Total defeat in war can collapse an entire civilization’s cultural self-confidence

Evidence

In Japan total defeat in World War II produced total cultural discombobulation. “It is very difficult now,” one Westerner deeply involved in Japan commented in 1994, “for us to appreciate the extent to which everything —religion, culture, every single aspect of this country’s mental existence—was drawn into the service of that war. The loss of the war was a complete shock to the system. In their minds the whole thing became worthless and was thrown out.” In its place, everything connected with the West and particularly the victorious United States came to be seen as good and desirable. Japan thus attempted to emulate the United States even as China emulated the Soviet Union. — Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the…, 286

Categorization

• SEED: An essay angle: how total military defeat functions as a cultural reset mechanism — comparing Japan 1945, Germany 1945, and the American South 1865.
• XREF: connects to: World War I destroyed faith in progress, evolution, and continuity with history. — David Harvey, The Condition of Postmodernity: An…, 1766; World War I collapse destroyed the world Austrian intellectuals grew up in — Dieter Plehwe, Quinn Slobodian & Philip Mirowski (eds.), Nine Lives of Neoliberalism, 701