcrimes of other nations. This is especially true of those who won recent wars, as they choose what happened for the history books.
With this in mind, my question is, is it hypocrisy? Or is the winner always right?

Wars are NOT war crimes. You must make the distiction.

Also, I guess you are pointing a finger at the US and Britain here? Who else would have the "capacity to either not hear of their side's atrocities... or not dissapprove of them."

To answer that, a free press is necessary. One that operates independently of the government. I feel that we have that in the US, even if the administration does bring pressure to "spin" things in a positive light.

There are alot of news outlets, many of which are NOT in any way under the US government's control (e.g. the BBC).

The US is very careful to avoid civilian "incidents", if you will recall the surgical bombing of Baghdad. It was not carpet bombing (which we could have done for far less money), it was very precise. Colateral damage did occur and will always occur, but it was limited precisely because the US gives a damn.

The winner, historically, has written the history books. But that is simply because the loser in these historical situations was rarely in a position to give an account (how many of the top leaders of Nazi Germany survived until 1960?) So the only account we have is from the winner.

Today, the loser is rarely "wiped out" or even assimilated into the victor's country. Thus, they survive and are able to present their case to any who care to listen.

Winner always right? Certainly not. Winners and losers alike should be willing to own up to their mistakes and atrocities and then move on, if possible. There have been many military actions taken by many countries that were suppressed by the media, government, history writers, etc. At the same time, some relatively small events get blown out of proportion, especially in view of those larger events that get suppressed. Certainly the scale and duration of the events determine whether the use of the word atrocity is justified. Something done in the heat of battle and of short duration is not the same as the deeds done that were planned and executed over a long period of time with the full knowledge and support of the leaders. That would be similar to first degree murder, which carries a harsher penalty than other degrees of murder.
The history books should reflect the events and the consequences of the events, and the leaders are the ones who should take the punishment for the crimes.

Just a question here since you are a student in Japan. Do Japanese history books dwell on WWII, and in particular events such as Pearl Harbor, the Rape of Nanking and the Bataan Death March? I don't think it is just winners that shape history books. I am guessing Japanese history books and American history books put different emphasases, and cite in different lights, the various incidences of WWII.

Unless the "loser" is wiped out, they to will have an influence in how the books are written. Particularly in any area that they remain in control of. College level history books, that I am personally familiar with, seldom whitewashed the US.

Until Keizo, our history books were very much dwelling on Japanese atrocities and little else, in the WWII sections. Elsewhere, they clearly werent. Keizo, after Miyazawa's denial of Japanese expansion in Asia (and his attempt to cover up the Rape of Nanking), was very intent on changing the history books to be more accurate.
No, I am not pointing the finger at the US, or Britain, in particular. I am pointing the finger at every nation which has ever deliberately with-held part of the truth... that includes the US, and Britain, and Japan, and most of the world. Bertrand Russel once said, "War does not determine who is right, only who is left." I hold by that. A quote by Peter Ustinov, however, was the original inspiration for my looking into this subject: "The nationalist not only does not dissapprove of atrocities commited by his side, he also has an unbelievable capacity for not hearing of them."
Simply put, I'm not on an anti-US witch-hunt. I'm merely trying to see how people feel about the -in general- ignoring of a nation's atrocities, by that nation.

This is why, when documentries are made, they try to find everyone, including the enemy, to put together the historical show.

Also, there are some independent writers who write books on our past foriegn policy. An example of this would be my favorite history book: Rise to Globalization: American Foreign Policy Since 1938 by Stephen Amborse

I do sometimes think that some "winners" re-write history to benefit them and blimish the "loser". I think that is why there are such things as reporters in combat situations to report the true story.

But, in conclusion, there are so many Anti-U.S. newspapers in the world and on the internet (Al-Jazeera and other arab publishings) to accuratly tell the whole world the truth because they want the masses to believe something that is not true.

History has traditionally been written and rewritten with a slant towards one side or another. No one is completely objective, to include historians. I’ll never forget an exchange, on a bus in Beijing, with the tour guide who explained that the Japanese aggressors in WWII were defeated due to the valiant efforts of the Chinese, along with the kindly Russian patriots. There was no mention of US involvement at all…and this was to a group of Americans! I must therefore believe that the Chinese history books tell a much different story than ours…even potentially excluding Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Personally, I don’t remember any historical references to our ‘wonderful patriots in the interests of freedom’ combating the evil communists in Vietnam. I think there is very little (one-way) slant in regards to post WWII American military involvement. Perhaps history grows fuzzy as it becomes more distant, or communication is better today which offers a more accurate understanding.

Frankly, from my personal perspective the slant is starting to go the other way. The public seems to hold our own soldiers' conduct to a vastly higher level of expectation than that of our 'enemies'. Our forces take tremendous risks to their own lives in order to ensure civilians are not harmed to as great an extent as possible. That is a fact, but it isn’t the typical view espoused by most internet perusals. I often read, "The Americans are aggressors who indiscriminately bomb civilians and destroy lives. They are all a bunch of war criminals". That's a big, inaccurate, and abundant spin.

Hmmm. Something tells me you were'nt happy about that'n.
Chinese history books never struck me as the most trustworthy. When I was in Taipei, I read about how the evil Japanese were repelled and than the US invaders were slaughtered, while the Russians stood by.
Sadly, the Chinese military was unable to prevent the 'forgotten holocaust', in which more than 10,000,000 civilians were killed. Of them, around 7,000,000 were females, who were gangraped for days before killed. You don't hear about that, either.
Then their's our old history books. "Japan waged war on the rest of the world and would have one if the valiant United States had not destroyed their largest military targets" in one chapter, and "Japan, which has never waged war on another nation..." in another. These were changed, and I love Miyazawa for that.

America has high ideals, though we rarely live up to them unfortunately, and have some of the same tendencies towards "super state" beliefs that the germans once had. Our side is always right. We are the good guys. We don't kill civilians on purpose, they are "collateral damage". Bring up our behavior on slavery, segregation, genocide of the native american etc, it is "ancient history" that we should "just get over". WE ignore history and our behavior as makes us comfortable and politically viable. Just like other regimes in the world, so we once again to not even live up to our ideals of open and honest society. Japan and Germany have mostly come to terms with thier crimes, America still has not even faced them.

But we are a nation of great ideals, and as long as we STRIVE to meet those ideals, we will be okay in the long run IMO.

Yeah, the United States would be a truly impressive nation... if all it's ideals were lived up to.
Unfortunately, I don't think that will happen in the near future.

I propose that Japan, at least, has not come to terms with its crimes in the healthy sense. Rather, it has been crippled by them. The urgent wish not to repeat the "adventurism" of the past has produced a society so anti-interventionist that a proposal to send troops to Iraq caused a near fist-fight in parliament. A country where pacifism was part of the constitution (let alone being considered as a viable basis for foreign policy). This is why many Americans (myself not included) are so afraid to have our students face up to America's past mistakes. They worry that it will cause America to withdraw in shame and fear.

I believe that it's hard to take account for the mistakes of your own nation. As a citizen, you don't particularly want to be reminded that there was violence committed by your community (or soldiers) against another community. You're living a quiet life, and the simple thought that your country made mistakes is hard to take. It becomes a personal hurt in your pride when you've come to love your country. I mean, if you love your country, your country can't be that bad after all, can it?

As a leader, you don't want to lose face and shame yourself for your actions or the ones of your predecessors (unless they were your enemies). I don't know many leaders who have said : "I was wrong, I did wrong and I am sorry." No, leaders prefer to transform history and change defeats into victories, through hypocrisy and disguise. They don't want to lose the support of the public opinion or they don't want to shame the country they represent.

I would never allow nationalism to cloud my judgement... particularly since I don't think there's a single nation in the world worth being nationalistic over. We divide ourselves, elect leaders to keep us divided and propagandize their little sector, and the rifts dividing the world grow. It's because of this that people 'love their nation' to the point of ignoring war crimes, of ignoring atrocities, of revising history.