Why does it seem the European Theater gets more attention than the Pacific one?

[ABNAK]

I realize that this was the 70th anniversary of D-Day, and this question isn't meant to in any way take away from the sacrifices made in Europe during WWII. It just seems that in movies, shows (i.e. the History Channel or the Military Channel who will beat you to death with "Nazi this" and "Nazi that"), and reporting it's more often than not about the war in Europe and not the Pacific. I know that it was indeed the "preferred" theater as far as the war effort and resources went. IIRC it was agreed upon by FDR and Churchill that the European struggle was to be given priority. I find that ironic as it was the Japanese in the Pacific that launched us into WWII.

Perhaps because my grandfather was a Marine in the Solomon Islands campaign (Guadalcanal, Munda, Bougainville) I have since childhood had a more marked interest in the Pacific war than in the European Theater. I love military history so I know a good deal about both but if you laid two books in front of me----one about each theater----I'd choose the one about the Pacific.

Maybe it's because Europe was where most American's heritage is from?

I suppose if there had been an invasion of Japan (thank God and fission for that not happening) we'd memorialize another D-Day in the fall of 2015.....what ultimately would have been a FAR costlier struggle that would have also consumed vets from the recent European victory. It's just that other than a blurb in military history circles you rarely hear of the "70th anniversary of Midway", Iwo Jima, or Okinawa.

[chuckman]

Generally I agree. The best book I have read on the subject was John Costello's The Pacific War. It reads like a textbook but the first quarter does a good job of explaining FDR and Churchill's relationship and decsion-making process.

[montanadave]

While certainly not true, the Pacific theater was largely a U.S. vs Japan operation whereas the European theater was England, France, the U.S., Russia, Poland, and the lot vs. Germany and Italy. The war in Europe was a spicier mix so it gets more ink.

[Airhasz]

I think the "final solution" makes the European theater more intriguing to people in a sick kind of way. I'm sure every new generation are abhorred when they discover this shameful German history and all the film footage that survived the war.

[skydivr]

I believe it was felt that Hitler's Germany was a greater threat to the Western world than Japan.

[Big A]

I think the "final solution" makes the European theater more intriguing to people in a sick kind of way. I'm sure every new generation are abhorred when they discover this shameful German history and all the film footage that survived the war.

This.

While the Japs were some brutal sons of bitches, especially towards POW's, they weren't rounding people up and putting them in ovens and gas chambers because of their race or religion.

[Eurodriver]

I actually just had this conversation with a girl last night. She thought "D-Day" was June 6th, 1944. She didn't understand that there were literally dozens of other D-Days, like February 19, 1945.

As a Marine myself, the attention spent on the Western European theater's ground war is quite confounding. It wasn't the deadliest, (Eastern front, Pacific Theater, and the US Army Air Corps all had much higher casualties) it wasn't the longest, (It literally lasted 11 months and 2 days out of a 6 year war) and it wasn't even that important. (Hitler would have eventually lost had the Allies went north from Italy, kept bombing Europe, and let Russia take over.)

Maybe it is indeed the holocaust coupled with battles in places that are "familiar" to westerners. Not many people can relate to hunkering down on volcanic sand on Iwo Jima, but nearly everyone can be amazed at a warzone on their city streets.

[chuckman]

This.

While the Japs were some brutal sons of bitches, especially towards POW's, they weren't rounding people up and putting them in ovens and gas chambers because of their race or religion.

Well, not EXACTLY, but they were pretty damn cruel to the Chinese and Koreans.

[Sensei]

This.

While the Japs were some brutal sons of bitches, especially towards POW's, they weren't rounding people up and putting them in ovens and gas chambers because of their race or religion.

My understanding is that the Japs were worse to both civilians and POW's having exterminated 30 million ethnic Chinese compared to Hitler's 6 million Jews and 20 million Russians and Pols. The Japs even had a sport to see how many Chinese children could be beheaded with a single swing from a sword. Ganging raping of children prior to execution was also the norm.

Historian Chalmers Johnson has written that:

It may be pointless to try to establish which World War Two Axis aggressor, Germany or Japan, was the more brutal to the peoples it victimised. The Germans killed six million Jews and 20 million Russians [i.e. Soviet citizens]; the Japanese slaughtered as many as 30 million Filipinos, Malays, Vietnamese, Cambodians, Indonesians and Burmese, at least 23 million of them ethnic Chinese. Both nations looted the countries they conquered on a monumental scale, though Japan plundered more, over a longer period, than the Nazis. Both conquerors enslaved millions and exploited them as forced labourers—and, in the case of the Japanese, as [forced] prostitutes for front-line troops. If you were a Nazi prisoner of war from Britain, America, Australia, New Zealand or Canada (but not Russia) you faced a 4% chance of not surviving the war; [by comparison] the death rate for Allied POWs held by the Japanese was nearly 30%.

I suspect that we all simply care less about Asia. After all, most Americans either do not recall or did not know about the 2004 Indonesian tsunami that killed 1/4 million people. Had the death toll been in France or England we would have annual days of mourning.

[MountainRaven]

While certainly not true, the Pacific theater was largely a U.S. vs Japan operation whereas the European theater was England, Free France, the U.S., Russia, Poland, and the lot vs. Germany, Italy, Hungary, Rumania, Vichy France, and Finland. The war in Europe was a spicier mix so it gets more ink.

Fixed.

France fought on both sides. Although so did Italy, Rumania, and Finland.

The liberation of France is pretty vanilla (see also: not so interesting) compared to the war in North Africa, the invasion of Italy, and the war on the Eastern front.

I can understand why the island hopping campaign of the Pacific is not as interesting to most people - and outside of the Age of Sail, most folks aren't that interested in naval warfare.

But what I really think is underappreciated (if that's the appropriate term) is the China-Burma-India theater.