1 I knew it! :-( Why are they letting the likes of Bigley and now Hassan, live for awhile? What's their point? Or is there one?

2 I really feel sorry for the Japanese gentleman. But what is the hell was he doing backpacking thru Iraq?

3 What I'm really disappointed in, is the Japanese! Remember Pearl Harbor? Or have they gone soft on everyone?!

4 Is it me or did this guy come across in the video as a realy nice gentle fellow that didnt seem to understand what was going on,that maybe? Could be he'd been hitchiking round the middle east not seeing any news footage for god knows how long having the holiday of his life, just bumming around, it's no crime being a free spirit,but obviously it is a crime to Zarqarwi and his henchemen. God have rest on this unfortunate mans soul.

5 I just hope the gentleman's father is a Yakuza boss or something. Id love to see the Yakuza head over to Iraq and sort out the problems.

6 Yep me too. The Japs usually don't take this kinda shit sitting down.

7 Has anything more been said about Koda? Perhaps he is still alive? Guess we'll know when the video comes out...sigh...

8 Koda's dead, the poor bastard. Just read in papers that they identified a body found in Baghdad by his fingerprints. DAMN IT...I'm surprised the Japs haven't dropped a bomb on those fuckers yet....remember Pearl Harbor??

9 The way you guys talk about the Japanese is right in some points. But dont you know that Japan has a peace treaty with the world stating they wont use bombs or wont wven fight with strong ammunition? Poor japanese guy, I have many japanese friends....I live in Japan. I feel it in the society here, the sadness....and he is stupid for going there.

10 Tired, tired, tired of this shit. Who do these people think they are? Wait, I know what they are...fuckin' demons.

11 laura please stop using JAP or JAPS when referring to JAPANESE it is a degrading term

12 i just want to see the video of how to kill the japanese hostage in iraq

13 Laura, If you say "remember Pearl Harbor" I would say "Remember Hiroshima and Nagasaki" What's more, we don't have bombs or any kind of weapon. US army is supposed to protect us and that's why there are so many US bases here... I guess so...

14 Unsurprisingly, people were quick to dismiss Shosei Koda as a flaky, clueless tourist who got himself killed. Early descriptions in the international press of him as a "drifter" and "high school dropout" certainly suggest that the media fell back on stereotypes from the start. I never figured him for a dimwit or a daredevil, because he was strikingly calm and collected in the first video. I thought perhaps that he was a 24-year-old who had been caught up in the excitement and freedom of being on the road for the first time in his life, a moth to a flame. But what I found from Japanese-language news sources was a more intriguin portrait than I could have guessed. Shosei Koda was the eldest son of a construction worker and a nurse. The family is Christian. His father was injured on the job some years ago, and the family subsisted on the mother's income and disability pension. He was forced to drop out of high school due to financial reasons, but went on to complete his high school equivalency at night school while working day jobs (mostly physical labor) to supplement the family's income. Koda's dream was to design prosthetics, in particular for civilians who had lost their limbs in war zones. He managed to save ¥2.5 million over 7 years or so and was planning to move to the U.S. in Fall 2004 to pursue this very specialized course of study. While he spoke passable English, he needed immersion learning; this is why he went to New Zealand for the summer. What happened next is uncertain, but Koda decided on an impulse to visit Israel. It was not an unusual destination for a Christian who literally wore his devotion on his sleeve -- he had a cross tatooed on his arm. From Israel he moved on to Jordan. By all accounts, he was not a risk-taker, which makes his insistence on entering Iraq something of a mystery. The only clue seems to be his choice of future profession. Those who knew him paint a picture of a serious young man who wanted to heal people, and had a need to keep it a personal mission. Perhaps he felt that whatever the danger, he needed to witness war for himself so that he would remember in his engineering classes why he was there. Perhaps he felt an ambivalence towards moving to a country that was conducting a war he opposed, and wanted to see Iraq before he set foot in the United States. The only person who knew for sure is now dead. The Israeli stamps in Koda's passport and the cross tatooed on his arm doomed what little chance he had of release. P.M. Koizumi couldn't disavow the young hostage fast enough, and the almost relieved reaction to an inexplicably misidentified body earlier in the day probably rid his captors of any idea that their prisoner may be more valuable alive. The Japanese pathologist who conducted the autopsy noted that the expression on Koda's face was peaceful.

15 well if the japs droped a bomb on pearl why dont they go and bomb the fuck outt them

16 Beings were on the subject of the bomb,and I see there is Japanize and American input out there, If you refer to "Rain of ruin,history of Hiroshima & Nagasaki" Page 80,left hand top corner you will see a man who Was the bombadier that flew the mission and directly below him sure looks like Howard Hues.That is the last pictures you will see of them for the most part,when they get back from the mission those people were differnt people.When I was young I looked identical to the man in the left corner.I still look very much like him because he was my father and I can prove it.I have pictures,military records,and he told me he droped the bomb when I was young on one of my only visits to see them but he wasnt supposed to.When I lived in the Hawian islands and the book came out,you should have seen how the japanize looked at me.Most Americans dont know what he looked like but I think you will find most Japanize do.They took me when I was young and hid me,They seperated me from my real family,They put me with another family,and it sucked.My whole life has been terible since I was a "BABY".Now That the picture surfaced,my life sucks,I Dont want to change the way I look,I have one question to you,do the japanize look at me like I'm the son of Hitler?Do they want to come "around" and make my life suck? The japanize i'm sure have notice the difference in the pictures and Ive been "noticed"and there never seens to be any facts,but there sure is a lot of unusual detremental coincidences in my life.I'm not making any acusations...Is there any help for me out there?

17 One other thing,and i'm very serios,should I be worried that some Japanize guy whose parents or grand parents were killed in that bombing might sneak up behind me a lop my head off with his samari sword?every race has some insanity. The reason for my posting is this,There are many japanize,and many differnt opinions I'm sure.I'm sure there are many Japanize that wouldnt want me to suffer because of The Presidential orders my father carried out.I'm wondering of the percentage That would and that would not,and the amount of power held by the differing partys. could some one please get back to me on this,Maybe we could take a poll....