The Japanese fought for their country, people and emperor.
They were honorable according to their culture and understanding of honor... at least as much as our side.
Key here is "according to their culture and understanding of honor..." [ellipsis in original].
Same is true, from a pure subjective standpoint, for the self-styled "mujihadin" or whatever they called themselves on those four airliners on 9/11.
Face it folks, some cultures are twisted, so yes, we can say that some are *better* than others. The refusal of "the other guy" to see the truth does not invalidate the truth.
Note this has nothing to do with who is without sin. Our culture, at least, recognizes the atrocities of its own troops as evil, and at least makes frequent attempts to identified the crimes, find the perpetrators, and punish them. Arguments over whether "we" ID all crimes, try hard enough to find the evildoers, or punish them severely enough, are mere quibbles which should not obscure the ultimate point, and the ultimate distinctions.
I may not see the movie, not even for the gunnie stuff, if futher firsthand reports indicate that it obscures the US actions in doing A Good Thing by over-emphasizing how some ham-handed government goons handled The Good Thing in a Bad Way.
My Mom's favorite Uncle landed in North Africa and then walked through most of Europe. Would not talk about it until the day he died, bless his soul.