ROANOKE TIMES

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, March 21, 1992                   TAG: 9203230168
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A-11   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short


JAPANESE BOASTED OF CANNIBALISM

THE EDITORIAL cartoon by Bill Day (March 12), criticizing an anti-Japanese joke, and then depicting the "horrible" Americans dropping atomic bombs on Japan, made me sick.

I would like to refer to a remark made by Japanese Maj. Suez Matabe at his war-crimes trial on Guam in September 1947. When asked by the court why he beheaded, cooked and ate captured American aviators, this cocky Japanese officer boasted, "Cannibalism makes me strong!" I wonder how Matabe would have cooked Bill Day - fried, baked or broiled?

Matabe was hanged on Sept. 24, 1947. A U.S. Navy photograph shows him smiling as he is led to the gallows. BUD FEUER ROANOKE



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