The Japanese and the War: Expectation, Perception, and the Shaping of Memory 9780231543989

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THE JAPANESE AND THE WAR

ASIA PERSPECTIVES WEATHERHEAD EAST ASIAN INSTITUTE, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY

ASIA PERSPECTIVES: HISTORY, SOCIETY, AND CULTURE A series of the Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Columbia University Carol Gluck, Editor Comfort Women: Sexual Slavery in the Japanese Military During World War II, by Yoshimi Yoshiaki, trans. Suzanne O’Brien The World Turned Upside Down: Medieval Japanese Society, by Pierre François Souyri, trans. Käthe Roth Yoshimasa and the Silver Pavilion: The Creation of the Soul of Japan, by Donald Keene Geisha, Harlot, Strangler, Star: The Story of a Woman, Sex, and Moral Values in Modern Japan, by William Johnston Lhasa: Streets with Memories, by Robert Barnett Frog in the Well: Portraits of Japan by Watanabe Kazan, 1793–1841, by Donald Keene The Modern Murasaki: Writing by Women of Meiji Japan, ed. and trans. Rebecca L. Copeland and Melek Ortabasi So Lovely a Country Will Never Perish: Wartime Diaries of Japanese Writers, by Donald Keene Sayonara Amerika, Sayonara Nippon: A Geopolitical Prehistory of J-Pop, by Michael K. Bourdaghs The Winter Sun Shines In: A Life of Masaoka Shiki, by Donald Keene Manchu Princess, Japanese Spy: The Story of Kawashima Yoshiko, the Cross-Dressing Spy Who Commanded Her Own Army, by Phyllis Birnbaum Imitation and Creativity in Japanese Arts: From Kishida Ryūsei to Miyazaki Hayao, by Michael Lucken, trans. Francesca Simkin The First Modern Japanese: The Life of Ishikawa Takuboku, by Donald Keene

THE JAPANESE AND THE WAR From Expectation to Memory

MICHAEL LUCKEN TRANSLATED BY KAREN GRIMWADE

Columbia University Press New York

Cet ouvrage a bénéficié du soutien des Programmes d'aide à la publication de l’Institut Français. This work, published as part of a program of aid for publication, received support from the Institut Français.

Columbia University Press Publishers Since 1893 New York

Chichester, West Sussex

cup.columbia.edu Copyright © 2013 Librairie Arthème Fayard Translation copyright © 2017 Columbia University Press All rights reserved Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Lucken, Michael, author. | Grimwade, Karen, translator. Title: The Japanese and the war : from expectation to memory / Michael Lucken ; translated by Karen Grimwade. Other titles: Japonais et la guerre. English | Japanese and World War 2 | Japanese and World War Two Description: New York : Columbia University Press, [2017] | Series: Asia Perspectives : History, Society, and Culture | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2016024793 (print) | LCCN 2016029722 (ebook) | ISBN 9780231177023 (cloth : alk. paper) | ISBN 9780231543989 (electronic) Subjects: LCSH: World War, 1939-1945—Japan—Historiography. | Collective memory—Japan—History—20th century. | Memory—Social aspects— Japan—History—20th century. | World War, 1939-1945—Influence. | War and society—Japan—History—20th century. | Japan—Social conditions—20th century. | Japan—Intellectual life—20th century. Classification: LCC D743.42 .L8313 2017 (print) | LCC D743.42 (ebook) | DDC 940.53/52—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016024793

Columbia University Press books are printed on permanent and durable acid-free paper. Printed in the United States of America Cover design: Rebecca Lown Cover image: Sadamasa Motonaga, Unititled, 1959. Oil on panel, 35-7/8 × 28-3/4 inches (91 × 73 cm). [© The Estate of Sadamasa Motonaga; Courtesy of Fergus McCaffrey, New York/St. Barth]

CONTENTS

Acknowledgments vii A Note on Names ix Introduction xi

1. THE NATION OUT TO CONQUER 1

2. A TOTALITARIAN DYNAMIC, 1940–1945 29

3. THE MEANING OF THE WAR 49

4. HEROES AND THE DEAD 81

5. FEAR AND DESTRUCTION 105

6. POSTWAR COMPLEXITIES 139

VICONTENTS

7. THE AMERICAN OCCUPATION, OR THE PRESENT VERSUS THE PAST 151

8. THE PLURALITY OF HISTORY 173

9. INDIVIDUAL CONSCIENCE AND COLLECTIVE INERTIA 185

10. MEMORY AND RELIGION 205

11. FROM MONUMENT TO MUSEUM: THE DIFFICULT PATH TO HEALING 229

CONCLUSION 267

Notes 273 Index 325

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

T

he author would like to express his sincere thanks to Fabrice d’Almeida and Pascal Griolet for their careful editing of this book, and to Michel Vié for his encouragement, comments, and corrections.

A NOTE ON NAMES

J

apanese, Korean, and Chinese names are given in the order family name followed by given name—for example, Kurosawa Akira.

INTRODUCTION

he year 1945 marked a watershed in Japan that saw unprecedented change in its history and geography. Its cities had been laid to waste by bombs, its armies, defeated on all fronts; its national territory was occupied by a foreign power for the first time, the economy, in tatters, and the empire, deprived of its recently acquired colonies. Millions of families had been plunged into mourning and rare were those who had escaped some kind of physical or material loss. Yet despite these historic changes the imperial institution managed to survive. Against all expectations, Emperor Shōwa—or Hirohito as he is generally known outside Japan—managed to preserve the existence of the throne.1 This explains why there was no need to abolish the constitution entirely, although in practice it was completely rewritten. An aura of mystery surrounds Japan’s millennia-old imperial institution, and its preservation after the trauma of the “Last Great War,” as it is known in Japanese, has merely heightened this. The figure of the emperor is a key to understanding Japan at war. Saving the imperial institution was the overriding objective of the Japanese government during the closing months of the war. In military terms, the war had been lost since 1943; however, the government hoped for a compromise that would allow the country to retain its independence and political structures. Hundreds of thousands of soldiers and civilians died to keep this hope alive. Of course, this is not what was said to the

T

XIIINTRODUCTION

Japanese people, who were constantly told that the “decisive battle,” the one that would bring victory to the country, was yet to come. Not everyone was fooled. In the spring of 1945, Kurosawa Akira was not yet a world-renowned filmmaker. Having launched his career in 1943, he had already completed three films and was one of the national propaganda machine’s most promising directors. Indeed, only filmmakers in whom the authorities had full confidence were still allowed to work at a time when the entire nation’s resources were being channeled into the war effort. During the final weeks of the war, Kurosawa wrote a screenplay that took a sixteenth-century battle as its backdrop.2 However, the film required substantial resources— notably horses for the battle scenes—and their unavailability forced Kurosawa to abandon his project. He then turned his attention to the theater repertoire and a famous play known in English as The Subscription List. The film’s modest scale meant that Kurosawa received authorization to begin shooting. He completed his film in September, after the Americans had arrived, making this one of the rare productions to have straddled both the war and the occupation. The film’s story follows the fugitive and great warrior Yoshitsune as he flees his brother, the shogun. Yoshitsune is accompanied on his journey by a clutch of loyal retainers, including the trusty Benkei. In order to evade capture they disguise themselves as Buddhist monks, with Yoshitsune dressed as a servant. Despite their efforts, the group arouses suspicion and is subjected to an interrogation. During a scene that provides the film’s dramatic climax, Benkei manages to trick his adversaries by answering their questions perfectly. However, no sooner are the bogus monks set free than suspicions over the servant’s true identity see them recaptured. In order to prove that the servant is not the great Yoshitsune himself, Benkei gives him a public beating, a ruse that enables the group to escape. The film closes with a pitifully comical scene in which Benkei tearfully begs his master’s forgiveness for having humiliated him to save his life.3 The replacement of Japanese censorship with American censors meant that Kurosawa’s film was refused release.4 It made it onto cinema screens only some seven years later, after the occupation had ended. Consequently, nothing was written about it in 1945, and since by 1952 the context had changed completely, it was perceived at its release as a simple adaptation of the Kabuki play. Yet the film’s original aim had been a political one, since it exalted the notion of sacrifice for one’s master while

INTRODUCTIONXIII

underlining the importance of doing what it takes to outwit the enemy, even if that flies in the face of social convention. And this is precisely what the Japanese government did upon defeat in order to save the imperial institution. Whereas Hirohito’s public appearances prior to 1945 had consistently been orchestrated to exalt his sacred status, he was suddenly portrayed in the media as a frail and inoffensive man. Showing great lucidity and foresight, Kurosawa’s film was a call to the Japanese people to protect their emperor. Nonetheless, the comical treatment of certain scenes and the film’s humorous title (The Men Who Tread on the Tiger’s Tail) reveal the director’s free spirit and his ability to make a film that transcends its era.5 Whether in the context of all-out war or defeat, the Japanese have always had a literature and performing arts tradition that has shaped their behavior, as well as enabling them to give meaning to the experiences they endured. In return, the violence of the events only heightened the complex nature of this culture, which since 1945 has continued to reflect on the meaning of World War II and Japan’s place in history. It is these fruitful interactions between history and culture that this book seeks to highlight.

R Entire sections of Japanese civilization have never been taken seriously. The West’s lack of interest in Japan’s middle class, its popular and comic culture, or even its intellectual sphere, reveals a kind of “ideological occultation,” to borrow the words of Roland Barthes.6 Many of the stereotypes that appeared during the nineteenth century, when colonialism was at its peak, continue to have currency today: the Japanese are said to lack an individual conscience, to be reluctant to take the initiative, to have a tendency to imitate, to be deeply fatalistic, and to have a propensity for violence. And while they are also deemed to have certain qualities—such as self-control, a sense of propriety, an ability to bounce back from adversity—this kind of characterization is hardly meaningful. A detailed look at the way in which history functions makes it clear that classifying the qualities of peoples is futile, that everything is constantly changing, that what exists at any given moment represents only a temporary configuration, and that the certitudes of today may crumble tomorrow. This will become clear throughout these pages through the

XIVINTRODUCTION

spectacular evolution in funerary practices and, more generally, through the relationship of the Japanese with death and how this was affected by the war. The history of peoples may reveal certain dynamics, but at the same time it opposes any kind of essentialist reduction. Cultures and civilizations can be clearly defined only if we first acknowledge that these concepts are merely approximations, truncations, crude divisions of human space. Through its scale, barbarity, and the unprecedented violence of the weapons it deployed, World War II was a momentous event for the contemporary world—a kind of monster, a founding yet malevolent divinity that is constantly referred to, whether consciously or not. In American mass culture the recurrent theme of a radical opposition between good and evil has its roots in Christianity but also finds an extremely effective vehicle in World War II imagery: the shape of a helmet, a haircut, or a Nordic physique—all evocative of the silhouette of German soldiers—are readily used to distinguish the bad guy. Similarly, the destruction of the World Trade Center’s Twin Towers in 2001 immediately gave rise in the United States to images and expressions reminiscent of the attack on Pearl Harbor. Although such associations of ideas function spontaneously, we are nonetheless capable of taking a step back and analyzing them. Over the past thirty years Japan has become the second largest producer of mass cultural products after the United States. Manga, for example, have made Japanese the second-most-translated language into French after English, based on the number of titles published each year. Through video games, manga, anime, and their spin-offs, or even pop music, Japanese culture is helping to shape the imagination of young people in countries as different as France and Korea. The theme of war is recurrent in Japanese works, perhaps even more so than in American productions. In certain cases the reference to history is explicit. This is the case with the manga series Barefoot Gen or the animated film Grave of the Fireflies, which tells the story of two orphans after the bombing of Kobe. Most of the time, however, the battles involve mutants or robots and have no basis in historical fact. Nonetheless, the past is constantly alluded to, particularly in terms of the values invoked, such as determination, solidarity, or pacifism, in stark contrast to the Manichean nature of American productions. Miyazaki Hayao, the director of Princess Mononoke and Spirited Away, was born in 1941. His earliest childhood memories thus coincide

INTRODUCTIONXV

with Japan’s defeat. As he explains, the experience of living through war was decisive in shaping his view of life: All around me there were adults who were proud of having killed Chinese. During the war my father’s family got by quite comfortably thanks to military demand, which no doubt explains how they even managed to escape the draft. Only an older cousin died during the bombings. My mother, who was scornful of progressive intellectuals due to their aboutface during defeat, instilled me with distrust and resignation by constantly telling me that “people will never change!” On the surface I was a bright and sensible child, but on the inside I was fragile and reserved. I loved the war stories I devoured one after the other. But after a while I became sick of their clichéd adjectives; it was with deep despair that I discovered, hidden beneath the enthusiastic and victorious rhetoric, the widespread stupidity of the Japanese army.7

Behind his films’ environmental message and their search for a harmonious coexistence between humans lie an awakening and a rejection of fatalism, both of which are directly linked to the memory of World War II. Knowing how Japan experienced and perceives the period from the late 1930s to the late 1940s provides a clearer understanding of certain ideals and thought patterns seen in Japanese manga and animated films. The same can be said of the news media. The disasters of March 2011 elicited reactions and images in Japan that can be fully understood only in the framework of a local history of representing disasters, in which 1945 has a preeminent place. Despite its importance for understanding the country’s contemporary culture, there is a relative lack of knowledge in France surrounding Japan’s wartime history. Only a limited number of publications have attempted to explain the Japanese experience of these dark years. The fact that France was involved neither in the Pacific War nor in the occupation of Japan partly explains this situation. Nevertheless, several recent studies have focused on the memory of the war; yet while some of these studies are of a high quality, the reality of the events on which the memory is based can at times seem somewhat distant and forgotten. Of course, it is entirely possible to explore the question of memory in isolation from the events being remembered; however, the state of the historiography has led me to deal with them in a single volume in order

XVIINTRODUCTION

to provide readers with a clearer measure of the links and discrepancies between the views expressed during the war and those expressed after. Moreover, a systematic articulation of the discourses that structure and predetermine the event’s genesis and those that analyze it and recast its meaning afterward is a fruitful approach challenging clear-cut oppositions between history and memory. In Japan, two main—opposing—schools of thought exist regarding the meaning that should be attached to the war. The first is held by conservatives, who defend the idea that Japan did not so much seek to conquer Asia as to protect itself from colonialism and the hegemonic ambitions of the great Western powers. The second, whose defenders range from liberals to communists, emphasizes the blindness of Japan’s elites and the responsibility of the fascist-militarist groups that took control of the state. In addition to these two perspectives there is the widely held feeling that the nation suffered enormously from the bombings and that the Allied occupation did not merely release the country from the clutches of the military but that it was also accompanied by a new form of dictatorship. The brutality and crimes committed by the Imperial Japanese Army are denied or played down by nationalists, who see the focus on such events as evidence of a desire to blacken Japan’s name and place responsibility for the conflict solely at its doorstep. These aspects of the war are recognized by the other groups, but in perceptions of the past they generally take second place to the suffering endured. In the People’s Republic of China and South Korea, differences in interpretation focus on the role of local collaborators but rarely on Japan itself, which is invariably portrayed as a belligerent and colonialist power whose government attempted to destroy Korean identity and whose armies planned and systematically carried out appalling crimes across Asia. However, other Asian countries, notably India, Burma, and the Republic of China (Taiwan), hold more nuanced views that underline Japan’s help in liberating local populations from Western domination. English-language scholarship on the issue is dominant. There is a great wealth of studies available, since the sources gathered during the war and the occupation can be accessed directly, but these represent the victors’ point of view. When historians in France deal with the Vichy regime, they position themselves within an essentially national intellectual field, and only marginal reference is made to English-language authors. In contrast, contemporary history in Japan is subordinate to the quasi-official

INTRODUCTIONXVII

narrative imposed by the Americans via the postwar tribunals and the preservation of the imperial institution. Nevertheless, such an influence is not without its contradictions: In the English-speaking Allied nations there are dominant narratives of a “good war” against the evils of fascism. Japanese memories incompatible with these Allied memories must be resisted. For example, Japanese memories of victimhood, particularly of the A-bombs, are uncomfortable for the Allies because the standard rationales for indiscriminate bombing of civilian targets were to end the war, stop Japanese aggression and save lives. Validating Japanese narratives of victimhood undermines these justifications, casts the Allies as perpetrators and subverts the “good war” narrative. Japanese “victim mentality,” therefore, must be criticized for not being contrition, even though it is unrealistic to expect hibakusha (A-bomb victims) to prioritize collective memories of Japanese atrocities (that they may have had no personal involvement in) over their personal experiences of the A-bombs. And the nationalistic narrative that Japan helped liberate Asian nations from Western imperialism has to be resisted at all costs: it subverts the “good war” narrative by making Western colonialism, not Japanese militarism, the primary evil of the 1930s and 1940s. Consequently, the only Japanese narrative compatible with the Allied “good war” narrative is contrition for Japanese war guilt. All other narratives have to be criticized as inadequate. Given the strength of the “good war” narratives in Allied nations, it is hardly surprising that criticism of Japanese narratives that threaten to subvert the “good war” narrative have become orthodox.8

Every culture tends to develop rationales that are consistent with its own representations and interests. Being aware of this phenomenon encourages us to step back from the Manichean preconception of the Japanese with an erroneous view of their past and Westerners within their rights to demand they be held accountable. What characterizes perceptions of World War II in Japan is not a rejection of national responsibility or victimization but rather a structural opposition between several memories—a situation that stems from ideological stances, political acts, and personal experiences that predate 1945. Just as in France, in 1940, Gaullism and communism began to develop

XVIIIINTRODUCTION

different yet complementary narratives that determined how history was perceived after 1945, so in Japan, the dividing lines separating the various memories must be traced back to the war period. While the decisions taken during the American occupation certainly played a vital role, they are connected to the different representations of the national bond prior to defeat. The question of the emperor’s role in particular is one of the points that best illustrate the close ties linking the two periods. It is reductive to think solely in terms of pre- and post-1945. While such a division is indispensable, it does not accurately reflect the tone that emanates from many accounts of the war. A three-part division may occasionally be more pertinent for describing the experience of these years. The first period runs until approximately 1943 and was characterized by territorial expansion, anticipation of the future, and the increasing ideological indoctrination of Japanese society. The occupation of part of China in 1937, of Indochina in 1940, and the victories scored against Great Britain and the United States all provided a positive boost to the nation. They made the efforts demanded easier to swallow, and criticism, suspicious. If we set aside the soldiers who fought on the continent and in the Solomon Islands campaign, the words generally used by witnesses describing this period in retrospect are collective mobilization, a certain feverishness, enthusiasm, and a feeling of power. The second period begins in 1943 with Japan’s losing control of the military situation on the Pacific front and finishes in 1952 with the end of the Allied occupation. To rephrase, it spans the Cairo Conference to the date the Treaty of San Francisco came into force. During this ten-year period Japan was no longer in control of its destiny and knew it. In late 1943 the civil population began to be evacuated from the cities, and a section of the student population was mobilized. Over the next two years the country endured relentless attacks from the Americans and finally surrendered unconditionally after all attempts at negotiation had failed. It was immediately occupied by a civil and military force that imposed its directives in all areas of life, something that did not fail to breed frustration. Those families that had fled the cities returned, but food and housing shortages made this a gradual process. The situation was similar for the millions of repatriates. Many were able to return home in late 1945, early 1946, but some were held in camps until the 1950s, particularly in Siberia. This period corresponds in the various memories to the height of the crisis, to a time of destruction and of the struggle to rebuild, despite the

INTRODUCTIONXIX

relief provided by the end of the war and the hopes raised by the American drive to democratize Japan. The third period begins in 1952. Japan’s sovereignty has been restored but the painful memories remain. Successive generations of politicians have declared that the postwar period is over, that the page has finally been turned, but the political and psychological consequences of defeat continue to determine the present. At the heart of this chronology is not the period 1937–1945 but rather 1943–1952. What came before and what came after form two sets of lines of varying lengths, both of them connected to this central period. The memory of the past seen in Japan today stems more from the bombings, defeat, occupation, war crimes tribunals, and repatriations than from the invasion of China or the victories over the British.

R The main texts that structured Japanese society between 1937 and 1945 date from the late nineteenth century. They include the Meiji Constitution, the Civil Code, and the Imperial Rescript on Education. Not only was there no break in continuity but there were no new political or cultural projects developed either. The war was conducted using preexisting ideological tools that were simply adapted to the crisis at hand. A good example of this is the repression of political opponents, which aimed, as reasserted during the 1920s, to protect the kokutai—the “Japanese nation” as it was defined during the Meiji period (1868–1912). In a context of international crisis, the mobilization of the population gradually intensified. The highly peculiar form of totalitarianism adopted by the Japanese government between 1940 and 1945 was a radicalization of the spirit of institutions created between 1870 and 1900 to counter Western colonialism. In the 1930s a certain number of Japanese artists were known in France. This was the case with the novelist Kikou Yamata or the painter Léonard Foujita.9 Japan was an exotic land on which clichés abounded, but certain individuals emerged and contributed to the dynamism of literary and art circles in the French capital. Back home, Japan was experiencing an effervescence of cultural activity. The media were extremely active and represented a diverse range of political tendencies. Consequently, given the fact that Japan saw no radical systemic change during this period, there was never a single, unified point of view on the war. At all levels of society, and despite growing pressure from the authorities on the theme of a sacred

XXINTRODUCTION

union, individuals maintained their differences. This was not always particularly obvious in the news media (mainly the press, radio, and cinematic newsreels) due to the high level of censorship in this domain; however, in critical literature, and even more so in personal literature (private diaries and letters) or the fine arts, the singularity of the different approaches and political sympathies shines through. War is a regime of violence and death on a massive scale. But in order for people to accept this regime there has to be a reason. In the case of Nazi Germany, certain historians have emphasized a trivialization of violence born of the fighting of 1914–1918, as well as a feeling of revenge that enabled the Nazis to unite the nation in a desire to reject the Jews and conquer foreign lands.10 In Japan’s case, fear played a crucial role. The colonial ambitions of the great Western powers had ceased to pose a real threat to Japan by the end of the nineteenth century, but the image of the West as predator long persisted in the collective imagination, with memories of this reawakened by the Russian Revolution and the war in Siberia. A further factor was the fear of being bombed. In the late 1920s the Japanese developed a fear of aerial attack, which the destruction caused by the Great Kantō Earthquake of 1923 enabled people to imagine in frighteningly real terms. These factors go some way to explaining both Japan’s policy of continental conquest and the tragic heroism of its armies. There is a lack of knowledge in France about the occupation of Japan by the Allied forces: not a single French-language reference work exists on the period from September 1945 to July 1952, which in fact extended to 1972 in the case of the Ryukyu Islands. And yet this was a critical period. It is an error to reduce the occupation to the demilitarization, pacification, and democratization of Japan. Such an interpretation not only suggests that peace or democracy were unknown concepts to the Japanese, which is false, but also avoids confronting the fact that MacArthur and the other American officials implemented policies that above all served their own interests in the short, medium, and long term. The ambiguous nature of the measures adopted during the occupation is particularly striking regarding the trials of Japan’s political and military leaders, school textbooks, and monuments. The manner in which, immediately after the hostilities ended, the Americans imposed their own interpretations of history, their handling of memorial and religious issues, and the fact that they exonerated the emperor and mainly indicted military leaders all decisively shaped Japan’s relationship with its past.

INTRODUCTIONXXI

The monuments and memorials dedicated to World War II, in the broad sense of the term, demonstrate the complex nature of the memory of the 1930s and 1940s in contemporary Japan. But there is a risk when visiting such sites of assuming a specific example to be a general rule. A visit to Hiroshima may indeed give the impression that Japan is traumatized by the atomic bombs, or that it sees itself more as a victim of the war than as a guilty party. Such an approach is misleading. Only a comprehensive and diachronic approach to the issue can reveal the complex dynamics at work—namely, that t
the situation has evolved with time; t
several regions have developed their own particular, competing discourses; t
the state, local authorities, and religious groups all follow their own reasoning; t
relations with South Korea and the People’s Republic of China play a decisive role; and t
the way individuals view their history is liable to change according to the identity of the person they are speaking to. In Japan, memories of the war are fragmented and historical controversies constant. For all this, such divisions have never truly threatened the country’s unity, for the national bond in postwar Japan is above all characterized by conflictual cohesion, or unity through the fruitful juxtaposition of opposites. Is this proof of the strength of Japan’s democracy? Or is there another way of understanding the balance between these clashing forces?

THE JAPANESE AND THE WAR

1 THE NATION OUT TO CONQUER

JAPAN GOES TO WAR

uly 7, 1937, marked the beginning of a series of skirmishes between a detachment of the Imperial Japanese Army and a garrison of the Chinese National Revolutionary Army. Hostilities centered on a twelfth-century architectural structure known as the Marco Polo (or Lugou) Bridge. On one side lay one of the main railroads linking Beijing to the heart of the country. On the other was Wanping Fortress, which controlled access to the center of the capital a few kilometers away. Japan used this incident as a pretext to launch a major offensive. In retrospect, the taking of Marco Polo Bridge can be seen as marking Japan’s entry into a conflict that prefigured World War II. Yet this was not the impression that reigned at the time, when the problem was seen as serious but distant and its consequences not clearly understood.1 During the entire first stage of the conflict the Japanese government spoke only of the “China Incident,” thereby downplaying its importance. Furthermore, the Japanese population was accustomed to hearing about military problems on the continent. Not only had there been serious clashes between late 1931 and early 1932 in Manchuria and Shanghai—events that were widely covered by the press and radio—but also the memory of these events was still fresh, stoked as it was by the government in a politically unstable context marked by assassinations and attempted coups, such as those that took place in May 1932 and February 1936.

J

2THE NATION OUT TO CONQUER

One particularly infamous feat of arms was at the forefront of people’s minds. On February 22, 1932, in the suburbs of Shanghai, three Japanese soldiers had been killed by the explosion of their Bangalore torpedo, a long tube designed to blow a hole in the enemies’ defenses. In the years that followed, the so-called three human bullets2 received unprecedented media attention. Their sacrifice (whether it was intentional or not is unclear) was lauded in several songs, one of which was added to the elementary school curriculum, where singing was a compulsory subject. Four films re-created their act of bravery, and it was celebrated in countless poems, theater plays, and stories. The national newspapers seized the occasion to organize extensive fund-raising campaigns, making it possible, for example, to erect a bronze statue, which no sooner unveiled in 1934 than it became a popular place for displays of national fervor. In fact, the image of a crowd paying tribute to the statue was later used abundantly by the Americans as a symbol of Japanese fanaticism.3 The war gradually became a fact of life, insinuating itself into people’s minds, while a movement exalting the idea of sacrifice for the nation simultaneously took shape.4

FIGURE 1.1  “Bronze

1934.

Statue of the Three Human Bullets (Greater Tokyo).” Postcard,

THE NATION OUT TO CONQUER3

As with most of the great modern conflicts, conscripts were the first to be affected. This was particularly true for Japan, since the battlefronts were located exclusively overseas. The Military Service Law governing conscription during World War II was enacted in 1927. Conscripts were ordered to report for a medical exam in their twentieth year following a declaration from the household head, thereby instilling individuals with a sense of responsibility for their acts vis-à-vis their families. Barring exemption or special circumstances, military service began a few months later,5 although a large number of young men had already attended a military training course conducted locally by former soldiers. Military service was intended to tie individuals to their place of origin. The Japanese system stipulated that men were posted to a regiment close to their place of civil registration, which, as in Switzerland, was not their place of birth but rather their place of family origin. For many city dwellers military service thus represented a kind of homecoming. The result of this organization was to bind the nation to its soldiers. “Because each regiment recruited locally, the conscripts knew each other, but more important they were known to villagers, neighbors, and local authorities, increasing local peer pressure on conscripts to do well in the army,”6 underlines Edward Drea. At the same time, military practices and habits were uniform throughout the country: the hierarchical rules and discipline, the general functioning of the barracks, the exercises, music, and songs, even the slang, were all powerful means of unifying the nation. Nonetheless, Japan was no different from other countries, and a certain number of its young men attempted to dodge the draft and military service. As of 1937, the number of requests to postpone active service in order to continue studying increased significantly, as did requests for deferment due to living overseas, particularly from areas like Okinawa with a strong tradition of migrating.7 Perceptions of the army varied within society, particularly since the violence and discrimination rife among its ranks were known to the population. At the end of the 1930s the country had a population of around seventy million inhabitants; life expectancy was just under 50 years and the average age 26.5. In 1941, just before Japan went to war with the United States and Great Britain, there were 2.1 million soldiers in the army and 310,000 in the navy.8 Even taking into account all those exempt for medical or social reasons, the army was assured of having reserves: in fact, in one age category the conscription rate rose from 54 percent in 1941

4THE NATION OUT TO CONQUER

to 90 percent in 1945.9 Until 1943 generous arrangements existed for the 120,000 or so students entering the country’s universities and normal schools each year, reflecting the government’s willingness to protect the elites. They could postpone joining the army until the age of twenty-five, enjoy a shortened military service, and, finally, be discharged directly into the territorial reserve. Students and, more generally, intellectuals thus participated little in the war effort against China between 1937 and 1941. This is an important point to make because it was first and foremost this group that wrote the history of the period.

THE NATIONAL IDEOLOGY

There were no national programmatic texts in Japan that, like Hitler’s Mein Kampf or the Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung, outlined the main features of the nation on its slippery slope toward mass violence. However, two texts were known to everyone—or almost everyone—and they were decisive in the process of unifying the nation. These were the Imperial Rescript to Soldiers and Sailors (1882) and the Imperial Rescript on Education (1890). They were read and distributed to all soldiers in the case of the former, and to all schoolchildren for the latter, and the main points learned by heart. If there was a characteristic “mentality” in Japan during the first half of the twentieth century, whether on the battlefields or in everyday life, it is first and foremost in these texts that it must be sought. This mentality was devised by those in power to resist Western colonialism, drafted by people of letters familiar with the West, and disseminated to the masses via the new means of communication. The Imperial Rescript to Soldiers and Sailors consisted of an initial section written in the first person10 and describing the nation as a living organism, with the emperor—“the supreme military commander”—its head, and the soldiers, its limbs. This was followed by five articles, often abbreviated to t
soldiers should consider loyalty their essential duty; t
soldiers should adhere to the codes of conduct—in other words, they should respect the hierarchy; t
soldiers should esteem valor;

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t
soldiers should attach the greatest importance to faithfulness and fulfilling their duty; t
soldiers should make simplicity their aim.11 These few lines were printed on a variety of media and even existed in song. They were memorized and recited by millions, over several generations, and their echo reached far beyond the barracks.12 The drafting of the Imperial Rescript on Education coincided with the promulgation of the 1889 Meiji Constitution and reflected a desire to nationalize the Confucian ethic.13 The text, written in the emperor’s name and in an archaic style, began with a reference to the myth of the unbroken imperial line and an affirmation of the nation’s historical unity, stating that “our millions of subjects are united in loyalty and filial piety.” A  series of moral precepts followed, calling on the Japanese to pursue their studies, show concern for the common good, and serve the nation in times of crisis. Copies were carefully made and distributed to all schools, where they were housed in an alcove or small pavilion (hōanden) built especially for that purpose. The rescript would be displayed next to a portrait of the emperor in military dress with the empress beside him. Prewar photographs clearly convey the solemn atmosphere that accompanied the reading of the rescript: students can be seen lined up in the school yard on the occasion of a public holiday, their heads bowed and bodies bent slightly forward; the school principal, along with one or two black-suited officials and sometimes a Shinto priest, is standing on the steps of the hōanden, its doors open for the occasion. The importance of the rescript continued to grow over the years, to such an extent that the fiftieth anniversary of its proclamation in 1940 was commemorated with a huge ceremony involving twelve thousand people lined up before the emperor. It thus became a “national text” capable of replacing what Christianity provided in strength and unity to the Western powers.14 What is more, it was distributed throughout the territories under Japanese rule very early on: in Taiwanese schools in 189715 and Korean schools in 1912. In the 1930s, teachers and students were required to bow when passing before the hōanden or alcove that held the rescript. Not only was this text read aloud on ceremonial occasions but it had to be memorized as well, if only in its abbreviated form of twelve commandments.16 Beginning in 1934, a school assembly was held one morning per week before classes began. In Toyama Prefecture the order of events was as follows:

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1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10.

Bow Sing the national anthem Raise the flag Bow to the flag Bow in the direction of the Imperial Palace Bow in the direction of Ise Shrine Recite the main precepts of the Imperial Rescript on Education Listen to a speech from the school principal Sing the national anthem Bow17

The rescripts were a central element in the indoctrination of Japan’s youth. Because their contents were copied and recited millions of times, generation after generation, from the late nineteenth century through 1945, these two texts were the principal means by which the government bound the population to its national unification policies. Yet the image of the national bond presented in these texts was characterized by a complete disregard for—or even mention of—any institution other than the people and the imperial dynasty. There is not a single trace of the nobility, the government, or any other body constituting a separate category or an intermediary structure.18 In this arrangement the emperor was both the center and the perimeter of the nation. As the monarch, he represented its center, but as the incarnation of the mythical empire, he also represented its contour. Contrary to what one might expect, these two texts were not laws, which would have required them to be countersigned by government ministers. They were presented as emanating directly from the sovereign. On the one hand there is “the One,” in other words the emperor, representing the country’s political center and mythical continuity while guaranteeing the infallibility of the rules of public morality; and on the other, there is the myriad of subjects, a complex, vast, and unstructured whole in which no groups or individuals can be distinguished. The nation (or national body, the kokutai) thus appears to be a joining of the emperor and his people, transformed by myth, history, and morality into an organic and interdependent whole, just as living beings and sometimes families are. And in fact, this is how the texts were explained to Hirohito during his adolescence. Having ascended to the throne, he liked to imagine his role as that of a brain controlling the rest of the body.19

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The kokutai ideology was disseminated via countless civil and military celebrations. During the Taishō period (1912–1926) there were at least ten national holidays, any one of which could give rise to large public gatherings encouraged by the authorities.20 This was in addition to Army Day (March 10) and Navy Day (May 27), as well as celebrations marking the new school year and a handful of special parades celebrating specific military operations. During these celebrations inhabitants of the capital were invited to gather before the Imperial Palace or in major parks such as Hibiya. In the late 1930s these festivities became significantly more participatory, involving lining up in rows, observing a minute’s silence, bowing, and shouting, “Long live the emperor,” giving participants a sense of both belonging to the masses and the power of those manipulating them. Through these different celebrations the state not only took control of the population’s leisure time but also shaped the people in accordance with its own view of the masses as a compact and homogeneous whole that lacked responsibility. When people were told that they formed a single body, individuals simply had to look around them to physically feel that they were being told the truth. For those few hours of the celebration, the crowd of individuals embodied the ideal image of the nation. Nevertheless, while the reports, films, and photographs conserved of these national celebrations and rites present an image of individuals firmly led by the state, Japanese literature and arts suggest a more complex point of view. And no one explored the relationship between individuals and the group more than the novelist Natsume Sōseki. As he wrote in I Am a Cat (1907) with much irony, “To the casual observer it may appear that all cats are the same, facsimiles in form and substance, as indistinguishable as peas in a pod; and that no cat can lay claim to individuality. But once admitted to feline society, that casual observer would very quickly realize that things are not so simple, and that the human saying that ‘people are freaks’ is equally true in the world of cats.”21 Sōseki’s characters always have great psychological depth. They have their own unique, well-drawn personalities but are motivated by feelings and opinions that can change according to the turn of events. They are lucid beings but also anxious and observant. In one scene from The Heredity of Taste, for example, the narrator, finding himself among a crowd that has gathered to hail a triumphantly returning general, describes feeling both irrepressibly drawn to the spectacle and yet ridiculous at having to jump up and down to see what is going on.22 The immediate and unfailing recognition of Sōseki’s

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talent, whether before, during, or after the war, shows that the Japanese are perfectly aware of the complex, tortuous, and often powerful and grotesque nature of the bond linking the individual to others.

THE ROLE OF CIVILIANS

The opening months of the war—in other words, from the summer of 1937 to the winter of 1938, during which events like the Nanking Massacre took place—did not significantly alter the lives of Japanese citizens. A strange atmosphere still hung over Japan, a peculiar blend of fever and apathy. Humanity and Paper Balloons by Yamanaka Sadao was released onto cinema screens in August 1937.23 This dark yet lighthearted film depicting the lives of a decadent samurai, a gambling barber, and the local thugs that rule the neighborhood turns social convention on its head with caustic humor. In the literary arena, the public continued to show an interest in Kawabata Yasunari’s Snow Country and Nagai Kafū’s A Strange Tale from East of the River, two highly aestheticized novels far removed from political concerns.24 Over in the world of art, surrealism was in its heyday. Despite the violent clashes taking place in China, the government had yet to take any special measures and was instead attempting to maintain the illusion of a colonial-type expedition with no direct repercussions for the metropole. Thanks to the plethora of news media in Japan, the population was able to follow events on the continent closely and in some ways was quicker to respond than the government. Throughout the country people were organizing war relief campaigns, a movement that the newspapers supported by providing coverage and publicity. Local authorities, professional organizations, and citizens associations held repeated fund-raising drives, collections of basic commodities, and charity sales, just as they did between 1931 and 1933.25 These were a great success, with vast swaths of the population spontaneously contributing to the war effort. The funds and goods collected were then offered to the families of war victims, hospitals, troops, or even the authorities. However, these efforts were completely uncoordinated. The money did not end up where the government would have liked it to, and very often the receiving institutions had no idea what to do with the objects donated. This is illustrated by a Kyoto

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FIGURE 1.2  “Protect

the Families of Soldiers [Fighting for the] Development of Asia!” Poster from the Military Protection Agency, 1938.

regiment that found itself wondering what to do with a set of abstract surrealist paintings donated by local artists.26 Thus, not only was the government overwhelmed by the scale of the conflict on the ground; it also failed to predict the wave of popular support, allowing part of the national savings to be frittered away without any direct benefit for the war. As was frequently pointed out at the time by Western commentators, Japan does not appear to have had a long-term plan.

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It possessed an ideology of national unification, a set of moral values and social practices, but neither a clear and unified political agenda nor any real strategy due to the organization of government circles into factions. In response to this situation the administration of Konoe Fumimaro passed a law in the spring of 1938 for the national mobilization of citizens, designed to bring Japan into line with Germany and Italy, with which the first treaties of alliance had recently been signed. The aim of this legislation was to define the ways and means of “controlling and employing human and material resources, using them in the most efficient manner possible in order to defend the country in times of war.”27 As of May 5, 1938, the date on which the law came into effect, Japan thus considered itself on a domestic level to be operating under a war regime. In the months and years that followed, a succession of imperial edicts was announced defining the scope of the law. All sectors of society gradually came to be concerned: individuals, regional governments, and public bodies, but also the press and private businesses. The government thus gave itself the means to control all the strategic sectors of economic life and to requisition individuals as needs dictated. Late 1938 and all of 1939 saw the implementation of various measures of social and economic control, as well as the beginning of a process to merge intermediary bodies. The number of cooperatives and labor unions, for example, dropped from 973 in 1936 to 517 in 1939. However, this was a gradual and relatively painless process, quite different from the one that occurred in late 1940, when the number of forced mergers rose and membership of independent cooperatives and unions suddenly shrank from 365,000 members to less than 10,000. At the same time, a certain number of operations were carried out to raise public awareness of the war.28 In August 1939, as part of its National Spiritual Mobilization Movement, the government implemented a campaign declaring, “Luxury is our enemy!” aimed at curbing consumption and encouraging people to save money in order to finance the country’s military operations. However, this initiative was not particularly restrictive, and there were still many areas of society in which money could be flaunted. The late 1930s was a particularly prosperous period for the Yoshiwara pleasure district, for example. At the same time, several measures were adopted to limit Westernization, with American-sounding imported terms, jazz, and modern hairstyles all vilified. The National Mobilization Law of 1938 thus

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had the greatest impact on the middle classes. In contrast, for the peasant families that still made up the majority of the population, war was a reality only in terms of their concern, tinged with pride, for the young men doing their duty on the battlefields.

REPRESSION AND REHABILITATION OF OPPONENTS

The philosopher Nakai Masakazu29 was arrested in Kyoto in November 1937 under the Public Security Preservation Law. Nakai had never been an activist for the Japanese Communist Party (JCP), nor had he criticized the imperial institution. He defined himself as an antifascist and was one of the main editors of the journal Sekai bunka (world culture), founded in 1935. He liked to quote Romain Rolland and hoped to see the birth of a kind of Popular Front in Japan. He was the victim of a regime that was no longer content to merely pursue communists, as it had done since the late 1920s, but had also taken to repressing intellectuals, artists, and members of religious congregations (particularly Christians) expressing divergent opinions on the main issues of national policy. Between 1937 and late 1941, 5,046 people were arrested on ideological grounds. Of these, 1,303—approximately 25 percent—went to trial.30 At a time when the government was conducting a series of information campaigns designed to raise public awareness of the danger of spies, any overly visible protest about the lifestyle imposed by the war was liable to be seen as an ideological stance or a threat to national security. Nakai’s entanglements with the law forced him to resign from his position at Kyoto University. He was charged and thrown into jail, where he remained for just over one year before being hospitalized with diphtheria. He was subsequently placed under house arrest and tried in October 1940. Found guilty of having communist sympathies, he was given a twoyear mandatory sentence (which he served while awaiting trial) and a twoyear suspended sentence. The year that followed was a period of isolation and destitution for Nakai. However, in 1942 he was awarded a grant from the Imperial Academy to continue his philological research. He examined all the Japanese literary classics and undertook the mammoth task of listing every occurrence of the concept ki, or “breath” in the Chinese sense. He published

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little during this period. Nonetheless, some of his papers have a clearly patriotic tone and champion the Japanese spirit, in particular its aesthetic of emptiness, a concept used abundantly in propaganda to promote a spirit of sacrifice among the people. Beginning in 1943, he made a concrete contribution to the war effort by leading his local firefighting unit.31 Nakai’s experience clearly illustrates how the authorities dealt with petty ideological offenders, communist sympathizers, antifascist campaigners, or simply those under suspicion for a variety of reasons. The modus operandi of the state was broadly established in the early 1930s: after their arrest, suspects were placed in prison, and while the majority were released shortly after, for others there began a period of provisional detention. The legal machine deliberately dragged out the investigation period anywhere from two months to two years, arguing that the court system was congested. Life in the cells meant suffering a combination of cold, heat, malnutrition, and sickness. Suspects were subjected to many interrogations in which lectures, violence, or even torture were routine. For all this, minor offenders were never completely cast out of society. Shinmura Takeshi, the French-speaking linguist and friend of Nakai, reported, for example, that his jailers frequently called him “professor” or “master” despite the beatings that accompanied his interrogations.32 Many arrangements were possible, making prison a painful, infantilizing experience that was dangerous for one’s health but rarely inhuman. During detention the authorities went out of their way to force prisoners to sign a document in which they agreed to respect the national interest and cease breaking the law. Prior to 1936, those who complied could hope for a provisional release, and after 1936, release on probation. In all cases release was conditional on a guarantor’s (a family member in 80 percent of cases) providing a monthly surveillance report. Involving relatives in this way reflected the family-oriented ideology of the kokutai and simultaneously enabled the authorities to establish a frighteningly efficient system. Rare were those who followed the example of the communist leaders Tokuda Kyūichi and Miyamoto Kenji by rejecting the compromise on offer. This operating method was one of the great successes of Japan’s nationalist indoctrination. Overall, the procedures can be said to have respected the rule of law. In contrast to what was seen in Europe or the USSR, the Japanese police never allowed punishment to take precedence over repression. They showed great constancy in their objectives, permanently adapting their methods

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to improve results and achieving total repentance in the majority of cases. The irregularity of arrests also gave those feeling under threat the time to “spontaneously reorient themselves” and, if necessary, to disband—once again “spontaneously”—the organizations to which they belonged. All of which was naturally the authorities’ objective.33 While the Japanese legal system did not give in to paranoia by seeking opponents everywhere, neither did it succumb to an ideology of purity that would have made any repentance seem necessarily suspicious. On the whole, it maintained a paternalistic and authoritarian line that was true to the spirit of the Meiji institutions. Once released from prison, individuals remained under the control of the police, in particular after 1936 and the adoption of the law on the prevention and surveillance of thought crimes. Nevertheless, this surveillance did not result in exclusion from society. While imprisonment may have had grave economic consequences for prisoners and their families alike, it seems that the accused were often given the opportunity to rejoin society. What is more, the state often tried to recruit them. Those publically proclaiming their new orientation could be re-admitted to the national community after one or two years. This was the case for Hino Ashihei, who just a few years after his arrest in 1928 became a highly famous war writer working directly for the army.34 This phenomenon was not limited to one or two individuals possibly manipulated by the government or the military for propaganda purposes. In the cultural sphere, it was almost a rule. Umemoto Takemata, for example, was a minor activist distributing copies of the JCP’s underground newspaper. Arrested in January 1934, he was freed two years later after agreeing to a political reorientation that respected the national ideology and, in 1938, joined the Army Information Board as a photographer.35 The Marxist economist Arisawa Hiromi was arrested in early 1939. He spent a few months in prison before being recruited by the army for a secret mission to analyze the economic consequences of a military conflict with the United States.36 The surrealist poet Takiguchi Shūzō was imprisoned from April to December 1941 because of the suspicious nature of his activities. In the autumn of 1943 he began working for an organ of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.37 The authorities thus not only refused to ostracize those repenting but also invested in them wherever that was deemed possible. The army in particular was one of the main institutions to have welcomed them. This strategy was driven by the same desire to unify that enabled a man like Saigō Takamori38 to

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become a national hero despite having opposed the imperial government during the 1870s. The archives of the Japanese Home Ministry identify just a few hundred people who, in 1945, had “yet to be reoriented.”39 There were no resistance movements organized on Japanese soil, and the number of people branded enemies of the state was extraordinarily low.40 Although many criticized the war effort behind closed doors, on the surface at least, by the early 1940s Japan had achieved the Meiji dream of total unity.

MEDIA CONTROL

The layout of Tokyo in the late 1930s was not very different from what we see today. The destruction of its old working-class neighborhoods during the 1923 earthquake and the construction of its urban rail network created a modern city in which one could easily and quickly travel from A to B. The central line (Chūō-sen) linking Tokyo Station to Shinjuku opened in 1919; the circle line (Yamanote-sen), forming a wide circle around the Imperial Palace and defining the new center of the megalopolis, was completed in 1925; in 1939, after twelve years of construction works, the first underground line (Ginza-sen) linking Asakusa to Shibuya via Ginza officially marked the shift of the city’s cultural and leisure centers to the south and west. Tokyo was already a vast, dynamic, and fluid city with an intense cultural activity whose influence could be felt throughout the country thanks to the media. Although Osaka and the Kansai region in general remained important, the increasing shift in the balance of power was palpable. The publishing industry, previously split between Tokyo and Kyoto, now tended to be concentrated in the new imperial capital. The film industry, which had initially flourished in the Kansai region, saw its center of gravity shift to Tokyo during the late 1920s. The press continued to have strong local roots, but the move toward centralization was felt across the board, and the capital’s main dailies gradually came to be “national” dailies. Finally, radio, which had begun broadcasting in 1925, was a state-run monopoly, and although local stations, in particular that of Osaka, enjoyed considerable autonomy, they nonetheless depended on the Ministry of Communications. This was particularly true after 1936,

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when the government appointed a top civil servant to head the national broadcaster NHK. Channeled by the media, the energy that radiated from Tokyo spread throughout the empire, from the northernmost to the southernmost tips of the country, then on to Korea, Taiwan, Sakhalin, and Manchuria. All classes of society had access to the press. Various surveys from the day suggest that by the 1920s more than 80 percent of working-class and rural households subscribed to at least one daily newspaper.41 The outbreak of the war with China did not put a damper on this trend; on the contrary, the percentage of families owning a radio grew faster than ever, rising from 18.1 percent in 1935 to 39.9 percent in 1940. Film production remained stable (approximately 500 pictures produced annually between 1935 and 1940), but there was a sharp rise in cinema attendance, from 290 million tickets sold in 1937 to 440 million in 1940.42 Only newspapers and periodicals saw an early downturn, with the number of publications suddenly contracting by 35 percent in 1939.43 Until the 1930s, the policy of national unification relied essentially on common principles of education and on events organized by public institutions, thereby lending it an air of solemnity. The new media encouraged an identification with national values that was both more routine and more exciting. Radio was instrumental in this, broadcasting, beginning in 1936, programs featuring patriotic songs and international sporting competitions. Japan’s militarist government was fairly quick to understand the significance of the changes afoot. In 1935–1936 it began a drive to nationalize key positions in the media, the objective being to control and orient. Wherever it could, it placed senior officials at the head of the country’s cultural organizations. This seizure of power was not carried out abruptly, however. Due consideration was given to dialogue so that, where possible, those formerly in charge retained a place in the new system. And while it was not possible to challenge the principle of this policy, a little room for negotiation did exist. A few months after the Sino-Japanese War broke out the government decided to step up this policy. Insidious nationalization through a succession of ministerial decrees gradually gave way to the adoption of increasingly generic and coercive laws. It was in this context that the Motion Picture Law was adopted on April 5, 1939, the overriding aim of which was to vet films prior to production, with screenplays submitted to a censorship commission overseen by a Home Ministry official.

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Producers were thus forced to self-censor their films considerably before submission, particularly since the commission’s criteria were not clearly stated, the law mentioning only its aim to “improve quality” and promote the “healthy development” of the Japanese film industry.44 Japan took the same approach to its cultural and social institutions as it did to its population—namely, a blend of indoctrination, vagueness, and coercion, leading individuals not only to understand by themselves but also to incorporate the values of the imperial ideology into their actions. The intensification of censorship emanated from a parliamentary system that, although in the service of the government, never overstepped the boundaries of the law. As such, it is difficult to ascribe a particular measure or law to any one political leader or even to a faction. There was no equivalent of Joseph Goebbels in Japan. Furthermore, the lawmaking frenzy of 1937–1940 did not sweep away and replace the system already in place. In many cases the preexisting legal provisions, most of which dated back to the Meiji period, provided a sufficient base for the government’s needs. The Newspaper Law of 1909, for example, already stipulated not only that the Home Minister could prevent the circulation of any publication threatening public order or breaching moral standards but also that the army, navy, and foreign affairs ministers could do the same for issues relating to military or diplomatic affairs.45 The legal framework was strengthened by amendment, but there was no break with the past from a legal perspective. By around 1940 freedom of expression was already severely limited. It was forbidden to campaign for the abolition of private property, criticize the founding principles of the imperial ideology, discuss any data relating to national defense or any measures linked to national mobilization, and, finally, to publicly breach moral standards. These rules applied not only to the written and spoken word, for newspapers and films alike, but also in a variety of related situations. It was forbidden, for example, to take photographs outside in the majority of cities for reasons of national security. Despite this situation, the law was not so draconian as to silence society to the point that people were afraid to speak out among friends and family, for the state did not put in place a unified system of surveillance and popular denunciation as was the case in Soviet countries. Although social pressure did indeed weigh on people’s minds, criticism continued to exist, justified and fueled by the rivalry at the very heart of government between the army and the navy, or between the Home Ministry and the Ministry of Education.46

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CONTROLLING THE BODY

Along the way, four or five Japanese, rather small in stature but young and handsome, stood in a line talking to a tall, young Westerner. I don’t know what they were talking about, but I immediately felt that the attitude of these elegant young men toward this Westerner exactly resembled that of vassals toward their lord, or like women in the workplace toward men. I don’t know if this Westerner was an important person or not, but I did not get the feeling that the respect shown to him was due merely to his personal worth. I felt deeply irritated and uneasy, as well as terribly dejected.47

This impression recounted by a writer at the beginning of the 1930s is much more than a simple anecdote. When Japan first opened its borders in the second half of the nineteenth century, it discovered the extent of the West’s military and technical prowess, as well as a system of thought that proclaimed racial superiority through strength. Internalizing this logic only made the sensation even more painful. Practices such as eating beef, wearing a beard, and sitting on tall chairs made the reality of Westernization a daily physical burden for the Japanese. This reality could never be forgotten in the way that, in Europe, one might forget that Disney’s Snow White is an American production. At the same time, the Japanese realized that self-confidence and the desire to dominate were the two psychological conditions necessary to achieve de facto superiority. It was this perspective, based largely on Spencerian thinking (which had a considerable influence in Japan), that led to the establishment of an educational policy aiming not only to unite the masses around the emperor but also to instill the idea of Japanese supremacy. The victory against Russia confirmed the pertinence of this decision and caused views on the specificity and genius of the nation to flourish. The form of racism developed by the Japanese toward Koreans and Chinese in the first half of the twentieth century was a perverse by-product of the policy of self-assertion developed in reaction to Western colonialism. It had neither the historical depth nor the religious roots of the anti-Semitism seen in Christian countries. Incidentally, while the nation was revered above all else, the idea of racial unity in the biological sense was not dominant. On the contrary,

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anthropological debates of the time show a tendency to favor the hypothesis of Japan’s population having multiethnic origins. Another, parallel theory upheld the idea of the Japanese and Koreans sharing racial similarities.48 This theory, which emerged just as antiannexation movements were intensifying on the continent, found a growing echo in Japan and precious allies among linguists. It resulted in a theory claiming Manchuria as the birthplace of Japanese culture and the Japanese, an Altaic population that had developed in a superior manner thanks to Japan’s favorable climate and nature. Following this logic, Japan’s territorial expansion on the continent was likened to a return to the nation’s roots, a simple move to reintegrate by the most successful element; in other words, a radically different discourse than the one motivating European colonialism. The perception of Japan’s ethnic identity changed little during the war, yet the conflict modified the relationship of the Japanese to the body, hygiene, sexuality, or even diet. In January 1938 the government created a Ministry of Health and instigated large-scale information drives on the subject of “good health,” relying heavily on the network of associations belonging to the Daily Life Improvement Campaign launched in the 1920s.49 On the other hand, it took to vilifying anything deemed “degenerate” and “unhealthy.” Colorful clothing gradually disappeared from the press and was replaced by brown, gray, and khaki garments. Men were encouraged to keep their hair short and the nape of the neck uncovered. In the pages of film magazines, the languorous and enigmatic actresses of the 1920s gave way to a succession of young women like Hara Setsuko with a clear, candid gaze. Japanese society, already highly normative in terms of body language and the attitude of individuals, became even more so. In a variety of everyday situations the body was required to bend itself to the rules. This was true of course in the world of work but also in terms of leisure activities: whenever the flag or the emperor appeared during the newsreels shown at cinemas, an on-screen note prompted viewers to remove their hats;50 even the population’s private lives were affected, as suggested by the disappearance of sex information from women’s magazines.51 At the group level, gymnastics, rugby, and the martial arts were all encouraged in an effort to “mold the masses into a national body,”52 while dance halls, associated as they were with individual pleasure and licentiousness, were gradually closed. The increase in parades and popular gatherings also provided an opportunity to formalize the ideal of national unity and encourage its physical assimilation by the population. More

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generally, in early 1940 the government adopted two laws, one intended to require the population to undergo a compulsory medical exam53 and the other to encourage “healthy” populations and “curb reproduction among populations with inferior constitutions and genetic ailments.”54 While virtually no concrete developments were made on this front, Japan’s entry into war was accompanied by a eugenic ideology of controlling individual body and social body alike. The fundamental virtue of good health was joined by that of simplicity, a theme already present in the Imperial Rescript to Soldiers and Sailors. At a time when the government was enjoining the nation to save in order to finance the war—“In the Heart, Patriotism; in the Hand,

FIGURE 1.3  “In the Heart, Patriotism; in the Hand, Government Bonds!” Ministry of Finance poster promoting China Incident government bonds, 1938.

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Government Bonds!” stated a Ministry of Finance poster from the late 1930s55—luxury was sharply criticized. A system of rationing and price control was gradually put in place. Cotton began to be limited in 1938; electricity and petroleum in late 1939; and in certain regions, ration books began to be distributed in April 1940 for staples such as rice, miso, salt, coal, sugar, and even matches. As summarized in an American report from 1945, “Before Pearl Harbor the average calorie intake per inhabitant was approximately 2,000 calories in Japan compared to 3,400 in the United States.”56 The Japanese population, which suffered a shortage of basic goods even before the Pacific War, soon found itself caught between two contradictory rationales, one extolling the virtues of good health and strength in imitation of the great Western powers and the other exhorting frugality and parsimony because of Japan’s lack of resources. It is precisely this contradiction that gave rise to the spiritualization of the war effort and the glorification of the mind at the expense of the body and of all things material in general.

THE ACCELERATION OF TIME

In June 1940 Japan News (Nippon nyūsu), a short information program created at the government’s behest, appeared on cinema screens for the first time. More than a thousand people were employed to create these newsreels. The first broadcast showed the emperor on a visit. It opened with a procession of cars followed by cannon fire and a shot of the imperial train, before closing with another procession of cars. The newsreel then moved on to an athletics meeting showing flags waving in the breeze, a pistol being fired into the air, and a hurdles race.57 Images of this type not only enabled the government to exalt the nation and the army but also provided a subliminal reminder of the time governing the period: a mechanical, fast-moving, and positive time. War brought with it a new temporality characterized by a rationalization of the nation’s timetable modeled on military service or school. Similarly, radio, in particular the  gymnastics programs and news bulletins, encouraged the idea that the life of the entire nation was timed to the minute, due not only to the schedule these radio programs imposed on listeners but above all to their fast pace and the brutal, jerking rhythm emanating from the radio set.

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The Japanese language during the war was characterized by the use of a range of time-related expressions: the populace was repeatedly told that this was a “time of war” (senji), a “time of crisis” (hijōji), or that these were “grave times” (jikyoku no jūdai). “We must hurry” (isogu, isogashii) repeated the playwright Kishida Kunio throughout his texts.58 Phrases such as “not waiting” (-mo matazu) or doing things “without delay” (ichinichi mo hayaku) were omnipresent. Individuals were called on to change their pace, and a feeling of urgency became all pervasive. Conversely, relaxing or simply taking one’s time were considered shocking. It was primarily this slow pace that was criticized in Tanizaki Jun’ichirō’s The Makioka Sisters (1943–1948), a novel that follows the wandering hesitations of four sisters from an upper-middle-class family. “This novel,” noted government censors, “goes on and on detailing the lives of weak and inadmissibly individualistic women.”59 This acceleration of time went hand in hand with action and collective engagement. But the more this sense of collective responsibility (in other words, the moral conscience) commanded that citizens adopt the national rhythm, the less room there was for thinking or taking other courses of action. On the eve of World War II, Japan’s system for reckoning time was still highly complex,60 consisting of three competing historical calendars: the era-name calendar, a calendar based on the mythical founding of the imperial dynasty, and, finally, the Western Gregorian calendar. According to the first, Germany’s defeat of France took place in year fifteen of the reign of Emperor Shōwa; according to the second, in the year 2600; and according to the third, in 1940. Although the era-name calendar was by far the most widely used, it was not uncommon to resort to the Western calendar. Furthermore, the 2,600th anniversary of the imperial dynasty revived the use of the second calendar, particularly as the government reacted by organizing countless formal celebrations and popular festivities exalting the empire’s long history, unity, and greatness. This momentous anniversary was both a return to Japan’s roots and a new beginning. This calendar gave the impression that Japan’s civilization was more ancient than that of the West, but having been little used until then, it also had an air of novelty and of legitimate revolution. The years 2601, 2602, and 2603 should be understood as years 1, 2, and 3 of a new national era. Furthermore, the ubiquitous references to the country’s being at war gave each of these new years a special value. As the novelist Miyamoto Yuriko (1899–1951) wrote in February 1940: “Not only will the coming year be

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worth ten, but, as we are beginning to understand in the Japan of 2600, the nature of this leap will impact all aspects of life in our society.”61 Beginning in 1938, the government introduced an increasing number of precisely timed commemorations. Mass information drives encouraged citizens, wherever they might be at the time, to observe a moment of silence and bow in the direction of the Imperial Palace at the following times: at 8:00 a.m. on April 29 (date of the emperor’s birthday); at 9:00 a.m. on January 1, February 11 (commemorating the founding of the empire), and November 3 (commemorating the birthday of Emperor Meiji); at 10:30 a.m. during the two great annual celebrations (one in spring, the other in autumn) held at Yasukuni Shrine; at midday on March 10 (Army Day), May 27 (Navy Day), and July 7 (the date Japan entered into war with China). In 1940 these were joined by several similar commemorations, including two on June 10 alone, at 11:12 a.m. and 1:54 p.m., respectively, coinciding with the emperor’s visit to Ise Shrine.62 Finally, between 1942 and 1944, December 8 (anniversary of Pearl Harbor and

FIGURE 1.4.  Notebook

1938.

cover announcing the Tokyo Olympic Games of 1940 (2600),

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beginning of the “Greater East Asia War”) provided a further opportunity to observe a moment of silence, at precisely 11:59 a.m.63 The practice of collectively bowing in the direction of the Imperial Palace appeared at the end of the nineteenth century. The moments of silence are even more recent. Imported from the West, this ritual was introduced in September 1924 on the first anniversary of the Great Kantō Earthquake. Newspapers reported that it was even observed by Emperor Taishō himself.64 Thus, from the beginning of the war with China onward, the Japanese were required, in the realm of the collective imagination, to follow a vague, dynamic, and unstable historical time whose artificial and fictitious nature was clearly in evidence while at the same being encouraged to regulate their daily activities according to increasingly numerous collective rituals. Consequently, beginning in 1940 we can speak of a precipitation of time, a phenomenon that merely grew and gathered pace after December 1941 when Japan entered the war against the Allies.

THE CONQUERED SPACE

In many countries exile was one of the solutions available to those who had been rejected by the system. Families from the Russian nobility or upper class fled the October Revolution, Italian communists took refuge in France in the 1920s, and thousands of Jews emigrated to the United States during the 1930s. From the safety of exile a community would form, keeping the flame of resistance alive and where necessary helping those who wished to emigrate themselves. And those who stayed behind could at least keep in the back of their minds the possibility of leaving. No such escape route was open to the Japanese whom the national policy appalled or frightened. Or to be more precise, one by one every door had been shut. Australia prohibited non-European migration onto its soil in 1901. In 1924 the United States imposed a visa ban on the majority of Asian countries. Brazil and Peru were popular destinations for Japanese emigration. However, departures for these countries were controlled by the government. When the war against China broke out in 1937, the Japanese government, concerned about a possible drain on its workforce and soldiers, put a block on emigration channels. The Soviet countries under Stalin were inaccessible. When the director Sugimoto Ryōkichi and his lover,

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a famous silent movie actress and fellow communist sympathizer, tried to flee there in January 1938, Sugimoto was accused of being a spy and executed by the Soviet services, while his mistress was imprisoned for ten years.65 France and Great Britain were two of the last possibilities available to the Japanese. However, the economic crisis and difference in living standards meant that this adventure was open only to the very rich. Both the painter Fujita and the playwright Hijikata Yoshi attempted to set up home in Paris in the late 1930s66 but were forced to leave France in 1940 and return to Japan. Fujita subsequently worked for the army, while Hijikata was thrown in jail. Aside from a few isolated cases, the only options open to the Japanese were Korea and Taiwan, both of them occupied or conquered lands. The desire for exile had to be suppressed or transformed into a colonial adventure. In the metropole, tourist travel, which had been popular at virtually all levels of society since the 1920s, continued until quite late into the war. Visas were not required for travel within the archipelago; there were also no measures in place to systematically check the identity of individuals, and the rail network was already extensive. The free movement of people was maintained throughout the war. Nonetheless, in early 1941 the government attempted to curb private travel: “The railway is a weapon. Let’s stop unnecessary travel!” stated a cinema advertisement. Private railway companies responded by launching campaigns on the theme of health and patriotism. To encourage people to holiday at the seaside, they began to vaunt the merits of a “fortifying summer” that would benefit the motherland. To promote train travel on public holidays they exalted the “sacred places” visited by various emperors, in particular Emperor Meiji. “A tacit agreement existed between the railway companies, which were unable to advertise leisure activities overtly, and Japanese citizens, who, although keen to go away on holiday, could not act openly.”67 Furthermore, while the government was keen to restrict travel as a way of encouraging people to save, it also pushed citizens to visit the main sites of imperial worship, in particular Ise Shrine, Nara, and Kyoto, not to mention Miyazaki Prefecture, touted in a major promotional campaign by the national tourism agency, Japan Tourist Bureau, as the sacred place where Emperor Jimmu was said to originate.68 Seen from this particular angle, the ideology of national unity gives the impression of having been nothing but a huge game, primarily a question of form, which curbed initiative but did not prevent individual arrangements. In fact, the Japanese

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traveled extensively throughout the country until the outbreak of the Pacific War, after which there was a marked drop in travel for pleasure. However, it was only in late 1944, when the American bombing campaigns began, that it can be considered to have stopped completely. Outside Japan, it was China and Vietnam that captured the national imagination. Globes, planispheres, and maps of Asia were omnipresent in newspapers and on cinema screens. The authorities erected huge billboards outside train stations showing the army’s advance across the different war theaters and the new contours of the empire. At school, remembers the novelist Kusaka Yōko, “we were made to paint the Philippines in red and place Japanese flags on the map as far as the Pacific Islands.”69 Even the private sphere was affected, as suggested in a scene from a Kurosawa film in which we see a map of Asia hanging on a little girl’s bedroom wall.70 For all this, the Pacific War did not alter the way the Japanese perceived their regional space. In 1940, Japan News bulletins opened with the image of a bird of prey71 sitting atop a globe on which a zone corresponding to Japan’s expansion circa 1942 gradually lights up. The war merely validated Japan’s long-held perceptions of its role in Asia, made to seem natural by the passing decades. The economic crisis, Spanish Civil War, and German invasions all caused the West to gradually close its doors. Japanese tourism subsequently shifted to the colonies and occupied territories. The frustration of having one’s movements restricted found consolation in the flattering knowledge of Japan’s imperial domination. There was a renewed interest in Korea as a tourist destination, as evidenced by the appearance of allinclusive organized tours to the country: in 1939, a ten-day trip to Seoul (known at the time as Keijō), including third-class train and boat travel plus hotel accommodation, cost approximately ninety yen (for comparison, schoolteachers at the start of their career earned around fifty-five yen a month).72 Even those who lacked the means to travel assimilated the clichés of colonial imagery through the publicity campaigns. Nevertheless, the only truly popular destination was Lüshun, or Port Arthur, whose name was synonymous in the collective imagination with the Russo-Japanese War. Tourist travel to this area emerged in the late 1920s, encouraged by the government and the powerful South Manchurian Railway Company, or Mantetsu, in whose bosom militarism had developed. At the end of the 1930s approximately two hundred thousand Japanese were visiting the town each year, in particular the many monuments commemorating

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FIGURE 1.5  Passers-by

look at a map of the war, in Ginza, Tokyo, 1942.

the fallen soldiers of 1904–1905, who were renamed the “human bombs” as a means of glorifying their sacrifice.73 This was a form of mass tourism, with several bus companies competing to drive the several hundred daily visitors to the best-known sites. As of late 1938, Beijing and Shanghai also attracted a certain number of visitors, mainly journalists, scientists, intellectuals, and artists, the vast majority of them men. This was not strictly speaking tourism but rather colonial-type study trips. Japanese visitors generally enjoyed privileged

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FIGURE 1.6  “Destination:

Korea!” Poster by the Government-General of Korea, 1935.

living conditions during their stay. The exotic and Westernized city of Shanghai was a hectic place where a sense of freedom hung in the air; Beijing was calm and majestic, part of its population having fled the occupation: “Beijing has many points in common with Kyoto, but alas, Kyoto is not comparable with Beijing,”74 noted a journalist in February 1940. Local experiences were varied: some took advantage of their position; others, such as the writers Takeda Taijun and Takeuchi Yoshimi, wanted to strike up friendships with the Chinese or devote themselves to studying continental civilization in order to give substance to the “culture of East Asia.”75

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Nevertheless, contempt for the local populations was common even among the best-intentioned individuals, prostitutes were used extensively, and the plundering of food and material resources was practiced with little remorse. A secret Japanese report written in 1940 provides a harsh analysis of the attitude of Japanese nationals in northern China. It mentions a widespread “feeling of superiority” over the Chinese, “many humiliating acts that feed resentment,”76and a “tendency to be driven by xenophobia.”77 No social category was exempt, not even colonists or government officials, who were described in the report as being greedy for quick profits78 and having lost all sense of shame due to the superiority of the Japanese army and the distance separating them from the homeland.79 The discriminations practiced by the Japanese against Asian populations were no secret, however. They were repeatedly and publicly lamented by General Ishiwara Kanji and many others. “It is undeniable,” he wrote in 1940, “that since the Meiji Restoration the desire to create a racially homogeneous nation has exacerbated the tendency to look down on foreign countries. This is the main reason why we have sadly not been able to win the hearts of the local populations, whether in Taiwan, Korea, Manchuria, or China.”80 Visits by public personalities to the continent received wide media coverage. Although only a limited number of people were concerned, China, Indochina, and the entire Pacific region were part of daily reality for the vast majority of the population thanks to the press, literature, and the arts. Nevertheless, “faced with the enthusiasm of the written press for this war, the authorities decided to systematically send novelists or critics with a view to improving and controlling the propaganda effect.”81 The handful of books that presented the war in an overly graphic or negative light, such as Soldiers Alive (1938) by Ishikawa Tatsuzō, were rapidly censored. Seen through the filter of propaganda and self-censorship, the territories under Japanese domination were merely a land of fiction, die-hard heroism, and escape.

2 A TOTALITARIAN DYNAMIC, 1940–1945

TOTALITARIANISM: A QUESTION OF DEFINITION

obert Guillain was head of the Tokyo offices of Agence FrancePresse during the war and as such was one of the few French journalists active in Japan. In 1947 he drew upon this exceptional experience to publish Le peuple japonais et la guerre (The people of Japan and the war), a lengthy diatribe on the history of World War II as seen from inside Japan. Guillain later regretted the racist tone of this book, in which he contrasted the moral courage of Westerners with the herdlike mentality of the primitive and illogical Japanese, capable only of physical courage.1 This notwithstanding, Guillain’s account contains many interesting anecdotes, and above all provides a characteristic illustration of the way Japanese society was perceived at the time by Westerners. There are two sides to the image that emanates from the book. First, Guillain saw Japan as a place where “chaos” reigned, where the ruling circles were in “bedlam,” and as a country ruled by bland individuals like General Tōjō Hideki who lacked substance: “No, Tojo and those behind and around him must be taken as they were, gray against a grayish background; let’s not separate them artificially from the clan to which they belonged, from the crowds against which they are only dimly visible.”2 His first impression was one of chaos. There was movement, but it was uncoordinated; there were constituent parts, but they were not clearly distinct, forming

R

30A TOTALITARIAN DYNAMIC, 1940–1945

instead a viscous continuum with blurred boundaries. Yet Guillain also saw order in Japan, including codes and rituals in everyday life, of course, but also an increasingly tight control of the population by the civilian police and its military counterpart (kenpeitai). In parallel to the chaos he sensed the presence of organizational rules and structures and saw something mechanical in the way the country operated. These two phenomena are complementary and characterize totalitarian systems. The regimes of Joseph Stalin and Nazi Germany were extremely organized; they imposed a system of mutual surveillance among the citizenry and proclaimed the triumph of science. However, the constant need to keep society in perpetual motion and identify new enemies on the fringes as well as at the heart of society meant that these regimes gave the impression of being an absurd, disorganized, and shapeless mass.3 Nonetheless, Guillain sensed that the “totalitarian regime of modern Japan,”4 as he called it, was clearly different from the Nazi system. “The ‘average Japanese,’ ” he wrote, never feels like a whole and self-sufficient world. He is nothing if he is alone. Unlike the German, he does not even feel the need to ignore, cut off or sever a part of himself to become, through an act of will, a unit or fraction of a whole. . . . In the West, the group never succeeds in “totaling” the individuals within it. A subtraction always occurs at its expense, with each member of the community withholding a part of themselves. In wartime Japan, the group manages to be the absolute total of its members. The individual consents to this fusion, seeks it, and enjoys it. Once again, he believes that he will find revenge for his weaknesses, compensation for all that he has repressed. It is his way of attaining, through the group, the proud feeling of power for which he yearns.5

Guillain was not the only person in the West to consider wartime Japan a totalitarian-type country; he did, however, establish a distinction with European systems. This is also true of the eminent American historian Edwin Reischauer, who devoted an article to the issue in 1944.6 “Japanese totalitarianism,” he wrote, “is not a recent borrowing from the Occident but a thoroughly native Far Eastern product.” For Reischauer, there was a clear distinction between the “old totalitarian mentality” inherited from the Tokugawa and a new and belligerent totalitarianism that was “no pale reflection of totalitarian Germany.”7

A TOTALITARIAN DYNAMIC, 1940–1945 31

Despite the judgment of those who experienced wartime Japan firsthand, scholars today are hesitant to describe the regime as totalitarian. This is due chiefly to the American occupation. While investigations for the Nuremberg Trials regularly described the Nazi system as “totalitarian,” the American authorities never applied this term to Japan, preferring instead to label it “militarist,” “ultranationalist,” or “State Shintoist.” This omission stemmed from the fact that totalitarianism immediately conjured up images of a strong central power embodied by figures such as Benito Mussolini and Adolf Hitler. In other words, speaking of totalitarianism in the case of Japan would have implicitly suggested that the emperor was responsible for the war. Yet this was not the road chosen by Douglas MacArthur, who on the contrary spared Hirohito in order to assure his own grip on the country. The second reason relates to the work of Hannah Arendt, for whom the term “totalitarianism” corresponded to the Nazi, Soviet, and, to a lesser extent, Maoist systems and implied (1) the absolute power of one individual, (2) a single mass party structured like a secret society, (3) a police force that created a climate of fear and terror among both the fringes of society and those close to the leader. Unable to apply this frame of reference to Japan, Arendt turned her attention elsewhere. In the context of the Cold War, Arendt’s theories rapidly came to dominate, and while certain authors have since suggested widening the concept’s scope, Imperial Japan is virtually never classified today as a totalitarian regime by political analysts, who generally describe it as fascist, authoritarian, or militarist.8 Only a handful of scholars specializing in Japan continue somewhat disparately to use the term, while others reject it entirely.9 The Japanese word for totalitarianism is zentaishugi. It was created in the late 1920s under Western influence and literally translates as “wholebody doctrine.” Although it was initially used to refer to Italy and Germany, in the mid-1930s it began to be applied to the Japanese situation, occasionally with a critical nuance,10 but increasingly with positive connotations. As the specialist in aesthetics Yamagiwa Yasushi wrote in 1941, “The victory of Nazi Germany, a country that has moved on from viewing the individual as central, to totalitarianism, demonstrates the importance of changing our view of society and the nation. Fortunately, ever since its origins, Japan has been a totalitarian land.”11 An identical opinion was expressed by a close associate of the ultranationalist Nakano Seigō, who stated that “in general, the Japanese have always been partisans of

32A TOTALITARIAN DYNAMIC, 1940–1945

totalitarianism.”12 Between 1938 and 1941, at a time when the country was linking its destiny to that of Italy and Germany, the idea that Japan was inherently totalitarian gradually gained ground on the radio, in general-interest magazines, and throughout the world of publishing. However, “totalitarianism” was not the only term used in Japan to refer to the national arena. The “Imperial way” (kōdō) is another example, as is the slogan “Eight corners [of the world under] one roof” (hakkō ichiu), a metaphorical indication of the way Japan envisaged its domination of Asia. Many other expressions could be cited, all of them emphasizing the idea of totality, union, and a unified body. Consensus on the use of the word “totalitarianism” was never reached, either because it conveyed an image of violence, had a foreign connotation, or because it was not natural, organic, or cohesive enough.13 This led a certain number of authors to clarify that the desired form of totalitarianism was in fact a “Japanese totalitarianism.”14 Or to state, like Yamagiwa, that “if the term ‘totalitarianism’ is problematic, at the very least we can say that the Japanese system is one of total unity.”15 Contemporary Japanese intellectuals have inherited this history and are well aware of the extent to which their country presented itself as a block during the war. This is why they do not hesitate to speak of totalitarianism, particularly since Hannah Arendt and the debates on Nazism—while still influential—naturally hold less sway in Japan than in Europe or the United States. There is thus disagreement over the use of this concept, a discrepancy between a Japanese historiography in which the notion of total and totalitarian was and continues to be essential and a Western historiography that today struggles to apply this term to Japan. While in itself this discrepancy is not problematic, it leads to ambiguity even among specialists,16 contradictions that hinder the development of a discourse capable of countering the kind of stereotypes found, for example, in the work of Guillain. A magazine cover from December 1944 carries an illustration by the cartoonist Katō Etsurō depicting a compact mass of men and women all facing in the same direction. Yet each character is carefully represented. We can make out the miner, the schoolteacher, the peasant woman. Social function serves to define and set each individual apart within the national community. Nonetheless, this mass appears to spill over the edges of the page; it is not confined. This detail is highly significant, for it reveals the continued existence of margins. The system is not enclosed

FIGURE 2.1  “Citizens! General Uprising!” Poster from the Imperial Rule Assistance Association, 1944.

34A TOTALITARIAN DYNAMIC, 1940–1945

and rigidly set in stone. The population has not been completely objectivized but remains a shifting and difficult-to-contain reality. Wartime Japan’s struggle to find a suitable term to refer to its form of government reflects a similar thought process. The concept of totality in Japanese wartime thinking did not refer to an enclosed whole, like a set of marbles in a bag. On the contrary, it was an open and organic whole that resists any narrow definition. Consequently, if we are able to speak of Japanese totalitarianism, it was all the more total for having consistently resisted such a label.

FIGURE 2.2  “May

the Rage of One Hundred Million People Crush the British and Americans!” Cover of the magazine Manga Nihon, 1944 (based on a drawing by Katō Etsurō).

A TOTALITARIAN DYNAMIC, 1940–1945 35

THE IMPERIAL RULE ASSISTANCE ASSOCIATION

The Imperial Rule Assistance Association17 (IRAA) was the name given to a national unification movement founded in October 1940 by the second Konoe cabinet after the last vestiges of Japan’s political parties had been dissolved in August that same year. Dissent within the government considerably limited the IRAA’s decision-making ability, with certain military leaders in particular objecting to the movement’s founding principle of “one nation, one party,” an idea they deemed too abstract, mechanical, and Western and that clashed unnecessarily with what in their eyes was the only important bond—namely, the mythical and emotional tie linking the emperor directly to his subjects. “Serving the nation implies a totalitarianism based on absolute loyalty to the emperor alone, with whom all begins and all ends; it is not a totalitarianism based on rights and duties,” explained Admiral Suetsugu Nobumasa,18 leader of the conservative revolt against the IRAA,19 at an important meeting in December 1940. It was thus agreed early the following year that this new entity, although nominally under the prime minister’s authority, would have no political power to speak of. In this sense, it clearly differs from the Communist Party of the Soviet Union or the Nazi Party in Germany. Despite this, the IRAA and the armed forces together constituted the principal means of indoctrinating Japanese society until the final days of the war. Moreover, from the moment the question of its political role was clarified and it was brought under the control of the Home Ministry, the IRAA became the clearest embodiment of wartime Japan’s ideological system. In its revised version, which existed between 1941 and 1945, the IRAA had the following six objectives: 1. Be physically involved in implementing the Way of the Subject 2. Cooperate in the building of the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere 3. Cooperate in the building of a political system that assists the Imperial rule 4. Cooperate in the building of an economic system that assists the Imperial rule 5. Cooperate in the building of a new cultural order 6. Cooperate in the building of a new life system20

36A TOTALITARIAN DYNAMIC, 1940–1945

As Victor Klemperer observed in the case of Nazi Germany,21 the entire social discourse of wartime Japan was irrigated with expressions emphasizing physical involvement and the harnessing of the body to drive action. There was no room for reflection or prediction, anything that might give rise to doubt or inaction. The “new order” was not some abstract, far-off project; on the contrary, it was concrete, performative, and required each citizen to be physically and mentally involved in the present. In order to heighten awareness among citizens of their role in achieving the imperial goal and ensure their active involvement, the IRAA channeled the majority of its efforts into the spheres of culture and everyday life; in other words, health, hygiene, sport, and even diet, in direct conflict with the health and education ministries, something that did not fail to ruffle a few feathers along the way. However, in May 1942, when it became urgent that Japan increase industrial production and rally its citizens to boost their work rates or donate scrap metal, the powerful Industrial Patriotic Association was absorbed into the IRAA’s fold along with its more than five million members. At the same time, the neighborhood associations to which each household was affiliated22 were also placed under its responsibility. Henceforth, all Japanese citizens belonged to the IRAA, and often in several capacities. For the IRAA to become a perfect network it once again needed to merge and subsume all existing associative entities under its umbrella. In the late 1930s practically every small town and village had several educational, artistic, patriotic, or philanthropic associations, but these were not legally recognized as such, in contrast to France with its law of July 1, 1901. Only their individual members were accountable, hence the great fluidity of these groups. Yet rather than being a legal shortcoming, this apparent oversight reflected a conscious decision dictated by ideological considerations. In a nation founded on the ties linking the emperor directly to his subjects, any groups that might appear within it were necessarily a source of confused values and social disorder. The only true group or community was the nation—the kokutai—and the law was the guardian of this order.23 For private associations, police measures and local customs sufficed. The true enemy of the state was perhaps less individualism than intermediary bodies. The creation of the IRAA in 1940 marked the beginning of the dissolution of Japan’s cooperatives and labor unions: from 517 unions in 1939, the number subsequently dropped to 49, then to 11, in 1941, and

A TOTALITARIAN DYNAMIC, 1940–1945 37

finally to just 3 in 1942. A similar trend can be observed with professional, religious, cultural, and leisure associations. Nevertheless, the government never resorted to violence. Or to be more precise, the Home Ministry avoided forcing its hand, instead allowing people time to prepare for the inevitable and making minor concessions. More than two years passed, for example, between the first mergers carried out among the press in December 1940 and the creation, in March 1943, of the Japan Publishing Association, which oversaw the entire sector under the auspices of the IRAA. Just as in the 1930s, this process reflects the same combination of brutalization, guilt, and instilling a sense of responsibility that was used to force communist sympathizers to change their political orientation, a strategy that implied on the one hand an iron firmness of purpose regarding the goal to be achieved and, on the other, a certain patience, allowing individuals to feel that they had been involved in the change. Nevertheless, the state’s intention was not only to tighten its controls over the citizenry. There was also a strategic issue at stake. By setting the IRAA the objective of uniting the nation without providing any real means of doing so, the government gave itself an extremely effective tool for justifying its calls for effort and sacrifice. The IRAA’s inability to impose unity by force allowed the existence of margins and justified the calls for unity that were essential to the power dynamics of the time. This is why, contrary to the arguments put forward by certain scholars,24 the latitude given to association heads and local leaders was not problematic. On the contrary, this elasticity in the system fueled the discourse on national unity, the only political discourse possible in the context of total war. In the spring of 1943, following the promulgation of several laws increasing the government’s powers over the bureaucracy and civil society, the IRAA became an all-embracing structure to which there was no possible alternative and whose complex network of branches permeated the entire social framework, with the exception of the military. The particularity of Japanese totalitarianism is to have successfully made itself appear natural, organic, sentimental, and in keeping with the historical circumstances, despite its foundations having been laid by the authorities in the late nineteenth century at a time when the country was fighting for its independence. It was a macrostructure designed to continually tighten its grip in times of crisis. Individuals were not unified in the sense of appearing identical, as in the USSR or China; they were unified in

38A TOTALITARIAN DYNAMIC, 1940–1945

the sense of having no room to differentiate themselves. Although they remained distinct from one another, they simultaneously formed an extraordinarily compact whole.

THE ROLE OF ARTISTS AND WRITERS

In late March 1944, shortly before the Mariana Islands fell to the Americans and enabled them to launch a bombing campaign on Japan, prominent artists working in the Japanese style (or Nihonga) gathered at Meiji Jingū, an important shrine dedicated to the spirit of the former emperor. With almost two thousand artists in attendance, they represented virtually all of the country’s Nihonga painters, who had been grouped together within a single patriotic society under the banner of the IRAA. These individuals belonged to different schools and generations. Some of them, like the group’s chairman, Yokoyama Taikan, were fervently nationalistic neoclassical painters; others were modernists more open to avant-garde experimentation and the West. Dressed in the people’s uniform—a khakicolored paramilitary uniform commonly worn by men at the time—they brought with them almost five thousand small paintings to be purified and presented as offerings to the army minister.25 The paintings in question all somewhat resembled one another, their formal differences having been completely erased.26 They were no longer artworks in the usual sense but rather votive images it was hoped would attract the good favor of the gods and protect the nation. They had an incantatory and magical function, just like the Nénette and Rintintin dolls used in France as good luck charms during World War I. Nevertheless, their role was to protect the kokutai—the nation—and not specific individuals. In 1940 a process of merging and tightly controlling artist groups began. This task was carried out chiefly by the Arts and Literature Office in the Cabinet Information Bureau,27 staffed by Army, Navy, and Home Ministry officials. Initially this organization sought above all to mobilize artists for the war effort. It sent renowned writers such as Kawabata Yasunari and Yoshikawa Eiji (1892–1962), the author of Miyamoto Musashi,28 around the country to give patriotically themed conferences. It also pushed avantgarde groups to stage plays or organize exhibitions on military themes. However, while the Cabinet Information Bureau’s role was important,

A TOTALITARIAN DYNAMIC, 1940–1945 39

many events were also organized on the initiative of local leaders, and in particular the various branches of the IRAA. Even the most recalcitrant artists, those least inclined to obey government directives, were induced to contribute to the war effort beginning in 1941–1942. This was the case with Tanizaki Jun’ichirō, who wrote a number of short patriotic texts, and Matsumoto Shunsuke, who created several propaganda posters.29 Not only were there no active opposition movements in Japan, but withdrawing into an obtuse and indifferent passivity was not an option either, except for a few artists of advanced age, such as the writer Nagai Kafū. On the other hand, in return for providing their support to the community, artists were allowed to retain a certain amount of freedom in their opinions and creative activity. Consequently, until 1943–1944 there was a continued—albeit necessarily marginal—presence of surrealist, expressionist, and abstract works in the official exhibitions, something that would have been unthinkable at that time in Germany, where “degenerate art,” in other words all nonrealist forms of art, was banned as of 1937.30 The painter Yoshihara Jirō, who founded the famous art association Gutai in the 1950s, had perceptively understood the prevailing logic of the time. An active member of avant-garde movements during the 1930s, he did not abandon his art but rather adapted to the context. He notably produced several paintings in a style reminiscent of Joan Miró but was careful to give them titles with patriotic connotations, such as a painting from 1942 titled Chrysanthemum, in reference to the imperial seal, in which a white flower against a blue background can be vaguely distinguished.31 Since Yoshihara was also willing to take part in patriotic exhibitions and did not depend financially on public commissions, he was able to continue painting in his characteristic style without interference. This same phenomenon of marginal divergence can be found in all sectors of society, from journalists and public servants to jurists and even military personnel. As the war intensified, the Cabinet Information Bureau continued to push artists to group together by occupational activity, the aim being to supervise and control all aspects of artistic life, from production to commerce.32 Following numerous meetings, a whole series of unified art societies and associations was rolled out between May 1942 and March 1944: one for poets, novelists, and playwrights; one for painters, sculptors, and artisans; one for illustrators; one for woodblock printmakers; one for carpenters, cabinetmakers, glass workers, and other craftspeople; one for amateur photographers and artist-photographers; one for calligraphers;

40A TOTALITARIAN DYNAMIC, 1940–1945

one for manga artists; and so on.33 Preexisting groups were not necessarily disbanded, but their activities ceased almost entirely. The various professional guilds, which resembled those seen in France and Germany at that time, were placed under the auspices of the Cultural Affairs Bureau in the IRAA, presided over at the time by Takahashi Kenji,34 the distinguished scholar of German literature. This process of standardizing and consolidating groups by profession went hand in hand with a similar campaign carried out at a geographical level. Cultural associations in all towns and villages were merged progressively between 1941 and 1942 to be placed under the responsibility of a prefectural or regional federation that was directly linked to the headquarters of the IRAA. However, the configuration of this system was never rigidly fixed. Significant differences in organization existed, reflecting local particularities and sensitivities. Instead of standardization being imposed from the top down and based on a single model, there was a constant dialogue back and forth between the various levels in order to find an equilibrium that was intended to be real rather than abstract. Each association was organized into a complex structure of chairpersons, directors, assistant directors, and section heads, all of them artists and writers rather than public servants. The organization chart of the Kitakyūshū Culture League, for example, featured no fewer than 140 persons with a wide range of responsibilities, particularly at the administrative level. What is more, many of these individuals simultaneously held positions in other organizations of varying sizes.35 Although one of the major slogans of the time called on individuals to “abandon [their] egos and support the group,” in reality ample consideration was given to people’s desire for recognition. Anyone willing to cooperate (and every effort was made to ensure that individuals were willing to cooperate!) could expect to receive responsibilities and grand-sounding titles that were the civilian equivalent of military ranks. In Kitakyūshū, one particular novelist was “head of communications,” while another poet was “assistant director of general affairs.”36 Within these associations, a constant stream of meetings and events were programmed. Unable to apply themselves creatively, artists and intellectuals were kept in a constant hive of activity, mimicking through their frenetic pace of work the sacrifice of soldiers on the battlefronts and workers in the nation’s factories. In 1942, the Kitakyūshū Culture League organized over fifty public events—a rate of around one per week—including the following:

A TOTALITARIAN DYNAMIC, 1940–1945 41

January: exhibition on the customs of East Asian populations February: writing of texts on the theme of “what to do in an air raid” and “what to do on the home front” at the request of the Information Office at the prefectural police headquarters; creation of posters, etc. April: organization of a play for wounded soldiers June: fine arts exhibition on the decisive battle July: campaign to promote radio broadcasts of gymnastics November: play and concert for workers at the cement works Tōyō Semento November: conferences by famous writers and philosophers such as Yokomitsu Riichi and Tanikawa Tetsuzō37 On the eighth day of each month: concert of patriotic songs38 Never before had artists shown such solidarity with the nation, and in return never before had the Japanese people shown such enthusiasm for reading, writing, or attending a variety of cultural events. The documentaries and war films produced were watched by vast audiences, just as the art exhibitions drew millions of visitors, the majority of whom had never before set foot in a museum. For individuals, the movement thus created was both restrictive and festive, at once reassuring and stimulating. Moreover, the proliferation of events demonstrated the deep desire of Japan’s power holders at the time—whether in the military, the bureaucracy, or the world of art—to succeed in absorbing the whole of society into the vast and patiently spun web of the IRAA. What is important to understand here is that, beyond its role as a propaganda machine, the IRAA’s raison d’être stemmed from a ritual and aesthetic need to create an institutional embodiment of the ideal nation, one that was all encompassing and mystical, at once complex and unique.

A FRAGILE EQUILIBRIUM

Not a single high-ranking official in Japan remained in the same position between 1937 and 1945, other than the emperor and his closest advisers, such as Kido Kōichi.39 While admittedly Tōjō served as prime minister during the crucial period from October 1941 to July 1944, he cannot be

42A TOTALITARIAN DYNAMIC, 1940–1945

held solely responsible for Japan’s entering the war, and he was unable to hold on to his position once the situation became critical. Although many other military officials and politicians had important roles throughout the entire period, none of them can be associated with a single office. This phenomenon was naturally reproduced at the lower echelons of the system. The IRAA’s secretary-general, for example, changed several times, as did officials in charge of the state’s propaganda organs. Suzuki Kurazō (1894–1964) is a typical example. This army officer was accused after the war of having been instrumental in orchestrating censorship and disseminating militarist propaganda. Through his role in the Cabinet Information Bureau, he was indeed actively involved in implementing government controls over education, the press, the publishing industry, cinema, and the arts. And yet, despite being a tireless advocate of national unity, a vigorous opponent of liberalism, and the author of several books on Japan’s “ideological battle,” Suzuki was abandoned by his superiors in April 1942 under pressure from the navy, which took issue with his attacks on individuals it endorsed, such as the philosopher Watsuji Tetsurō.40 In the name of preserving the balance of power in the Cabinet Information Bureau, the army had no qualms about sacrificing an efficient and feared officer and sending him to Manchuria until the end of the war.41 Beyond a certain level of tension, preserving the general equilibrium prevailed over ideological zeal, leading in reality to incessant climbdowns, balancing acts, and bouts of political one-upmanship. Whereas power was split between several conflicting forces, there was no such flexibility in the framework itself: the institutions, built as they were around the emperor, were not only unalterable but also regarded as sacred. Groups and individuals had no other option than to find a modus vivendi and work together, unless they were willing to threaten the system and place themselves outside the law, like the supporters of the attempted coup d’état of February 1936. In terms of the objectives set and the means used to achieve them, things were not quite so clear-cut. Despite the macrodiscourse on national unity, the different factions and sociocultural interest groups were never able to achieve a true synthesis of ideologies or tactics.42 Consequently, a kind of plurality can be observed throughout the war, although the symbolic space within which each group could assert itself was extremely small. The three main general-interest magazines still in circulation at the beginning of the Pacific War—namely, Kaizō (reform), Chūō kōron

A TOTALITARIAN DYNAMIC, 1940–1945 43

(central debate), and Nihon oyobi Nihonjin (Japan and the Japanese)— published texts written essentially by intellectuals and writers. The first of these three publications, Kaizō, was created in 1919. It had a socialist orientation and championed the idea of collective progress founded on individual fulfillment through culture. Its contributors included some of the emblematic writers of the 1910s, such as Mushanokōji Saneatsu and Hasegawa Nyozekan, who upheld humanist and idealist values.43 Chūō kōron was launched in 1899 and took a slightly less politically and socially engaged stance than Kaizō. The magazine was open to intellectuals from both ends of the political spectrum, as well as to dialogue with the West. The third magazine, Nihon oyobi Nihonjin, was founded in 1907 and, as its title suggests, had a resolutely national perspective that exalted the values of order, power, and the beauty of tradition. Remarkably, each of these publications continued to display its distinctive editorial line during the war. This is visible in the January 1942 issues, at a time when we might have expected the enthusiasm born of the first victories against the British and Americans to have unified content. Accordingly, Kaizō emphasized the “liberating of the peoples of Asia,” notably in an article written by a specialist of Kant44 titled “The Path to the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere.” Several articles also underlined American responsibility for the war. The editorial line thus followed a leftist logic that was anticolonial, pan-Asianist, and anti-American. Chūō kōron took a much more pragmatic stance. Most of the contributions, including the issue’s opening article, by the philosopher Miki Kiyoshi,45 stressed the need for Japan to organize itself and structure its various forces, particularly in the field of politics, economics, science, and agriculture. The main thrust of this issue was that Japan must prepare itself for a “long and drawn-out total war.” Accordingly, this stance could be described as centrist, forward-looking, and emphasizing public responsibility. As for Nihon oyobi Nihonjin, after a brief editorial it opened with a collection of poems. In the articles that followed, references to the emperor and national identity were omnipresent, including phrases such as “let’s rediscover the real Japan!” and “the manifestation of the divine spirit of Japan, the imperial land.” The general tone was characterized by lyricism and exaltation, with myths and grand sentiments featuring prominently. This journal subscribed to the mystical nationalist school of thought. As we can see, in early 1942, as the Pacific War raged, the Japanese public still had access to high-quality

44A TOTALITARIAN DYNAMIC, 1940–1945

magazines presenting opinions that could be associated at a glance with the main political movements. Plurality in confinement underpinned the organicism that prevailed in Japan at the time. On the one hand there was a unanimous assertion of shared destiny, and on the other, a profusion of minutely varying discourses that it would be virtually impossible to cover in depth, so numerous are the factors contributing to their heterogeneity. These include political orientation, religious beliefs, geographical location, military position, social class, gender, and generation.46 However, equilibrium was possible only if there were contact and tension between the various forces at work. Occasionally this balance was abruptly shattered—for example when one of the factions committed an error. This was the case in the summer of 1942 when an article in Kaizō suggested that Japan take inspiration from the Soviet Union in building the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. This article caused a radical shift in the status quo. A group of Kwantung Army officers from the Special Higher Police seized on the affair, arresting the article’s author, a certain Hosokawa Karoku,47 in mid-September. During their investigations the police discovered a photograph of Hosokawa with the directors of both Kaizō and Chūō kōron. They quickly jumped to conclusions, suggesting the existence of a vast conspiracy to revive the Japanese Communist Party. In the face of such accusations, the navy, which backed Japan’s progressive intellectuals, was helpless to smother the affair. In January 1944, several senior editors from both magazines were arrested, and staff from the publishing house Iwanami, as well as the newspaper Asahi shinbun, also came under scrutiny.48 Known as the Yokohama Incident, this affair sealed the moral victory of the army’s most radical and nationalistic elements. Yet the victory was short-lived, for in July 1944, at another level entirely, General Tōjō lost the emperor’s support and was forced to resign from the government. With the ensuing appointment of Yonai Mitsumasa as deputy prime minister, the navy recovered a symbolic role that it had previously lost, while the most important affairs were handled henceforth directly by the Imperial Palace. A certain balance was thus restored to the system, just in time for the ordeal of the American bombing campaign. The fundamental role of the emperor was to maintain the organic balance of the system. This method of organizing power was disseminated throughout the regions by the IRAA, despite resistance from autocratic local leaders. At the system’s periphery, however, notably in the colonies

A TOTALITARIAN DYNAMIC, 1940–1945 45

and the occupied territories in particular, this scenario ceased to apply. Power was exercised without being offset by others; there was no longer any need for balancing. The Kwantung Army’s unchallenged domination of Manchuria is typical of this phenomenon. In China, the Japanese could speak and behave in a way that would simply be unthinkable back home. What is more, the factions were well aware that creating instability on the fringes of the empire was the best way to shake up positions at the heart of the political arena. The appalling violence inflicted by Japanese troops abroad can be explained in part by the imbalance created by the exceptional situation affecting the general economy of power.

THE CHAIN OF EVENTS

The two-month period from late August to mid-October 1940 gives the impression that an inexorable mechanism had been set in motion, stoppable only by an explosion of violence: late August 1940, launch of the Hundred Regiments Offensive by the Chinese, confirming the strength of the Communist forces and making any short-term resolution to the conflict on the mainland impossible; September 22–26, invasion of French Indochina by the Kwantung Army; September 27, signing in Berlin of the Tripartite Pact; October 1, creation in Tokyo of a Total War Research Institute; October 12, founding of the IRAA. Reading this succession of military, diplomatic, and political events, there is a sense that Japan’s involvement in World War II had become inevitable. We should be wary of such interpretations, however, since chronologies are far from neutral texts. A certain number of clues suggest that between the spring of 1938 and September 1939, the Japanese population believed that an end to the war was imminent. There is no trace of such a belief at any other point in the conflict, either before or after this period. Despite the entire nation’s being mobilized for war, over a period of several months the press and artists spoke of peace being close at hand.49 In Japan, the prevailing atmosphere was less characterized by urgency. News of the war appeared to be positive, especially since Chinese resistance was downplayed and Japan’s defeat by the Soviet Army at Nomonhan, Mongolia (May–July 1939), was put into perspective. War was not perceived as an inexorable

46A TOTALITARIAN DYNAMIC, 1940–1945

crescendo. Similarly, one could argue that the decision to attack Pearl Harbor resulted from a combination of circumstances. As Michel Vié has stressed, this tactical option was not the only one considered; yet it came to fruition because of the hard-line policy of the Americans and the rivalry that existed between the army and navy.50 In fact, numerous voices were raised in Japan against the hostilities. The Total War Research Institute, for example, had expressed misgivings to the government and predicted the scenario of defeat.51 Popular perceptions of the war thus went through phases, and Japan’s decision makers, just like its ordinary citizens, were forced to make choices. This essential point of view partially contradicts the systemic approach. If different decisions had been made in September 1941 and if Japan had not joined the war against Britain and the United States, world history would no doubt have been very different. America’s entry into the war against Germany would have been deferred, the conflict in China would have continued in relative indifference, and Japanese society, although still mobilized, would have recovered a certain measure of freedom. To look at things from the opposite angle, the way Japan gradually united into a compact whole was not merely the result of an ideological program; it also stemmed from its lack of control over a chain of events unfolding in the international arena. Nevertheless, even if Japan had not launched itself into war against the British and Americans, it is unlikely that peace would have come quickly and that a major conflict could have been avoided. Ever since World War I, the Imperial Japanese Army had anticipated a “total war” against the Western powers, and several measures aimed at militarizing the population were taken in the 1920s, notably the establishment in 1926 of youth training centers providing basic military training.52 When Japan entered hostilities in the autumn of 1941, the nation felt ready. This was true not just in military terms but also on the political, economic, and social levels. A society readied for war not only has its own inertia driving it to fulfill its destiny but also resembles a new weapon in the hands of the government, one that it is tempting to use. Moreover, to do otherwise could be construed as a weakness and thus undermine the government’s position. At the heart of the national ideology was the concept of faith: the population had to have faith in the emperor’s sacred status, faith in the strength of the nation, and even faith in the war. In wartime Japan, the word kessen, generally translated into English as “decisive battle,” more correctly referred to a “battle of decision” or a “battle of

A TOTALITARIAN DYNAMIC, 1940–1945 47

determination.”53 Yet where there is faith there is primacy of the spiritual, of the soul, and of conviction, as well as a distrust of anything belonging to the realm of science or rationality, rooted as they are in the material world and resulting in the reign of the machine. I will return to these points later. The drive for war was further strengthened by the fact that it was not based on military and social preparation alone but also on a groundswell in Japanese culture glorifying gestures of faith, assertive action, and the victory of intuition and empathy over the abstract order attributed to the Anglo-American democracies. This movement was not limited to 1940–1941, a period when hopes were high, but also extended into 1944–1945, when the war was already lost and prolonging it could lead only to ruin. Japan’s move to total unity was not simply a case of adapting to the circumstances and extending military mobilization to the civilian population in response to the events taking place. The almost mystical glorification of “will” set in motion a formidable chain of events. Each time the situation became strained, whether in the autumn of 1940 when the IRAA was created, in late 1941 on the eve of Pearl Harbor, in early 1943 following the decision to abandon Guadalcanal, in 1944 in anticipation of the American bombing campaign, or in 1945 when faced with the potentially imminent arrival of American troops, the authorities, and in particular the emperor,54 responded with a voluntarist dialogue calling for aggressive action. Following this logic, the deteriorating situation was first and foremost due to a lack of unity, implying that the nation needed to be even more compact, that citizens should be just a little less individualistic and give more to the state. But it was never enough. Greater efforts were always required. Particularly since the United States was portrayed as a fickle and soulless nation where from one day to the next elections could change everything. The war was thus presented as a psychological war, with victory going to whoever wanted it most, in accordance with Japan’s belief in the absolute primacy of spiritual strength over reason and material strength. Thus, the Japanese government’s drive for total unity was founded not so much on physical coercion as on psychological pressure. This pressure was brought to bear through not only the national press but also businesses, local association leaders, and of course families. It called for courage and positive virtues, while at the same time playing on much more complex emotions. The famous conservative intellectual Tokutomi Sohō55

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was eighty-one years old in 1944. He made the following comments in an interview with a journalist: Sohō: “Nothing is currently more important than achieving a harmonious union in our nation, I agree with you entirely. Unfortunately, however, if I may be frank, this harmony seems to be desperately lacking. Despite the use of all manner of slogans, such as ‘general unity,’ ‘one hundred million hearts beat as one,’ or ‘united as one,’ in reality we have yet to see any true harmony. When we walk down the street, everyone has a sad face. And what about on trains? There are very few people—which is not to say that there are none—who seem happy, full of energy and courage, like someone on their way to a wedding. And what do family conversations revolve around? Nothing but problems over rationing or tomorrow’s food. And yet there should be no reason for anyone to worry about how they are going to survive.” Journalist: “You are quite right. It is incredible! How is it that a nation like ours, whose loyalty is second to none, struggles to demonstrate true harmony and return to the idea that we are one hundred million hearts beating as one?”56

Just as with communist sympathizers in the 1930s and cultural elites around 1940–1943, the Japanese authorities did not induce the masses to support the regime and prepare for war on home soil solely through coercion. The policy they implemented was accompanied by a vast discursive campaign aimed at touching people’s hearts and giving meaning to their sacrifice. In other words, although the war did bring about indoctrination from the top down, notably through the press and the education system, it is important to understand that propaganda spread more in a horizontal and rhizomelike fashion than vertically. This phenomenon was the result of the organicist theories that permeated Japanese society in the late nineteenth century, giving each individual, irrespective of their age or role in society, a sense of responsibility and of being one with the nation.

3 THE MEANING OF THE WAR

THE JEAN-CHRISTOPHE GENERATION

iterature in wartime Japan was not a domain reserved for the elites. Its influence irrigated all of society. Whether in the form of war narratives financed by the military,1 detective novels, coming-of-age novels (bildungsroman), historical and romance novels, poetry, or essays, Japanese literary production around 1940 was comparable to that of the great European nations in the late 1930s. Paper rationing, censorship, and the mobilization of the nation nonetheless dealt a blow to the literary world: “By 1944, 35 percent of Japan’s 16,000 bookshops had closed, and of the 1,759 publishing houses listed in 1941, only two to three hundred were still in business at the end of the war.”2 Despite this situation, generally speaking the number of titles being published did not drop sharply until late in the war. Print runs were shortened, overall quality declined considerably, and variety waned, but writing and publishing continued apace until 1944. From 795 new novels and plays published in 1940, this figure rose to 1,022 in 1941, then to 1,364 in 1942, before dropping back to 807 in 1943.3 The war was thus a period of intense literary activity. Moreover, content was by no means uniform, although the context did permeate the majority of works produced. Finally, books were not reserved for city dwellers. A considerable effort was made to disseminate them in the countryside and on the battlefronts. A survey conducted in 1942 lists 711

L

50THE MEANING OF THE WAR

reading clubs located in rural areas around the country, from Hokkaido to Okinawa, with each club possessing on average 850 books.4 The authorities had a policy of making “reading recommendations,” and certain books deemed to be politically or morally dangerous were not accessible. It should be noted, however, that wartime Japan did not destroy books, as was the case in Nazi Germany, and that in private people were able to continue reading texts that opposed the values of the regime. Why was it so important for the authorities to encourage people to read, at a time when the military was doing its utmost to raise the conscription rate among Japan’s youth to the detriment of their education? The first reason was to indoctrinate the population and disseminate the national spirit. The second was to improve science and technology education with a view to increasing national output. Finally, the third and interrelated reason was to control people’s leisure time. Nevertheless, these concrete objectives driven by the historical context concealed a deeper motive—namely, a kind of idealism that was visible in both Japan’s assertion of the nation’s progress and its desire to outshine Europe (in the cultural sphere, the Japanese made little reference to the United States at the time, comparing themselves only with Germany, France, Great Britain, and, to a lesser extent, Italy). Forms of idealism can be seen in all nations at war. In order to understand the characteristics of the idealism observed in Japan, it is important we avoid the error of turning to books that exalt “traditional” virtues, like the famous Bushido: The Soul of Japan, written in English in 1899 by Nitobe Inazō.5 In 1940, Japan was a society in which Western ideas had penetrated far and wide thanks to the vast effort to translate foreign works undertaken since the late nineteenth century. For elites among the generations born after 1880—in other words, those responsible for steering Japan through World War II—the novels of Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky, the poems of Whitman and Maeterlinck, as well as Greek and Christian texts, were often more important and intimate references than Chikamatsu Monzaemon’s plays or the Chinese classics. It is first and foremost in these works and those written by Japanese authors in response to them that we can get a feel for the nature of this idealism. In fact, despite having exalted the Way of the Warrior, Nitobe6 was a Christian, and those beliefs profoundly colored his perspective on the culture of his country. The same can be said of Suzuki Daisetsu, whose works on Zen Buddhism influenced generations of Western artists and intellectuals, notably André

THE MEANING OF THE WAR51

Breton and Alan Watts in the 1930s and 1940s,7 but who was originally an Anglicist, translator, and specialist of Emanuel Swedenborg.8 Among the authors who enjoyed immense success between the two world wars, the case of Romain Rolland (1866–1944) is one of the most intriguing. Rolland was a figure who exerted an extraordinary influence on the international stage. A few months into World War I, this winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1915 and biographer of Tolstoy wrote “Above the Battle,” an appeal for intellectuals on either side of the Rhine to open their eyes and for an end to the fighting. Forced into exile by his pacifist beliefs, he set up home in the Swiss town of Villeneuve, where, in the words of Stefan Zweig, “he had no party, no newspaper, no influence. He had nothing but his passionate enthusiasm, and that indomitable courage to which the forlorn hope makes an irresistible appeal. Alone he began his onslaught upon the illusions of the multitude, when the European conscience, hunted with scorn and hatred from all countries and all hearts, had taken sanctuary in his heart.”9 Rolland thus became a figure of antimilitarism and, later, of antifascism. In 1917 he took a passionate interest in the Russian Revolution. Despite having clearly pronounced himself in favor of Stalin from the moment Hitler came to power, he never joined the Communist Party and often criticized the violence of communist methods. Finally, he was a great advocate of liberating oppressed peoples and particularly supported the work of Gandhi, with whom he maintained a close friendship.10 Rolland was widely translated and actively promoted by several high-profile authors, including Hermann Hesse and Zweig in Germany and Austria, Maxim Gorky in Russia, and Lu Xun in China. In India, Rolland’s extremely close ties with Rabindranath Tagore and Gandhi lent him a considerable aura. “For more than fifty years,” explains Chinmoy Guha, “Romain Rolland, more than any other figure, completely dominated and influenced intellectual life in India.”11 And Japan was no exception. The first person to translate Rolland into Japanese was the famous poet and sculptor Takamura Kōtarō, who began to publish extracts from Jean-Christophe in 1913.12 A few years later, in 1920, all ten volumes of the novel became available to the public, and the author’s reputation spread throughout the land, among all social classes.13 “Romain Rolland,” wrote Takamura in the wake of World War I, “was the conscience of Europe. Today, he is on his way to becoming the conscience of the world.”14 A survey conducted by the Japanese Ministry of Education shows that in 1938,

52THE MEANING OF THE WAR

twenty-five years after it was first published, Jean-Christophe was still the third most popular foreign novel among students after Pearl Buck’s The Good Earth and Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell.15 All the same, it is astonishing to learn that in 1942–1943, as the war raged, it was still possible in Japan to publish The Soul Enchanted or to republish a biography of the French author.16 Romain Rolland’s influence before the war was particularly noticeable in two intellectual circles: one was among antifascists, who faithfully reported each of his declarations;17 the other was among Romantics like Shimazaki Tōson18 and idealists from the Shirakaba (white birch) movement—including Takamura, Mushanokōji, and Kurata Hyakuzō— who helped introduce Rolland to Japan in the 1910s. It goes without saying that in 1943, the political dimension of Rolland’s writings could no longer be promoted, though it was clearly known to readers, and this alone would have constituted ample grounds for prohibiting any reference to his work. Yet his anticolonial stance and the impassioned, heroic tone of his novels meant that they continued to pass the censors. Thus, in 1943, his biographer described a lyrically charged author who called for “the merging of France and Germany, first and foremost through spiritual understanding,” an opportune message that could also be applied to Japan’s policy in China at that time.19 Rolland was familiar with the activities of the Shirakaba movement. In 1932, in his preface to the French translation of Kurata’s play The Priest and His Disciples, he wrote, “For around twenty years the neo-idealism of the Shirakaba movement has asserted the rights of the soul over the naturalism and neo-romanticism that reigned before it. The poets of this school were inspired by Tolstoy and felt the powerful influence of Western and Eastern religions. They dreamed of marrying the genius of Christianity with that of Buddhism. They now seek a means of reconciling urgent social duty with the legitimate rights of individualism. Universal fraternity, or the spiritual harmony of the human race, is the ideal driving their art and their actions.”20 The links established between Rolland and Japanese intellectuals were maintained through visits to Villeneuve and the exchanging of letters. Between 1915 and 1939, Rolland wrote no fewer than eighty-six letters to Japanese correspondents.21 During the war, Shirakaba writers, who had come to play a leading role in the Japanese literary establishment, ardently supported the conflict.

THE MEANING OF THE WAR53

Takamura was head of the poetry section of the Patriotic Society for Japanese Literature, Mushanokōji was an active member of this same association, and Kurata published nationalistic texts, such as his Manifesto for a Japanese Culture (1939),22 whose impact was considerable. These writers were clearly betraying the ideals of their youth, and among them some that Romain Rolland had helped nurture—namely, universal fraternity, peace, and spirituality. Indeed, this does not seem to have gone unnoticed by the French author, who distanced himself from Japan beginning in the mid-1930s. Nonetheless, in other aspects it is not impossible to see a kind of Rollandian logic in their support of Japan’s militarist policy. In the “prewar” novel Jean-Christophe, the notion of engagement as a physical and moral struggle is central, as is its usual corollary, a kind of heroizing of individuals. Yet these two romantic ideals—engagement, in other words immediate and concrete action, and the glorification of individuals seeking to transform the world by surpassing themselves in myth—were at the heart of war fiction and made a deep impression on future soldiers and the general public alike. There is a particularly striking form of negativity in the work of Romain Rolland. The life of Christophe is a constant succession of failures and the fate of peoples, a race along the road to ruin. Indeed, it is only through hardship that humankind can realize the need to unite and gain the strength to overcome destiny. This line of thought linking the fundamental negativity of individual existence with salvation through self-sacrifice excited Japanese interest for decades. It found expression during the war not only in literature and criticism but also in the action taken in the present, each of which was in reality indissociable from the other.

IMAGINING THE POSTWAR PERIOD

In his speech to the nation on December 8, 1941, announcing the beginning of the Pacific War, General Tōjō, after laying the blame on the British and Americans, made the following declaration: “We desire nothing other than the preservation of world peace and a halt to the devastation caused to humankind.”23 Indeed, in Japan as elsewhere, “wage war today for long-lasting peace tomorrow” was one of the leitmotifs of the period.

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Yet coming from the mouth of Tōjō it has a particularly unpleasant and cynical ring to it. Nonetheless, the Japanese clearly did not enter the war blindly and expected some kind of symbolic or economic advantage in return once peace was restored. How did they imagine life after the war at the moment they entered the conflict? If we are to comprehend how the Japanese handled the experience of defeat, we must first understand what they expected of the war and thereby gauge the discrepancy between what they had hoped for and the reality of what actually occurred. The term “postwar” (sengo in Japanese) was frequently employed after the war with Russia and post-1918, and this was naturally even more the case after 1945. However, it was also used around 1937–1940, as was its synonym, “post–China Incident” (jihengo). The issue of the postwar period was frequently broached, seen as a near future for some, a distant one for others, but in any event something that people attempted to imagine. Although the term was observed primarily in the economic sphere, with its predictions based on precise facts and figures, it was also applied to political and social reflections. Dozens of reports, articles, and books circulated at the time on Postwar Supply and Demand for Raw Materials in Central China, Postwar China and Japan, Postwar Education Reforms, and so forth. Among these forward-looking texts, one in particular holds special interest—namely, Problems in Postwar Thinking, published in 1939. The authors of this book, all eminent specialists in their respective fields, were united by a kind of national socialism that represented the common denominator. It is immediately clear from the preface that “postwar” was seen as synonymous with “postvictory.”24 Yet this point was not stated explicitly. While victory was hoped for, the different contributions to the book went beyond glorifying the military. Moreover, several expressions conveyed a sense of crisis, and none of the authors announced an imminent end to the hostilities. On this point Abe Isoo25 was perfectly lucid, stating that “one can easily imagine that in the future we will have to face an even more formidable enemy than China.”26 For this reason, the authors considered the end of the war to be ten or twenty years away; the postwar period was unanimously seen as belonging to “the future.” The article by Murobuse Kōshin27 is one of the most significant in the book. After examining Western thought and its hegemonic ambitions, he questioned what efforts were needed to bring about a break with the past and enable a “new historical system”28 to emerge. This system, which

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he referred to indiscriminately as “totalitarianism” or “fascism,” was to place individuals back in their natural element, meaning collective life. “Totalitarianism,” he stated, “perceives the individual to be an individual within a whole and values him accordingly, but under no circumstances does it aim to deny the individual, deny his individuality, or deprive him of his freedom.”29 In this way, he suggested that individuals in such a system were less vulnerable than in individualistic societies, where materialism and mechanical rationalism had gradually robbed them of their sense of spirituality and, consequently, their full humanity. He thus advocated the advent of a new humanism, stating that “what we need today is in no way a Renaissance. The intelligence of today must be of today. The humanism of today must be of today. To put it plainly, it must be a new intelligence, an antirationalist intelligence—in short, a totalitarian humanism.”30 In order to achieve this objective Murobuse championed a “fighting philosophy,” for which he claimed to have been inspired by José Ortega y Gasset. Faced with a “mathematical world”—in other words, an overly rationalized one—he championed the power of passion and will, citing Friedrich Nietzsche and Søren Kierkegaard, men he described as the “fathers of contemporary thinking”:31 “Where the modern man calculates, compares, observes, thinks, doubts, analyzes, and compromises, the contemporary man decides, acts, has a global vision, carries through, and creates.” All that was needed was to rediscover the meaning of “life,” because, as Murobuse reminded readers in the words of Seneca the Younger, vivere militare est (to live is to fight).32 Although Murobuse also expressed reservations about waging war against the United States, his article resembled a kind of theoretical legitimization of the expansionist policy being implemented on the continent. Nevertheless, the author repeatedly returned to what remained the crux of his reflection: “The question of what kind of thought will emerge after the war can be answered easily. The fascist orientation will become increasingly marked and finally immovable. That is all!”33 Beyond the reference to fascism, which was not unusual at the time, it is interesting to note that the majority of contributors to this book imagined the postwar period as a time of undisturbed peace. They do not seem to have considered the possibility that the hostilities might give way to a period of unrest or confusion. Everything would be settled by arms; the country would leave history behind and enter a kind of eternal present, following a logic resembling the theories advanced by Nazi and Stalinist ideologists.

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However, this totalitarian or fascist point of view—often described at the time as “realist”—was qualified by the author himself a few pages later. He did not see war and peace as realities that depended on politics, and even less so on international agreements; he saw history as condemned to repeat itself in a cyclical fashion. He wrote, “After the war, the intellect will surely reawaken. Voices will once again cry out in favor of humanism, for inevitably during war, the intellect is driven to become dormant and humanism is oppressed. But what is oppressed will fight back. The truth that ‘you can drive out nature, it will always come back’ is valid here too. It is only too clear that after the war there will be a reawakening of the intellect, the return of impassioned calls for humanism. However, this does not mean returning to the nineteenth century, much less to the Renaissance. What we need is a lively intellect, global humanism, a healthy humanism!”34 This type of approach, whose origins must be sought in both Chinese political thought and Buddhism, is distinctive for being extremely dynamic. Considered from this angle, war and peace are not antonyms; in this global, holistic perspective they are complementary states, suggesting a clear awareness of their transitory nature, with one spontaneously implying the other. As Kobayashi Hideo summed up in 1942 at a famous round-table discussion on the theme of “overcoming modernity,” “Things are forever the same, and man forever fights the same battle.”35 It has often been commented that the Japanese preferred to speak of “incidents” (jiken) and “events” (jihen) rather than use the word “war” (sensō): what is at stake in an armed conflict lies not in the realm of law, or else only indirectly. Similarly, in 1939, when intellectuals spoke of the peace that would follow the hostilities, it was not as an armistice between warring nations or a settlement of the conflict but rather as a period of newly found or restored balance in the workings of the nation. “It is often said that what we need in the twentieth century is a fusion between spiritualism and materialism,” wrote the novelist Abe Tomoji.36 “Yet in reality the twentieth century is ablaze at all levels with dramatic contradictions and struggles to find a harmonious balance. The nation that succeeds in finding it will be the true leader of the world.”37 What mattered in his eyes was thus a kind of “harmony.” In fact, the term “harmony” (chōwa) appears almost as frequently in these texts as the term “peace” (heiwa). In some ways the prevailing logic of Japan in 1939 could be summed up as an opposition between “instability” and “harmony.” This paradigm is

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far from having completely disappeared after 1945, despite the American occupation’s having ushered in the primacy of a war-versus-peace dichotomy that placed the problem in the realm of law. What we have observed here in sociopolitical discourse had its counterpart in the field of philosophy. Nishida Kitarō38 drew on Buddhist concepts in particular to develop the idea of a complementary relationship between the one and the whole, between what he termed the “multiplicity of the one” and the “unicity of the whole.” In several of his texts from the 1940s, in particular his last major essay, “Life,” he shows that one cannot be understood without the other; consequently, a view of the world that would seek to impose the unity of the whole—in other words, the prevailing view during the war—was possible only if one kept in mind the multiplicity of its consubstantial parts.39 The transition that was afoot from a world of Totality to a world of the One—in other words, the world of the autonomous subject, democracy, and individual culture that would develop after the war—was consequently nothing more than a simple adaptation to the natural movement of history.40 This logic, founded according to Nishida on the principle of “absolutely contradictory self-identity” and given wholly concrete applications in the work of the previously mentioned authors, provides a further dimension to the explanations that, when describing the passage from war to postwar, merely highlight the influence of the American strategy or the sense of responsibility felt by Japan’s elites. It goes without saying that it is impossible to understand the about-face performed by Japanese intellectuals and even politicians in August 1945 if we do not fully measure the depth of this synthetic thinking. One of the fundamental stances of American historiography regarding the Pacific War is that the Japanese initiated hostilities as part of a long-nurtured plan, or a “ninety-three-year dream,” as is occasionally written in reference to the time between the American fleet’s arriving on Japan’s shores in 1853 and the country’s defeat in 1945.41 Japan is portrayed as having, over the space of a few years, believed in victory, in revenge on the West, in a total domination of Asia, before suddenly realizing the extent of its error. However, while a kind of collective euphoria did grip the nation in the opening months of hostilities, it would be difficult to explain the entire war from this angle, either in terms of its direct causes or the manner in which events played out. Indeed, it is well known that Japan’s political and military leaders, particularly in the navy, seriously

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doubted the nation’s ability to sustain a head-on clash with Britain and America. Admittedly, the army declared itself confident of a swift victory, but, as the emperor himself pointed out at an imperial conference on September 6, 1941, the same had been said in 1937, and there was no reason to believe that an all-out war against the British and Americans would be any easier than conquering China.42 This is why the historian of ideas Tsurumi Shunsuke spoke of Japan as being precipitated “into a war which there was no prospect of winning.”43 How should we interpret this observation? Having already seen the influence of a kind of fatalism, which beneath a superficially triumphant discourse considered that history should be allowed to run its course, that violence was inherent to mankind, and that it was always followed by peace, let us now attempt to identify the school of thought to which all those who actively supported the war belonged. And for this we must return to the subject of Romanticism. Romanticism in modern Japan developed in phases. The first ran from 1890 to 1910, a period in which Romanticism developed essentially as a literary movement advocating the glorification of nature and the expression of personal feelings. It was a relatively limited and short-lived phenomenon. Nevertheless, if we understand Romanticism from a political and philosophical standpoint, as it was interpreted by Johann Gottlieb Fichte and Arthur Schopenhauer, it permanently irrigated Japanese thought and was in a constant state of development. Its trace is clearly visible in the Shirakaba movement during the 1910s, as in all the movements advocating a “return to Japan” or to Asian traditions in the 1920s. This echoes the way German Romantics turned to Germanic folklore and mythology in their search for a means of reenchanting the relationship between individual and state. This led the philosopher Karatani Kōjin to state that “in modern Japan, things elaborated as Eastern or Buddhist discourse are always already Romantic and aesthetic.”44 The clearest evidence of the importance of Romanticism during this era was the establishment of the Japan Romantic school around 1934 by young intellectuals and critics whose influence on the youth of Japan was considerable. Kamei Katsuichirō was instrumental in leading this group and his background typical of its members: born into a good family, he entered the University of Tokyo in 1926 to study aesthetics and as a staunch socialist was active in the student movements. This came to a halt in 1928 when he was arrested and subsequently spent two years in jail. In 1934 he joined forces with Yasuda Yojūrō, and together they founded

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the Japan Romantic school. At this point Kamei took a keen interest in the works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky and Lev Shestov, leading him to reject Marxism in favor of a kind of swallowing up of individuals by their historical and social environments through action. One of the recurrent themes to appear in Kamei’s work is heroism. “Hero Literature” was the title of an essay he published in 1938. Kamei begins with the following observation: while in the late nineteenth century Japan had great lyrical poets who celebrated national heroes, the novel and other literary forms have had little to say on this theme, the fault for which lay with Western influence and its monopolization of people’s minds.45 In the 1920s, proletarian literature had attempted to revive heroic literature, unsuccessfully, according to Kamei, due partly to the fleeting nature of this movement in Japan and to its failure to adjust to the local sensibility.46 His reflection then shifted to analyzing the characteristics of the Japanese hero. He cited in particular Mori Ōgai’s47 novel The Abe Family (1913), which describes the destruction of an entire family, and mentioned the names of several great warriors from the Middle Ages and the modern era. Kamei drew on all these examples to conclude that “it is the fallen hero who most touches our hearts.”48 He expressed the same view in antithetical terms a little further on, stating that “we do not want a literature that is simply powerful and virile.”49 This stance was neither new nor specifically Japanese, something Kamei did not refute, his model being none other than Prometheus. Nevertheless, in his eyes the figure of the tragic hero was perfectly suited to the national culture and sensibility, and for this reason he made it the keystone of his system of values. He wrote, rather grandiloquently, It will no doubt become clear if we reflect on the death of Kusunoki Masashige50 in battle, the executions of Ishin-shishi activists [sic], the suicide of Saigō Takamori,51 the fall of the Toyotomi clan,52 or the death throes of the Taira clan53 that heroes, when they do appear in literature, begin to reveal their splendor only in ruin. What does this mean? That the most complex facet of human nature—the suffering of the soul and the turmoil of the heart—reaches its peak in the moment of defeat. . . . When vulgar heroes appear in popular literature, it is not rare for the story to conclude with a simple happy ending. Of course, victory is wonderful and conquests are great deeds. Yet the poet feels keenly that behind victory there is pain, that in conquests there is impermanence.54

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In writing these words, Kamei clearly had in mind the turbulent events of the period. Indeed, he did not hesitate to draw parallels between what he sensed in fiction and what he saw in the reality around him: “Needless to say, these days it is the battlefields that occupy people’s minds the most. Perhaps even more than any type of literature, it is news from the front that people want to read. And what is it that moves us? The beauty of the brotherly love that blossoms only in the moment of death, the beauty of valor, nothing more.”55 In the 1930s there was still a relatively abstract and literary glorification of heroism, a pretty and virtually empty box that wanted nothing more than to be filled and validated by events. While reflecting passionately on the meaning of being “Japanese” in his day and age, Kamei introduced the world of defeat into the world of words: “The present day marks the end of an era,” he wrote. “Some say that the heart of man is in decay. But who truly knows decadence? Who has experienced firsthand the tragedies of the end of an era? The darkest lessons are said to shine the longest. Is it not essential we keep buried deep in our hearts that for the poet who sings the glory of heroes, only the children of darkness are ultimately the harbingers of light?”56 This stance, which is reminiscent of certain passages in Jean-Christophe, made a deep impression. The historian of ideas Hashikawa Bunzō, who was eighteen in 1940, wrote that “the Japan Romantic school as we experienced it said nothing other than ‘We must die!’ I therefore see it as a premonitory form of the ineluctability of defeat.”57 For all those who were receptive to this idea, war was not a means of obtaining something; rather, in a dark and ironic way it was the only act of survival possible. Imprisoned in Western modernity like the Kafkaesque man in his conscience, Japan had no other choice in their eyes but to enter into war so that, for one last time, individuals could feel and prolong the purity of the national spirit. There was neither peace nor postwar on the horizon; all that mattered was engaging in war immediately, completely, and irrevocably. Light would be waiting in ruin. Totalitarianism, fatalism, and martyred romanticism: while other ideological movements were certainly active and influential, such as socialism, Confucianism, or a form of Darwinism applied to social and international relations, when we analyze the texts attempting to imagine the future or the postwar period, these three movements are predominant. Although the strategic decisions that led Japan to war were not made on

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the basis of such considerations, the influence they exerted on hearts and minds makes them impossible to ignore. Moreover, the Romantic hypothesis is the only one that goes even some way to explaining, without resorting to absurd or contemptuous arguments, Japan’s decision to engage in war when its chances of victory were virtually nil.

THE WAR IN CHINA

In July 1937 the Kwantung Army persuaded the imperial government to go to war with the promise of a brief military campaign. But when stiff resistance was encountered from the Chinese, army chiefs adopted a strategy of pacification through terror, all the while drumming up a festive response to each victory back in the home islands. During the capture of Nanjing in early December that same year, orders were given to “annihilate the enemy,” take no prisoners, and consider all young Chinese to be disguised or defeated soldiers.58 At the same time, back in Japan the fall of the Kuomintang capital was celebrated in a variety of ways, from parades, banners, and news reports to songs and poetry competitions. With the front relatively stable since the Battle of Nanking and faced with the vehement response these events had triggered in the international community, the Japanese army relaxed its campaign of systematic violence somewhat. It resumed at the end of 1940, however, when Communist troops began to harry Japanese forces on the northwestern front. This strategy came to be known by the Chinese as the Three Alls Policy—“kill all, burn all, loot all.” Approved by Imperial General Headquarters on the eve of the Pacific War, it caused an even greater loss of life than in Nanjing and the surrounding areas during the early stages of the war. Moreover, it was accompanied by the use of chemical weapons, a tactic authorized by Tokyo in the summer of 193759 (in total, approximately one thousand operations using gas are known to have been carried out, this is in addition to the biological agents dispersed via crop dusters or water contamination). It was also characterized by a soaring number of rapes, which in turn brought about an explosion in venereal disease. Among the civilian population alone, the Japanese historian Kasahara Tokushi suggests a figure of 2,870,000 deaths that can be directly attributed to the Imperial Japanese Army.60

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In addition to being ferocious in battle, the Japanese army between 1937 and 1945 also committed untold crimes and acts of violence on soldiers and civilians in each of the countries it occupied, and none more so than China. There were massacres, such as those recorded in Nanjing, Singapore, and Manila, as well as countless instances of indiscriminate bombing, murder, rape, torture and barbarity, looting and arson, not to mention forced prostitution and labor, the plundering of raw materials, commercial fraud, and all manner of threats and humiliations. While the precise figures remain the subject of debate, the Japanese invasions caused the death of millions of soldiers and millions of civilians, an appalling death toll and a colossal responsibility. The occupation of Manchuria, the war against the Chinese National Revolutionary Army, and the capture of the coastal provinces were all part of a vast campaign of territorial expansion that began in the nineteenth century. However, Japan had no plan to target the Chinese as a group, and even less so its civilian population. On the contrary, a report drawn up in 1940 lamented the fact that the contempt shown to local populations by Japanese colonists in northern China, and the acts of violence they committed there, “prevent a harmonious cooperation between the two peoples, something that is fundamental to the nation-building project.”61 Indeed, the official rhetoric was one of liberating the people of Asia and building a coprosperity sphere in which each population would be bound to the empire yet autonomous, following the example of Manchuria. This idealistic view was frequently expressed in newspapers, literature, and the arts. The reality, however, was quite different. Imperial General Headquarters continued to encourage the destruction of Chinese territories and populations, a policy adopted in 1941. It ordered the creation of units conducting research into biological warfare— the most infamous being Unit 731—and oversaw their running: as demonstrated by the interrogations carried out as part of preparations for the Tokyo War Crimes Trials, notably that of Tanaka Ryūkichi, military chiefs in Tokyo were aware of the strategy of terror employed by Japanese troops.62 It remains unclear, however, just how detailed the information in their possession was. No reliable documentary evidence from the period provides figures that even come close to those established using Chinese documents and the testimony of the victims’ families. Personal accounts constitute the majority of reports from the time. The journal kept by Sasaki Tōichi, for example, who commanded the Thirtieth Brigade of the

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Sixteenth Infantry Division during the Battle of Nanking, reports some “ten thousand dead bodies abandoned in the city” for December 13, 1937, alone and describes his desire to allow every last prisoner to be massacred.63 There is no mention of civilians, however, and it is unclear to what extent and in what form such information made its way back up the chain of command to Tokyo. Secret reports are known to have been burned in August 1945 when the army set about destroying its archives; however, it is also possible to imagine that operational chiefs on the ground concealed their actions, and that the metropolitan authorities refused to have precise knowledge of the victims’ fates, following a pattern that has echoes of the Algerian War. Several of Japan’s military chiefs were trained specialists on China. This is true of General Matsui Iwane, who commanded the troops engaged in the Battle of Nanking. At the very least, then, they had an interest in Chinese culture and affairs. Some historians have suggested that such individuals harbored a personal animosity born of their disillusion at having failed to curry favor with Chiang Kai-shek,64 their hatred fueled by an unrequited fascination. While this is something to be taken into consideration, it can hardly explain the general behavior of the Japanese. Between 1937 and 1945 several million Japanese soldiers passed through the Chinese front. Despite this considerable number, accounts relating the events are scarce and focus mainly on fragmented acts of violence: such and such a soldier witnessed the execution of twenty or so people; another heard talk of rape. One pilot confided in his journal in January 1945 that he had “heard a talk given by an infantry officer who had spent a long time on the battlefields of our Central China operation. He talked about how they killed prisoners and women soldiers—in a way so hideous such words as cruel and inhumane are inadequate.”65 Some, however, admitted to having committed isolated acts of violence themselves, notably during the “mopping up” of Nanjing, while others denied having heard or seen anything. Additionally, the acts of violence in question were for the most part committed during military campaigns (as was the case for the executions of prisoners), lending them a semblance of legitimacy in the eyes of those concerned. On the other hand, written or oral testimony describing rape, the murder of civilians, looting, and other irrefutably reprehensible acts under martial law are few and far between. And when they do exist, such acts are often justified as having been committed under orders. This was

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the case with Sumioka Giichi, who explained that he had killed an old man because his commanding officer had wished to test his courage.66 The vast majority of those who committed crimes either concealed them or cloaked them in vague expressions about the cruelty of war. In the absence of political will, these accounts have at no point—either during or after the war—represented a powerful vehicle for conveying information to the general population. In the privacy of the home, however, the atrocities committed could be discussed. Yet the masses back home in Japan were not completely deprived of information, whether in the press, literature, or the letters and accounts written by soldiers. The death tolls published in newspapers at the beginning of the war (which were later concealed) reveal an immense disparity between Japanese and Chinese losses. In March 1938, during an operation to “mop up the northern bank of the Yellow River,” the Asahi shinbun published a press release from the Army General Staff listing four hundred deaths on the Japanese side and fifteen thousand for the Chinese67—a ratio of one to forty. Such information provided a glimpse into the indiscriminate, ruthless violence of the Japanese army, particularly since this was not the result of a pitched battle but rather a series of skirmishes. Nonetheless, this violence was presented either in a triumphant light, as in the preceding example, or as a necessary response to Chinese abuses. Indeed, during the 1930s a certain perception of the war against China prevailed in the Japanese mind. In 1937, memories of the war of 1894–1895 had not receded. It was commemorated annually, and former soldiers were invited to share their experiences. This conflict had been exceptionally violent: Japanese troops had executed Chinese prisoners, committed rape, burned and pillaged Port Arthur. “Although they took place almost forty-three years apart, many commonalities can be seen in the behavior of Japanese soldiers.”68 Moreover, the ferociousness of the war against the Qing had not elicited a particularly strong reaction from the majority of the great Western powers, although it was reported back in Japan, notably in the form of bloody illustrations. The Japanese army derived a kind of doctrine from this experience, with brutality and contempt for the enemy becoming a means of illustrating to soldiers the fate that awaited them if they were captured and thus of strengthening their resolve using fear and shame. In this way, historical events led violence against the Chinese to be seen as something normal or trivial in the Japanese popular imagination.

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FIGURE 3.1  Utagawa Kokunimasa, Illustration of the Decapitation of Violent Chinese Soldiers, 1894.

The idea that it was natural to be brutal with the Chinese was accompanied by a whole set of stereotypes fueled by a scholarly discourse presenting them as incapable of remaining calm in the face of crisis. This led, for example, an eminent Japanese Sinologist to write in 1926 that China possessed an “army that, in its organization and weaponry, is in every respect from the twentieth century, but whose mentality and qualities, it must be said, lag nine centuries behind.”69 More widely, the Chinese were portrayed as a cowardly, treacherous, and unpredictable people prone to committing acts of “terrorism”—a word omnipresent in the press of 1938—in contrast to the physical and moral courage the Japanese attributed to themselves. The explanatory framework for justifying Japanese brutality was thus in place even before the Sino-Japanese War began—namely, that any violence committed by the Imperial Army against the Chinese could only be a necessary reaction to their fundamental lack of discipline.

THE CONQUEST OF SOUTHEAST ASIA

The painter Nakamura Ken’ichi produced many battle scenes during the war but also contributed a number of more academic works to the official art exhibitions. At one such event in 1942 he presented a painting called

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Memory of Annam, in which a young Indochinese woman is shown reclining suggestively on a chair, her bare feet posed delicately on an ottoman. Her dark, intense gaze is turned toward the viewer in a sign of mysterious invitation. The exhibition of 1942 contained around half a dozen paintings of this type, all of them featuring female subjects with intentionally exposed breasts.70 Europe was not unique in producing an orientalist style of painting. In Japan too this genre developed in the 1910s and was characterized by the same erotic and exotic clichés, with Southeast Asia and the Pacific Islands providing the main focus of such fantasies. Since the Meiji period, Japan’s relationship with Asia had been mediated by two contradictory discourses. The first stressed the need to “leave Asia” in order to achieve progress. The more progress became a reality, the more the country felt superior to its neighbors. Japanese colonialism was born of a desire to secure the nation’s borders but also from a feeling of national superiority. The second discourse, which was contemporaneous to the first in terms of public debate but slightly posterior in terms of actual deeds, notably major government decisions, stressed the importance of closer ties with other Asian nations. It was given organized expression in the 1880s through the words and actions of certain politicians and intellectuals, who argued that Japan must uphold the idea of a shared destiny among East Asian nations—meaning Japan, China, and Korea—on political, economic, and cultural levels. The ideologies of colonialism and pan-Asianism have thus coexisted in Japan since the beginnings of modernization. Colonial ideology was the first to be translated into concrete action. After taking control of the Ryukyu Islands, Hokkaido, and the southern part of Sakhalin Island during the Edo period, Japan maintained its momentum by seizing Taiwan and Korea, which it placed under direct administration while retaining any potentially useful local structures. However, colonial expansion essentially ended in 1910 with the annexation of Korea. This was due to the signing of the Anglo-Japanese Alliance (1902) and the victory against the Russians (1905), which cemented Japan’s status as a great regional power, thus ensuring that its security was no longer under direct threat. In this new context, idealist discourses became more audible. Thus, in 1904 the thinker Okakura Tenshin, using the slogan “Asia is one,” underlined the existence from India to Japan of a “broad expanse of love for the Ultimate and Universal, which is the common thought-inheritance of every Asiatic race.”71 Perhaps Okakura

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would have objected to his pan-Asianist ideal being used to justify Japan’s policy of territorial conquest; his thought nonetheless provided authorities with the conceptual foundations for an alternative to colonization. Borrowing his idea of a cultural and spiritual unity throughout Asia, Japanese military leaders, notably Ishiwara Kanji, maintained that the country was justified in its plan to liberate Asia from the Western yoke and unite its peoples under the emperor’s authority, all the while allowing them to retain their independence.72 The creation of Manchukuo in 1932 inaugurated this new strategy, which recalled both the former Chinese empire and the Commonwealth of Nations established by the British in 1931. The difference was that the majority of Japan’s empire was yet to be built. Consequently, Japan sought to physically invade the countries it coveted and then install puppet governments. In this way, the army and navy were able to pursue their efforts to conquer China, Indochina, and all of Southeast Asia, all the while denying that their aim was to establish a colonial empire. This distinction between the two phases of territorial expansion—the integration of the Meiji period and the satellization of the 1930s and 1940s73—is an important element in understanding how Japan’s wartime authorities were able to get the nation behind the idea of “liberating” Asia. It was between June and September 1940, with the capture of French Indochina, that Japan opted to expand toward South Asia, since expansion to the north had been blocked by the army’s defeat by Soviet forces at Nomonhan in 1939 and by the signing of the German-Soviet pact of nonaggression.74 At the same time, in July 1940 the Konoe cabinet published a document formally setting out the new doctrine of economically exploiting the Japanese-occupied territories, a document that gave rise to the notion of a Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere.75 However, Japan lacked sufficient knowledge of the countries and populations it set out to conquer in December 1941—whether the Philippines, Malaysia, Burma, or Indonesia—and despite creating a Ministry of Greater East Asia in late 1942, it had neither the time nor the means to study their histories and cultures in depth, as it had done with Korea and China. The ties linking Japan to these nations were unilateral, based on domination and a professed mission to civilize. The massacres perpetrated by the Imperial Army in Singapore and Manila, which left tens of thousands dead, were passed over in silence. In contrast, the firefighting operations in Rangoon and the American bombing of Bangkok were widely

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publicized, not so much because of an interest in or compassion for local populations but rather to warn the Japanese of the dangers awaiting the nation and encourage a redoubling of efforts.76 Among the liberal bourgeoisie and the majority of intellectuals on both sides of the political divide, the idea of a coprosperity sphere uniting all of Asia under Japanese leadership garnered much support. People began to dream of a political and cultural union—modeled on the Japanese social contract linking individuals to the emperor—in which each nation would abandon its egotism to create a perfect historical order and where each country would be respected in its autonomy while maintaining a sense of responsibility vis-à-vis the whole. This position, which was upheld for example by the philosopher Nishitani Keiji,77 echoed French colonialism in suggesting that physical domination was justified by a desire to enlighten the local population intellectually and spiritually. Rule by force, liberate through the mind. While these two dynamics may seem contradictory, they structured the entire debate on Asia during the Pacific War. Moreover, they usually went hand in hand and were interconnected: physical domination would only be temporary, whereas a spiritual approach would be longer lasting and take deeper root. This point is important in light of the postwar period, for while the turn of events was not in Japan’s favor, history did not invalidate this discourse. The Japanese occupation was indeed short-lived, and as for Japan’s moral or spiritual influence, the attainment of independence by the majority of occupied territories between 1943 and 1950 provided those nostalgic for the empire with a whole battery of examples confirming its importance. Between 1941 and 1945, the Japanese were abundantly informed as to the existence of independence movements in all the occupied lands (with the exception of Korea and Taiwan, of course, which received little more attention in the national media than a Japanese prefecture). The arrival of Japanese forces was systematically presented as being the first step toward freeing the local population from the Western yoke. However, local political leaders were depicted as being in a position of allegiance to the Japanese government. The declarations of “independence” in Burma (August 1, 1943), the Philippines (October 14, 1943), and Vietnam (March 11, 1945) were thus portrayed from a clearly imperial perspective. In a news report from September 1944, Sukarno (1901–1970), the future president of Indonesia, can be seen standing before a general and a huge Japanese flag, reading a declaration in which he “thank[ed] His Majesty

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the Emperor for his benevolence”78 after Japan, under intense military pressure on the various fronts, promised to grant Indonesia its independence. During the Pacific War, then, Japan saw itself as both the absolute master of Asia and a transitory occupying force. This ambivalent stance toward Asia was expressed particularly clearly in official media outlets such as the illustrated magazines Front and Shashin shūhō (photo weekly).79 Yet the Japanese media did not neglect to show the utility of the expansionist policy. The Japanese occupation needed to be profitable immediately.80 Emphasis was thus placed on the development of the Thai rail network or the tapping of resources such as rubber in Borneo, tin in Malaysia, oil in Indonesia, or sugar in the Philippines. Great pains were taken to stress, however, that these efforts bore no resemblance to the actions of the British or Dutch.81 Japanese domestic propaganda constantly strove to maintain the illusion among the population of the coprosperity sphere’s civilizing mission. Accordingly, if we leave aside the military, the Japanese, be they workers or farmers, were portrayed no differently from their Filipino counterparts in newsreels from the era. There is little trace of the condescension or exoticism found in British films on India or Kenya. On the contrary, there is a palpable desire to convey a certain equality between the peoples and thus reinforce the idea that Japan was waging a legitimate war. While Japan exploited raw materials, it went even further in exploiting human capital.82 It was here that the spiritual dimension came into play. The coprosperity sphere was presented chiefly as an endeavor intended to bring about an ideological and cultural revival. Newsreels reported how “Filipino prisoners of war, who under the American yoke readily cast off their Asian hearts and minds, rediscover in the benevolence and rigor of Japanese Bushido the path to a renaissance and are thus striving to become Asian once again.”83 Japan stressed education, hygiene, a work ethic, and hoped to instill the values of moral and physical discipline that were seen as being characteristic of Asian peoples. Reports on Asia published in Shashin shūhō uniformly featured rows of schoolchildren, huge crowds doing gymnastics, or workers marching in step. The Japanese model of modernity, although essentially romantic, wore the smooth, cold traits of austerity, self-control, and determination. But there was also an internal significance to such images, for the more the conquered populations were portrayed as disciplined, the more the Japanese had a duty to be exemplary. The Japanese media constructed a mirror image of Southeast Asian

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peoples, thereby concealing their otherness and preventing the masses from perceiving the violence of the imperial presence.

THE JEWISH QUESTION

The “Jewish question,” as it was also known at the time in Japan, was not as sensitive an issue in East Asia as it was in Europe. It appeared only sporadically in the daily press or newsreels. Nevertheless, it was actively debated and commented on in scholarly circles, generating a relatively abundant literature that provides a clearer picture of how Japan perceived the problems facing the world and where it stood in relation to them. Public interest in Jewish issues developed in Japan around 1935, the same year that Germany adopted the Nuremberg Race Laws. During the ten years that followed, the subject was explored in hundreds of books and articles, peaking in 1941, when no fewer than twenty-two books were published, several of them by leading publishers. Although the angle of attack varied—The Jews and the World War, East Asia and the Jewish Question, Newspapers and the Jews84—the majority of these studies were in the field of international politics. The Jewish Policy of the Nazis (1941) was an openly anti-Semitic volume in the “Nazis” collection, published by Arusu with a view to increasing public knowledge of the empire’s new allies. It was the most comprehensive general-audience publication to come out of this period.85 The different phases of the Nazi strategy to “exclude” Jews from society were presented in detail, from the bans on entering certain professions to the “order to evacuate” Polish Jews in 1939–1940.86 However, there was no mention of any massacres, and the question of concentration camps was skimmed over with a reference to a “plan to round up Jews in the province of Lublin,” a possible allusion to the creation of a camp at Majdanek.87 Jews were presented as foreign bodies that had infiltrated other nations, and the German measures, a legitimate response.88 However, the reality of the “final solution to the Jewish question,” adopted around 1941, did not become known until the end of the war, although rumors of massacres had begun to circulate in 1942.89 Two opposing camps, corresponding to two different political sympathies, can be observed in the analysis of the Jewish question:  the first consisted of pan-Asianists hailing from, among others, the Ministry of

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Foreign Affairs and the Kwantung Army; the second was made up of radical nationalists who identified with magazines such as Nihon oyobi Nihonjin. The first camp prevailed until 1942, after which the second came to dominate. However, the dividing line between the two positions was far from watertight. A typical view expressed by supporters of a favorable policy toward the Jews maintained that this group contained a “deadly poison,” and that while Japan could utilize them, as it had done during the Russo-Japanese War, extreme caution was necessary.90 Approximately one thousand Jews lived in Japan around 1940–1941, three-quarters of them in Kobe. This was in addition to around thirty-three hundred persons residing in Manchuria, notably in the city of Harbin.91 Until the breakout of the Pacific War, the Japanese government took a relatively benevolent view of their presence. Its position was set out in a circular from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, dated December 7, 1938: —Jews currently living in Japan, Manchuria, and China will be given the same impartial treatment as other foreign nationals, and no special measures to expel them will be taken. —Jews arriving in Japan, Manchuria, or China in the future will be treated impartially, in accordance with the regulations for admitting foreigners. —Jews will not be actively encouraged to travel to Japan, Manchuria, or China, with the exception of investors, skilled individuals, and, more widely, any persons with a particular quality or value.92

The Japanese authorities justified their position through the notion of racial equality, the desire to attract capital to finance the development of Manchuria, as well as a wish to remain on good terms with the United States. As we can see, the Japanese government was far from aligning itself with Nazi Germany, despite the latter’s protests. It was by virtue of this policy that a certain number of refugees found a home in Manchuria and that the Jewish community in Japan was able to remain relatively free. This is evidenced by the example of the Polish pianist Joseph Rosenstock (1895–1985), who conducted the Japan Symphony Orchestra and “gave piano recitals in Japan throughout the Pacific War.”93 This pragmatic stance was blown out of the water by the events of December 1941. There was no longer any need to tiptoe around the United States, nor any hope of attracting capital to Manchuria. On this issue, as

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on many others, the attack on Pearl Harbor represented a critical turning point. While no discriminatory measures were taken against the Jews living on its territory or in Manchuria, Japan ceased to show them any benevolence, thereby leaving the door open to a variety of extremist views. The result was a sharp contraction in the small Jewish community living in Japan, which numbered no more than 364 persons by late 1942.94 However, a similar phenomenon was also observed regarding Westerners in general. Given its lack of a long-standing historical tradition, anti-Semitic discourse in Japan drew even more heavily on The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. This fraudulent document, written by a Russian forger in 1903 in order to fuel the anti-Semitic policy of Nicholas II, had been translated into Japanese in 1924. The Bolshevik Revolution was perceived by some as a confirmation of the Protocols. In the 1920s, Shiōden Nobutaka did more than any other individual to spread the idea that communism was a Jewish threat. Shiōden was an officer from the army’s pro-Islamic circles and wished to construct a vast, anti-Western, and anti-Chinese front dominated by Japan. In fact, he served as chairman of the Great Japan Islamic Society.95 Nevertheless, it was above all in 1938, under the influence of Nazi theories, that anti-Semitism began to spread. The most widely available edition of the Protocols, dating back to 1938, was reprinted almost yearly until 1943 and featured a cover page showing a serpent snaked around the globe, its forked tongue pointed toward Japan. During this second phase, and beginning in 1941 in particular, American liberal capitalism and Parisian-type modern culture gradually replaced communism in the anti-Semitic imagination. Thus, the author of The Jewish Policy of the Nazis stated in his introduction that, “The tripartite Axis of Japan, Germany, and Italy is a resistance to the Jewish international finance capitalism of the British and Americans, and the expression of a desire to establish a new economic structure that rejects ‘money’ from the heart of the system. These days, Anglo-American capitalism is merely a synonym for Jewish capitalism, and to speak of the Nazis’ Jewish policy is to speak of their policy vis-à-vis the Anglo-American Jewish countries.”96 This habit of conflating the British and Americans with the Jews only increased after Pearl Harbor, and several books expounded the idea that waging war against the Americans was the same as waging war against the Jews.97 Such views were an additional element in Japanese perceptions of the Americans during the Pacific War.98

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FIGURE 3.2  Illustration

from the book The Jewish Problem, 1938.

France was the other country associated with the idea of Jewish domination, in this case cultural rather than economic. This point of view was particularly prevalent in the wake of France’s military defeat, which saw a flourishing of acerbic or derisive commentary on the Jewish and effeminate nature of contemporary France or the “degenerate” character of paintings from the School of Paris.99 Japanese anti-Semitism did not take the form of racial hatred in the biological sense; rather, it served to define, in an abstract way, everything that threatened the primacy of the national structure, whether that be communism, financial liberalism, or cultural internationalism. What is more, the fact that this issue gained such importance shows that the same debates agitating the West also agitated Japan. The Japanese did not fight the war in a bubble. On the contrary, the main protagonists of the conflict shared a common bank of references.

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THE BRITISH AND AMERICANS

The English philosopher and sociologist Herbert Spencer (1820–1903) was a key reference for the intellectuals and politicians at Japan’s helm during the 1880s and 1890s. On several occasions Itō Hirobumi100 and his inner circle questioned Spencer directly on subjects as diverse as the constitution, international trade, or marriage with foreigners. Spencer developed a certain interest in Japan but constantly urged its leaders to proceed with caution. As he wrote in a letter in 1892, “You see, therefore, that my advice is strongly conservative in all directions, and I end by saying as I began—keep other races at arm’s length as much as possible. I give this advice in confidence. I wish that it should not transpire publicly, at any rate during my lifetime, for I do not desire to rouse the animosity of my fellow-countrymen.”101 Spencer clearly saw the West as a threat to Japan. This point of view expressed by a philosopher hostile to imperialism naturally echoed what the Japanese themselves had felt keenly for decades, ever since the sudden appearance of Commodore Perry’s ships off the coast of Japan in 1853, an event that forced the shogunate to sign unequal treaties. Admittedly, Japan saw the threat subside at the beginning of the twentieth century thanks to its alliance with Great Britain and its victories over China (1895) and Russia. Nevertheless, the memory of this period in which the country was at the mercy of the colonial powers remained deeply engrained in people’s minds, fueled notably by school textbooks and bittersweet stories like Madama Butterfly, which enjoyed considerable success.102 Consequently, come 1940 it was extremely easy to revive this fear (and thus hatred) of the West in general, and the United States in particular, since this nation had been the first to prize open Japan’s borders. Presenting Japan’s opposition to America as revenge for the events of 1853 was a recurrent theme in Japanese propaganda both before and during the war. If certain diplomatic or military decisions had been made differently, the Pacific War could have been avoided. On the other hand, no one in Japan could have been entirely surprised by the turn events took in December 1941. The possibility of a war against the United States had been evoked explicitly since the late 1930s, and media coverage in 1941 was such that it became impossible to ignore. Even Ishiwara Kanji, who represented the opposition to General Tōjō within the army, wrote in 1940 that “the European war [i.e., World War I] was a battle for supremacy

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between the peoples of Europe. It cannot be described as a ‘World War.’ The center of Western civilization has since shifted to the United States. The decisive war that is bound to occur in the future will be a truly world war centered on Japan and the United States.”103 The tragedy of the Pacific War had been foreseen. The situation in Japan on the eve of hostilities was fairly similar to that seen in France in the early 1910s. Despite the long-standing resentment felt by the Japanese since the nineteenth century, a resentment fueled by the many racist decisions and stances adopted by Britain and America during the 1920s and 1930s, notably their refusal to acknowledge the principle of racial equality during initial discussions on the creation of the League of Nations in 1919,104 there were many admirers of America in Japan’s elites, in particular individuals who had previously studied at the great universities in California and the East Coast and Rotary Club members.105 Furthermore, there was a sizable Japanese-American community in the United States, with an estimated membership of 277,000 people, just over half of whom resided in Hawaii. Through these human networks, but also at the initiative of government bodies, contact was maintained between the two countries until the attack on Pearl Harbor. The number of American films shown in Japan declined by two-thirds between 1939 and 1940, but they were officially banned only in December 1941.106 Up until 1940 certain weeklies published comic strips, such as the Asahi gurafu, which ran the George McManus strip Bringing Up Father. Even the following year, it was not rare to find positive accounts in the press of some educational, scientific, or cultural aspect of American society. The campaign to demonize the United States and Great Britain was prepared fairly shortly in advance, and it was not until the outbreak of war, and the bombings of 1944–1945 in particular, that there was an explosion in propaganda. During this period, the rejection of the enemy was expressed chiefly through stereotypical expressions depicting a demon beast (kichiku), a wild brute (jū), a dog (-ken), or a harmful animal (kori). In general, however, these expressions were much less varied, offensive, and contemptuous than those employed by the Americans to refer to the Japanese,107 or by the Japanese to refer to the Chinese. Similarly, several monuments representing Americans who had played a notable role in Japan during the nineteenth century emerged from the war unscathed, such as the stone portrait of Ernest Fenollosa108 in Ueno, on the campus of Tokyo University of the Arts.109 The Japanese had assimilated the idea of a hierarchy of races and cultures, as suggested by,

FIGURE 3.3  “Offer

Your Savings to the Empire at War! We Will Fight On!” AntiAmerican poster from the temple Higashi Honganji, 1943.

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among others, their tendency to highlight their light skin tone as a sign of their superiority over other Asian nations.110 In their eyes, the British and Americans had retained the prestige of history and power. The first victories scored by the imperial forces in late 1941, early 1942 were immediately followed by saber rattling and pompous declarations. The nation was going to “slaughter,” “destroy,” and “exterminate” the “Anglo-Americans,” or the “Merikens,” as Americans were called at the time. Reading the press, the war appears to have been not only about conquering territories or liberating Asia; it was also a deadly showdown between two civilizations. Right from the outset, the Pacific War was seen in Japan as a total war in which the very survival of the country was at stake. The idea that this was the final war, the war that would decide the long-term future of the new globalized world, as advanced by Ishiwara, immediately became the line adopted by official propaganda. And in fact, this was coherent with the strategy employed, which consisted in attacking the United States head-on. During the war, Japanese media and intellectuals dwelled heavily on the American mentality, conscious that Japan’s real enemy was not the old British colonial power, which was tied up in its struggle against Germany. The massively disseminated images (in the form of films, photographs, and paintings) of Lieutenant-General Arthur Percival marching alongside a soldier bearing a white flag during the fall of Singapore in February 1942 or looking contrite as he signed a treaty of surrender opposite a triumphant Tomoyuki Yamashita considerably dulled Britain’s prestige. The Japanese analysis of American culture rested on two pillars: the idea that the Americans had a taste for power and valued material strength and wealth, but also the idea that American culture was fragile because of its lack of historical depth and a common ideal, a weakness that was seen as being compounded by the democratic system. So prevalent was this discourse that one wonders at times if propaganda was in the service of the military or, on the contrary, if the military simply acted in accordance with these images. The analysis provided by Watsuji in 1944 is a typical example: the American national character, he said, is materialistic and puritanical, traits it inherited from the British;111 however, the American people are more violent and for this reason, “drawing on natural law and arguing that it was within its rights, it was able to massacre indigenous populations and resort to slavery.”112 The United States, he added, is the very essence of the “machine civilization” whose entire development is

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predicated on population growth and increased production.113 Nevertheless, in the event of a war of attrition, they would be psychologically incapable of withstanding heavy losses. Faced with a difficult situation, their will to fight would be susceptible to a sudden “nervous breakdown,” he concluded in English.114 Following this logic, the only way to bring the American army to its knees was thus to rely on moral, psychological, and spiritual virtues such as solidarity, determination, courage, and a sense of sacrifice. While this analysis proved to be inadequate and presumptuous, it was not entirely unreasonable. The media provided daily rundowns of military operations, paying particularly close attention to enemy losses, which they regularly exaggerated. Yet we can truly understand the importance accorded to such data only in the light of Japan’s analysis of the American mentality—namely, that any new loss might bring about a major breakdown in the United States, a prospect that rapidly became Japan’s sole hope of victory. Nevertheless, in 1942, the same year that the battles of Midway and Guadalcanal were fought, the newspapers began to talk of a “counteroffensive by the Anglo-American enemies.” Initially of course it was claimed that this counteroffensive had failed, but the death of Admiral Yamamoto Isoroku in April 1943 showed the population that the reality was no doubt quite different. Particularly since newspapers, after having announced the end of the counteroffensive, subsequently took to headlining the need to “break it,”115 suggesting that none of the previous attempts had been successful. Beginning in the spring of 1943, Japan’s inability to block the Allied advance forced military high command to change tactics in its communiqués and emphasize the heroism of imperial soldiers over enemy losses. The Battle of Attu in the Aleutian Islands, which ended in May 1943 with the death of 99 percent of the 2,665 Japanese soldiers engaged in fighting, was thus accompanied by a vast campaign hailing the dead as martyrs. This continued until October, thereby preparing the population for the prospect of fighting on home soil. At the same time, the press stepped up its reporting of American cruelty, criticizing the treatment meted out to Japanese immigrants who had been interned in camps in 1942: “Britain and America treat our civilian compatriots cruelly, in conditions inferior to those of prisoners of war,” reported newsreels in February 1943.116 American economic imperialism, lack of emotion, and mechanical implacability versus the Japanese glorification of effort, purity of heart, and determination: in substance, such

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were the terms of the conflict in the eyes of the Japanese during the final months of the war. This was summed up succinctly by the nationalist critic Tokutomi Sohō when he said that “for them, the war is a question of profit; for us, it’s a matter of life or death.”117 So strong was this sentiment, there appears to have been a lack of clearly distinct views on the Americans in Japanese society, in contrast to those held on the Chinese and the Jews.

4 HEROES AND THE DEAD

THE IMPERIAL IMAGE

hat was the emperor’s role during the war? Scholars paint a double-sided portrait. For some, Hirohito reigned over the country in accordance with article 1 of the Meiji Constitution but in reality was manipulated by fascist factions in the government and did not truly exercise power. He merely guaranteed that any decisions binding the nation were made in a consensual and balanced manner, his ultimate concern being to preserve the imperial institution.1 He is even portrayed as having tried to avert the war before resigning himself to sanctioning the army’s plans.2 In this scenario, his decision to surrender in August 1945 simply reflected the exceptional nature of the situation. For others, whose convictions I share, although the emperor exercised power in a way fundamentally different from modern dictators, he nonetheless took a meticulous and considered approach to overseeing state affairs. “Where necessary he intervened extensively in the running of the country and in the strategic plans of the military,”3 writes Awaya Kentarō. Hirohito not only monitored the situation constantly but also influenced national policy in a variety of ways. He began to concentrate executive power around himself in 1938 by convening an increasing number of imperial conferences. He paved the way for individuals such as Kido and Tōjō— his right-hand men—to rise to power. He kept abreast of diplomatic,

W

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political, and military affairs on a daily basis and made this fact known to those around him, whom he did not hesitate to question or lecture. His role was essentially no different from that of the British monarchs, who were among his main models. In concrete terms, Hirohito sanctioned the attempt to conquer China in 1937 and the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, intervened frequently on tactical issues, and right to the very end strove to find a military solution to the conflict.4 That he exercised authority at the time of surrender further suggests that he could have changed the course of events earlier, had he so desired. Consequently, he can be considered to carry as much responsibility for the course of events as the majority of those indicted. One may question whether the emperor had a clear-cut personal stance and whether he was able to ensure that his wishes translated into action. The isolated nature of the imperial institution certainly made it possible to manipulate the emperor and betray or ignore his wishes. However, power is not only a question of personal decision. To a significant extent, it is also a question of mastering the use of representation and symbols, particularly in the case of Japan, where indoctrination through images was one of the pillars of national unification.5 The emperor was central to the visual economy of Japan. Although some were privileged enough to glimpse him at public ceremonies, he was visible chiefly through the media. Representation of the emperor took a variety of forms, the most obvious being photographs. An official version hung in every school, and it was not unusual to find such portraits in companies or private homes. The presence of imperial images was further strengthened by the portraits of Emperor Meiji, who continued to be extremely popular. Well-known artists such as Fujita and Kita Renzō6 also painted several portraits that were widely reproduced and disseminated. Furthermore, it was not rare to catch a glimpse of the emperor in newsreels or in papers and illustrated magazines. Roughly once a month he made public appearances at naval maneuvers, military parades, or the award ceremonies held at officer cadet schools. On such occasions he wore military uniform and was often referred to as generalissimo (daigensui), a rank he alone held. He played his part conscientiously, riding his horse, saluting troops, or silently honoring a ceremony with his presence. Hirohito was thus often represented in the public space. He left the palace regularly, thereby demonstrating his interest in national affairs, but

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FIGURE 4.1  Kita

Renzō, His Majesty the Generalissimo, 1942.

was careful not to make himself too visible for fear of compromising the solemnity of his appearances. Consequently, while the emperor may not have exercised power in everyday affairs, he nonetheless strove to represent this power and possessed all of its attributes: he resembled a Western-style military chief yet with historical legitimacy; he was the absolute authority and he knew it. There was also a religious element to the emperor’s role. The Meiji government, conscious of the political importance of religion, had taken inspiration from Christianity to organize the various forms of Shinto into a single institution focused on the sun goddess Amaterasu, from whom legend tells the imperial family descended. Any rites performed by the emperor—such as the Festival of the First Tasting on November 23, which from 1873 to 1947 was a national holiday—were considered to be among

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the most important. During the Shōwa period this aspect of the emperor’s duties was increasingly emphasized and covered by the media, notably through the use of what Kawamura Kunimitsu terms “invisible portraits,” meaning photographs or paintings that show the emperor’s car, for example, but not the man himself, or simply a vague silhouette. This practice reflected a long-standing iconographic tradition in the way political power was represented in Japan. “Similarly,” continues Kawamura, “it can be said that photographs of the Imperial Palace, with the Double Bridge and Fushimi Turret in the foreground, hint at the presence of the sacred manifest deity who lives cloistered within the palace walls, suggesting and symbolizing an emperor who cannot be seen.”7 In the Meiji Constitution the emperor not only was presented as the empire’s political chief but also appeared to be its military chief, its historical chief, and, finally, the polymorphic incarnation of State Shintō: in other words, an absolute leader for a nation aspiring to total unity. Figural representations fail to convey the pervasiveness of the imperial image during this era. In literature and the press, the emperor was represented primarily through words, notably the title used to refer to him, “Tennō Heika,” or “His Majesty the Emperor.” More important, however, were the honorific prefixes—“Your Imperial will,” “Your Imperial benevolence,” “Your Imperial rescript,” “Your Imperial army”—which were ubiquitous but nowhere more so than in the press and propaganda poems. There was no need to name the emperor explicitly when a sudden sign of deference sufficed. Hirohito was at the heart of an entire system of symbolic references that underpinned State Shintō. Thus, in all government and public offices, as well as the majority of businesses and homes, there was a small altar or miniature shrine known as a kamidana, which can be seen as a symbolic representation of the imperial institution. The same can be said of the depictions of Mount Fuji. In the context of war, the famous volcano became a metonym for the entire empire, its immaculate summit a metaphorical reference to its leader.8 The entire public space was overrun with allusions of this type, not to mention the Japanese conception of historical time, which was reckoned using a system based on the enthronement of the reigning emperor or the mythical Emperor Jimmu. Around 1940 the imperial institution was fetishized to an unprecedented degree. Yet this phenomenon bears only fairly superficial similarities to the personality cults seen in Western authoritarian regimes.

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Hirohito consistently wore a bland, almost aloof expression that contrasted with the expressivity frequently seen in representations of European dictators. What is more, imperial portraits were infinitely less visible in Japan than their equivalents in Germany or the USSR. And yet the abundance of symbols representing Hirohito vested him with incomparable power, leading millions to see him as a kind of deity. This phenomenon can be explained by (1) the fact that the imperial line had continued essentially unbroken for several centuries, thereby conferring the emperor with an undeniable historical legitimacy; (2) the efficiency of the political and educational structures established in the late nineteenth century; and (3) the skillful use of the media and symbols by those in favor of increasing the emperor’s power, notably in 1937 when the idea of the tennō as “manifest deity”9 was revived. In Europe, Louis XIV is often held up as the quintessential monarch who embodied power through images. In Versailles, the ritual that accompanied each of the king’s appearances captivated court and country alike, while throughout the land his portraits symbolized his omnipresence. “In the person of the king, symbolic body and real body become confused to the point that the king himself is held to be divine.”10 This fetishization of political power, which characterizes absolutism, tempted many a nineteenth-century monarch, and even more so the dictators of the twentieth. Yet two factors have always tended to limit its significance: first, the awareness, despite everything, of the illegitimacy of the divine being embodied in human form, an awareness born of the distinction—which is essential in monotheistic religions— between god and man, mind and matter; second, a kind of overload of the visual senses, an excess that undermines the feeling of sacredness, brought about by the proliferation of signs sent by the political power to compensate for the illegitimacy of its deification. This mechanism does not apply in the case of Japan, for while the idea of a transcendent Being does exist thanks to Christianity and certain forms of Buddhism, it is offset by a feeling, which is particularly crystallized in the Shinto faith, that the divine is always in situ—in other words, in matter in movement. Immanence and relativity tend to incorporate desires for transcendence. As such, it is clear that the emperor’s divine status was not merely a pretense of being a higher authority. Some may have disputed this reality on a political level, such as those who, like the legal scholar Minobe Tatsukichi,11 saw Hirohito as nothing more than the organ of

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the state, others accepted the emperor’s sacred status out of desperation and irony.12 It nonetheless had a theological legitimacy that is evident both in the manner in which it portrayed itself and the manner in which it protected itself. It is this that enabled the state to disseminate signs of the emperor throughout Japanese society without lapsing into an excess of representation. Indeed, while the image of the emperor was omnipresent and this omnipresence was apparent to all, it took the form primarily of metaphor rather than physical embodiment. And even when the emperor’s mortal body was on display, it was deliberately left in the shadows. It drew people’s attention and yet rejected it. The same applies to the written word. When Hirohito signed an imperial edict, he wrote his name, but when that same edict was published in the press, the words “Your Imperial name” simply appeared at the bottom of the document (a practice that continues to this day). The Japanese state skillfully manipulated the tennō’s sacred status to construct the image of an absolute being who was both singular and collective, human and divine, fundamentally unaccountable because answerable to no one, whether to his people or to a god. Yet this would have been impossible without the active support of the emperor himself, in this case Hirohito, who personally strove to embody this fundamental historical role in the interest of ensuring the system’s survival. And on this, he could justifiably have been held to account.

YASUKUNI AND THE NETWORK OF MILITARY SHRINES

In 1940 the Ministry of Education launched a new song intended to glorify the sacrifice of soldiers. Played in cinemas, on the radio, and sung in schools as part of the national curriculum, it opened with the following verse: You reflect the light of the Rising Sun And watch over the souls of loyal heroes for all eternity; Your pillars are wide and resplendent, O Yasukuni Shrine, palace of glory, To which His Majesty pays tribute!13

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Countless children learned this song during the war. The commemoration of fallen soldiers was traditionally a time when the ties linking individuals to the nation were the most powerful and affecting. This is no longer true today. Yasukuni Shrine (or Yasukuni Jinja as it is known in Japanese) still stands to the north of the Imperial Palace, in the heart of Tokyo, and continues to attract many visitors, but its role is radically different. The memory of the Japanese has faded, been objectivized and politicized. Up until 1945 the state was involved at every level in the commemoration of soldiers. It supervised the arrangement of funeral ceremonies, guided and controlled discourse in order to cast a positive light on the soldiers’ sacrifice but also exercised its influence at a more intimate level through the decisions made on the retrieval and preservation of corpses. As in many civilizations, two types of celebration exist in Japan: one focused on relics and physical remains, the other purely spiritual in nature. The former corresponds to Buddhism, the graveyard religion, and the latter to the Shinto faith with its emphasis on the soul.14 Originally Yasukuni was merely one of several Shinto shrines built to comfort the souls of those who died during the war that brought about the Meiji Restoration. Founded in August 1869, it received its current name only some ten years later, when it was placed under the joint control of the army and navy ministries.15 As Japan sought to affirm itself as a nation-state, Yasukuni was assigned a prominent role, and it was decided that it should enshrine the souls of all soldiers killed in overseas conflicts, beginning with the expedition to Taiwan in 1874. It thereby rose to national significance, while the remaining shrines were placed under the control of the Home Ministry and continued to have an essentially local role.16 These shrines are generally identical in size and composed of a main hall measuring approximately thirty meters wide and a secondary hall that is either adjoining or separate. Additionally, in some cases a small concrete building serves as an office and meeting space. While local variations do exist, all these shrines share the same simplicity of form and color. In March 1939, as the Sino-Japanese War raged, the Home Ministry, in consultation with the army and navy, proceeded to reform this network to conserve just a third of all shrines, or roughly one per prefecture.17 As part of this process they were reclassified as “nation-protecting shrines” and placed under the supervision of Yasukuni. This measure reflected a

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desire on behalf of the state, and the army in particular, to harmonize and centralize commemorative rites. Yasukuni also enjoyed close ties with the imperial house, and these only strengthened with time, since Emperor Meiji made just seven visits to the shrine during his long reign, whereas his grandson Hirohito made twenty between 1926 and 1945 alone.18 The most important rite at these shrines consists in adding the souls of the newly deceased to those already enshrined. During the war this rite generally unfolded in two stages, beginning in solemn style with priests performing memorial celebrations. These were followed immediately after or during the same afternoon by sumo, judo, kendo, or even archery tournaments organized in honor of the dead. There was a festive element to the events, which occasionally featured gagaku or Noh, tea ceremonies, ikebana or art exhibitions, and even poetry recitals. Military shrines became artistic and social venues, the immediate purpose of which was to console the bereaved families but which also served the propaganda machine by lending a glorious and aesthetic sheen to the soldiers’ sacrifice for the nation. The only tangible trace that remains of the soldiers in these shrines is their names inscribed in registers. In short, and contrary to what is sometimes written, there are no bodily remains. There nonetheless appear to have been exceptions, which is logical at a time when Shinto was trying to popularize its own funerary rites in competition with Buddhism.19 Be that as it may, shrines are essentially a place for recording the names of the deceased. Following a practice found in both ancient Greece and Judaism,20 it is names that are the true vehicles for worship. Yasukuni currently holds more than two thousand registers containing the names of the victims, their dates and places of birth and death, the branch in which they served, their rank and class, and even the medals they were awarded. Celebrating the name of the deceased and conserving information relating to their existence in a sacred space implies that each individual is clearly distinguished and valued as a “precious and irreplaceable life,” to quote an expression typical in Yasukuni literature. This practice, which developed in the nineteenth century at a time when a civil registration system was being established, has an eminently modern aspect that, in the national context, sets each individual apart as unique. Nevertheless, we must not forget that in a family context Buddhism generally remains the religion of choice for honoring one’s dead.21 Shinto never succeeded in supplanting Buddhism as the religion of mourning.

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MONUMENTS TO THE DEAD

Memorial steles can often be found in Japanese parks. Black, age worn, and at times buried under vegetation, they give the impression of being centuries old, when in fact many are monuments commemorating the fallen soldiers of various modern wars. They generally take the form of a simple upright stone, in the center of which a vertical inscription composed of three or four characters reproduces a calligraphy offered by a well-known personality, such as a general or politician. A list of victims from the area can often be found engraved on the base or rear, particularly in the case of monuments to the Sino-Japanese and Russo-Japanese conflicts but much less so for monuments dedicated to the fighting of 1937–1945. Japan did not wait until the end of World War II to construct its monuments to the dead. Small steles began to appear in the vicinity of military shrines and graveyards as early as 1937, as well as in towns and villages that lacked such infrastructure. In such cases the stele became the place of worship, and in fact these steles were often referred to as “village Yasukuni” or “local Yasukuni,” indicating that people associated them with the religious world of Shinto. This also proves that these steles were identified and known to the community rather than obscure, hard-to-find monuments as is the case today. In fact, local elementary or secondary school grounds were a popular place to install such memorials, close to the small pavilion that housed the national flag, the emperor’s portrait, and a copy of the Imperial Rescript on Education. Japanese legislation stipulated that, outside of military grounds, planning permission for steles was to be issued by local police stations.22 Applications began to flood in in the autumn of 1937, leading the Home Ministry to request in February the following year that “separate constructions be avoided as far as possible” and that “one single monument be constructed for all the war dead within the same town.”23 This measure reflected the government’s desire to standardize commemorative rites at the administrative and national levels, thereby putting an end to private and family initiatives, although in the countryside this remained the preference. The majority of steles were constructed at the behest of local veterans’ associations, for which this was one of their main activities.24 In most cases the authorities or one of the local Shinto shrines provided the land; however, responsibility for raising the necessary funds lay essentially with

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the population. In the village of Tama, which at the beginning of the twentieth century was not yet the huge suburban city we know today, a stele was erected in 1923 to commemorate the fourteen villagers killed in the line of duty since 1894.25 This stone monument, measuring approximately 3.5 meters high, was erected at the far end of the local elementary school’s courtyard. It was financed through a fund-raising drive carried out among the eleven local Buddhist temples and village families.26 Most families donated a small sum, as did all the temples, clearly illustrating the religious syncretism that prevailed on this issue at the time. The practice of creating monuments to the dead developed in Japan in the late nineteenth century, particularly after the first Sino-Japanese War. This period saw the birth of the generic term “stele for loyal souls” (chūkonhi), which was frequently employed during the war. It promoted the idea of loyalty to the emperor as well as to the nation he embodied and that was taking shape at that time. In the early twentieth century steles had a variety of appearances. Many took the form of rough stones or small square towers, and some featured bas-relief decoration or were surmounted by a bronze statue. However, their style became increasingly sober beginning in 1937 under the influence of modernism in architecture. This is notably evident in the appearance of numerous obelisks, whose diamond-shaped tip is said to evoke the mythical sword—one of the three Imperial Regalia of Japan—which legend has it was discovered by Susanoo during his victory over an eight-headed serpent. This shape was perceived to be specifically Shinto and thus national in origin, despite its being far from peculiar to Japanese architecture, since examples exist on every continent. Additionally, there was a marked evolution in epigraphs, with sigillary and cursive styles being replaced by upright and semicursive writing that was more in keeping with the monuments’ new simplicity. Economic and social considerations post-1942 led the government to attempt to curb the construction of new steles, but hundreds were nonetheless built. Logically, none were intended to convey a retrospective or critical stance on the war, and even less so a message of peace, as is the case for many of the monuments built in France, for instance, after World War I. Their main function was to immobilize the families’ grief in an upright, soldierly, and heroic pose. Their style evokes a fascist aesthetic, because they belonged to a mythical time, freeing themselves from the forms of the recent past through their use of straight lines and virile references. Finally, their similarity symbolized the unity of Japanese citizens not only in life but also in death.

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SUPPORTING SOLDIERS AND BEREAVED FAMILIES

Many letters were exchanged between civilians and soldiers during the war, particularly between husband and wife, parent and son, but not exclusively. One of the major roles assigned to the military personnel assistance associations was to organize the production and sending of letters: schoolteachers and pupils, young women in the patriotic societies, military trainers, small-town mayors, and so on were regularly encouraged to write to men they may not have known well, or even personally, but who originated from their community or with whom some link existed. In return, it was not rare for these letters to be mentioned in the personal accounts from the front published during the era for propaganda purposes. As one soldier wrote, “What we like least are the printed greeting cards, which hold little interest. They do not adequately convey the sender’s feelings. The announcement that comfort packages are to be handed out is greeted by great cries from soldiers, and everyone begins to dream in a manly fashion. If one of us receives three packages, in the interest of fairness these are shared out, generally by drawing lots. . . . The discovery of a letter from someone of the opposite sex leads to jumping about in excitement as if we’d hit the jackpot. It is foolish to ask why these letters bring us such joy. But I would very much like women to write to us more.”27 By encouraging the production of anonymous letters and war diaries, the state and the military established a system that used the local community as a means of reforging emotional and erotic ties. Showing solidarity for soldiers alone was not enough. What was needed was a blurring of the lines between public and private and for each individual to feel that they played an active role in an organic whole. In this sense the system epitomized the kokutai ideology, one of the main principles of which was transcending dualistic oppositions through action and empathy. In an abstract way, the epistolary activity of military support groups contributed to the dream of national unity but also served to transmit concrete messages and expectations to soldiers. Letters conserved from the period show that those writing them conformed to a fairly stereotypical model. What stands out immediately is the preponderance of information concerning the home village or town, intended to reinforce the soldiers’ identity and convey to them that beyond the harsh conditions of military life lay the comfort and compassion of home. Indeed, these

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letters were commonly referred to as “comfort letters” (a term reminiscent of the “comfort women” forced to work in military brothels). However, there were also numerous references to the faith placed in soldiers to bring home victory, as well as comments that merely parroted Japanese propaganda on the “holy war,” the “sly Chinese,” or “Anglo-American bestiality.”28 Consequently, these letters served as a communication channel between state and conscripts, thereby placing soldiers under intense psychological pressure. They were particularly instrumental during the kamikaze operations, inciting thousands of young men to sacrifice their lives to the nation. The many letters held at the Chiran Peace Museum for Kamikaze Pilots, located on the site of a former air base in southern Kyushu, highlight the vital link forged between young people who were strangers to one another. A news report from December 1944 even shows pilots wearing a headband that, as the commentator points out, was marked with “a rising sun painted with the patriotic blood of pure young maidens.”29 The aid provided by the military support groups was both material and psychological in nature. It targeted future soldiers and new recruits, who received ideological and material support until the day of their induction into the army; garrisoned soldiers and those on the battlefronts, who received letters and packages; disabled veterans and bereaved families; and, finally, families encountering difficulties due to the lack of men. Additionally, these associations organized funeral ceremonies whose crucial objective was to make death in combat seem positive, heroic, or even enviable. More generally, the period from 1937 to 1945 was a golden age in terms of the welfare benefits accrued to ex-servicemen and the war wounded. The end of the Russo-Japanese War had seen a backlash against the conflict fueled by the victims and their families, who felt they had been abandoned. The government learned its lesson and in 1917 adopted a law on military aid that provided for the payment of war disablement pensions. As the conflict in China intensified, the government was driven to reform this system in 1938. Yet the fundamental objective was not so much to provide better compensation to the “victims” but rather to enable these men to continue to be economically useful.30 In parallel, the patriotic fervor of 1937–1938 caused a flood of local initiatives aimed at soldiers, to such an extent that in 1939 the Ministry of Health listed almost one military personnel assistance association per town or village—in other words, more than ten thousand across Japan.31 Following an initial period

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of confusion, the state realized that it could use this network to its advantage and attempted to standardize practices via ministerial circulars such as the “Educational Plan for Assisting Military Personnel”32 of February 1940. Local organizations were thus instrumental in providing psychological support and spreading propaganda.33 Funerals were another important aspect of the assistance provided. The majority of soldiers who died in the line of duty were simply abandoned on the battlefield. Nevertheless, the absence of physical remains did not prevent families from holding a funeral, a rite that in Japan is intentionally distinct from burial. Notable differences can be seen, however, between the opening of hostilities in China and the moment of defeat. Until 1941, the death of a soldier on the continent often led to a ceremony being organized jointly by the military personnel assistance associations, the town council, veterans, and families. Funerals provided an opportunity to highlight the qualities of the deceased—military qualities such as devotion, courage, and stamina but also more personal traits such as the individual’s character or disposition. This was made possible through the anecdotes that, along with the soldier’s service record and decorations, appeared in registers that could be published en masse.34 A picture of the deceased along with a short accompanying text also appeared in local, or even national, newspapers. Almost every day between August 1937 and early 1939, the Asahi shinbun carried a small insert dedicated to the men killed at the front. The soaring number of deaths as of 1941 led the government to impose restrictions, as it had done for the construction of monuments and for the departure ceremonies held for new conscripts.35 The associations were asked to opt for simple and inexpensive funerals. Newspaper obituary columns became increasingly inconspicuous, other than in exceptional cases, before rising to prominence again in late 1944 with the kamikazetype suicide missions. Consequently, from venerating each individual and holding them up as an example there was a move to glorifying only the sacrifice of a few. This evolution betrays the government’s fear of a massive backlash against the conflict brought about by the growing death toll but also hinted at a narrative phenomenon that holds that heroes cannot be multiplied indefinitely, that too many heroes ultimately kills the hero. This rivalry in acts of bravery, in a context of escalating violence, led to a kind of heroic inflation, the logical consequence of which was the creation of the kamikaze squadrons.

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CEMETERIES AND OSSUARIES

In 1945, as World War II came to a close, there were more than ninety military cemeteries in Japan: eighty-six for the army and seven for the navy, with local military divisions or the general staffs directly responsible for their upkeep.36 Eight additional graveyards were located in Korea and five in Taiwan.37 These establishments maintained registers containing information on the deceased, mirroring the practice seen at shrines. Although Shinto or Buddhist ceremonies could be held within the grounds, the presence of religion was controlled, and nonregulatory funerary implements (bowls, vases, flowers, and lanterns), all essentially Buddhist in origin, were forbidden.38 It is difficult to talk of secularism, however, since no philosophical stance seems to have existed on the issue. Administrative documents give the impression that the main concern of the authorities was to avoid clerical disputes and simplify the upkeep of cemeteries. Any mention of cemeteries necessarily raises the question of how the dead were dealt with in practical terms by the military. This subject was evoked in the film Mud and Soldiers,39 in which an infantryman is killed in rural China and his body brought back to camp just as his battalion receives orders to set out. Fearing that his friend’s body will be hastily buried, one of the soldiers goes to see his commanding officer and insists that the body be cremated according to military tradition. The following scene shows the soldiers lined up before a funeral pyre, paying tribute to the deceased. If we are to believe this film, cremating bodies was the norm and burial the exception. In fact, the historical reality was quite different, and this scene was primarily a propaganda message. In Japan, burial at the place of death was long preferred over transporting the body or relics.40 In the immediate wake of the Meiji Restoration, soldiers from the shogun’s army killed in the Kyoto area, many of whom hailed from northern Japan, were buried close to where they had fallen.41 The decision to return the dead to their prefecture of origin came later, thanks to the Meiji rationalization of administrative procedures.42 Henceforth, families could request that the bodies be returned to them. Despite this, the majority of soldiers killed on the continent were immediately cremated and their remains buried close by. During the war against the Qing in 1894–1895, which caused the death of some thirteen

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thousand Japanese men, very few bodies were repatriated. Accordingly, when the war against Russia broke out, families were encouraged to collect hair and nail clippings from soldiers before they left,43 to make, in other words, “anthumous relics” following a long-held tradition seen in Buddhist monasteries.44 From a legal perspective, then, the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries were characterized by a desire to dispose of the body of each fallen soldier individually and in a manner that respected local communities. In reality, however, the state proved to be chronically incapable of putting the necessary logistics in place. Whereas in the year 2010 99 percent of the deceased in Japan were cremated, the corresponding figure for 1900 was approximately 25 percent. War was instrumental in bringing about an evolution in funerary practices, with one decree issued in May 1938 marking a particularly decisive step. In stipulating that “the bones or hair of the deceased should be divided up,”45 it effectively officialized cremation, a practice that in the majority of Asian countries does not seek to obtain a fine ash, as in the West, but that, on the contrary, stops while the bones are still clearly visible. Cremation is thus a means of rapidly obtaining relics and not of reducing the body to ashes, as in Christian countries. This fundamental difference explains why I refer to the remains as bones rather than ashes. In concrete terms, the new regulation meant that soldiers were cremated on the battlefield and their remains subsequently divided up, with half being placed in a grave or ossuary located at the place of death and the other half returned to Japan and laid to rest in the military cemetery assigned to the soldier’s regiment. Relatives could ask to receive a portion of the bone fragments that had returned to Japan—in other words, very little. The military’s need to rationalize in the face of a rapidly growing death toll, in addition to a desire to drown the families’ grief in a collective heroization of the victims, saw Japan move from a system that, in spirit, aimed to facilitate the mourning process for relatives but in practice was rather arbitrary, a methodical nationalization of cremated remains. The regulations of 1897 stipulated that the grave of a general should be three and a half times that of a simple soldier.46 Both, however, shared a common design—namely, a base consisting of between one and three stones, from which rose a vertical stele in the form of an obelisk. In contrast to American military graveyards, which feature row upon row of hundreds or even thousands of identical crosses, thereby formalizing the Christian idea that human beings are equal in death, Japanese military

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regulations up until World War II stressed a differentiation of merit, a phenomenon that is also observed in China and South Korea. Furthermore, the regulations adopted in the late 1930s led to the disappearance of individual graves from military cemeteries, other than in cases where special authorization had been given. Instead, the army encouraged the building of ossuaries. These angular structures with a square cross section should not be confused with memorial steles, despite their resemblance. Ossuaries, or “towers to loyal spirits” (chūreitō), are places “where the bones of military victims are stored”47 and thus clearly distinct from commemorative steles. Moreover, this function lent them a Buddhist spirit that was further reinforced by the use of the character tō, meaning “tower” or “funerary tower,” and which also translates the Sanskrit term stūpa.48 These funerary monuments thus promoted the idea of collective sacrifice rather than individual bravery, in accordance with the ideal of the era. They were intended to house part of the remains of all citizens who had given their lives for the homeland and form a network that would supersede that of the military shrines.49 The role of encouraging and supervising the construction of ossuaries was entrusted to the Great Japan Society for Celebrating Loyal Spirits. The vast majority of these memorials, a certain number of which still exist, were modeled on the individual tombstone and feature steps leading to a lower chamber (the ossuary proper) surmounted by a somewhat imposing obelisk. On the front one can read the words “tower to loyal spirits,” while the back carries a small inscription exalting heroes. Although the funerary chamber is not accessible, scientific studies have been conducted on a few of these monuments. A chamber in Osaka, for example, contains several rows of shelves bearing small urns.50 Yet many of these hold no human remains. As the authors of one such study note, “during the Sino-Japanese War the great majority of urns contained bone fragments, but as the Pacific War progressed, so the number of urns without any remains increased.”51 In such cases the urns contain a tablet bearing a number that refers to a register. Consequently, it is clear that with the escalation of violence and opening of two new fronts, in Southeast Asia and then the Pacific, Japan was unable to keep pace with its ambitions. Soldiers were forced to improvise under pressure, and many families received nothing in the form of remains, making the grieving process even more difficult, whether on a collective or individual level.52

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LOST BONES

The Picture of the Week in one issue of Life magazine from 1944 features a highly artistic shot of a young woman pensively writing a letter, her eyes turned toward a human skull. The caption opposite reads, “When he said goodbye two years ago to Natalie Nickerson, 20, a war worker of Phoenix, Ariz., a big, handsome Navy lieutenant promised her a Jap. Last week, Natalie received a human skull, autographed by her lieutenant and 13 friends, and inscribed: ‘This is a good Jap—a dead one picked up on the New Guinea beach.’ Natalie, surprised at the gift, named it Tojo.”53 Despite the fact that such an article could clearly never have made it to publication without military approval, the magazine points out somewhat hypocritically that “the armed forces disapprove strongly of this kind of thing.” Although the U.S. government banned the media from showing dead American servicemen until September 1943, it was common to see the remains or bodies of Japanese soldiers.54 Some of these compositions are particularly macabre. American wartime perceptions of the Japanese were extremely negative, and they were routinely described as animals, monkeys, or dogs.55 The two nations’ differing perceptions of death and the way the dead should be treated are crucial to understanding this deep animosity. The Marines in particular had a rule of doing whatever it took to retrieve the bodies of fallen comrades. This entailed not only the efforts of the troops but also considerable logistical support. Repatriating the victims’ bodies was made possible through the combined actions of the entire American military machine. In contrast, the Japanese had no need to bring back entire corpses. Once cremated, just a few bone fragments could suffice. Consequently, there was no need to provide extensive logistical support in order to repatriate the dead. Corpses were disposed of by each military unit and the remains transported by fellow soldiers, as described in a military song from the era: “I’m off, carrying your bones in my arms / Protect me, comrade!”56 This is one of the reasons why the Japanese preferred to dispatch mobile units requiring little backup, as in the Solomon Islands campaign. The manner in which a country wages war can be explained in part by the way it deals with its dead. The kamikaze operations most eloquently highlight the two nations’ differing perceptions. The horror these suicide missions inspired among Americans stemmed not only from

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FIGURE 4.2  The caption reads, “Arizona war worker writes her Navy boyfriend a thank-you-note for the Jap skull he sent her.” Picture of the Week, Life, 1944.

witnessing the enemy’s total sense of self-sacrifice but also from what was perceived to be a disregard for the body and thus a lack of respect for life. For soldiers raised not only in a Christian culture but also in one that fetishizes corpses to such a degree, the behavior of the Japanese, whom

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they occasionally discovered carrying severed limbs or human bones, could not fail to seem monstrous.57 Despite appearances, retaining some trace of their dead was vitally important to the Japanese. But, as the study of ossuaries and the war accounts from soldiers demonstrate, the Imperial Army largely failed to implement the system it had put in place. Significant regional differences also existed from one theater of the war to another. Let us begin with an example where everything went according to plan, in this case a corporal killed in China in 1938. Immediately following his death his body was placed in a hut along with a few of his treasured possessions. A wake was then held at which former comrades-in-arms shared their memories of the deceased. At his funeral the next day, a soldier from the ranks who also happened to be an ordained monk chanted a Buddhist sutra. The body was cremated immediately after. Two days later, as ritual dictated, his remains were buried.58 Although there is no mention of it in this particular case, it is probable that some bone matter was sent back to Japan when the company returned home, notably the Adam’s apple, considered by Buddhists to be the most important bone (due to its resemblance to a meditating Buddha). In such situations, processions were organized and soldiers would march carrying urns containing their comrades’ remains. Let us now examine a case where it was not possible to comply with the rules—because the funeral pyre risked attracting enemy attention, because dry wood was unavailable, or because there was no time. A war

FIGURE 4.3  A

parade of soldiers carrying funerary urns in Tokyo, 1942.

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photographer traveling with the army during the attack on Singapore (1942) gave the following account: “We were transporting the body of Koie Masaki next to that of Iwasaki Shun’ichi. Our small group of reporters got to work. Since we were unable to cremate the bodies, we dug a hole using a small shovel, working until our hands bled, and then tearfully placed the corpses temporarily inside. . . . When the fighting ceased, we returned to Bukit Timah hill where we had buried our comrades and proceeded to cremate the body of Iwasaki with much emotion.”59 Significantly, however, this example dates from the beginning of the war when Japan’s armies were still victorious. When the tide turned, it was often no longer possible to retrieve the bodies. The chosen solution was then to sever part of the corpse: a hand or a finger in the case of a soldier; an arm or even the head in the case of an officer. Where circumstances allowed, this body part was rapidly cremated on the spot; where this proved impossible, it was placed inside a comrade’s pack and carried away until conditions became more favorable. With a little luck, the bones could be sent back to Japan at a later date.60 Sekiguchi Sakae, a soldier who fought in the disastrous Burma Campaign, believes that when he returned from the Battle of Imphal in the summer of 1944, he carried with him the charred remains of fifteen or sixteen fallen comrades.61 The Japanese possessed considerable infrastructure in Manchuria. The army built ossuaries and the number of casualties was low. Overall, the victims’ bodies were disposed of according to regulations. In contrast, the Japanese presence in China was more uneven, and while human remains were duly cremated where circumstances permitted, units on the ground were routinely forced to improvise. This could mean cremating corpses but retaining just a few bones due to a lack of time or space, burying the bodies in haste, severing a body part, or simply abandoning the remains.62 In Southeast Asia and the Pacific Islands the debacle was such that relatively few bones made it back to Japan. Eyewitness accounts from the Burma Campaign describe a disastrous situation. At best, the bodies were buried after having removed a little finger or a hand. Occasionally a handful of hair or any gold crowns the victim might have had were simply ripped out. Yet the soldiers carrying them might in turn be killed, and in the chaos the precious relics they held would be lost too. More often than not, the dead were simply abandoned. There was thus a considerable discrepancy between what was planned and what was possible in reality. Being hygienic and easy

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to implement, cremation facilitated the strategy of rapid expansion. In other words, the Japanese cult of relics helped bring about a military situation in which, paradoxically, the repatriation of biological remains became extremely unpredictable. If so many corpses and bodily remains were lost, what was in the white wooden boxes presented to families shortly after they were notified of the death? At best, a few fragments of bone matter. And by 1943, the majority were simply empty or contained nothing but nonbiological remains. A survey conducted in the first decade of the twenty-first century among twenty-six war widows listed the following contents: bones: 8 slip of paper: 3 wooden tablet: 7 stone: 1 bamboo pipe: 1 nothing: 6 Two women stated that they had never opened the box.63 This was the case of Komine Misa, who in 1946 placed the box in a grave along with a cap and a teacup returned to her by the army.64 Among the women who declared they had found bones, the only two who had received a full urn were those whose husbands died early on in the war, in 1937 and 1942.65 The others received just a fragment of bone. Military high command was well aware of the difficulties encountered. A report written by the Twenty-Ninth Infantry Regiment in March 1943, after the Guadalcanal Campaign, notes that it was impossible to bring home the bodies, that it was rarely possible to cremate corpses in the jungle, and that “even where bones or hair were retrieved, it was extremely rare for these to make it all the way home,”66 particularly since they were often reduced to dust while in transport. Consequently, this particular regiment decided to bring back fine sand as an offering “to the fathers and mothers [waiting] back home.” Bringing home sand, earth, or a small stone from the place where the soldiers fell was often the solution adopted to compensate for the absence of biological remains. While earth was clearly no substitute for a body in the eyes of the families, for some it may have helped make their loss more tangible and thus facilitated the mourning process.

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On a symbolic scale, earth lies the furthest from the body and as such is a last resort. The army thus preferred to rely on the use of anthumous relics, a practice that was common during the Russo-Japanese War. However, rather than simply asking families to take a lock of hair or some nail clippings before soldiers joined their regiments, in the final months of the war the army proceeded to collect such samples itself. “I left my fingernails and hair for you at the regiment,”67 wrote one soldier to his parents in June 1944 as he prepared to head to the front. Many small envelopes printed with the words “hair, fingernails, photograph” were found. They appear to have been distributed to soldiers in order to be filled, archived, and later delivered to families in the event of death. In other cases, soldiers would send the clippings directly to their parents along with a farewell note: “Father, Mother, Older Brother, Yasuhide, Sumiko, I pray that you will be happy.  .  .  . Since nothing will remain of me, I am sending you some hair,” wrote Inudō Kentarō, who died in a kamikaze attack in April 1945.68 This attempt to create a kind of corpse prior to death was particularly marked in the case of the suicide missions. The young kamikaze pilots were urged to write farewell letters but also to trace a few final characters on paper, a calligraphy exercise in which ink was occasionally replaced by blood.69 A “memorial photograph” was also taken—in other words, one to be used during funeral ceremonies. Finally, hair and fingernail clippings were carefully collected. One survivor even described how on his particular air base, despite the obligatory close-cropped haircuts, pilots were allowed to grow out one lock of hair until the day of departure, something that was a source of great pride.70 It seems that in certain cases the handing over of these relics was ritualized, with pilots being presented with a white wooden box out on the airfield before handing it back as a sign that they accepted death.71 Thus, the pilots’ relics already existed at the moment they took off on their mission. Symbolically speaking, they were already dead, as suggested by one newsreel commentator in language typical of the era: “Those flying the planes are gods, not men.”72 Despite these late adjustments to the system, almost 1.5 million corpses were abandoned, notably between 1943 and 1945, when the military situation deteriorated. This complete breakdown in the system for managing the dead (and the medical service in general) unquestionably stands as a damning indictment of Japan’s military high command, which not only led its men to defeat but also was incapable of satisfying the

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fundamental human need to respect the dead. Its responsibility weighs heavier still when we consider that rather than being limited to a handful of battles, this failure spanned a period of several years and concerned the majority of theaters. This inhumanity was not exclusively the work of a few men but rather an entire system and ideology whose primary characteristics were a form of police paternalism and a constant desire to absorb opposition, uncontrolled military expansionism, intermediary organizations that were constantly forced to merge, and the sanctification of the emperor and resulting unaccountability of the executive and the military. When the image of the empire is hypostatized to the point of appearing to be the only true Being, individuals are reduced to the status of fingernail parings. And, in fact, in most cases this was all that could be brought home of those who had laid down their lives for the nation.

5 FEAR AND DESTRUCTION

THE MENACE FROM ABOVE

he first American attack on Tokyo (the Doolittle Raid) took place on April 18, 1942, spurring the government to issue a flurry of warnings to the population: “Enemy Planes Will Be Here Sooner or Later!”1 ran a headline in one illustrated magazine in December that year. The Japanese viewed the arrival of American troops much as they would a relentlessly approaching tidal wave. Conversely, the German attacks on London in 1940 and Russia in 1941, the Japanese taking of Singapore in 1942, and the Allied bombing of Caen in 1944 were all surprise attacks on relatively unprepared civilian populations. While it is true that a certain number of air raid shelters existed in London in late August 1940, the violence of the Luftwaffe’s attacks meant that more had to be constructed urgently the following month. The Japanese, on the other hand, just like the Germans, had several years to prepare for the mass destruction to come. This “time factor” was critical, as it conferred a special meaning on the resistance effort, the defeat, and the reconstruction—whether physical or psychological—that followed. Both strategists and the general public had long known that the country was vulnerable to aerial attack. The Imperial Capital Under Air Attack is a futuristic novel published by Unno Jūza in 1932: “In a city like Tokyo,” it reads, “enemy bombers would need to drop only five tons of

T

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bombs for the entire city to be reduced to ashes, just as in the Great Kantō Earthquake.”2 The story, set between 1935 and 1944, depicts Japan— the “master of the nations of East Asia”3—being bombed by the United States, as well as the beginnings of the “great naval battle of the Pacific.”4 It describes the fear of war, the wailing sirens, the gas masks, the refugees crammed into subway stations, the “pillars of flames,”5 the ineffectiveness of the rescue services, the bodies littering the streets of Shinjuku, and, finally, the creation of “volunteer units.”6 It also mentions the threat from Soviet Russia, although the outcome of the war is left in doubt. With the exception of the atomic bombs, all the main ingredients of the Pacific War are present, albeit in random order. The following year, in 1933, an aeronautics specialist offered a comprehensive analysis of the situation in the popular news magazine Kaizō. The author stressed that Japan’s vulnerability lay in the concentration of its population in four major conurbations (Tokyo–Yokohama, Nagoya, Kobe–Osaka–Kyoto, and the industrial basin of northern Kyushu) and its built environment constructed primarily of highly flammable wood. “The situation is such,” he wrote, “that bright red blood will gush forth wherever we are hit. It is only natural, therefore, that we should have a heightened sensitivity to air attack; to imagine the devastation we need only think back to the Great Kantō Earthquake.”7 Conscious of the threat from China and Soviet Russia, he advocated establishing closer ties with the Americans in order to strengthen Japan’s national defenses.8 However, it was not only in fiction or scholarly discourse that the prospect of being firebombed was evoked. During this period the army began to organize mass air raid drills in cooperation with the Home Ministry and veterans’ associations. These could last two or three days and culminated at night in a total blackout. Such exercises began in the Kitakyūshū area in 1931, in the Kantō region in 1933, and in Osaka in 1934. A large section of the urban population was mobilized for the occasion and organized into firefighting units, a pioneering measure that set the stage for the rampant social control of the war years.9 Arguably, at this time no population was more conscious of the risk of aerial attack than the Japanese. In the main cities of the home islands the fear of being bombed was real and deep-rooted. For their part, Japan’s potential enemies were also well aware that the country’s geography left it vulnerable to attack.10 “Much has been said,” wrote one expert in the well-known American journal Foreign Affairs, “about the vulnerability of

FIGURE 5.1  “Air

ture, 1932.

Defense: Air-Raid Drills, July 17, 1932.” Poster from Hyōgo Prefec-

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Japanese cities, built of wood and paper. Significantly enough, this danger of incendiarism via the air, afterwards dwelt upon so elaborately by the whole ‘horror school’ of writers on modern war, was first pointed out by Japanese who were interested in increased military budgets.”11 Everyone was thus aware of the issue, but American specialists believed that Japan deliberately exaggerated the problem in order to justify a rise in weapons expenditure. And, in fact, subsequent events in part vindicated this view. The Japanese did develop a powerful air force and soon forgot their own fears when they initiated a campaign of sustained bombing of Chinese cities, notably Guangzhou in 1937–1938 and even more so Chongqing between 1939 and 1943, two devastating episodes that were widely reported in the international press and that helped banalize the very strategy Japan feared would be used against it. It is worth remembering that airplanes were also one of the means by which the Japanese army dispersed chemical and biological weapons. As we can see, then, not only was the destruction inflicted by the bombings of 1944–1945 widely anticipated in Japan, this anticipation in turn played a significant role in the country’s militarization and policy of aggressive diplomacy. Indeed, in 1933 part of the elite already believed in the absolute necessity of Japan’s taking preemptive action since the country was incapable of resisting aerial attack: “The first principle of an air defense battle,” wrote a journalist in a now famous article, “is to ward off an attack before it occurs.”12 In order to limit the possibility of an aerial bombardment it was deemed necessary that Japan establish a vast security perimeter that inevitably included China. Among the causes of the war, we must not forget the role played by doom mongering, fueled partly by memories of the 1923 Great Kantō Earthquake and the manipulation of people’s fear by the media and authorities for commercial and political gain. The first Air Defense Law was passed in 1937, three months before the offensive against China was launched. It was subsequently revised and expanded on the eve of Pearl Harbor in November 1941, then again in October 1943.13 Major information campaigns on the subject were conducted throughout this period in the press or via posters, as well as through the use of objects like crockery and toys. Flame-resistant clothing such as quilted cotton hoods for women and children, gas masks, air raid shelters, washtubs, and fire hoses were all omnipresent in the media and left an indelible mark on the collective imagination of the period. Beginning in 1943 it was decided that civilians should attend regular three-day

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training sessions. Yet despite the country’s early awareness of the danger, its constantly updated regulatory provisions, and the considerable efforts made by the population, when the time came, Japan’s air defense and firefighting systems proved to be wholly insufficient. As a recent study curtly points out, “Fifteen years of anti–air raid exercises, carried out from 1931, served virtually no purpose at all.”14 On the contrary, they were harmful, since the emphasis was on extinguishing the fires at all cost, whereas many lives could have been saved if people had been encouraged to flee.15 This fact did not escape everyone at the time, as one journalist recorded in his private journal: “The air raid training is completely formalistic. We feel the necessity for this, but when we look at it realistically it becomes ridiculous. Because everybody has the feeling that ‘it can’t be helped,’ they say, ‘In the real situation it would not be useful at all.’ ”16 In all probability the ferocity of the American attacks was such that nothing could have saved Japan’s cities, yet it is also clear that the authorities were more concerned with psychologically controlling the population than with protecting civilians. The regular drills, “proactive” firefighting measures, and promotion of self-sacrifice all enabled the army and government to maintain the idea of a perfectly determined nation that was united in battle. As Miyamoto Yuriko reported in 1947, “These were air raid drills in name only; they were merely a disguised attempt at strengthening the spirit of unity.”17 In the hands of the military and the government this fear of being bombed became a weapon. The same logic applied to Japan’s plans to evacuate its urban centers. The objective as seen in newspapers was to make the main cities “unburnable” using concrete as the core material (note that this policy was continued after 1945).18 These evacuation plans saw children and the elderly sent to the safety of the countryside in late 1943, so that the working population did not have to look after them in the event of an attack and could instead devote themselves to their tasks.19 The aim of the evacuations was not to protect individuals; it was to continue the war in the most efficient manner possible. The evolution of the conflict in Europe provided an indication of the Allies’ striking power. From June 6, 1944, the press began to follow the advance of “enemy forces” against Germany on a daily basis. Despite journalists’ striving to maintain as positive a tone as possible, the fall of the Third Reich was visible between the lines, as in this headline from June 27: “Heavy Losses Among Enemy Forces. Cherbourg Falls Despite

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Bitter Fight from Germans.”20 Similarly, the German “retreat” from Paris and the Allied bombings across the Rhine sounded a warning to the Japanese population. A newsreel from October 1944 reported the bombing of Berlin by waves of “between a thousand and two thousand aircraft.”21 Brandishing the example of German resistance served to prepare the entire Japanese population to fight to the bitter end. Yet nothing caused more anguish to the population than the evidence of the Imperial Army’s inexorable retreat from China and the Pacific. The Battle of Saipan in particular, fought concurrently with the Normandy Campaign, brought home the imminent nature of the danger at hand: “Enemy Attacks Intensify,”22 warned the Asahi. Consequently, the arrival of the B-29s was preceded by a flurry of articles designed to appeal urgently for efforts from the population but that also stoked up intense feelings of anxiety. And this was only exacerbated by the fact that the Japanese media had not waited until 1945 to denounce the “blind” and “indiscriminate” bombings carried out by American airplanes. Indeed, such expressions appeared as early as 1942.23 There is no doubt that it was partly this fear of being bombed that enabled the Japanese state to successfully mobilize the entire nation and adopt a strategy of fierce resistance. A strategy that in turn drove the Allies to launch their campaign of mass air raids. Bombings and fierce resistance are like two opposing yet interdependent characters in a historical tragedy in which the arrival of waves of B-29s over the island of Honshu in 1944 was the final act. Just as the oracle’s predictions played a decisive role in the misfortunes of Oedipus, so the knowledge of their vulnerability plunged the Japanese into a negative spiral that culminated in the very destruction they so feared. This phenomenon becomes particularly important if we adopt the subjective viewpoint of those who experienced the events: the first widescale destructions confirmed that the country was indeed vulnerable, that the diagnosis made in the 1930s was correct, and that the strategy of territorial expansion had been justified, despite its not having been enough to protect the country. There was thus an inexorable logic to the way events unfolded—namely, that the country had done everything to avoid its destiny but could not escape ruin, in keeping with the tragic hero narrative so often exalted in the national culture. In other words, everything was in place to allow the idea that Japan had been a victim of the war to take shape in the collective imagination.

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THE KAMIKAZE MISSIONS

The term kamikaze conventionally refers to all the military units created between the summer of 1944 and August 1945 to carry out suicide missions. Originally, however, it was merely the name given to one of the first units of this kind, specifically a naval aviation squadron that made its first sortie on October 21, 1944. Each unit was given a special, symbolically charged name such as Mitate (noble shield), Kikusui (floating chrysanthemum), or Yasukuni (peaceful land). This practice was initiated by the navy and replicated by the army a few weeks later. Although the majority of these “special attack forces” (tokkōtai), as they were known in military circles, used light aircraft, others employed midget submarines, speedboats, or simply a diving suit. While the diving missions were largely ineffectual, the air attacks on Allied warships, mainly off the coast of the Philippines and Okinawa, achieved a certain amount of success. Some 50 or so American and British ships were sunk or put out of action, while approximately 4,900 sailors were killed and 4,800 wounded. Over on the Japanese side, the number of lives lost in training or in combat was 2,531 for the navy and 1,417 for the army (in addition to approximately 10,000 men who died in operations using means other than aircraft). When compared with the overall ratio of Japanese to American losses during the Pacific War (not counting civilians), which was around 14:1, we can see that the kamikaze missions were not entirely unsuccessful. Nonetheless, while it is important to recognize that there was a certain tactical rationality to these missions, we cannot possibly understand the logic that prevailed at the moment of their creation without perceiving that their role was above all one of propaganda. Their exploits were widely covered in the media, and the amount of information provided as to their location, the materials used, and combat techniques employed contrasted sharply with the caution and lack of transparency that had previously been the norm. In the eyes of Tokyo, there were two targets: the Japanese public on the one hand and, on the other, the Americans. The commonly held conviction in Tokyo was that the Americans were psychologically weak. It was thought that demonstrating the nation’s total resolve through spectacular military operations might make the Americans hesitate to see the war through to its end and thus provide an opening to negotiations. And the first major kamikaze offensives were indeed

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a shock to American soldiers. So much so in fact that it was only in the final months of the war, beginning in late May, early June, 1945, that publications such as the New York Times and Life made the suicide missions famous in the United States, at a time when victory was already assured. Aware of the damaging impact these operations could have on morale back home, the American officials in charge of controlling information moved to limit their effect.24 The kamikaze missions also targeted the Japanese people and as such were the subject of intense media coverage, with each departure of a group of pilots heralding a special publicity campaign. Throughout the period from late October 1944 to the end of the war, these operations were not only the most recurrent subject in the media but also the most spectacular due to the bombastic treatment they received. They repeatedly made front-page news in the major national dailies and were abundantly covered on the radio and in newsreels. Japan News featured the subject in fourteen of its final twenty-three newsreels, particularly between November 1944 and January 1945, then again between April and July 1945. Although many cinemas ceased operating in the closing months of the war, most remained open until February 1945.25 The vast majority of citizens were thus informed of the kamikaze operations in pictures and in real time, and every effort was made to portray them as exceptional. On the other hand, any cases of pilots defecting or returning to base—although relatively numerous— were carefully concealed, in particular the violence that was inflicted on such individuals.26 News reports featured recurrent scenes that generally unfolded as follows: libation of sake, patriotic speech delivered to pilots by a senior officer, view of the pilots running off to their planes (or simply climbing aboard), takeoff accompanied by farewells from air base personnel lining the runway, shots following the planes as they disappeared from view. All of this was set to the slow and poignant melody of “If I Go Away to Sea,” a patriotic song that celebrated dying for the emperor and that was regularly played on the radio.27 Newspapers and magazines took a slightly different approach. In terms of iconography the emphasis was on photographs, but the farewell letters left behind by the young pilots also featured prominently. There was a palpable sense of leaving a “trace,” and paper publications thus possessed a funereal dimension that was lacking in film.

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FIGURE 5.2  “Spirit

of the Second Unit of Special Attack Forces.” Photographs of soldiers killed in the suicide missions that preceded the kamikaze operations. Dōmei gurafu, May 7, 1943.

The imperial high command did not invent the suicide missions; it simply drew inspiration from the world of literature, since the acceptance of dying in combat has been one of the principal motifs in Japan’s epic tradition since The Tale of the Heike. It can be found in an aestheticized form in most eras, both in popular works and in more refined literary endeavors. It is also apparent in the fine arts and played an important role in education. After a two-year stay in Nagasaki between 1690 and 1692, Engelbert Kaempfer (1651–1716) commented, for example, that in Japan “the boys at school, who learn to read and write, have scarce any other book, or copy, allowed them, but the remaining letters and histories of their illustrious heroes, and those persons, who made away with themselves, an action, which the Japanese esteem noble and heroic, that by this means courage, resolution, and contempt of life might take place in their minds, from their tenderest years.”28 Epic literature and the Buddhist-inspired ideals it carried—the importance of having a pure

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heart despite the vanity of this world—were not only alive and well in the 1930s and 1940s but also the focus of renewed attention. Together they constituted the cultural backdrop to the kamikaze operations. Nevertheless, the suicide missions did not simply reflect the power of a cultural phenomenon. Ever since the Meiji period, the modern state and the military in particular had found it to their advantage at one point or another to exalt this aspect of literature and the arts and transform it into a national value. This is evident in the Imperial Rescript to Soldiers and Sailors, as well as in several other texts aimed at military personnel. The glorification of sacrifice was one of the main instruments used to control troops on the front line, while the resulting deaths in turn triggered a surge of emotion that united the nation around its armies. The benefits for military and political leaders were considerable. This was particularly true in late 1944 as Japan, facing the prospect of an Allied invasion, sought to prepare the nation to fight bitterly on home soil and save the imperial institution. A Special Higher Police document dated April 1945 mentions the creation of “special attack forces in farming villages,” indicating that the expression Ichioku tokkō (All of Japan as suicide bombers!)29 was more than just a slogan: the authorities truly planned to extend the use of suicide attacks to certain volunteer civil defense units.30 The one-way missions were the logical extension of the desperate charges seen in the Aleutian Islands, the Philippines, or the South Pacific, in which entire battalions were decimated. Indeed, the army operated a no-surrender policy, and this was reflected in the way it trained its men and censored all information surrounding cases of defection. Nevertheless, the special attack forces differed in the sense that they were planned and were intended to be implemented widely in order to protect the imperial system. In fact, the emperor himself stepped in to encourage the volunteers. In a message read in his name after one of the first suicide missions, he declared in a surprisingly casual tone that “the aircraft that hurled themselves into their targets did extremely well and achieved splendid results. I congratulate them on having given their lives to the nation.”31 As John Hersey wrote in July 1945, “Suicide as a military device in times of desperation is nothing new. . . . But . . . the Japanese have done something no other nation in the world would be capable of doing. They have systematized suicide.”32 The kamikaze operations were above all the expression of a regime in crisis and one that, faced with the threat of imminent defeat, sought by any means to maintain its authority and control, even if that meant leading the nation to ruin.

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SUICIDE AND THE MEANING OF HISTORY

A poster distributed around Hiroshima in late 1944 by the Imperial Rule Assistance Association read, “Metal objects, collection among families. Donate to the collection! The great contribution of the home front! Repay the glorious sacrifice of the kamikaze special attack forces! Let’s boost production through our collections!”33 The drive to recycle metal and other objects of use to the war effort was launched by decree  in September 1941, three months before the attack on Pearl Harbor, and gradually gathered pace before culminating in 1945 with the requisitioning of even aluminum objects (lunch boxes, spoons). Major press campaigns taught women how to replace their traditional irons with ceramic ones, or metal buttons with wooden buttons. The huge bells from Buddhist temples and the bronze gates (kanadorii) from Shinto shrines were melted down by the thousands. This policy was applied with particular vigor in Korea and Taiwan. The emperor and military high command had known since 1943 that the Americans could not be defeated through battle, but they believed it necessary to pursue a strategy of total war if there was to be any chance that the United States would tire of the war and offer Japan an honorable way out. Such was the logic that determined its extremist strategy and drove it to adopt increasingly drastic measures of mobilization, including drafting liberal arts students; reducing the age of conscription to nineteen; introducing the possibility of calling up seventeen-year-olds in 1944, then fifteen-year-olds in 1945; and the possibility of conscripting women aged seventeen to forty that same year. It was in this context that a radical scheme to salvage bronze statues and other monuments was launched in May 1943. The purported aim of this operation was to obtain precious metals for the defense industry. Yet the intention was also—and perhaps even primarily—to glorify the notion of sacrifice among the population. If the heroes of the past were able to give their bodies to the nation, how could a simple individual not do the same? A few months later the committee responsible for examining the issue published a report listing some 9,236 bronze statues across the empire. Of these, 8,344 were classified as “removable without hesitation” and 613 “possibly removable.” Only 279 statues were considered too important to be destroyed, either because they were linked to the imperial family

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or because they had some exceptional religious or artistic significance.34 While it is unclear how many of these monuments were actually melted down, the majority were dismantled, generally in the presence of religious and political authorities, and the event reported in the press. None of the actions carried out by Japan between 1943 and 1945 in the context of total war should be interpreted in a strictly functional or economic sense; there was always some element of spiritual mobilization at work. The monuments selected by the authorities for destruction reflected the ideology of the time. Statues of businessmen, scholars, or artists were destroyed, as were the majority of those representing Meiji politicians, including the most influential, such as Itō Hirobumi (1841–1909), Itagaki Taisuke (1837–1919), and Ōkuma Shigenobu (1838–1922).35 The same fate awaited the heroes of the Russo-Japanese War. That they had been considered “military gods,” like General Nogi Maresuke (1849–1912), was immaterial.36 Finally, the greatest historical figures were also made to contribute to the war effort, beginning with Toyotomi Hideyoshi (ca. 1537–1598) and Tokugawa Ieyasu (1543–1616).37 On the other  hand, monuments representing members of the emperor’s family or figures linked to the imperial cult were preserved (note that there were no sculptures depicting Hirohito). Thus, during this campaign to destroy monuments a great show was made of the nation’s sacrifice for the war effort; however, it also brought about a lasting change in the way the national narrative was represented in the public space, reducing history to being seen through the imperial prism alone. Finally, it is worth pointing out that when the Koreans, Manchurians, and Taiwanese were liberated in 1945, some of the monuments symbolizing Japanese rule had already disappeared, such as the statue of former governor Gotō Shinpei (1857–1929) in Taipei, which was dismantled in 1944.38 Throughout the war a series of evocative expressions was employed to refer to military exploits involving the sacrifice of soldiers. The first was nikudan, commonly rendered in English as “human bomb” or “human bullet,” although a literal translation would be “flesh missile.” This was not a long-established expression; it is said to have been coined by an army officer named Sakurai Tadayoshi (1879–1965) during the Russo-Japanese War. Having sustained serious injuries during the Siege of Port Arthur in August 1904, he fell after committing several heroic acts only to regain consciousness just as his body was being carried away for cremation. Two years later he published a book on his experiences titled Nikudan. It was

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one of the major success stories of the Japanese publishing industry in the first quarter of the twentieth century and was translated into several languages, including English in 1907.39 Consequently, when this expression was revived in 1932 to illustrate, as we saw, the heroism of three soldiers killed during the Battle of Shanghai, it did not strictly have any connotations of suicide. In fact, the inventor of the expression was not only alive and well but also famous. This term came to be widely synonymous in the press with hero and broadly referred to soldiers “prepared to give their lives.” “Japan today has built a fortress of unparalleled strength overseas thanks to its nikudan. No matter what reasons we may give for having achieved peace in the homeland, the Japanese should be grateful to these men,”40 wrote, for example, the popular novelist Nakazato Kaizan in 1938. In the late 1930s the expression taiatari grew in popularity and gradually came to replace nikudan. “A terrible end! The Sea Eagle [fighter pilot] makes a taiatari. He attacks using his plane as a bomb,” read a frontpage article in the Asahi on February 27, 1942. Taiatari was originally a sword-fighting term meaning to “hit with the body.” It refers to the act of dropping one’s guard and launching a surprise charge on one’s opponent in order to strike a more effective blow. It was thus a less-crude expression than “flesh missile” and had the further advantage of being linked in the popular imagination to the samurai and Japan’s national history. The third and final expression is of course kamikaze (or shinpū, to give its Sino-Japanese reading).41 The origins of this word can be found in the Chronicles of Japan (eighth century), where it referred to a “divine wind” that blew over Ise Shrine. However, it was only during the Edo period that this term came to be popularized, notably by historians from the Mito school, to refer to the legendary storms said to have saved Japan from the Mongol fleets attempting to invade the country in the thirteenth century. Kamikaze is thus a poetic and highly romantic term of mythological origin and was heavily used in the 1930s to refer metaphorically to the strength of Japan’s defenses. The press first used the term in reference to the Special Attack Corps in October 1944, in parallel to taiatari and other poetic expressions, since this was the name that had been assigned recently by the navy to the first suicide attack operation. In the space of approximately fifteen years, there was thus a move away from using a newly coined and sensationalist word to employing poetic and historically loaded terms. A change of scale simultaneously occurred in the operations these words referenced: infrequent and unusual in the

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early 1930s, they were organized, planned, and involved thousands of men by 1944–1945. In other words, there was a tendency to spiritualize and mythicize the war that developed in proportion to the escalation of violence. Although this phenomenon is nothing new, it was particularly marked in the case of Japan. As of 1944 the main organs of the state—whether it be the armed forces, the government, the press, or the patriotic associations—were united in their attempt to exhort the nation to show greater spiritual strength, disregard physical and material hardship, and accept death: “Every morning our hearts must prepare for death,” insisted the Confucian philosopher Yasuoka Masahiro a few weeks before the kamikaze squadrons were established and the first bombing raids hit Japan.42 “Even if the enemy should come / Again and again by the hundreds of thousands / The final victory will be ours / Now has come the turn of our brothers [to sacrifice their lives] / We long for the day when it will be ours!”43 wrote Takamura Kōtarō in a poem published in April 1945. These appeals were not intended merely to sway the masses; they also served as a kind of incantation. Repeating slogans on the theme of self-sacrifice, purity, and national unity was like an invocation to the gods. This echoes the numerous celebrations, purification rites, and ceremonies of religious offerings that were widely reported in the media. The importance of this function was reinforced by the awareness that, even if the gods did not respond as desired, the historical impact of such acts would be decisive: future generations could not help but be moved by the efforts made and would thus be driven to perpetuate their memory. The kamikaze missions epitomized this rationale. Although clearly acts of war and propaganda, they were also part of a vast historical and magical ritual, and this merely intensified as defeat became imminent. Indeed, at this point in the war an entire ritual was adopted (writing of farewell letters and messages, last meal while dressed in white mourning clothes, libations, collecting of hair and nail clippings, speech by senior officers, presentation of a bandana or hachimaki, accompanying and saluting of pilots by military personnel and civilians, films and photographs, articles in the press, enshrining of the souls in Yasukuni) where previously on the air bases there had been none, or only on a much smaller scale. There was a sacrificial element to the kamikaze missions, the significance of which must be fully measured. However, they were above all designed to influence the writing of history, to force future generations to draw parallels

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between the present and the great literary tragedies, thereby casting a positive light on defeat. As Maurice Pinguet has written, “They no longer believed they could win the war by cowing the enemy, nor destroy an invasion fleet, nor even put off the landings on Japanese soil. But sacrifice had to remain part of the general agony, like a flame for all eyes to see, for the glory of Greater Japan on point of death.”44 The remarkable educational level of kamikaze pilots, many of whom were recruited from the ranks of university students, tends to confirm the hypothesis that historical consciousness played an important role in the one-way missions. “These young men were exceptionally well educated, and reading and writing were their major daily activities,”45 wrote one scholar. A certain number of them had read Karl Marx, Nietzsche, or Romain Rolland,46 and just like the majority of senior military officials, they were both cultured and cosmopolitan. Nevertheless, this awareness of the judgment of future generations went hand in hand with an awareness of the necessity of their own deaths, for some due to the patriotic fever and machinery of war, for others because their ideals demanded it. A page had to be turned, and with it their lives. “Father, Mother, I have no regrets. I rejoice in being able to die a glorious death for the nation,” wrote one pilot, before adding, “Having had the supreme honor as a soldier of having served in the Special Attack Corps, from now on I shall live in the eternal law [of the homeland].”47 Dying physically to keep the national consciousness alive. The importance attached to a mythical version of history paradoxically brought about a lyrical exaltation of death in the present. Such a sensibility is not unique to Japan of course, but it expressed itself with particular force there, especially given the emphasis placed on the aesthetic dimension: “I know it comes from sentimentalism, but if one must die, one wishes to die beautifully,”48 wrote a future pilot in 1940. For the vast majority of pilots there was a moral beauty to the suicide missions. Yet they were also designed to have a formal beauty. Pilots were encouraged to write poems with a paintbrush onto flags or pieces of paper. The various ceremonies that preceded departure—a blend of military and religious traditions—were organized with great attention to form. Furthermore, films and photographs from the era regularly feature cherry blossoms or chrysanthemums,49 in addition to children, young women, dolls, or even animals, creating a scene designed to elicit an emotional response from viewers. Finally, the airplanes and aviators of the

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day presented a powerful spectacle. The kamikaze attacks deployed an aesthetic of death and the triumph of will. These were not merely war missions. They were also a spectacle, a theatricalization of defeat, and this was only emphasized by the contemporaneous dissemination of stories, shows, or paintings on the theme.50 They were a catastrophe in the sense of a Greek tragedy. Yet their scale and underlying desire to influence the future writing of history gave them a dimension that elevated them beyond the level of mere tragic event. Virtually no large structures were built in Japan during the war, and one of the rare projects of this type (a memorial for soldiers to be built at the foot of Mount Fuji) never saw the light of day.51 Conversely, the kamikaze operations can collectively be considered the greatest monument created by the Japanese during this period. Like a great work of architecture, they not only perpetuated and glorified a tradition but also served to rally the nation, had an incantatory and sacrificial dimension, a historiographical role, and an extraordinary aesthetic power. The fact that the Japanese word has passed into dozens of languages without being translated is no surprise: inscribing their role in the pages of world history was all part of the plan.

THE BOMBED CITIES

The so-called strategic bombing campaign conducted by the Americans against Japan was launched in November 1944 from bases in China and the Mariana Islands. It was preceded by a wave of attacks on Japanese-held territories in the Kuril Islands, Taiwan, China, and Manchuria, as well as a few raids on Kyushu. Initially the attacks focused on military targets— for example, the aircraft assembly plants in Nagoya or the outskirts of Tokyo. This strategy changed in late February, early March, 1945, just a few days after the bombing of Dresden. Henceforth, the American air force repeatedly carried out indiscriminate raids on Japan’s inner cities, using incendiary devices in an attempt to disrupt the running of the country and demoralize the population. Although there are differences between the German and Japanese cases, the simultaneous use of similar strategies reveals the United States’ desire to bring the conflict to a swift close without changing its fundamental objective—namely, the unconditional surrender of both empires.

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The first American air raid on Tokyo to involve a large quantity of incendiary bombs took place on the night of February 24–25, 1945. Despite extensive damage being inflicted (3 square kilometers completely flattened), this was merely a test in preparation for a much larger attack that was launched two weeks later, on the night of March 9–10, and in which 335 B-29s dropped close to 1,700 tons of bombs.52 The city’s fire defenses and emergency services were completely overwhelmed. The bombs and ensuing blaze reduced the entire northern and eastern sections of the city—an area measuring some 41 square kilometers—to rubble and caused approximately 90,000 deaths. As one scholar wrote, “Surely the Tokyo fire raid is one of the deadliest air raids of all time, surpassing Hamburg, Dresden, and Nagasaki, and on the scale of Hiroshima, and is certainly one of the most destructive.”53 Note incidentally that the destruction seen in the Japanese capital did not spread from one particular area but was instead diffuse and tentacular, affecting the working-class neighborhoods more than the city’s affluent areas and central power base. The disaster immediately reawakened memories of the 1923 earthquake as well as the many descriptions made in prediction of the devastation. Unno Jūza, who during the 1930s had helped relay the prevailing doom mongering of the day, wrote in his diary on March 13, 1945, that “during the great air raid before daybreak on March 10, many people in Tokyo were burned to death or drowned; there seems to have been a repetition of the scenes witnessed during the earthquake.”54 The circle was complete: what had been predicted had come to pass. Several other attacks were carried out on the capital in the months that followed, notably on April 15 and May 26, each reawakening the ghosts of the past. The bombings thus joined a history of natural disasters that provided a set of images and a framework for interpreting the events. A parallel was drawn between the war and the Great Kantō Earthquake, blurring the boundaries between natural and man-made disasters. This suited the authorities very well, since this tendency to blend natural history with human history cleared them of their own responsibilities. The destruction of Tokyo stood as a clear warning to the rest of Japan’s cities, heralding the attacks that would spread to the rest of the country. However, while the scale and violence of the Tokyo raids may have taken inhabitants of the capital by surprise, those in Nagoya and Osaka were better prepared and the number of deaths was thus reduced. Nagoya was bombed on March 12 and 19, as well as on several occasions during the

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spring, causing the destruction of 90 percent of its built environment. The major Kansai cities (Osaka, Kobe, Sakai) were bombed extensively between March 13 and late June, with the exception of Kyoto, which was subjected only to precision attacks. The majority of industrial cities in the regions of Chūgoku, Kyushu, and Shikoku suffered the same fate. The coastal cities along the Sea of Japan were less affected, but rare were those that emerged unscathed. Up in the north of the country, 90 percent of Aomori was razed to the ground on July 28, during the final weeks of the war. Nor were the cities of Hokkaido able to escape ruin: on July 14 and 15 the American navy launched an extensive air and sea operation that devastated minor cities such as Muroran and Kushiro. American estimates put the total destruction at an average of 50 percent of Japan’s sixty-five main urban areas. Almost two hundred cities suffered attacks. The only major cities to escape the mass firebombing campaign were Kokura (modernday Kitakyūshū), Hiroshima, Kyoto, Niigata, and Nagasaki, all of which were retained as possible targets for the atomic bomb. In addition to these figures, terrible devastation was wrought on several of Japan’s smaller islands, notably Okinawa, whose prefectural capital, Naha, was reduced entirely to rubble and the southern half of the island bombed extensively as American and Japanese troops clashed between March and June. As an American report noted in 1945, leaving no region intact was part of a strategy to dismantle Japan’s capacity for armed defense and emphasize to its population that there was no way out.55 Not all regions suffered the same damage, and urban areas were hit infinitely harder than the countryside. The Japanese community in Korea, numbering some eight hundred fifty thousand individuals, must also be set apart as the only major Japanese population center for which the threat of aerial attack remained relatively remote. It is clear, then, that experiences of the bombings among the Japanese were disparate. Nevertheless, the vast majority were affected in some way or another, either directly or through the media and the firefighting drills. Radio was instrumental in making the bombings a collective experience. Throughout 1944, NHK repeatedly broadcast public service announcements advising citizens on what to do in the event of an attack. Beginning that summer, first in Kyushu then in the other regions of Japan, it also began to relay air raid warnings. Reading literature and testimonies from the era, and knowing how the media works, it is easy to imagine an entire nation trembling as the sirens began to wail, waiting in silent anguish to hear the distant drone of

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approaching bombers. Whether directly or indirectly, millions of people came to be familiar with the sound of bombs whistling in the night, the explosions, the screams, the crackle of fire, the smell of the city burning, the helpless rage. A phenomenology of this experience is necessary if we are to understand the motifs associated with it but also recognize that there was an individual and collective dimension to the bombings. For millions of people the air raids were an individual trauma, yet each victim was also aware that the majority of their compatriots were suffering a similar fate. This explains why the bombings did not succeed in dividing Japanese society, in contrast to what was seen in France during the exodus of 1940. This point is crucial regarding the construction and transmission of the memory of these events.

BLINDNESS

The Great Tokyo Air Raid of March 9–10, 1945, made the front page in all Japan’s newspapers. The Asahi headline on the morning of March 11 read, “Indiscriminate Bombing in Dawn Raid on the Capital by Some 130 B-29s.” However, neither the editorial nor the two articles devoted to the attack specified the number of fatalities or the name of the neighborhoods destroyed.56 There were no illustrations or photographs accompanying the information. Emphasis was placed instead on the “immorality” of the Americans and the losses inflicted on them by Japan’s antiaircraft defenses. Despite having spent the past ten years brandishing the threat of aerial attack, predicting tens of thousands dead and depicting the damage that would be caused by incendiary bombs or chemical weapons, when the American bombing campaign actually came to pass, the Japanese media suddenly reduced all factual information to a bare minimum and redoubled its encouragements to fight to victory. One week later, on March 19, all the major newspapers covered the emperor’s tour of the devastated areas. For the first time in the war he appeared to be directly involved. In the background of the photograph published on the Asahi’s front page we can just make out the destruction caused by the fires.57 The text itself, however, was careful to point out that “the majority of victims took refuge in the shelters provided,” suggesting that few lives had been lost. A few days later, Japan News also broadcast

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two reports on the subject.58 Just as in the press, the focus was firmly on the B-29s shot down and the “hundredfold courage” of the Japanese in their determination to fight on. The ruined streets were shown from eye level only, and there was a complete absence of aerial shots that might suggest the full extent of the damage. This restriction on images was the result of legal provisions and censorship, with numerous laws controlling the use of photography.59 In its revised version of 1940, the Law on Fortified Areas provided for a fifteen-kilometer security perimeter within which it was forbidden to take photographs without express permission.60 The Law on the Protection of Military Secrets allowed the army to ban photography in certain zones, notably ports, and also authorized the arrest of anyone suspected of making enquiries in such areas. Books were published on the subject, and the public was regularly reminded of the regulations in magazines. “In the area of Sasebo the publication of population figures is ‘secret’ . . . [and] maps of both Japan and Kyushu do not exist anywhere. Available maps are only those of Burma and the Dutch Indies,” noted one observer in his diary.61 People were even discouraged—with the help of illustrations—from

FIGURE 5.3  “His Imperial Majesty the Emperor Tours the War-Damaged Areas.” Report published in Shashin shūhō, March 28, 1945.

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taking photographs on trains or ship decks and urged to show caution when bringing back souvenirs from a trip or a picnic.62 All photographers, whether amateur or professional, were familiar with these rules. In fact, as early as May 1942 the Home Ministry had declared a ban on foreigners’ taking photographs during air raids, and restricted this possibility for Japanese nationals to “cases where there is a clear reason, it poses no threat to counterespionage, and it is recognized as being particularly necessary.”63 The text of the law specified that it was forbidden to disclose the number of casualties and the circumstances in which they had died. The final set of restrictions concerned the possibility of disseminating images. Between 1937 and 1945 the authorities introduced increasingly stringent rules and conditions for obtaining permission to publish. Navy regulations destined for the press stipulated that “photographs depicting cruelty shall not be published.”64 It was thus clear to all newspaper and magazine editorial teams that images showing the country struggling after the American bombings should not be released. Most of the surviving photographs of Japan’s bombed cities are aerial shots taken by the American army to assess the effectiveness of the attacks. Nevertheless, a certain number of ground-level views do exist. With the exception of a few “stolen” shots of poor quality, they were taken by a handful of photographers such as Ishikawa Kōyō (1904–1989), who worked for the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department. Despite his position, he was arrested by military police on two occasions while out at work, illustrating just how keen the army was to control images.65 His photographs show charred corpses and scenes of well-known neighborhoods razed entirely to the ground. Naturally such documents were not made public at the time. And while Ishikawa stresses that he documented the events freely, his vision was almost certainly conditioned by his position as official reporter. In this respect, the fact that he did not take any personal portraits is revealing. Individuals are photographed from a distance; they are not singled out but stand merely as impersonal examples of American cruelty or the determination of Japan to fight on. The reports and documents detailing the extent of the damage were not only concealed from victims and the general public, they were produced with a view to keeping the war effort alive. Consequently, although we know from letters and diaries written at the time that people were able to share their impressions and individual pieces of information, they did not possess a global picture of the events nor have a reasoned understanding

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of the devastation. All they had were fragments: no death tolls, few pictures, and even fewer panoramic shots—nothing but a ground-level perspective. “Each one tries to add to his own experiences with the accounts of others, it is as though one had to splice together scattered and random takes for a film, with bits and pieces coming along here and there,”66 wrote Elias Canetti. The experience of the bombings did not lead to a detailed and comprehensive body of knowledge being established. It was therefore difficult for the public to approach the situation rationally, to put it into perspective or compare it with events that had occurred in other countries or times, thereby nipping any spirit of rebellion in the bud. On the contrary, the destruction illustrated Japan’s misjudgment of the enemy’s strength and its inability to resist attack. Years of preparation and training had been blown away in an instant. Rationality lost the last remaining traces of its legitimacy, and the population was left helpless to resist the mysticism of the militarists’ propaganda. These factors must be taken into account when trying to understand why the Japanese followed their government’s orders to the very end. Not only does propaganda lose none of its potency when a nation suffers an intense emotional shock and everyday life is turned upside down: the fact that it emerges as one of the few elements to have any structure only renders it more powerful. However dubious its content or creators are felt to be, it feeds on the impoverishment of the situation, particularly given its ability to suppress information.

FORECASTING AND COUNTING THE DEAD

In the closing weeks of the war, Takamura Kōtarō published a series of poems imbued with a kind of madness. “Be gone with the past, may it disappear!”67 he wrote for example as Japan’s cities endured day after day of American air raids. Or in another, “If we do not burn all that is wrong in our country, the gods will forsake us.”68 The overriding concern of the government during the bombings was to dissociate physical destruction from the idea of defeat in the minds of Japanese citizens. Hence the government harnessed all its instruments to force “noncombatants” to take refuge in the countryside while urging everyone else to remain in the cities and work, notably on the construction of underground shelters from

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which the war was to be continued.69 The destruction of Japan’s cities was merely a setback on the road to victory. The desire to convey this message saw the emergence of a discourse stressing that Japan was better off this way, that the country would only come out stronger. The past was swept away and no one should regret it. The seeds of this mentality were already present in the months and years preceding the bombings and can be seen in the writings of intellectuals with differing political sensitivities. It is clearly visible in the work of Sakaguchi Ango, for example, for whom the upheaval caused by the war was not something negative but rather brought hope: “If the need arises, plow under the parks and turn them into vegetable plots. If inspired by a genuine need, then those plots are an integral part of our everyday life, and they are sure to be beautiful,”70 he wrote in 1943. This ability to glorify the eradication of the past may explain why the Japanese, despite knowing that their cities were vulnerable, made no attempt to construct air raid shelters while there was still time. From the 1930s onward they had favored an essentially psychological approach to the issue, developing the idea that fire should be fought through will and solidarity rather than technical solutions. An aestheticization of total destruction, blending the Shinto veneration of purity with the Buddhist notion of rebirth, grew during the final months of the war and was skillfully exploited by the authorities. Nevertheless, that this new discourse gained such ground was also due to the government’s having exhausted its rhetoric on victory. By 1945 the state’s writers and ideologists had nothing new to give. Everything had already been said on what the war effort could offer in terms of a “revival” to the nation’s arts, culture, and science. As the writer Kikuchi Kan lamented in unwittingly tragicomic terms in 1944, “Not every novel or film can end with the main character heading off to the front, after all!”71 The hearts and minds of the Japanese were exhausted: “Loneliness spreads imperceptibly / Like rain leaking down / Walls and sliding doors / Like tear stains,”72 wrote the poet Kaneko Mitsuharu in May 1945. This positivity in Japan’s eleventh hour, despite the nascent revulsion and evidence of failure, could only be a reversal, through sheer force of will, of the negative quality of the destruction. The bombing of Japan’s major cities left hundreds of thousands of refugees in a state of utter destitution, with the newly homeless gathering mainly in parks, schools, temples, and shrines. In Tokyo, between May and October 1944, the metropolitan government had developed a set of

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measures aimed at listing survivors and providing care in the event of an attack but also at dealing with corpses. It is therefore important we make a distinction between the media, with their vague, partial, and biased coverage, and the authorities, for whom the bombings were anticipated and planned-for events. The plans developed by Tokyo’s metropolitan government were based on the assumption that there would be a total of ten thousand bodies disposed of at a maximum rate of five hundred cremations per day. Funds were even set aside for the gas needed to cremate the bodies and fuel for the trucks to transport them. The possibility of an even deadlier attack is known to have been considered, however, since reference can be found in certain documents to land available for the temporary burial of one hundred thousand bodies.73 As Theodor Adorno had already remarked in 1944 concerning the fighting in the Pacific, beyond the official rhetoric, the exterminated showed as much cold technical skill as those doing the exterminating.74 The plans drawn up for the capital proved to be woefully inadequate on the night of March 10, 1945. No doubt it had been politically and ideologically unthinkable to plan for greater losses. While in theory a police official was supposed to certify the death, record the victim’s name, and list his personal effects, after which the body was to be placed in a coffin and transported to a crematorium or buried temporarily,75 the scale of the disaster led the metropolitan services and the Ministry of Health to immediately modify procedures. Initially, corpses were gathered together by neighborhood in parks like Sarue and Ueno, where they remained briefly so that families could identify them. As was common in Japan during a disaster, missing person posters flourished on emblematic monuments like the famous statue of Saigō Takamori in Ueno. Only 7,127 bodies were ultimately identified and then buried or cremated individually. The remaining corpses were buried on-site or in hastily designated places, without a coffin, and often in groups of two to three hundred. This task was carried out by police officers and firemen, aided by some one hundred forty prisoners as of March 13.76 Collecting and temporarily disposing of the dead took more than a month in total, except in the area toured by the emperor, where the cleanup operation was completed by March 18. Civilian deaths amounted to eighty-three thousand, to which we must add the several thousand missing persons whose bodies were never recovered, presumably because they had been buried or had sunk to the bottom of Tokyo Bay. Funeral

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operations could not be completed during the first few years following defeat. It was only between 1948 and 1951 that the metropolitan government finally emptied the communal graves and cremated the human remains inside in line with the regulations. The charred bone fragments were then put into urns and transferred to a memorial hall that had been built in 1930 to house the ashes of those who died in the Great Kantō Earthquake. The victims of the two disasters—one natural, the other man-made—thus lie side by side in a final sign of the formal, symbolic, but also causal links between these two events.

HIROSHIMA AND NAGASAKI

The blinding flash, explosion and great rush of air, the raging fires that engulfed the cities: the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki trigger images of instant and total destruction. Nevertheless, as the Fukushima disaster once again demonstrated, nuclear technology implies radioactive substances that have a long-term effect on both organisms and land, causing living creatures to develop various pathologies and genetic mutations. The events of Hiroshima and Nagasaki demand to be considered according to two separate time frames: one immediate, the devastation, the other delayed, the contamination, although in reality this is a complex endeavor since the two are interwoven. The memory of these explosions has been instrumental in forcing the government to recognize the specificity of the atomic bomb survivors, known as hibakusha in Japanese. It was only in April 1957, a few years after the accounts and images of the disaster were widely disseminated at a national level, that the Japanese government first adopted a law providing these individuals with free medical care. Conversely, the suffering of the victims has continued to draw world attention to the two cities for decades, helping to disseminate the memory of the explosions. It is estimated that 250,000 people lived in Nagasaki in early August  1945. This city, which lies in western Kyushu some 1,000 kilometers from Tokyo, was an industrial port town with a rich historical and cultural past, since between approximately 1641 and 1858 it was the only Japanese city open to the world thanks to the presence of Chinese and Dutch traders. Hiroshima was a less important city during the Edo

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period. Lying on the Seto Inland Sea some 680 kilometers from the capital and 280 kilometers from Osaka, it grew significantly beginning in 1889 to become a major port for the transportation of troops and military material. It was thus a city whose development was linked to Japan’s expansionist policy. At the time of the blast it had a population of under 400,000, in addition to tens of thousands of soldiers either garrisoned in the city or passing through, between 5,000 and 50,000 Korean forced laborers,77 and a significant number of people who had arrived that morning from the surrounding area.78 The population present in the two cities on August 6 and 9 was thus chiefly made up of soldiers; men and women aged twelve to sixty-five, who alongside their usual activities regularly undertook a variety of war-related tasks as members of civilian volunteer units; laborers, many of them Korean; and very young children. Overall, the least affected were children aged eight to eleven, who had been evacuated to the countryside en masse. In Hiroshima, eight thousand five hundred children were evacuated as part of this program, in addition to about fifteen thousand others of various ages who had been sent to safety by their families.79 The elderly and those in poor health were also encouraged to leave. Generally speaking, the populations of Hiroshima and Nagasaki expected to be heavily bombed, since both cities had suffered only minor attacks until then. However, they thought such an air raid would be made at night, as had been the case in Tokyo and Osaka. Furthermore, they had no knowledge of atomic bombs. The three days separating the two attacks were not enough for the inhabitants of Nagasaki to hear about the new menace other than via a vague rumor that had no impact on their behavior or reactions. This is clear from the account provided by Nagai Takashi, who reported that even his colleague, a nuclear physicist, was unaware what kind of bomb had produced the explosion in Hiroshima.80 The plutonium bomb used in Hiroshima exploded at 8:15 a.m. at an altitude of six hundred meters above the city center. The uranium-based bomb dropped on Nagasaki detonated over the city’s working-class neighborhoods at 11:02 a.m. The traumas inflicted by these explosions took a variety of forms. There were third-degree flash burns from the rays generated by atomic fission, fire burns, severe shock, injuries sustained from flying debris, drownings—particularly among the wounded—not to mention radiation sickness in its various forms, including the immunosuppressive conditions and internal hemorrhaging that appeared in

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the weeks following the explosions, and a range of cancers, in particular leukemia, whose effects will continue to be felt until the last remaining hibakusha die. The Radiation Effects Research Foundation, a binational Japanese-American organization and successor to the Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission set up by the Americans in 1946, provides the following death toll: “In Hiroshima, an estimated 90,000 to 166,000 deaths occurred within two to four months of the bombing in a total population of 340,000 to 350,000. In Nagasaki, some 60,000 to 80,000 died in a population of 250,000 to 270,000.”81 The imprecise nature of these estimates indirectly provides some idea of the chaos that confronted survivors. Not only was it impossible to identify and list the majority of corpses on-site, but even months later there was still no record of the dead. Close to the hypocenter, the most exposed corpses had been reduced to ashes, while those that had been less exposed or were found further away were cremated as and where they were recovered. Similarly, clinics and hospitals carried out collective cremations or burials in the days immediately following the explosion, during which half the deaths occurred. All trace of tens of thousands of people simply vanished without anyone being able to say with any certainty what had happened to them. The fate of the Korean conscripts undertaking forced labor is particularly uncertain, since this captive population was moved around by the Japanese authorities at will and according to need. Not only were the traumas inflicted on Hiroshima and Nagasaki of an unprecedented violence and their consequences physically tangible for decades, but also the inability to comprehend the situation, the constantly swirling rumors on the effects of radiation, and the prolonged doubt surrounding the fate of tens of thousands of people all set the atomic bombs apart as unique events that blur the boundaries between raw experience and subjective impressions, between history and memory.

THE CONTROL OF IMAGES

Hiroshima–Nagasaki: A Pictorial Record of the Atomic Destruction is an illustrated book that often serves as a reference.82 On the cover is a photograph of an injured young boy holding a ball of rice in his hand and staring dolefully at the camera. Focused as it is on an individual, and in

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particular a child, this image has served to underpin a humanist discourse condemning the cruelty of war. Yet it was taken in a different context altogether. The original photograph, a slightly off-center shot showing the child from the waist up, was taken by Yamahata Yōsuke, an army photographer stationed in Fukuoka and who was dispatched to Nagasaki by his superiors on the day of the explosion.83 Recalling his orders on the day of departure, the reporter wrote in 1952 that he had been “directed to photograph the situation in Nagasaki so as to be as useful as possible for military propaganda.”84 Since it was strictly forbidden at the time to take photographs outside in a port town like Nagasaki, Yamahata waited until he had obtained a permit from the local police station before beginning his work, illustrating his submission to the rules despite the chaos that greeted him upon his arrival, at dawn on August 10. Incidentally, the picture in question is clearly not a candid shot. The child is posing and was asked by the photographer to show the ball of rice he had been given. The original message behind this picture was that help had arrived and that the country was still standing, despite the barbarity of the Americans. It thus perfectly reflected the official line held by public and military authorities—namely, “Return quickly to your place of work; the war cannot be halted, not even for a day,”85 as the governor of Hiroshima himself ordered on August 7. Although by nature photographs are often more malleable than texts and can be cropped to create a new meaning, it is important to keep in mind that virtually all the documents created prior to August 15, 1945, were conceived with a view to continuing the war and following traditional propaganda lines. This explains why the number of images showing dead bodies was so severely limited: only half a dozen for Hiroshima and thirty or so for Nagasaki.86 This phenomenon has nothing to do with a purported “Japanese modesty,” as was repeatedly suggested by Western media after the tsunami of March 2011: for the record, following the earthquake of 1923 images of charred bodies were sold on postcards! The absence of corpses in photographs from 1945 was the consequence primarily of the stringent media controls imposed by the government. The other factor to consider is the mass destruction of archives undertaken by the Japanese authorities. On the day of the country’s surrender, the army gave the order to “gather all portraits of His Majesty, regimental flags, and any documents written by the emperor, and proceed to burn them respectfully via the unit commander.”87 This message was

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followed a few hours later by an instruction to destroy all secret archives and other important military documents. The aim of this exercise was twofold: first, to deprive the American occupation forces of information in the event of a guerrilla-type resistance being formed, as many officers hoped; and, second, to obstruct any potential investigations into war crimes. Dozens of photographs showing the aftermath of the atomic bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki were burned as part of this process.88 Many others, notably those providing evidence of the atrocities committed in China or the system of forced prostitution, no doubt shared the same fate. Imperial Japan mirrored Nazi Germany in its desire to exert an absolute control over images, which in wartime Japan were both omnipresent and greatly feared. The order to begin by destroying portraits of the emperor demonstrates the great importance attached to them. The heroic efforts made to save these portraits from the fires triggered by bombs are yet another sign of their significance. As one eyewitness from Hiroshima reported, A visitor interrupted my meditation. He was an employee in the General Affairs section of the Bureau who had had the grave responsibility of protecting the Emperor’s picture in case of emergency. He was on a streetcar which had just reach Hakushima when the bomb exploded. Making his way through the darkened streets and around fallen houses, he managed to reach the Bureau ahead of the fires. His first act on arriving was to run to the fourth floor where the Emperor’s picture hung and pry open the doors behind which it was kept. With the assistance of Mrs. Awaya, Oishi, and Kagehira, he carried it to the chief’s office and discussed with Mr. Ushio what should be done with it. After much discussion it was decided the safest place would be Hiroshima Castle, where less smoke appeared to be rising than elsewhere. . . . During its flight, the party encountered many dead and wounded, as well as soldiers near the barracks, the number increasing as they neared the dikes. Along the streetcar line circling the western border of the park they found so many dead and wounded they could hardly walk. At one point it became impossible, so great were the masses of people around them. The party shouted: ‘The Emperor’s picture! The Emperor’s picture!’ Those who could, soldiers and citizens, stood and saluted or bowed. Those who could not stand offered a prayer with hands clasped.89

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The goal of wartime Japan—from “total unity” to the “coprosperity sphere”—was an aesthetic one aimed at shaping reality to reflect the imaginary relationship with the emperor, a relationship that was sacred, all embracing, emotional, and incarnate; it was not based on logical and abstract principles. Achieving this goal meant encouraging people to take action, to commit themselves fully to the endeavor, something propaganda chiefs and artists strove to achieve in dynamic and spectacular fashion. At the same time, no doubt because their potency was only too well known, images were seen as highly suspicious. There was a constant desire to control those capable of producing visual information, whether they be professionals or amateurs. This explains why so few films or photographs depict the horrors perpetrated by the Japanese armed forces. It also explains why, ultimately, the physical suffering inflicted by the air raids or atomic bombs was so poorly documented and is so underrepresented in the historiography, particularly since there continues to be a preference for illustrating these disasters using convenient plumes of smoke.

THE BOMB TO THE EMPIRE’S RESCUE

As early as the spring of 1944, Douglas MacArthur and his general staff began to consider how they might monitor news and information in Japan once the Imperial Army had been defeated and the country occupied. The dilemma facing them was as follows: the United States was fighting for freedom and democracy, yet it could not allow openly critical views about itself to be expressed. The Press Code issued by the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers (SCAP) on September 19, 1945, reflected these contradictions. On the one hand, article 1 stipulated that “news must strictly adhere to the truth,” and, on the other, article 3 says that “there shall be no false or destructive criticism of the Allied Powers.”90 While a falsehood is clearly the opposite of the truth, the meaning of “destructive” is far more subjective. This adjective represented the keystone of American censorship in Japan. It was in order to avoid any “destructive” criticism that the Americans banned a certain number of images and testimonies pertaining to the bombings in general and the atomic bombs in particular.91 Documents did nonetheless circulate, as did death tolls and scientific analyses. Although the violence of the nuclear explosions was minimized

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during the occupation, their existence was known, particularly since information on the subject had abounded during the weeks before the Press Code came into force.92 The use of atomic bombs was first announced in Japanese newspapers on August 8, 1945. “A New Type of Enemy Bomb Hits Hiroshima,” ran one Asahi headline, while over at the Yomiuri one could read, “The B-29s Use a New Type of Bomb.” Despite the end of the war being nigh and the country’s transport systems in chaos, the press continued to be heavily censored and the differences between newspapers were far subtler than at the time of Pearl Harbor. The same homogeneity was visible in reports of the explosion in Nagasaki on August 11. Without exception, newspaper commentary emphasized “the inhumanity of the enemy” or their “incomparable cruelty,” as was the case during the firebombing of other cities. If we limit our examination to the days preceding Japan’s capitulation, we can see that these events received no special treatment in the media, either in terms of volume or content. They were covered essentially in the same way as any other bombing, meaning that their impact was downplayed and the violence of the attack used to incite hatred for the enemy, but they were by no means “obliterated.”93 The country’s surrender was announced to the Japanese at midday on August 15, 1945. It is common knowledge that the atomic bombs were one of the key arguments put forward by the emperor to justify his decision. As he stated in the declaration that was broadcast over the radio, “Moreover, the enemy has begun to employ a new and most cruel bomb, the power of which to do damage is indeed incalculable, taking the toll of many innocent lives. Should We continue to fight, it would not only result in an ultimate collapse and disappearance of the Japanese nation, but it would also lead to the total extinction of human civilization.”94 The technological power and violence of the Americans were two fundamental arguments given by the emperor to explain why he was ending the war against the advice of his army minister. Continuing to fuel this theme in the wake of surrender could thus only strengthen the emperor’s position while simultaneously weakening that of the militarists who had opposed the decision. Seen from this angle, the media coverage of Hiroshima and Nagasaki post–August 15 finally becomes coherent. Despite having been treated at the time like any other bombing, these events were indeed given particular prominence in the press between mid-August and late September. Articles were published almost daily on different aspects

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of the disasters: the number of lives lost and the extent of material damage as of August 16; the first eyewitness accounts from survivors—including Ōta Yōko—beginning on August 30;95 nuclear reaction and the effects of radioactivity on humans as of September 8; and so on. Similarly, radio broadcasts and a segment in the Japan News were devoted to the subject, as were two general-public booklets with a print run of two hundred thousand for one and fifty thousand for the other.96 This phenomenon cannot be ascribed to a sudden wave of freedom having swept over the media, nor to a relaxation in the censors, as if censorship was merely external and not something that had been internalized by editorial staff.97 Moreover, no one spontaneously raised the issue of the imperial regime’s own responsibility in the country’s downfall. It was only later, under the American influence, that this point of view emerged. The only views to be expressed in late August 1945, in an effort to absolve the emperor of all blame for the war, were the deep regrets of government officials for having caused him “so much anxiety.”98 Until late August 1945 the press underscored the inhumanity and cruelty of the atomic bomb. But the arrival of the occupation forces saw it rapidly abandon such direct criticisms and focus instead on the scientific and technological superiority of the former enemy. This change is yet another sign that the media was strictly controlled during this period. Particularly since what might today pass for objective reporting was, in the context of the time, first and foremost a means of taking the opposite road to the military, which had constantly exalted spirit and disparaged science. Consequently, whether emphasizing the violence of the new weapon or the enemy’s superiority, news coverage aimed to illustrate that there had been no choice for the emperor but to end the war. The atomic bombs had “alas driven Japan to defeat,” to borrow the words of one commentator of the day.99 Not only were the Japanese swiftly informed of the events in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, this press campaign served the interests of the throne at a time when it was particularly vulnerable. It helped portray the emperor as a pacifist who was devoted to science and cared about his people, all the while weakening the position of the army chiefs. The number of victims quoted in the press in the weeks following the bombings was significantly lower than the actual final death toll. In late August the Asahi quoted police data to report thirty thousand deaths.100 As time went on, these figures were gradually revised. The suffering of the wounded and dangers of radiation were also mentioned on several

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occasions. On the other hand, relatively few images were published. It is largely this absence of sensationalism that creates the impression that the subject was ignored in the media, particularly when compared with 1952, when publications depicting the horror and cruelty of the war flourished. Only a handful of photographs were reprinted in the press, and none of these showed human victims.101 A report from the Japan News in late September 1945 constitutes the main public visual document from the period. Significantly, however, it opens with an explanation that the images were filmed during a visit to Hiroshima by the emperor’s chamberlain, Nagazumi Torahiko (1902–1994), who had been dispatched to the city to survey the extent of the damage in the emperor’s place, as was the custom after natural disasters. This report thus presents itself explicitly as the imperial point of view. Moreover, the procession of officials seen at the beginning of the newsreel is strikingly reminiscent of Hirohito’s visit to Tokyo in March that same year. In the two minutes that follow, the camera pans over the destroyed city before showing various scenes that underline the sheer force of the blast: huge uprooted trees, stone structures in a state of collapse, houses with only one wall still standing. “All that remains are metal-framed constructions twisted like candy,”102 explains the commentator. Beyond the factual information given, the message was once again that the force of the bomb had left the emperor with no choice but to halt the war. As John Dower has observed, the imperial entourage was extremely skilled at “demonizing the military” and “making the emperor a pacifist,”103 and the handling of the press campaign on Hiroshima and Nagasaki is merely further evidence of this.

6 POSTWAR COMPLEXITIES

AUGUST 15, AN AMBIGUOUS DATE

t midday on August 15, 1945, a message recorded by Hirohito was broadcast to the nation announcing the country’s surrender. Throughout the empire people gathered around their radios, having been warned that morning of an important announcement that was to be made. Hara Hiroko was eleven years old at the time. Ordinarily she lived in Keijō (Seoul), but her family had left the city in August 1945 to take refuge in a village in what is now North Korea. Her initial reaction was one of disbelief. She looked on impassively even when her parents broke down in tears: “The adults remained listless from midday on August 15 through to the evening, as if their appetites had disappeared; I seem to remember we had potatoes or sweet potatoes for dinner. I was struck by how utterly dejected the adults were, yet I also felt a huge relief: ‘The air raids are over!’ ” she added, thinking of the homeland. “On the 16th,” she continued, “my mother took a book of English songs out from a stack at the bottom of a cupboard. The collection, which included ‘Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star,’ was called Little Lord Fauntleroy and had previously been a textbook at the school for young girls. Armed with an EnglishJapanese dictionary, she began to teach me English. She had hidden these books because they were banned, for until then English had been the language of the enemy. We even called it the enemy language.”1

A

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Seventy years have since passed, but for Japan, August 15 forever marks the end of World War II, whereas in the United States it is September 2— the day that the Instrument of Surrender was signed—that was chosen to commemorate the end of hostilities. In 1963, August 15 was selected by Japan as the date for holding a “national mourning ceremony for the war dead,” then subsequently designated a “day for mourning the war dead and praying for peace”2 in 1982. Although not strictly speaking a national holiday, it is generally a nonwork day on which each prefecture holds a public celebration that is attended by government representatives. In Tokyo, for example, the emperor and the prime minister regularly take part. The choice of August 15 for such celebrations is far from innocent. It carries a political message that subtly influences the way the Japanese relate to their history and their nation. On August 15, 1946, one year after the war had ended, the Asahi ran the headline “Burial Day for the Old View of the State,” while the Yomiuri reported the government’s plan to make this a day for commemorating peace.3 During the occupation, August 15 was presented in the press as the anniversary of Japan’s entry into a radically new era, a day when talk on both sides of the political divide was of “peace” and “rebuilding.” In 1946, the Korean communities of Osaka and Kawasaki began to organize festive gatherings in remembrance of the “liberation.” On the other hand, the “surrender” itself was commemorated annually on September 2, but this custom began to fade in 1951 before disappearing altogether in 1955. Thus, there has been an almost complete turnaround in practice between August 15, anniversary of peace and regained freedom as it was celebrated during the occupation, and August 15, a day of mourning and remembrance as it has been celebrated since the mid-1950s. The speech given by the emperor on that fateful day was undisputedly of historic import. Even in 1945, it was clear to the Japanese that August 15 represented a turning tide.4 This was due in large part to the novel form of the speech. Never before had the emperor addressed the nation directly. Never was he filmed in the act of speaking; his every movement had always been skillfully staged to illustrate his supervision of events and supraworldly authority. The fleeting appearances, lack of speech, and somewhat slow movements all pointed to his sacred status. When the “Jewel-Voice Broadcast” (gyokuon hōsō) hit the airwaves on August 15, the historic nature of its content was embodied in its form. The means chosen to announce Japan’s capitulation were almost as important as

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the decision itself, which had been settled on August 9–10. Despite the poor audio quality of the broadcast and the impenetrable language used in the rescript, which was intoned in the style of a norito (a sacred Shinto prayer), this declaration suggested to both the Japanese people and American leaders that the decision to cease fighting emanated personally from the emperor, and that in so deciding he was disowning those who habitually spoke on his behalf.5 “The emperor had made the broadcast of his own accord and for the reason that he did not want the nation to suffer any more,”6 wrote a physician in Hiroshima on August 17, 1945. “The military authorities most certainly planned to kill the entire citizenry of Japan, but His Majesty the Emperor intervened to save us,”7 noted the novelist Oda Sakunosuke in November that year. Despite the intrinsic importance of August 15, the Japanese could have chosen to emphasize another date, for example August 14, the date selected in September 1945 by the highly official Japan News8 and which corresponds to the date the government notified the Allies of its acceptance of the Potsdam Declaration. Or they could have chosen September 2, like the United States. Or even April 28 (1952), the date the San Francisco Peace Treaty came into force, the first article of which officially terminated the “state of war” between Japan and the Allied Powers. Yet in the overview of Japan’s national history provided in junior high school textbooks, August 14 receives little attention and September 2 is often omitted altogether. As for the San Francisco Peace Treaty, which marked the end of the American occupation, it is presented as distinct from the global conflict. Conversely, August 15 is systematically portrayed as a landmark date,9 notably through the typography used or the presence of a photograph. Several explanations justify this choice. When the Ikeda administration decided to make August 15 a day of official commemoration in 1963, negotiations were under way with South Korea to sign a treaty that would normalize bilateral relations. Since 1948, however, this date had been a Korean national holiday celebrating the peninsula’s independence from Japan and the end of the Japanese occupation. Choosing the same date was Tokyo’s way of countering the Korean celebration of independence with mourning and remembrance, thereby planting the seeds of the commemorative rivalry that would follow the signing of the treaty in 1965. Moreover, in the majority of Japan’s regions the Festival of the Dead (obon) is celebrated in mid-August. There was thus a religious coherence to honoring those who died for the country at the same time as ancestral spirits.

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Ultimately, however, this date was chosen primarily because it provided an opportunity to highlight the historic role of the emperor. For months Hirohito and his entourage had resisted the American calls for unconditional surrender, hoping to obtain at the very least an assurance that the throne would not be in danger. While we may question the ethics of America’s intransigence in the closing months of the war, particularly when we consider that ultimately the emperor was neither prosecuted nor deposed, the responsibility borne by Japan’s leaders is heavy indeed. Hundreds of thousands of soldiers and civilians perished between the fall of Okinawa in late June and Japan’s surrender, all in the name of preserving the emperor system. Despite the dramatic events taking place, one of Hirohito’s main concerns was to protect the Imperial Regalia:10 a jade pendant, a bronze mirror, and a sword. His aim in ending the conflict was not so much to spare lives but to save three objects symbolizing the mythical origins of the imperial line. Had a land offensive been launched simultaneously by the Americans and the Russians, as in Germany a few months earlier, these would have been in grave danger. Japan’s decision to accept the Potsdam Declaration was based primarily on its perceived chances of maintaining the imperial institution, and the means chosen to announce the decision to the nation followed this same logic. The majority of images published in the press between August 15 and 17—showing citizens bowing toward the palace as an “apology” for their failure to win the war or depicting their emotional acceptance of the imperial decision— were either fake, posed (some of them the day before the emperor’s broadcast), or had been taken in another context entirely, clearly illustrating the state’s calculating and manipulative stance.11 The first weeks of the occupation confirmed that the emperor’s decision had been the right one and that, while the imperial system established in the late nineteenth century was destined to disappear, the institution itself had been saved. In other words, although August 15 is now presented as a “day of mourning,” it unconsciously celebrates Hirohito’s success at retaining the throne. In this respect, it is significant that part of his famous speech is disseminated each year in the media, in particular the passage that reads, “We have resolved to pave the way for a grand peace for all the generations to come by enduring the unendurable and suffering what is insufferable.” These words drive home the image of Hirohito as a father figure and savior while simultaneously obscuring the extent of his role in the military tragedy. Moreover, describing the emperor’s actions as

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a “sacred decision” (seidan), to borrow the Japanese expression, enabled government officials to claim that the country had not been defeated but had simply ceased fighting.12 This strategy can be said to have placed the focus of the entire postwar era, beginning in the 1950s, firmly on the emperor’s benevolence, a phenomenon that has merely been reinforced ever since by the recurrent nature of the commemorations, creating the impression over time that they are natural and sempiternal.13 Of course, Japanese historians have long known that the emphasis on August 15 shapes the war memory in a way that is favorable to the imperial institution and have made efforts to impose a more complex or neutral chronology.14 However, on this subject, as on many others, their views struggle to dominate, suggesting that the meaning that should be given to the defeat remains a political issue even today.

THE REMANENCE OF THE WAR

To junior high school students in France today, the term “war of 1939–1940” has little meaning; at best it passes for a lazy way of saying “1939–1945.” This once natural expression has since fallen from favor. Viewing the dark years of the war in three clearly distinct phases (war of 1939–1940, German occupation, liberation) has been replaced by a more global view of the conflict. In other words, from a history that distinguished the war from the occupation, France has moved on to a history that includes the occupation in the war itself. Broad chronological divisions are liable to evolve, and the occupation of one land by a foreign army is often viewed as a state of war. Leaving aside Okinawa, Japan was occupied by the Allied forces (mostly American, although with up to forty thousand men stationed in southern Japan, Commonwealth forces represented a significant part of the whole occupation apparatus) from September 1945 to July 1952, when the San Francisco Peace Treaty came into force. These years are generally thought of as representing the beginning of the “postwar” period. Indeed, as of late 1945 peace became a recurrent theme in the media. The emperor mentioned it in his speech to the nation on August 15 and later returned to the subject in his edict to the Diet on September 4, in which he spoke of his desire to see Japan become a “peaceful nation.” From this moment on, it

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was abundantly discussed in the press. Similarly, the arrival of the Allied forces was cast in a positive and fortuitous light: “The attitude of soldiers toward citizens is calm and cases of the misconduct we feared somewhat are extremely rare. The American army’s entry into Tokyo has passed peacefully and without incident,”15 reported the Japan News in late September, against the sound of an Austrian waltz. Not only had the fighting and air raids ceased,16 it was clear that the country was moving in a new direction. Nonetheless, peace was not seen as having been realized. It was always envisaged as something that belonged to the future. “The war is over but peace is not here. The peace humanity has been waiting for has yet to come. It has been abandoned to a distant past. But history moves quickly. If peace is to be achieved in the future, it will not resemble that of the past. We, and more widely humanity, must conquer this peace. For now the world has laid down its arms, but they have not been abandoned,”17 wrote, for example, the novelist and critic Toyoshima Yoshio. In other words, the status of the occupation was ambivalent. That 1945 serves as the cutoff point in the conflict is inevitable, but while some of the events that took place under the occupation contrasted with the war, others, on the contrary, were an extension of it. The American stranglehold on Japan lasted almost seven years. Several anecdotes reveal the apprehension and deep distrust felt by the Japanese immediately after the surrender.18 Fear of rape, which is heightened among occupied populations, led the government to create brothels for American soldiers.19 Meanwhile the Allied forces high command, known as SCAP,20 proceeded to take military possession of Japan, dismantle its empire, arrest or purge those who had held positions of responsibility during the war, and, finally, demilitarize the country, even going so far as to confiscate private sword collections in the winter of 1946.21 Despite the absence of any organized attempts by the Japanese to mount a resistance, the two countries were still far from being partners. Between the spring of 1946 and late 1948 the Allies pursued their policy of eradicating all symbols of the imperial regime and instigated legal proceedings against certain leaders. Censorship of the media, literature, and the arts was rampant. By now this was not so much a military occupation as an administrative and legal one. Nevertheless, not only was SCAP still in a position to dictate its directives to the Japanese government, but it also frequently imposed its point of view on businesses and newspapers. Between late 1948 and the end of the occupation in July 1952, the Soviet threat led the

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Japanese and American governments to develop closer ties. Communists and their sympathizers were the subject of coordinated purges, before Japan became the rear base for American troops involved in the Korean War. Consequently, even at the end of the occupation there was no feeling that peace had been definitively realized: “Every one of Japan’s islands is today entangled in war,”22 wrote a concerned Miyamoto Yuriko. In fact, it is only thanks to the harmonious relationship that the United States and Japan gradually established that we can now clearly distinguish the occupation from the Pacific War. Had the Soviets invaded Japan around 1950 and set up a communist government there, as they did in North Korea, the American occupation would today certainly be likened to a period of war. Ever since the occupation ended debate has continued over the meaning that should be attached to this period. Three fundamental critical stances currently exist in Japan. The first questions the logic of cutting off the war at 1945 and instead conflates the so-called militarist period with the years spent under American rule. This Marxist approach holds that history must be constructed by the people and not the elites who oppress them. Thus, the war cannot terminate in 1945, for only a revolution could bring about true freedom and end the fight. The second critical stance asserts Japan’s need to shake off the legacy of a period seen as having perverted the country’s endogenous values and transformed the Japanese into a vanquished nation. Following this line of reasoning, Japan must forget or move past the defeat and occupation if it is to regain its “pride.” This angle of attack has been particularly prominent in nationalist and neoconservative circles since the 1990s. Last, and notably in areas with a heavy American presence, there is a general feeling among the population, one that has little ideological basis, that the occupation never completely ended. This is particularly true in Okinawa, which returned to Japanese administration only in 1972. Indeed, the American military bases at Futenma and Kadena constitute extremely loud and visible extraterritorial zones in the most heavily populated part of the island. The feeling that World War II continues to interfere with the present, that its consequences are still palpable, or even that it never quite ended is the common thread that weaves together the Marxist, nationalist, and popular positions. This naturally influences Japan’s understanding of its history from the early 1930s to 1945, since perceptions of a historical event differ according to whether it is seen as belonging to a completed past or as retaining some contemporary relevance.

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On a domestic level, numerous factors have combined to create an impression that the war extended beyond 1945, or even 1952, depending on the way the conflict is segmented: from a military perspective we can cite the presence of an occupying force, the signing of security treaties allowing the United States to operate bases and training grounds in Japan, as well as the Okinawan issue; on political and legal levels, America’s hand in drafting numerous legislative texts, notably the 1947 constitution; from an economic and customs-based point of view, the dismantling of the zaibatsu, the maintaining of strict foreign exchange controls, and the limiting of international tourism until 1964; from a social and public health perspective, the issue of the war wounded, those suffering the effects of radiation, the repatriates and prisoners of war; in the urban space, the presence of building sites, ruins, and the creation of no-go areas, which were relatively numerous until the early 1960s; and finally, we must not forget the psychological damage caused by the war. In the realm of international relations, peace treaty negotiations have helped perpetuate the impression that the hostilities have yet to end. The signing of various treaties normalizing Japan’s relations with other foreign nations (the Allies in 1951, India in 1952, China in 1952 and 1978, South Korea in 1965) was widely reported in the press. To date, no peace treaty has ever been signed with Russia. This does not prevent relations between the two countries being peaceful, yet the absence of such an agreement leaves the status of the southern Kuril Islands unresolved, an issue that is regularly raised by Japanese politicians and the media. These different historical facts, often described as “problems,” constitute the objective memory of the war, its remanence, or lingering imprint. They are fundamentally linked to the conflict and must be distinguished from both public memory, which is ethical in nature and shares de facto similarities with national historical narratives, and from subjective memory, which is pervaded with collective images and shaped by public discourse.

THE JUDGMENT OF OTHERS

For Japan, in contrast to what was observed in Europe, the end of the war in 1945 also marked the end of the colonial era. It resulted in the liberation of Korea and Taiwan, leading to the mass repatriation of civilian populations to the metropole. Colonial memory and war memory are intricately entwined.

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Between 1938 and 1945, two hundred forty thousand Koreans were enlisted into the Japanese armed forces, as were two hundred thousand Taiwanese. Initially recruited on a voluntary basis, they held primarily low-ranking positions. However, conscription was extended to the colonies in 1943, and young Koreans and Taiwanese began to be sent to the front. Some were even accepted into the kamikaze squadrons. At the same time, millions of men were mobilized as laborers working under extremely harsh conditions, particularly those sent to Manchuria, Sakhalin, and Japan, while tens of thousands of women were recruited or forcibly placed in prostitution centers by the army. On the majority of these issues, progress has been made in terms of Japan’s recognition of the suffering it inflicted on Koreans during its rule. A similar evolution can be seen in relations between Japan and Taiwan. On the other hand, the situation regarding the war in China is slightly different, and there have been few recent developments. It is logical for countries to hold divergent views on their shared history. We should not be surprised that Japan has focused on the atomic bombs, while the People’s Republic of China and South Korea have constructed huge memorials to the victims of the Japanese invasions and campaigns of repression. To expect uniformity in their representations would be to ignore the complexity of historical processes. Yet neither should we content ourselves with a purely relativistic approach. International relations in the contemporary world are conditioned by principles of law and moral codes. A nation that has wronged another must make reparations, both moral and material. In the case of Japan, a sincere acknowledgment of the pain it caused among the peoples of the countries it occupied or invaded can be considered due. Why this reminder? Because it enables a distinction to be made between the place accorded to the war with China or the colonization of Korea within Japan and the way in which these events are evoked. It is the latter that is important and should be considered first and foremost. In the late nineteenth century Gyeongbokgung Palace in Seoul, rebuilt in 1867, was one of the main seats and symbols of the Korean royal family. It was virtually leveled in the 1910s by the Japanese, who proceeded to construct the vast General Government Building that would house the headquarters of the colonial regime. This edifice was inaugurated in 1926,23 during the first year of Hirohito’s reign. Korean leaders took over the building in 1945, and in the decades that followed it served as the seat

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of the Republic of Korea’s national assembly, a sign of the solemnity and power it exuded.24 However, at the beginning of the 1990s, despite the country’s having successfully transitioned to a democracy, a need was paradoxically felt to return to the old order. The colonial building was thus demolished and major works undertaken to restore the original pavilions to their rightful place. The fate of this building illustrates a mixture of fascination for Japan and a desire to eradicate its influence. Two statues were recently erected in the center of Gwanghwamun Plaza, on the wide avenue leading to the palace, and beneath them an exhibition space dedicated to the two historical figures in question was opened in 2010. The first is King Sejong, who is credited with having invented Hangul, the Korean alphabet. This script enabled Korea to free itself from Chinese cultural hegemony and as such is a powerful symbol of the country’s national identity. The second figure is Yi Sun-shin, a Korean military hero who in the late sixteenth century played a decisive role in the naval victories achieved against the Japanese invaders.25 Seventy years after the end of the war and Japanese rule, South Korea continues to celebrate the memory of a figure who symbolizes national independence and the fight against Japan. This is not an isolated example. We can also cite the inauguration in 2009, just a stone’s throw from the palace, of an independence park built around the former prison of Seodaemun, where the Japanese once incarcerated anticolonial activists. Despite Korean music, film, and television series all riding a wave of popularity in Japan, the fact that the peninsula continues to make its rejection of Japanese rule and its denunciation of the crimes committed—notably forced prostitution—a core part of the national identity maintains bilateral relations in a postconflict context. Korea had a marginal role in World War II. Being under foreign rule, it was not a decision-making center and saw no violent combats. Yet neither North nor South Korea sees itself as a former colony having played a peripheral role. This is because the Koreans refute the legality of the annexation that was forced upon them in 1910. Since 1945, Korean leaders have made repeated demands for Japanese authorities to recognize the treaty’s invalidity. Only recently, the centenary of the annexation in 2010 prompted a variety of initiatives (demonstrations, petitions) designed to put pressure on the Japanese government.26 To date, Tokyo has consistently refused to change its stance. The reason for this refusal is that such an acknowledgment would have significant symbolic repercussions. The period that began in 1910 would

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FIGURE 6.1  School

groups visit the Seodaemun Prison History Hall in Seoul, 2011.

no longer be an era of colonial occupation but rather one of military occupation; it would no longer be a period of peace (in a legal sense) and development but one of conflict, almost comparable to the occupation of Manchuria. Seen from this angle, Japan would have been continuously at war not from 1931 to 1945 but rather from 1910, or even 1895, if we go back to the war against the Qing that brought Korea under Japanese control. Japan rejects this image of itself as an imperialistic and belligerent state, despite the fact that this was the prevailing view in the West until 1945. The publication in 2005 of a history textbook written jointly by Japanese, Korean, and Chinese historians attracted much attention. It was the first attempt to establish a common narrative on the modern history of East Asia from the 1850s, when the great Western powers gained a foothold in the region, through to approximately 1960. The chapters examining Japan-Korea relations focus on the following: t
the creation of a police state in the peninsula from 1910 onward t
Japan’s humiliating cultural policy in Korea t
the measures banning the Korean language at school, the radical changes in the civil registry system, and the entire policy of forced assimilation in 1939 t
the extensive exploitation of the peninsula’s natural and financial resources

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t
the plundering of property and the poverty forced upon the Korean people t
the forced labor imposed on Koreans and their conscription into the Imperial Army t
the exploitation of Korean women in military brothels27 A single chapter presents Japanese rule in a positive light. It describes the modernization of the peninsula’s cities and transport systems as well as the development of popular culture, notably film, songs, and satirical art.28 Such is the view arrived at by Korean authors keen to take the Japanese perspective into account. In contrast, ordinary South Korean textbooks paint a considerably darker picture and devote more space to the Korean resistance, while for their part, Japanese textbooks stress the modernization of Korea’s economy and mentalities under their influence and devote less space to depicting the acts of violence committed. There is nothing “natural” about this discrepancy. The positions of each party are directly linked. History is not written in a void but rather in constant interaction with opposing points of view. Indeed, the book analyzed here was written in response to the 2001 publication in Japan of a nationalist textbook that sparked intense debate.29 Japanese perceptions of their history depend on the Korean, Chinese, and American points of view in particular. Each significant evolution in the history of these countries has direct repercussions on Japan and vice versa. An official denunciation by the United States of its use of the atomic bomb would in all likelihood alter Japan’s victimist discourse. Other lines of division do exist. Hirohito, Tōjō, and even MacArthur have been the main protagonists in the Pacific War narrative since 1945. This is essentially a male history in which political and military leaders play a central role. Marxists, feminists, and various social and intellectual movements have long since introduced theories that have brought about new interpretations of the past. And yet as recent school textbooks eloquently illustrate, the great historical figures continue to dominate. Schools of thought do not simply appear in succession but rather confront and shape one another. History exists only within a complex balance of power.

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THE DISMANTLING OF STATE SHINTŌ

apanese recollections concerning soldiers were profoundly influenced by the Allied occupation. In cinematic newsreels American servicemen appeared relaxed, open, and smiling. In January 1946 they could be seen running around during a football match. The following month they were heard whistling at a cabaret show. In June, it was the turn of a military chorus to be filmed singing popular songs.1 Their behavior, as it was presented in the media, not only departed from the image portrayed of them during the war but also formed a stark contrast to the countless depictions of Japanese military rigor, which were still fresh in people’s minds. In the comparison that inevitably followed, the past appeared only more austere and violent, the present, more carefree and lighthearted. Not only is the present pregnant with the past, but choices made in the present cause the meaning of past events to evolve constantly. Yet this cyclical phenomenon is neither regular nor unequivocal. MacArthur was familiar with mass psychology. He believed that a military occupation should last no longer than three years; any more, and the occupied population would feel frustrated regardless of the occupier’s efforts.2 Following a period in which restored calm underlines the hardship of the past, this calm becomes oppressive and the gloom of days gone by gradually recedes from memory. Popular sentiment changes: with

J

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weariness comes a desire for the new that challenges ideological divisions and political timetables. Language is one of the elements most sensitive to fluctuations in popular aspirations. Buzzwords between 1945 and 1948 included “democratization,” “liberation,” “war crimes,” “new Japan,” or even “revelation.” Throughout the occupation SCAP constantly strove to keep images of Allied servicemen out of the media and film, enabling it to some extent to avoid wearing down public opinion. This is evident in the letters sent to SCAP by Japanese citizens. Whereas in Germany a similar phenomenon tapered off after two or three years, in Japan a steady stream of post was received until the early 1950s. American services estimate that almost five hundred thousand letters were received between September 1946 and late 1950, equaling a rate of around two hundred eighty per day.3 The vast majority were messages of thanks or encouragements to pursue the reforms. Nevertheless, just as MacArthur had predicted, public opinion toward the Americans gradually shifted and a certain lassitude began to be expressed after 1948, particularly in literature and the arts. This was characterized by a feeling of suffocation, conveyed by the presence of dark forms and prostrate bodies, as in the painting Heavy Hand by Tsuruoka Masao.4 Slogans openly demanding the withdrawal of American troops began to appear at May Day parades as of 1948. There is a seesaw effect, an oscillation between excitement and lassitude that, while clearly not divorced from historical events and ideological trends, independently influences the way people understand their experiences. The memory of the past is not impervious to this phenomenon. A society’s perception of the traumas it has suffered necessarily evolves over time. William K. Bunce (1907–2008) is one of the Americans whose names have fallen from memory but who played an instrumental role in occupied Japan. After studying history at university, Bunce was sent to the island of Shikoku in 1933 to work as an English teacher at a Japanese high school in Matsuyama. Upon his return to the United States in the late 1930s, he earned a PhD before taking up a position at Otterbein University in 1939. In 1943 he then joined the United States Navy, at whose suggestion he studied international law, politics, and the economies of Asia, first at Columbia, then at Princeton. When he arrived in Tokyo via the Philippines in October 1945, he was just thirty-eight years old and one of the many specialists recruited and trained by the American military to help implement the Allied policy. Preparations for the occupation of Japan were made far in advance and involved relatively young civilians, many of

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whom liked Japanese culture and knew it well. The fact that, as intellectuals, these individuals would later help write the history of this period merely underlines the importance of their role. Upon his arrival in Japan, Bunce was appointed head of the Religions Division in SCAP’s Civil Information and Education Section (CIE).5 He was given the delicate task of disestablishing Shinto as the state religion of Japan, one of the ideological pillars on which the emperor system rested. Between late October and early December 1945, Bunce and his colleagues wrote several policy notes along the lines suggested by the American government prior to the war’s end. These were then presented to Japanese specialists and submitted to MacArthur. At the end of this process, on December 15, 1945, SCAP issued the Japanese authorities with a directive to be implemented on the dismantling of State Shintō.6 The text explained that “the purpose of this directive is to separate religion from the state to prevent misuse of religion for political ends, and to put all religions, faiths, and creeds upon exactly the same legal basis, entitled to precisely the same opportunities and protection. It forbids affiliation with the government and the propagation and dissemination of militaristic and ultranationalistic ideology not only to Shinto but also to the followers of all religions, faiths, sects, creeds, or philosophies.” The general thrust of the American plan is plain to see. The Shintō Directive laid the foundations for the separation of church and state, something that was given definitive expression one year later in article 20 of the new constitution, which stated, “Freedom of religion is guaranteed to all. No religious organization shall receive any privileges from the state, nor exercise any political authority. No person shall be compelled to take part in any religious act, celebration, rite or practice. The State and its organs shall refrain from religious education or any other religious activity.”7 At the same time, it was agreed that the emperor would publicly repudiate his divine origins. The publication of an imperial rescript on January 1, 1946, handed MacArthur the opportunity to provide both the Japanese people and American public opinion with proof of Hirohito’s good faith, thereby justifying his retaining of the throne. Shidehara Kijūrō, who drafted the text, was perfectly aware of the issue at hand: “Since it appeared to me that the main aim was to impress people overseas rather than the Japanese, I wrote it directly in English,”8 he noted. He proved to be extremely adroit, for what in the English version comes across as a complete repudiation of the emperor’s divine status is less

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clear in the Japanese, which merely stated that Hirohito was not a “manifest deity”9 (akitsumikami). In other words, this statement did not prevent people from believing in the emperor’s divine right to rule. In this way, the government agreed to reconsider the position it had upheld since the 1930s, but the exact wording of the rescript preserved the sacred status of the imperial institution. This explains why an event that was presented in Europe and the United States as a great victory for SCAP went relatively unnoticed in Japan. The Asahi, for example, mentioned the event in a subtitle on its front page but felt no need to expand on it, preferring instead to stress that the rescript, published as part of the emperor’s New Year greetings, was simply the monarch’s way of showing solidarity with his people.10 The Yomiuri, on the other hand, distorted the Americans’ intended message with its headline: “Ties Between Emperor and Nation Not Based on Myth and Legend,”11 thereby making these ties appear only stronger and more authentic. It was only later that the “Declaration of Humanity,” as it is now commonly known, took on a historical significance, notably through being disseminated and discussed in schools and universities.12 Of all Japan’s religious institutions, Yasukuni was by far the most tightly controlled by the Americans, despite the government’s having rapidly maneuvered to protect it from change. The emperor paid a visit to the shrine in November 1945, as did the prime ministers of the day. Nevertheless, they were forced to abandon this practice once the Shintō Directive came into force. Having ceased to be under military control when Japan’s armies were dismantled, Yasukuni was ordered to choose between two options: remain in the government fold but renounce its religious dimension—in other words, become a public memorial—or remain a Shinto shrine but become a private religious corporation. It chose the latter option. Yasukuni thus took on the mission of celebrating the “ancestral spirits of those who gave their lives for the nation” and “promoting a peaceful and refined civic culture.”13 Financing was guaranteed through revenue from a fixed fund and private donations. As for the other military shrines, Bunce and the Religions Division held discussions on the issue in the autumn of 1946.14 It was decided that they would remain untouched, with no alteration to their name or purpose. However, they would no longer be overseen by the Home Ministry—which was also dissolved—but would instead be placed under the auspices of the Association of Shinto Shrines, a private religious organization, in line with the other Shinto establishments.

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Ever since the Russo-Japanese War, Yasukuni had held biannual celebrations commemorating the soldiers killed in combat: on April 30 for those in the army and October 23 for those in the navy.15 A host of festivities were organized on each of these dates, most of them within the shrine’s grounds, except for a procession that took place through the city streets. In April 1946, Yasukuni sought permission to maintain this ritual. Yet while it was allowed to organize a collective celebration for over twenty-five thousand soldiers whose deaths had recently been registered at the shrine, SCAP banned any procession through the streets of the capital.16 Outside Tokyo, prefectural shrines were subject to the same regulations, yet a lack of familiarity with the new directives and the strength of tradition occasionally caused incomprehension.17 As we can see, then, commemorations within the shrines themselves were allowed to continue, but there was no question of their spilling onto the streets outside. The Americans maintained a clear frontier between religious and civilian celebrations, and this was written into Japanese law in November 1946 by decree: official civilian ceremonies were authorized on the condition that no religious leaders took part and that they celebrated neither the memory of soldiers nor that of any individuals with known militarist or ultranationalist leanings.18 As for religious ceremonies, they were authorized as long as no government officials attended. This policy of containment remained unchanged until the end of the occupation. Although the years 1948–1949 represented a turning point in the occupation authorities’ policy in Japan, one accompanied by a relaxation in the censoring of anything reminiscent of nationalism, SCAP remained intransigent on the issue of State Shintō. Under the American occupation, the entire Japanese commemorative system was forced to reinvent its practices and models. More generally, rites, customs, and anything connected with social behavior were vigorously monitored and controlled, whereas the existing tangible heritage, notably within temples and shrines, received considerably less attention.

JUDGING WAR CRIMES: THE VALUE OF THE LAW

When hostilities broke out in Manchuria in 1931, Japan was a signatory of several international agreements regulating the conduct of armed conflict. In November 1911 it had ratified the Convention with Respect to the

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Laws and Customs of War on Land (1907), which stipulated that “prisoners of war must be humanely treated” (art. 4), and that it was forbidden for nations “to employ poison or poisoned weapons,” “kill or wound an enemy who, having laid down his arms, or having no longer means of defense, has surrendered at discretion,” or “employ arms, projectiles, or material calculated to cause unnecessary suffering” (art. 23). Similarly, in 1929 it had become a signatory to the Briand-Kellogg Pact, which condemned the “recourse to war for the solution of international controversies,” and the Geneva Convention relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War.19 This explains why in 1937 the regime took care to point out that the Chinese nationals it had captured would not be considered POWs, on the grounds that the two countries were not officially at war. In the early 1940s the Japanese Ministry of Justice also published several studies formulating its stance on the issue and refuting the accusations leveled against the imperial armed forces.20 Japan’s political, military, and legal elites were thus familiar with the concept of war crimes. On the other hand, the notion of crimes against peace was not well understood, since it was first defined at Nuremberg on the basis of investigations conducted by the United Nations War Crimes Commission.21 Accordingly, the defense counsel at the Tokyo Trials sought to demonstrate the nullity of this charge, particularly since it did not appear in the Potsdam Declaration: “It goes without saying that Prime Minister Tōjō bears a heavy responsibility toward the Japanese people. However, we absolutely refute that having initiated this war constitutes a crime in international law,”22 declared one of his attorneys in March 1946. The tribunal ended with several Japanese leaders, including Tōjō, being found guilty of crimes against peace. The idea of trying a nation’s leaders for crimes against peace—in other words, for having launched a major armed conflict—developed soon after World War I. The Advisory Committee of Jurists established by the League of Nations debated the issue as early as 1919–1920.23 Although the Japanese government was involved in this process of binding international acts by law, it had endured the process rather more than it had been a partner to it. Being compelled to sign unequal treaties with Great Britain and the United States in the nineteenth century had left Japan with a permanent distrust of international regulations. And this phenomenon only intensified in the 1930s when the militarists rose to power. Japan left the League of Nations in 1933 and unilaterally pulled out of its commitment to limit its naval shipbuilding

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capacities. In both 1931 and 1937 it entered into armed conflicts without first clarifying the legality of its actions. The same holds true for December 1941, when Japan’s formal declaration of war against the United States was delivered in such a tardy manner that it failed to arrive before the attack on Pearl Harbor commenced. Finally, we can add the East Asia “coprosperity sphere,” which broke with the conventions of international law. Japan’s leaders long favored a diplomacy based on the fait accompli, a pragmatic approach to international relations and conflicts, rather than relationships founded in law. This distrust of legal rules can be attributed to a lingering influence of Confucianism, with its preference for custom over legislation, and to a feeling that international law had historically been manipulated by the Western powers. Incidentally, drawing a parallel between the unequal treaties of the nineteenth century and the war crimes trials remains a common theme in public debate today, and the fact that it cuts across the political divide merely strengthens its impact. Nevertheless, we must not forget that the sense of injustice born in the nineteenth century was itself utilized in the 1930s by the military’s most adventurist elements, whose main aim was to unshackle the country from its legal constraints. This complex background must be taken into account when analyzing the Tokyo Trials and the debate they continue to generate. From the Japanese point of view in particular, not criticizing the tribunal would be to forget that, in the hands of the West, international law has been an instrument of power used to dominate the world; yet conversely, criticizing the postwar international jurisdiction in Asia would mean exposing Japan to the risk of unintentionally reviving the militarist rhetoric. The sixtieth anniversary of the Tokyo Trials illustrated the continuing ability of this subject to ignite debate and fuel nationalist discourses. More generally, all the war crimes tribunals held in East Asia and Oceania between 1945 and 1951 have continuously stoked controversy both domestically and abroad, whether between Japan and China or, in a more latent form, between Japan and the United States. In the Japanese language alone, research papers on the subject number in the thousands, and books, in the hundreds.24 Moreover, the focus is not simply on a few isolated issues; the entire process is called into question, from the conditions in which the trials were held, the nature of the charges, and the status of the accused to the content of the accusations and the disparity in treatment between victor and vanquished.

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Nevertheless, although a kind of revisionism is expressed across the political spectrum by scholars and certain politicians, school textbooks present the trials in a factual manner, with emphasis placed on the execution in late 1948 of seven high-ranking political and military leaders25 and on the execution of some one thousand Class B and C war criminals out of the almost six thousand Japanese put on trial during this period. The only textbook to present a resolutely skeptical take on the events is the one by the Japanese Society for History Textbook Reform, and this is used in very few schools. The debate can thus be said to take place within the democratic context of a constitutional state, which is not the case everywhere, notably in China.

DEFINING RESPONSIBILITIES: THE EMPEROR ISSUE

The former Imperial Japanese Army Academy was built in 1937 on the grounds of the Army Ministry. However, in 1941 its function evolved. The army minister—Tōjō, who for several years held this position concurrently with that of prime minister—set up his offices within the academy, making it one of the main command centers for the Imperial Army. It was then abruptly repurposed in early 1946 when the Americans symbolically chose to stage the Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal there. Tōjō was sentenced to death in the very place where, in the words of Life magazine, “many of the defendants had plotted aggression since 1928.”26 Two decades later another event that caused an international stir took place in this same building. On November 25, 1970, the writer Mishima Yukio entered the former ministerial office and committed suicide by ritual disembowelment, as if to wash away the shame of defeat with his blood. The fate of this building eloquently illustrates how the postwar trials overshadow the history of the war in people’s memories.27 The military tribunals held in Khabarovsk (where the use of chemical and bacteriological weapons was notably examined) and Shanghai enabled many officers and soldiers from the Imperial Army to be brought to trial, and the verbatim record of these proceedings constitutes a precious source of information on the extent and cruelty of the atrocities committed by the Japanese in Asia. Although justice was at times summary and certain individual cases are problematic, the fundamental

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legitimacy of these tribunals is generally uncontested. The same cannot be said for the International Military Tribunal for the Far East, where the so-called Class A criminals were judged. The decision to bring to justice those responsible for the Pacific War was made by the Allies well before hostilities ended. One of SCAP’s earliest tasks was to arrest a certain number of Japanese leaders, with the first wave of incarcerations taking place before mid-September. These arrests targeted primarily military leaders who had held political responsibilities, the most notorious being Tōjō Hideki, who was placed under formal investigation on September 11, 1945, after his failed attempt at suicide. Many individuals feared being charged with war crimes upon the Americans’ arrival, not only military and political leaders but also industrialists, intellectuals, and artists: “I’ll be captured, I know it, just like ninety thousand people in Germany. For my part, I accept my fate, for I have resolved to die, but such misery will descend upon my family!”28 wrote Unno Jūza, who was, ultimately, never arrested. From the autumn of 1945 to the establishment of the Military Tribunal in January the following year, newspapers and the radio or cinematic bulletins were assiduous in covering each wave of arrests and the evolution of the investigations. For three years the media spoke of little else. Yet while it was clear that certain high-ranking individuals would be tried and punished, three unanswered questions were the subject of speculation—namely: Was it possible that the entire population would be prosecuted? What level of support for the regime and participation in the war effort would be deemed a crime? What fate would be reserved for the emperor and the imperial family? SCAP provided a response to the first question in early December by confirming in the press that legal proceedings would be initiated only against natural persons and that the Japanese people as a whole would not be held responsible for the war,29 despite ideas the Allies had temporarily entertained.30 This decision introduced a symbolic break with the war years. Whereas since the 1930s the state had constantly asserted the unity of the government, the army, and the Japanese people, thereby justifying the mobilization of civilians in the final weeks of the war, a new order now emerged in which only individual acts mattered. The notion of kokutai was suddenly rendered obsolete, as was the “general contrition” called for by the government immediately after the defeat. While it was clearly crucial that certain individuals be tried for their crimes, that the fallacious nature of the union lauded by the Japanese state be demonstrated, and

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that the private and group interests hidden behind the slogans be revealed, we must nonetheless acknowledge that the manner in which the Japanese were tried did not reflect the image they had held of themselves during the war. Not only did the decision to restrict the trials to individual cases resemble a search for scapegoats and thereby undermine the legitimacy of the tribunal in the eyes of the elites and part of the population, but also initiating collective proceedings against the Japanese as a whole would no doubt have provided a clearer picture of the extent of the totalitarian process and hence the level of resistance it had encountered. The number of incarcerations declined considerably after December 1945. This enabled SCAP to implement the second phase of its plan. On January 4, 1946, it issued a directive barring from public office and elected posts anyone who had held a position of responsibility during the war.31 This included war criminals, career soldiers, political leaders who had supported the militarist regime, heads of patriotic societies, heads of companies involved in the war effort, colonial administrators, and, finally, “other militarists and ultranationalists.” This last category was extremely broad, since it concerned, to quote the directive, “any person who has played an active and predominant governmental part in the Japanese program of aggression or who by speech, writing or action has shown himself to be an active exponent of militant nationalism and aggression.” This purge was covered widely in the media, leading a vast section of the elite to fear sanctions and take stock of their former actions. In reality, the process was implemented relatively slowly, and the Americans were forced to exert constant pressure on the government in order to see the purges widely executed. In total, more than two hundred thousand people were removed from their positions or barred from office between 1946 and the spring of 1948. This apparently significant number is nonetheless misleading, for almost 80 percent of those purged were from the military.32 The Japanese state moved swiftly to defend itself and negotiate appeal procedures with SCAP. There were always elements in the government that were quick to use the mechanisms of democracy to block democratization. Moreover, the application of these measures across the different sectors was highly disparate. While the purge brought about a certain renewal of the political class, it was on an even more moderate level than in West Germany.33 Right from the beginning of the occupation the government oscillated between two contradictory objectives: on the one hand, making a favorable impression on the Americans, hence its

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conscientious translation of SCAP’s directives into Japanese law, and, on the other, attempting to preserve the national unity. Its inability to resolve this dilemma paved the way for a strategy of evasion, with tactics including procrastination, obstruction, attempts at circumventing, and on occasion a certain laisser-faire attitude—in other words, anything but a clear and consciously chosen ideological position. While the American directive made it possible to designate and punish those responsible for the war—including around one thousand people working in the fields of media and culture—it inherently raised the question of the moral responsibility of the elites. A settling of scores via the press erupted as early as September 1945: writers denounced Takamura Kōtarō, Hino Ashihei, or Yasuda Yojūrō; painters and sculptors pointed the finger at Fujita and Yokoyama Taikan; while in the highly restricted world of Western classical music, Yamada Kōsaku (1886–1965) was attacked by his peers.34 However, the legitimacy of the accusers was highly questionable. The accusations leveled at certain individuals centered not on their having supported the war effort, something of which almost everyone was guilty, but on having profited from the war.35 The debate died down fairly quickly, therefore, and resumed only in the mid1950s, albeit on different grounds. At the beginning of the occupation this issue of war responsibility often took the form of a repolarization of national politics, with the right reviving the theme of an unavoidable conflict and the need for unity at times of war, while the left, led by the communists, argued that the state had oppressed the people and waged a war of aggression. In this respect, the strikes at the Tōhō film studios in the winter of 1946 were characteristic. Although this labor dispute was rooted in censorship and wartime working conditions, and one of the strikers’ slogans called on the industry to “Banish war criminals from the world of film!”36 the union’s main demands—namely, increased transparency and democracy in the selection of screenplays and the running of the studios—were resolutely turned toward the future.37 Even in the trauma of defeat, history never stood still; at no point was there a pause in which the past could be observed and judged without the interference of current political issues. At the end of the war the populace was divided as to the emperor’s fate, and this is illustrated by the letters sent to SCAP, which included both short, impassioned pleas for him to be protected and longer, more detailed letters demanding that he be put on trial.38 Yet even his supporters

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were not necessarily in favor of maintaining the status quo. Many wanted the emperor to abdicate and be replaced by a regent until his son came of age. The Japanese Communist Party openly argued for a more radical solution: “I demand the abolition of the emperor system. The miserable conditions experienced during the war and ever since were brought about by the emperor system and in the emperor’s name,”39 wrote Tokuda Kyūichi, the future secretary-general of the party in late November 1945. In government and inner court circles, too, voices were raised publicly to demand that Hirohito take responsibility for his actions and renounce the throne. The most famous of these was Prince Konoe.40 Even members of the emperor’s immediate entourage urged him privately to step down, notably his younger brother Prince Mikasa, and Kido Kōichi.41 Hirohito personally researched previous cases of abdication, both in Japan and in Great Britain, and is said to have considered taking the plunge on several occasions between late 1945 and the end of the occupation. Over in Allied quarters it seemed a foregone conclusion in the final months of the war that Hirohito would abdicate and be put on trial. The press and politicians demanded it. A renowned criminologist and Harvard professor like Sheldon Glueck placed Hirohito in the same camp as Hitler, Mussolini, and Tōjō.42 Indeed, the Potsdam Declaration clearly implied the possibility of initiating legal proceedings against the emperor. This point of view was still dominant at the beginning of the occupation, and the American government continued to envisage bringing the emperor before a court of law during the winter of 1946.43 Note, too, that right up until the Tokyo Trials were convened, the Australians and the Dutch tried in vain to pressure SCAP into keeping the promise made during the war.44 Yet MacArthur and his right-hand men (Bonner Fellers, Courtney Whitney) quickly came to see maintaining both Hirohito and the throne as a necessity, though they had no plans to hold a referendum, which, in contrast to the outcome of a similar vote in Italy, would no doubt have further strengthened the emperor’s position. As MacArthur explained in a telegram to Eisenhower, “If he is to be tried great changes must be made in occupational plans and due preparation therefore should be accomplished in preparedness before actual action is initiated. His indictment will unquestionably cause a tremendous convulsion among the Japanese people, the repercussions of which cannot be overestimated. He is a symbol which unites all Japanese. Destroy him and the nation will disintegrate.”45

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Each time pressure was brought to bear on Hirohito, SCAP weighed in to assure the emperor of its support and request that he remain on the throne for the good of his country.46 So ingrained was MacArthur’s doctrine that prosecutors at the Tokyo Trials purportedly requested that Tōjō modify a testimony in which he referred to the emperor’s ultimate authority so that Hirohito would emerge untainted by war responsibility.47 As John Dower wrote in his remarkable description of the way MacArthur came to Hirohito’s rescue, “This successful campaign to absolve the emperor of war responsibility knew no bounds. Hirohito was not merely presented as being innocent of any formal acts that might make him culpable to indictment as a war criminal. He was turned into an almost saintly figure who did not even bear moral responsibility for the war.”48 Whatever drove MacArthur to act the way he did—his desire to preserve the relative stability he found upon his arrival in Japan; his wish to distance himself from Washington in order to have free rein; the brewing Cold War, which illustrated to him the need to tread carefully with nationalists; his pride at having held the fate of the imperial institution in his hands—this policy had a considerable impact on people’s memories of the war. Although we can speak of Japanese revisionism, we must first mention the opportunism displayed by SCAP, which neither abolished the monarchy nor indicted the monarch. Yet either of these solutions would undoubtedly have provided the Japanese people with a clearer understanding of the meaning of its sacrifice and the corrupt nature of the system. For it has to be one or the other: either Hirohito played an active and direct role in the war, in which case he should personally have been brought to trial; or it is clearly established that he had no political influence and should be spared. But if that were the case, there was absolutely no reason to transform his status in the constitution and reduce his role to that of a mere “symbol of the state.” The only coherent solution in that situation would have been to abolish the imperial institution and create a republic, as advocated, for example, by Reischauer.49 The only way out of this line of reasoning was to imagine that the emperor had not desired the war but had been a pawn of the military. In this scenario, he had indeed played a political role but a positive one, an argument that justified both his exemption from prosecution and the preservation of the monarchy, while the entire blame for the war fell squarely on the military. This was precisely the position adopted by SCAP, the government, and the emperor’s entourage. The Japanese strove

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to portray a peace-minded emperor through his many tours around the country, while the Americans used the Tokyo Trials to depict an omnipotent and tyrannical military. Yet this image of an actively pacifist emperor controlled by military leaders is not only implausible, the very idea that former enemies could discover, just a few weeks after the end of hostilities, that the historical truth on such a burning issue served both their interests is simply too miraculous to be credible. Particularly since it is well known that the Americans never pursued a serious investigation of Hirohito’s role during the war but instead drew heavily on the version of events upheld by his closest allies, such as Kido, in order to support their own narrative.50

THE TOKYO TRIALS AND THE LIMITS OF THE DEMOCRATIC SPECTACLE

On September 12, 1945, ten days after the Instrument of Surrender was signed and following a month of wild rumors, Japanese newspapers announced the American decision to create a war crimes tribunal. A fear of “victor’s justice”51 immediately surfaced in the press, and questions were raised over the legitimacy of the legal procedure. The Tokyo Trials were thus not merely a means of trying Japan’s leaders; they also had to portray the values and rules of democracy. The communists played a pivotal role in lending legitimacy to the proceedings, becoming the objective allies of the Americans in the opening months of the occupation. “This directive,” explained Miyamoto Kenji concerning SCAP’s decision to purge officials from public office, “is extremely useful for the democratization of Japan, and, as such, the Japanese Communist Party supports it fully.”52 Miyamoto and Tokuda, who were highly visible in the media following their release from prison in early October, helped create a Japanese identity for the newly introduced concepts. In their mouths, words like “liberation,” democratization,” “war of aggression,” “militarism,” and “war crimes”—which they were quick to adopt—appeared to be not translations from English but rather homegrown expressions. The communists’ support was vitally important to SCAP, and initially they were allowed to participate fully in the public debate on war responsibility.

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The tribunal convened in April 1946, and the main verdicts were delivered in November 1948. During these months, in addition to the intense media coverage made possible by the numerous open sessions attended by journalists, a series of library and general-audience books containing documents relating to the trials were published with a view to supplementing the newspaper articles.53 A vast quantity of information was thus available to the Japanese, enabling them to enjoy a sense of the freedom that comes with democracy. The tribunal stood as both judgment of the past and an active testament to the benefits of the country’s new political orientation. A parallel can be drawn between the media excitement over the International Military Tribunal for the Far East and the then newly discovered enthusiasm for courtroom dramas like Miracle on 34th Street, which was released in Japan in November 1948. Hollywood helped reinforce the idea that the courtroom was a place where truth prevailed. Nevertheless, the democratic spectacle was tarnished by a number of elements—namely, the existence of censorship, a sweeping under the carpet of certain crimes, and a feeling that the tribunal had no interest in the state’s responsibility to the people. The task of monitoring and censoring the media was entrusted to the Civil Censorship Detachment (CCD). This unit within the occupation authorities examined countless texts and screenplays, rejecting those that contravened the various principles and codes issued by SCAP. This naturally drove Japanese media editors and movie producers to filter information and films and encouraged writers to censor their own work. Given the sensitive nature of the Tokyo Trials, it was forbidden to express overtly hostile opinions on the proceedings or to openly criticize the Allies. Yet this censorship was certainly not felt as keenly at the time as it would be later, once the workings of the CCD were better known. Given that the impression of freedom is somewhat subjective, the abundance of information and renewed diversity in the public debate contrasted with the previous years and largely offset the presence of censors. Moreover, despite what has been claimed on occasion,54 it was not impossible to criticize the tribunal publicly, particularly after 1949. Miyamoto Yuriko, for example, wrote an article in September 1948 in which she attacked the “unscrupulous power attempting to defend the lingering fascist forces by exploiting the Tokyo Trials and sacrificing just a handful of the defendants.”55 What is more, American censorship operated in such a way as to conceal its existence, in contrast to its Japanese counterpart, which constantly

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revealed itself in the press in order to increase its influence.56 Reading the press and literature of the day, it appears to have been considerably easier to criticize the war crimes tribunal than it was to complain about the existence of the CCD. The tribunal’s decision to overlook some of the worst atrocities committed by the Imperial Army is yet another bone of contention. It is now known that the Americans struck deals with several Japanese physicians, including Ishii Shirō (1892–1959), the commander of Unit 731, in return for data derived from clinical experiments conducted on prisoners. In exchange, these medical officers escaped prosecution, and it was not until the Russian-organized Khabarovsk Trials, which received relatively little media attention in Japan,57 that light was shed on just some of the crimes they committed. Nevertheless, just as with the existence of the American censors, very few people were privy to this information in 1945–1948. It was chiefly after the trials that the true scale and cruelty of these crimes came to light, thereby retrospectively undermining the legitimacy of the legal proceedings, which had focused more on Pearl Harbor than on the war in China. For all this, in the long term the main obstacle preventing the Japanese from accepting the verdicts of the Tokyo Trials undoubtedly lies elsewhere, in the nonprosecution of the emperor. From the Allied perspective, the primary objective of the tribunals was to punish those responsible for the loss and suffering the Allied nations had endured, and this conditioned the investigations carried out. On the other hand, for Japan it was the “memory of deceased comrades-in-arms,” and, more generally, of all those who had died for the nation, that made the trials necessary.58 Many believed that those for whom the nation had fought and suffered were morally obliged to take responsibility for their actions. Such divergence in the views of victor and vanquished is only natural. Yet usually in such cases both sides can agree on at least the identity of the guilty party. This was not the case in Japan. Indeed, it was much easier to explain to the Allied troops that Hirohito was merely a figurehead—although certain veterans continued to consider him a criminal—than it was for the Japanese to forget his omnipresence during the war. Oguma Eiji quotes the example of a demobilized soldier haunted by the memory of his fallen comrades and who is staggered to discover that not only had the emperor not committed suicide after Japan’s surrender, but he had no intention of abdicating either and had even gone so far as to politely meet MacArthur

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and collaborate with the former enemy. “Countless human lives were sacrificed in the emperor’s name! It pains me to say it, but as the head of state he bears more responsibility than anyone else,”59 wrote this soldier in his diary in early September 1945. Conversely, others who expected the emperor to be indicted seem to have come around to SCAP’s way of thinking and accepted the idea that he was nothing but a puppet. This is the case with Miyamoto Yuriko, who wrote that, It was decided by the International Military Tribunal for the Far East that the emperor bore no responsibility for the war. Everyone was rather surprised and, ironically, aggrieved. The people of Japan were deeply shocked to find that the all-powerful emperor was such an incompetent man. If the world had deemed the emperor to be an adult possessing the qualities befitting a true head of state, he would not have been excused of his responsibilities regarding the law, much less his responsibilities with regard to the human race. I do not wish him ill as an individual, but the fact that it has been proven to the Japanese people that he bears not even the responsibility of a simple soldier clearly shows that the emperor system, in whatever form, no longer has any place in a democratic Japan.60

Yet whether people wanted to see the emperor take responsibility for the nation’s dead or were stunned by his innocence, it was difficult to feel satisfied with the handful of generals and politicians brought before the courts. With neither the emperor indicted nor the imperial house abolished, many Japanese found the verdicts hard to swallow. The trials may well have been democratic; they were nonetheless fundamentally flawed.

WHAT FATE FOR JAPAN’S MONUMENTS?

A magazine from January 1946 carries a humorous cartoon composed of three vignettes: the first shows the statue of a general seated upon his horse; the second shows a sculptor hitting the general with a hammer; and the third, visitors in a museum admiring a statue of the lone horse.61 The Japanese authorities can hardly have been surprised by the American demand that all militarist symbols be eliminated. That the victors took

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issue with the monuments exalting patriotism and military chiefs was considered par for the course. Even the about-face performed by artists had been anticipated. The scrapping of the nation’s statues was portrayed in the media as symbolizing the rejection of the old Japan.62 Yet the American directive on the disestablishment of State Shintō devoted little attention to the question of monuments and physical objects already in place. It merely carried an order to remove the small altars and miniature shrines found in public institutions during the war. In any case, besides the aforementioned objects, which were duly removed, and the stamps and banknotes that were no longer permitted to depict shrines or torii gates, there were few images liable to fall foul of these measures, since the Shinto faith, in contrast to Buddhism, tends to be somewhat suspicious of figured representations. According to the wording of the SCAP directive, neither ikebana, Noh, sumo, gagaku, nor any of the art forms occasionally linked to Shinto and exploited during the war were concerned. As remarked Faubion Bowers, a personal aide to MacArthur and defender of Japanese theater during the occupation, “No one cared about no [Noh] because it was so antique people didn’t understand it.”63 Although certain Kabuki plays, like The Treasury of Loyal Retainers (Chūshingura), were swiftly suppressed, and a number of literary classics, such as the Record of Ancient Matters (Kojiki), were censored, many forms of expression that had served to disseminate the spirit of State Shintō fell outside the directive’s scope.64 The American directive did specify, however, that certain expressions were henceforth prohibited: “The use in official writings of the terms ‘Greater East Asia War,’ ‘The Whole World under One Roof,’ and all other terms whose connotation in Japanese is inextricably connected with State Shintō, militarism, and ultra-nationalism is prohibited and will cease immediately.” The scope of this regulation was at once vast and extremely vague, with State Shintō, militarism, and ultranationalism presented as superimposable realities. In consequence, with its lack of detail and at times lack of coherence, the directive proved difficult to implement. Moreover, it applied only to texts that would be written in the future and not to those already in existence. If we limit ourselves to a strictly literal interpretation of the directive, the commemorative columns, steles, plaques, and signs erected during the war were not concerned. This vagueness forced Japanese officials to interpret the text’s meaning.

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Yet the issue of monuments was taken very seriously by SCAP. The Religions Division remained vigilant throughout the period from June 1946 to early 1948, demanding reports on the monuments being destroyed or the impact of these measures on the population.65 The Arts and Monuments Division in the CIE also became involved on several occasions. In May 1948, for example, it demanded the declassification of all historic sites linked to Emperor Meiji.66 Although the burden of implementing any measure fell essentially to the Japanese government, the occupation authorities remained vigilant and did not hesitate to intervene in specific instances. Nevertheless, to all intents and purposes the various divisions abandoned this issue at the end of the spring of 1948. As William Woodard, Bunce’s assistant in the Religions Division, remarked, “It was desirable to remove any impression that the Occupation was opposed to the appropriate commemoration of the war dead.”67 Sources summarize the total destruction as follows: “Between late 1946 and May 1948 when the program was completed, some 5,613 monuments and 354 statues had been removed; 890 monuments and 17 statues had been moved to less conspicuous locations; and 908 monuments and 29 statues had had their appearance altered or the wording of the inscriptions changed.”68 Note that not all the monuments that survived the occupation were preserved. Indeed, the destruction and relocation of monuments continued long after the occupation had ended, until the late 1950s, following evolutions in the local political balance of power. In other words, one section of Japanese society had clearly adopted the American measures as its own. The first ministerial circulars on the issue of funerary ceremonies and commemorative monuments appeared in the autumn of 1946 and coincided with the promulgation of the new constitution. They set out in concrete terms the principles established by the Americans. A circular dated November 1 stipulated that “under no circumstances will memorial towers, steles, and other monuments or bronze statues be erected for the soldiers who died in battle, any more than for militarists and radical nationalists.” With regard to existing public monuments, it was requested that all those with warmongering connotations and, more generally, any monuments located in schools be removed.69 On the other hand, graves and cenotaphs for the soldiers killed in action were authorized on the condition that “they did not glorify military actions”70 and were relatively sober in style. Thus, detailed documentation regarding the regulations was available to local authorities as of late 1946. Nevertheless, there was

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a fairly clear divergence from the American directive of 1945. Whereas the Americans had targeted chiefly State Shintō, the equivalent expressions in Japanese did not appear in the circulars, which focused on “militarism” and “ultranationalism.” For the Japanese, these concepts recently translated from English had the advantage of being relatively obscure71 and thus provided local authorities with considerable room for interpretation. Kinjirō is the familiar name of a historical figure who symbolizes a thirst for education, self-sacrifice at work, and social success.72 He appeared in school curricula during the Russo-Japanese War, and statues of him flourished in school yards in the 1920s. Born to a peasant family, the young Kinjirō is often depicted walking along with his head in a book, a bundle of firewood strapped to his back. His fate during the occupation is telling. In places where he was seen as symbolizing the values of the old system, he disappeared from view; while in places where he was seen as simply encouraging people to do well, he was allowed to remain. It was in school yards that the clearest change took place after 1946. Symbols of the past were hunted down, notably the memorial steles, which were destroyed or moved outside the school grounds. The small pavilions housing a copy of the Imperial Rescript on Education, the national flag, and a photograph of the emperor were also demolished.73 Away from schools the situation is less clear-cut, as monuments were often rebuilt or simply put back in place after the occupation ended. Generally speaking, it is in Tokyo that the most detailed information on this process exists. A commission of inquiry was established in the capital in February 1947 to decide which statues and monuments should be destroyed.74 In its report, the commission suggested removing around ten monuments; this was in addition to the handful of statues dismantled between late 1945 and the spring of 1947, either on the direct orders of the Americans or spontaneously by the owners. Although the total number of monuments destroyed during the occupation was relatively low, it must be remembered that many statues had already been melted down during the war. Those that had emerged unscathed were not only of exceptional value but also lucky to have escaped the air raids and fires. The majority of monuments destroyed during the occupation were linked to the Meiji-period conflicts, despite ministerial texts stipulating that monuments from the Russo-Japanese War could be exempted.75 That this did not happen demonstrates the commission’s view of them as promoting war. As a cinema newsreel reported in 1947, the imposing statue

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of Hirose Takeo, who died a hero’s death in 1904, was to be removed “because it exalts the fighting spirit of the people and excites their animosity.”76 Nevertheless, several examples, such as the statue of Kawakami Sōroku, which once stood next to Yasukuni Shrine, introduce an element of doubt. Kawakami Sōroku (1848–1899) was an army officer who, after achieving success during the First Sino-Japanese War, ended his glittering career as head of the Imperial General Headquarters. He died before the conflict with Russia even began, and any links he might have to World War II are extremely tenuous. The government’s primary objective in stigmatizing high-ranking military officers from the late nineteenth century onward was to establish a genealogy of militarism, as if an insidious conspiracy had gradually robbed the emperor of his power, thereby simultaneously clearing him of any responsibility for the war.77 Conversely, the commission decided to conserve all sculptures depicting members of the emperor’s family, as had been the norm during the war, on the grounds that the imperial institution could not be held responsible for the conflict.78 It was this decision that enabled the equestrian statue of Prince Kitashirakawa to be conserved (despite his wearing military attire). Originally located in the center of a large square at the entrance to an Imperial Guard’s barracks, it was moved a short distance away in 1963 to an inconspicuous, tree-lined spot opposite the palace. The same fate befell the statue of Prince Arisugawa, which originally stood opposite the Imperial General Headquarters. Following the dismantling of the army, it was moved in 1962 to a memorial park named after the prince, placed between a sandpit and the entrance to the Tokyo Metropolitan Central Library. Despite being powerful elements in the capital’s prewar identity, these monuments were removed from their symbolic, highly visible original locations and placed in ambiguous new surroundings that were prestigious but hidden. Only a few monuments were both preserved and maintained in situ. This is the case with the statues of Kusunoki Masashige (1900), located in front of the Imperial Palace, and Saigō Takamori (1898) in Ueno Park. The same can be said of the statue depicting Ōmura Masujirō, father of the modern Japanese army. Although dedicated to a great military figure, this monument’s location at the entrance to Yasukuni means that it is directly linked to the imperial cult. Only the cannons that once surrounded its base were removed. The decision in 1947 to destroy statues commemorating military leaders reveals a determination to have them shoulder

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responsibility for the war. We must nevertheless bear in mind that this list was drawn up to appease the Americans and that the Japanese were thus obliged to find symbols to eliminate. With a few exceptions—which include the capital—the symbols of Japan’s military leaders were not systematically eradicated. In Gunma Prefecture alone, for example, there are still thirty-six memorial steles carrying an epigraph written by General Tōjō.79 The measures introduced by the Japanese government were implemented unevenly. A large monument located just outside the city of Miyazaki, for example, built in 1940, was saved from destruction. In its center are engraved the words “Eight Corners of the World Under One Roof,” an expression that was expressly blacklisted by the Americans. With the war over, local officials debated what should be done with this huge monument symbolizing the imperial dream and whose base was composed of stones taken from each of the former occupied territories. After some reflection it was decided that it should be conserved but renamed the Peace Tower.80 In a similar vein, a bust of Admiral Tōgō Heihachirō was removed from the capital but not the park named after him, while a stele commemorating the victims of the Sado-maru was dismantled in Tokyo but not in Kitakyūshū. Although the capital must be seen as a special case, these irregularities illustrate that, right from the occupation, local authorities have played a key role in memorial issues. The government did not seek to openly obstruct the work of the Americans; it preferred instead to delegate the problem to the prefectures while making occasional attempts to influence decisions in favor of the imperial institution.

8 THE PLURALITY OF HISTORY

TABULA RASA

econstructing history implies engaging in memory work: remembering certain dates, events, and names. Yet more importantly, it means setting aside other dates, other events, and other names, considered minor and unlikely to enhance our understanding of the past. History is a science based on selection; it prioritizes facts, retains some and rejects others. Yet because it seeks truth but can offer no more than an approximation, because it is a narrative and strives for unity of form, because it is an educational tool with moral and political dimensions, history, by its very nature, cannot easily reveal what it obliterates. At most it can specify its criteria for selection. This process of obliteration is no doubt the most concealed in school textbooks. In a desire for efficiency they emphasize the positive (what must be learned and understood) over the negative (what has been eliminated and why). In the autumn of 1945, hundreds of thousands of young Japanese directly experienced the relativity and bias inherent in history when the Ministry of Education instructed them to cut out or blacken pages in their textbooks, deleting all references to Ise Shrine, the goddess Amaterasu, the imperial institution, Japan’s military leaders, and any “inappropriate” passages. This experience was doubly unsettling since teachers were occasionally at a loss to explain this request,1 despite the efforts of official

R

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FIGURE 8.1  School

textbook from the American occupation era covered in ink. The bottom section featured chrysanthemums, while the text at the top read, “Chrysanthemums bloom on Emperor Meiji’s birthday. Let us venerate Emperor Meiji, grandfather of His Majesty the Emperor. The chrysanthemum is the precious [Imperial] Emblem. We love these flowers. Let us dedicate them to Emperor Meiji, grandfather of His Majesty the Emperor.”

media channels to explain the futility of the imperial mythology and the harm caused to education by militarism.2 The strategic nature of school textbooks was obvious to the political and military leaders of the 1940s. In 1941, as it geared up for war against the United States, the Japanese government had reformed the education system and ensured that textbooks more clearly promoted the values of patriotism, morality, social harmony, and good health. In elementary and high school textbooks history served primarily to glorify the emperor system, the nation, and the military. Faced with this situation, the Americans took remedial action shortly after they arrived in Japan.3 However, even before it learned of the American directives, the Ministry of Education issued orders to eliminate any passages with militarist connotations. The Japanese authorities moved to neutralize history without waiting to be

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forced, illustrating not only a tactical desire to win the occupier’s favor but also a certain ability to engage in criticism of the past. This measure was subsequently adopted and elaborated by SCAP as it awaited the drafting of new textbooks, which were delivered with some difficulty in time for the new school year in April 1947. The solution chosen in Japan was thus different from the one commonly adopted in West Germany, where books from the Weimar Republic were reprinted in haste. In parallel to its efforts to eradicate all reference to mythology, the imperial power, and its values, SCAP set about proposing a new interpretation of the war and revealing facts that had been concealed from the Japanese during the hostilities. Even before the Tokyo Trials convened, the CIE passed information to the press for publication. Accordingly, between December 8 and 17, 1945, the first general account of the “history of the Pacific War,” “based on documents provided by [the Allied] GHQ,”4 appeared in all of Japan’s daily newspapers. These articles were then compiled and published in book form in April 1946.5 Whereas the first death tolls provided by the media three months earlier had emphasized Japanese losses and the “two hundred thousand dead heroes”6—in other words, the soldiers who had refused to surrender and were killed during suicidal charges—this first American retelling of events focused on the suffering inflicted by the Japanese. It notably included one of the first descriptions in Japan of the massacres perpetrated in China: On December 7 a Japanese military offensive was launched against positions around Nanjing. One week later, the Japanese army vented its anger in the face of fierce Chinese resistance in Shanghai by perpetrating appalling acts of cruelty. Based on eyewitness reports, it has been established with absolute certainty that over twenty thousand men, women, and children were killed—the greatest massacre in modern history. For four weeks the streets of Nanjing were covered in blood and pieces of mutilated bodies littered the ground, while Japanese soldiers, becoming increasingly frenzied, inflicted every kind of physical cruelty on the civilian population, notably rape and murder.7

The vocabulary used also contrasted vividly with that previously employed, with the conflict becoming known, as in the West, as the Pacific War, thereby marginalizing the Sino-Japanese War. The text insisted,

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however, that the “war of aggression” had begun with the invasion of Manchuria in 1931, a periodization that prefigured the appearance of the term “Fifteen-Year War” in the 1950s. It also mentioned the “puppet state” of Manchukuo, the predatory nature of the Japanese presence in Asia, the absence of a declaration of war on China, the fact that hostilities were initiated in 1941 by Tokyo, the mistreatment of POWs, the “advance” of American forces in the Pacific, and the lies told by the “military clique.” More generally, the so-called senseless war was presented fundamentally from the perspective of defeat. The basic outline of what would become the dominant narrative of World War II in Japan was thus established and disseminated to the public in late 1945, in a compact and coherent form, using terminology and sources that were overtly American. This obliteration of the previous history and superimposition of a new, nonnative version was undoubtedly a harsh and memorable experience for the Japanese, particularly the youngest members of society. Yet despite this frequently being cited by nationalists as proof that Japan’s entire contemporary history has been “twisted”—thereby implying a need to “correct” it—at the time this new information was neither blindly accepted nor rejected outright. It was listened to, considered, and debated. As Miyamoto Yuriko wrote, “How it pains us to hear the radio broadcasts of the Tokyo Trials. We want to cry out to all the women in the world: Don’t believe that all Japanese are so barbaric! Think of all the widows’ tears that flow in our country! Yet at the same time, we cannot look back at the past without our hair standing on end. What a miserable and bloodstained object Japan’s semifeudal power has made of the beauty of culture!”8 The discovery of the atrocities committed by the Imperial Army triggered a complex range of emotions. In the case of Miyamoto, she accepted her country’s responsibility and felt compassion for the victims but at the same time demanded acknowledgment of Japanese suffering, while her words betray a hope that Japan might soon rejoin the community of nations. The American-desired process of demilitarizing the nation’s minds began in uneventful fashion, with neither excessive political polarization nor widespread rejection. Generally speaking, and regardless of political allegiance, all those who expressed their opinions at the end of the war demonstrated a desire to understand, a sense of responsibility, and a certain attentiveness to the suffering of others. The current struggle

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of one section of Japanese society to accept the weight of past sins is not the perpetuation of a denial ab initio. It is the result of a process in which the handling of the question of war responsibility played a key part, not only in and of itself but also, and perhaps in particular, because of the repercussions it had on the writing of history.

THE EVOLUTION OF AMERICAN HISTORIOGRAPHY

On the cover of its issue of April 1950, the satirical magazine Shinsō (revelations) carries a drawing of Hirohito. He is shown dressed as a commoner, his shoulders hunched forward, tipping his hat with a foolish air, an image reminiscent of the tours he made around Japan in 1946 in order to bring himself closer to the people and support the country’s transition to a democracy. In this magazine in particular, but elsewhere too, it was not rare to find caricatures of the emperor during the occupation and until the late 1950s. It is also noteworthy that the aforementioned illustration depicts Hirohito standing on skulls, a clear reminder of his responsibility toward the dead. The Tokyo Trials and the relatively recent nature of the war made it impossible to forget the millions of compatriots who had died in his name. Conversely, since the 1960s the imperial figure has once again become a sensitive subject, with caricatures and public criticisms now rare because of the risk of suffering reprisals from farright groups.9 Here once again SCAP played a role, for the American high command was not content to simply maintain the imperial institution and exempt Hirohito from standing trial. Throughout the entire occupation SCAP helped rewrite the history of modern Japan so that its decisions would not resemble agreements between the powerful but rather a fair assessment based on fact. In 1948, for example, SCAP’s Statistics and Reports Section began to draft and publish information sheets on Japan’s modern history with a view to explaining the main measures implemented since 1945, notably the Tokyo Trials and the new constitution. Two years later, this unit was renamed the Civil Historical Section and compiled a “History of the Nonmilitary Activities of the Occupation of Japan,” edited by William E. Hutchinson (1917–2009), a specialist in military and political information.10

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Although it was never published, this compendium, which broadly outlined the constitutional history of Japan between 1868 and 1947, clearly shows how the arguments used to absolve the emperor at the beginning of the occupation have made their way into historical discourse. Thus, in accordance with SCAP’s interests, the imperial power is presented as purely virtual: “The theory of the Meiji Constitution gave the Emperor absolute power but for 10 centuries or more personal intervention had almost never been exercised.”11 Or, “This system continued the traditional practice of giving theoretical power to the Emperor, who was relieved of all responsibility for his actions, while allowing actual power to be exercised by others.”12 In other words, the emperor’s lack of accountability during the war was justified using a typically orientalist argument that was familiar to readers of the era—namely, that Japan was an unchanging world where continuity and repetition had prevailed over the desire to take charge of its destiny and transform history, and that although Japanese institutions had been modernized in the late nineteenth century along Western lines, they remained fundamentally unchanged, for custom and tradition had won out. As for the power of the military, it was presented as follows: “The army and navy, by refusing to participate in the formation or in the continuance of a cabinet, thus ultimately came to dictate the policy of the administration.”13 How? Why? Using what mechanisms? This the text does not say. The information is presented as a forthright statement, creating the impression that the influence of the military was self-evident. The second part of the text, which focuses on the new constitution, is equally as crude in its explanations, and contradictions abound, notably with regard to the postwar establishment of a constitutional monarchy: “This involved depriving the Emperor of all military power, restricting him to only such powers as were specifically conferred by the new Constitution, and obliging him to act only in accordance with the advice of the Cabinet.”14 It is odd, though, to have felt the need to eliminate the emperor’s power over the armed forces if he had been proven to have had none in the first place. It seems clear, then, that this document was written to legitimize decisions that were above all political. However, it also reveals the view of modern history that guided SCAP in its supervision of the drafting of new Japanese textbooks.15 One of the sources of inspiration for SCAP’s historians, and for Western historiography on Japan between the late 1940s and the 1990s

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in general, was Edwin Reischauer. Born in Tokyo in 1910, Reischauer worked for the American intelligence services during the war as a specialist on Japan.16 His reports, which were examined in some of the highest echelons, concluded that the emperor had very little personal responsibility.17 Reischauer thus suggested exempting him from legal proceedings. On the other hand, he considered the imperial system to have failed and recommended it be abolished. While it was tinged with orientalist prejudices, his analysis, which drew on the author’s solid knowledge of Japanese sources, was nonetheless coherent. In the years that followed the war’s end, Reischauer ceased mentioning the creation of a republic but continued to uphold the idea that the emperor had acted as a counterbalance to the military.18 In his dual capacity as Harvard professor and later U.S. ambassador to Japan from 1961 to 1966, Reischauer was instrumental in developing the field of Japanese studies in the United States. His work thus helped provide a historical foundation to SCAP’s decision. In return, his authority as an expert was enhanced, and this provided a boost to his own career. It was not until the mid-1960s that the official orthodoxy on the emperor’s lack of responsibility was called into question. Leonard Mosley (1913–1992), and above all David Bergamini (1928–1983), were the first to attempt to take up the case against the emperor.19 Although Bergamini in particular, who was a journalist at Life, brought to light certain new elements, his theory of a conspiracy by the imperial family to increase its wealth and rule Asia was too caricatured and politically oriented to undermine the MacArthur-Reischauer doctrine. It was only in the late 1980s that a new generation of historians (John Dower, Herbert Bix) and journalists (Edward Behr), drawing on new Japanese studies and benefiting from the recently declassified American archives, demonstrated that it was impossible to extricate Hirohito completely from the decisions made under his authority and that SCAP had done everything possible to save him for political and economic reasons. This detour via American historiography is important, for the U.S. point of view has had considerable repercussions in Japan. One might even venture to say that the basic outline of modern history as taught in Japanese schools today is American. SCAP oversaw the drafting of school textbooks during the occupation, and while a few notable changes have since been made, the main framework, in particular concerning World War II, remains the same.

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THE IMPOSSIBLE CONSENSUS

The perception of history held by different nations is not symmetrical. In Great Britain, for example, the violence inflicted by the Japanese on POWs marked those who lived through this period and created a long-lasting image of a cruel people. Conversely, a Japanese child viewing a blackened tricycle, a tattered school uniform, or the charred remains of someone’s lunch at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum will at times struggle to suppress a feeling of unease vis-à-vis the Americans. For the majority of Westerners, Chinese, and Filipinos, it is the extent and cruelty of Japanese violence that prevails; whereas for the majority of Japanese, it is the feeling of having been a victim of the war. This disparity is the result of conflicting viewpoints during the hostilities but also of commemorative policy and historiographical work since 1945. The recurrent and widespread nature of the atrocities committed by the Japanese against their enemies—soldiers and civilians alike—was revealed to the general public in Japan as soon as the war ended. The Tokyo and Khabarovsk tribunals provided much in the way of information and supplementary testimonies. However, the end of the occupation and the democratically guaranteed right to freedom of expression led to the publication of revisionist texts that directly challenged the so-called victor’s history. These included Japan Is Not Guilty (1952), which drew on the conclusions of Justice Radhabinod Pal (1886–1967), who argued at the Tokyo Trials that the war had been the direct consequence of Western imperialism.20 The most characteristic phenomenon of the 1950s was the concealment of Japanese colonialism and the Sino-Japanese War. The first comprehensive summaries of military history, written by the likes of Hattori Takushirō, focused on the Pacific War. They strove to analyze the failures of the political and military apparatus and underline the heroism of the troops.21 Yet as marked as this phenomenon was, it would be wrong to assume that it caused people to forget about the war crimes issue. Memories of the tribunal had not faded and certain publications served as a reminder of the extent of the suffering inflicted. These included The Three Alls: Revelations on Japanese War Crimes in China (1957), the collected accounts of around fifteen Japanese soldiers recorded by the Chinese authorities. Although pervaded with Maoist rhetoric, this was one of the first books to reveal and provide a detailed description of the medical

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experiments conducted on the maruta—or “logs”—as the human guinea pigs executed by the “Ishii bacteriological unit”22 were known. The following decade was marked by an increase in academic literature on the subject, which gradually came to supplant the publications written by former officers and protagonists in the war. This brought about a widening of perspective, from a history of the war viewed from the general staffs and established to explain the failure of the high command to a ground-level observation that drew on soldiers’ testimony. The Sino-Japanese War was reincorporated, notably in Ienaga Saburō’s work The Pacific War (1968), in which the author mentions the “great Nanking massacre”23 while pointing out that the events in Nanjing were merely one example of the strategy of terror implemented in China. Nevertheless, while academic research expressed an acceptance of Japan’s responsibilities, this was partly offset by the publication of works like An Affirmative Theory of the Greater East Asia War (1963–1965), which created a considerable stir in the media. This text, written by essayist Hayashi Fusao and serialized in the journal Chūō kōron, revived the idea that the war in Asia had been a defensive act against Western imperialism.24 Hayashi saw the conflict as nothing more than the inevitable outcome of a “Japanese-American cold war,”25 initiated according to him in the mid-nineteenth century, hence his use of the term “Hundred-Year War.”26 This theory is not devoid of merit, but the absence of any reference to the crimes committed by the Imperial Army betrays the author’s partiality. After the student protests of 1968–1969, the period running from 1970 to the early 1980s was characterized by a focus on the civilian victims of the war, Japanese or otherwise. It was during this period that the three comprehensive Chronicles of Wartime Damage were compiled, covering the bombings of Hiroshima, Tokyo, and Nagasaki, respectively.27 Also worthy of mention are Honda Katsuichi’s Travels in China, initially published in the Asahi and based on Chinese accounts of Japanese violence; Military Comfort Women by Senda Kakō; and The Devil’s Gluttony by Morimura Seiichi, which helped raise awareness of the atrocities committed by Unit 731.28 Nevertheless, this focus on the suffering caused by war did not lead to the disappearance of texts questioning the figures and methodology of the Chinese, such as Suzuki Akira’s The Illusion of the Great Nanking Massacre.29 In the mid-1980s Japanese historiography entered a new phase. Those authors who had personally taken part in the war were gradually

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replaced by researchers and essayists from the next generation, leading to an increase in the perspectives adopted and the number of works published. The sociocultural approach in particular experienced spectacular growth, with numerous studies focusing on education; the role of women; the involvement of the media, artists, and intellectuals; and the situation in the colonies. Serious research was conducted into the massacres perpetrated in Asia, military prostitution, and the biological experiments— research undertaken by historians such as Kasahara Tokushi and Hayashi Hirofumi using English, Chinese, and Japanese sources. Finally, the revisionist movement also gathered pace, notably through the Japanese Society for History Textbook Reform, founded in 1996, a movement driven by intellectuals who tend to be quite poorly integrated into the research community, such as Nishio Kanji and Sugihara Seishirō.30 Three main approaches have thus driven the historical debate since the 1950s. First, there is a median viewpoint that echoes the American version of events introduced during the occupation: the war is presented as a transgression on behalf of military leaders, but the question of war crimes and responsibility is left relatively vague. Put simply, this is the view upheld by the government. On either side of this central line are two conflicting approaches. The first, represented by the Marxists, accepts the idea of a militarist dynamic but sees it as reflecting the semifeudal nature of prewar Japanese society. It stresses the crimes committed by the Japanese while highlighting the problems created by American choices after the defeat. The second, defended by nationalists and certain conservatives, places responsibility for the war on the Western powers, downplays or denies the massacres in China and Southeast Asia, demands that the American air raids be recognized as war crimes, and, finally, contests the Tokyo Tribunal and the “victor’s justice” it dispensed. Although the balance of power between these different positions has evolved in the six decades since the occupation and the polemic subjects have changed, a diverse range of views has always existed. Foreign analysts have often portrayed Japan as a self-pitying country that struggles to consider the suffering of others. This judgment fails to show the complete picture. There is no consensus in Japan on how the past should be interpreted. As Philip Seaton has shown, “there is no single typically ‘Japanese’ way of looking back on the war”31 but rather a variety of competing narratives. The dominant characteristic of Japanese historiography on World War II is fragmentation, an absence of unity.

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It is interesting to compare the Japanese situation with that of South Korea. On the peninsula, which transitioned to a democracy in 1987 following forty years of authoritarian rule, history resolutely serves as a political tool used to promote national unity. Japan, and the colonial occupation in particular, is used as a foil. To this day, each year tens of thousands of schoolchildren visit the major sites linked to Korean independence, such as Seodaemun Prison in Seoul or the Independence Hall in Mokcheon, central Korea. A unified discourse on the period 1910–1945 is systematically disseminated to the population. This is far from being the case in Japan, despite recent attempts made by the government at the instigation of nationalists. Some schools organize visits to Nagasaki, others take their pupils to Okinawa or Nanjing, while a certain number avoid such trips altogether. Knowledge of World War II among the young generations is thus highly fragmented, with those who visit the Hiroshima Peace Memorial coming home with a very different perception of history from those who travel to Okinawa. Historical knowledge in Japan has a tendency to be splintered and divided, in striking contrast to the situation in South Korea. Japanese textbooks, which devote little space to the period from 1910 to 2010 compared with the premodern era, both perpetuate and reflect this phenomenon. The absence of cohesion has led to a sidelining of twentieth-century history, a situation that only accentuates the dispersion of viewpoints. In some ways the coexistence of several interpretations and the vigorous debate this generates may be seen as a sign of Japan’s robust democracy. This system is not perfect, but then, none ever is. Korea’s nationalist exploitation of history and the French propensity to legislate on historical matters are not without their own problems. Yet the Japanese system is not so much a political choice as it is a reflection of the weakness of those in power. It is not democratic out of principle but rather by default. Several governments, notably during the prime ministership (2001–2006) of Koizumi Jun’ichirō, have attempted to bind the nation together using powerful historical symbols such as the imperial hymn, but this has merely exacerbated divisions and underlined the authorities’ lack of legitimacy on this matter. This analysis, which could be applied to several other areas, must once again be linked back to the emperor. Indeed, the fact that the monarch retained his role post-1945 as a “symbol of the state” and of national unity—thanks to his skill and efforts to bring this about—means that political power has never managed to reincarnate

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itself in another figure. The nation thus remains centered on the emperor, just as it was before 1945–1947, but since this center is devoid of constitutional power, the whole structure is loose, limp, and afloat. Figuratively speaking, the dense, tightly woven web of wartime Japan was not swept away by the occupation, it was simply left blowing in the wind, tattered and dangling. In these circumstances, no one has been able to pull the nation together using a grand heroic narrative, as in Korea, or an institutionalization of self-criticism, as in Germany. Given this context, it is logical that LDP conservatives would propose revising—as they did once again in 2012—article 1 of the constitution to elevate the emperor to the position of “head of state.”32

9 INDIVIDUAL CONSCIENCE AND COLLECTIVE INERTIA

THE RETURN OF SUBJECTIVITY

ino Ashihei was one of Japan’s principal wartime writers, and the novels he wrote, such as Earth and Soldiers, were widely read between 1938 and 1945. He was roundly attacked during the occupation by fellow members of the literary establishment, due in large part to his refusal to show contrition. Indeed, in Unhappy Soldier, published in September 1945, he argued that Japan’s position during the war had been legitimate, that its soldiers had been loyal in combat, and that this loyalty should remain one of the core values of the new Japan.1 Continuing to write despite having been purged, he criticized the opportunism of those who vilified the defendants at the Tokyo Trials and showed contempt for the many literary works of the day that painted a bleak picture of the battlefront experience and its brutality.2 While the fragmented nature of Japan’s war memories is a social phenomenon that can be explained retrospectively in systemic terms, it is impossible to ignore the clash of individual convictions that came about during the occupation, thereby structuring the memorial landscape. Four distinct profiles can be identified. Hino Ashihei belongs to the first group, which consists of individuals who were actively involved in the war and who, after the hostilities ended, took responsibility for their actions despite the defeat.

H

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The second profile consists of people who actively supported the war but who expressed regret after the defeat, claiming that they had been mistaken and had allowed themselves to be carried away by the events. The poet and sculptor Takamura Kōtarō is the most famous member of this group. Despite publishing impassioned poems into the final days of the war, he chose to withdraw from society during the occupation and live as a recluse in northern Honshu. This period of introspection led him to admit in 1950 to “seeing a model of stupidity in the foolish, ambiguous, and predetermined path”3 he had trodden. He simultaneously rediscovered the ideals of his youth, as illustrated in the following lines: “Alone in a corner of my workshop / I sigh deeply in silence and / The heart of the big, wide world / Soaks me like tears. / A kind, strong, and warm hand / Gently touches my shoulder. / I look up, and there is Romain Rolland / Still in his frame.”4 As with Takamura, for many Japanese the occupation was a period of reflection, a time for a radical overhaul in their system of values. The third group consists of all those who endured the national mobilization movement or who supported it reluctantly and who were able to express their frustration and rejection of the war upon the arrival of the Americans. This was the case for Miyamoto Yuriko, whose husband spent eleven years in jail from 1934 to 1945. As a well-known postwar figure in the Japanese Communist Party, she threw herself energetically into the peace movements: “War! Such power to destroy the lives of the common people these three letters convey! The life of the people is shattered between the burning sky and the mangled earth. For the people, war is directly a question of life and death. . . . Those of us who fear and loathe war must fight to eradicate it,”5 she wrote in 1950. It should be noted that many ex-soldiers identified with this militant stance. The fourth and final profile corresponds to individuals with relatively little ideological commitment to the policy of national mobilization but who suffered enormously. This includes a certain number of victims of the bombings, in particular those of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Given that the intensity of the trauma they suffered was not offset—or only to a very limited degree—by a sense of personal involvement in the war, they developed a selective and local memory, thereby helping to bring about a paradoxical memory that is both pacifist and anti-American. I say paradoxical, for while pacifism implies a rejection of war on principle, anti-Americanism, on the contrary, tends to justify it historically.

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These four profiles, established based on ideological engagement during the conflict and the polarity of postwar memories, can be applied to the majority of those who lived through the events. They also provide an understanding of how the memorial landscape in which later generations have grown up took shape. Nevertheless, this rapid fragmentation of Japan’s war memories would not have been possible without the liberation of individuals’ subjectivity, and in this, the measures introduced by the Americans undoubtedly played a decisive role. As early as October 4, 1945, for example, SCAP issued a memorandum obligating the imperial government to respect the freedom of speech and of assembly, “including the unrestricted discussion of the Emperor, the Imperial Institution and the Imperial Japanese Government.”6 Establishing the framework of a democracy in Japan created the conditions for an evolution in mentalities. Yet it was also essential that the Japanese seize the new possibilities on offer. As the philosopher Maruyama Masao (1914–1996) wrote in December 1945, “Today ‘freedom’ has unexpectedly been given to us, or rather, imposed on us by a foreign nation. But to speak of given freedom or enforced freedom is essentially a contradiction: it is a contradictio in adjecto, because freedom can come only from the Japanese people exercising their own minds to determine their own affairs. In other words, if we are truly to be free, we must wage a long and difficult battle to seize hold of this proffered freedom until it inhabits us.”7 Maruyama was one of the principal intellectuals to champion the idea of a society that valued people’s subjectivity. Yet he was perhaps unaware, in late 1945, that the seeds of this change he so ardently desired had already been planted. One whole swath of the population was ready for a more open society founded on the expression of individual conscience. Nakai Masakazu, as we saw earlier, was incarcerated between 1937 and 1939. He left Kyoto in early 1945 for his home city of Onomichi, in Hiroshima Prefecture, where the mayor put him in charge of the local library. After the war ended he remained in Onomichi until 1948, when he was appointed vice president of the newly created National Diet Library. During his three years in Onomichi Nakai introduced a series of initiatives aimed at promoting the development of local culture. As early as the autumn of 1945, for example, he gave a series of public lectures at his home and in the small library that he ran. He set the bar extremely high by choosing to focus his talks on Kant, whose importance on the issues of subjectivity and peace is well known. These lectures were attended by

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around twenty individuals, with the venues no doubt at their maximum capacity. Given the catastrophic situation in Japan at that time, this initiative is a testament to Nakai’s remarkable intellectual appetite and ambition. Shortly after, in June 1946, Nakai invited a group of scholars and artists from Kyoto to take part in a summer university in Onomichi. He repeated the experience the following year but on a grander scale. The event began in the ruins of Hiroshima before moving on to around twenty other towns and cities in the prefecture.8 The lectures given as part of this tour included “The History of the People,” by the historian Hani Gorō, and “Questions of Dialectics,” by the physicist and nuclear specialist Taketani Mitsuo.9 All the subjects offered demonstrate an astonishing confidence in the ability of Japanese citizens to undertake an in-depth reflection on the country’s historic situation and their role in society. The impact of Nakai’s work in the months following defeat was such that he was asked by the unions to represent the left by running for governor of Hiroshima Prefecture in 1947.10 Having received just over 40 percent of the votes, Nakai failed in his bid, but his activities are emblematic of a phenomenon found in various forms across Japan as of late 1945. This movement to promote individual freedom could no more be dictated by the Tokyo elites than it could be imposed by the Americans. While political reforms were no doubt decisive, as were famous writers and actors, the most important role was played by the citizens themselves, who even in the furthest-flung corners of Japan truly brought freedom to life through their initiatives, enabling a relocalization of the subject and thus a relocalization of memories. By definition, this process allowed differing opinions and sensibilities to be expressed, particularly with regard to the war experience. Having been locally rooted from the outset, the lines of division that exist in Japan may have evolved over time but have proven impossible to transcend.

CHANGING PERCEPTIONS

The importance of generation in people’s perceptions of the past is undeniable. Not only does a first division exist between those who experienced the events personally and those who did not, but there are also considerable differences even within these two groups—for example, between

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those who were children during the war and those who fought on the front. It is not always easy to pinpoint the influence generational differences may have on collective memory.11 Regardless of these difficulties, the 1990s and following decade saw increased exchange between the last remaining survivors of the war and the rest of society. This movement was bidirectional, with the survivors showing a desire to pass on their memories and the youngest generations moving to record the testimony of the oldest. This phenomenon, which peaked in 1995 and 2005, goes some way to explaining why the interest shown in memory-related issues has remained high over such a long period and has never really waned. In the wake of defeat, individuals were able to construct their own personal memory based on their experiences and the information obtained from the media and those around them. The freedom of opinion upheld by the Americans enabled people to express themselves within their families, or even publicly when this did not pose a threat to the occupiers’ interests. Looking back, it may seem as if the war was one of the major themes of the postwar period, particularly after the San Francisco Peace Treaty was signed. Certain well-known collections of soldiers’ letters published during this period, in addition to famous texts recounting the disasters of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, such as The Bells of Nagasaki (1949) by Nagai Takashi, Human Rags (1951) by Ōta Yōko, and Hiroshima Diary (1955) by Hachiya Michihiko, create an impression that the experience of the war was put into words, that individuals were able to make their voices heard. The reality was no doubt quite different. If we take Iwanami Shoten,12 for example, which published between two hundred fifty and four hundred titles annually during the 1950s, it was not until 1956 that a book whose title included the word “war” (sensō) appeared in its catalogue.13 A similar situation existed at other major publishers, such as Kōdansha and Asahi Shinbunsha. Admittedly, Bungei Shunjū, which at the time published around forty titles per year, devoted a significant portion of its catalogue to accounts by writers who had experienced the front; however, in general, the theme of World War II was not as present as one might expect. The norm for individuals long seems to have been relative silence, with a few great literary texts serving to publicly recount the experience of all. It was not until 1960, and even more so the 1980s, that personal accounts of World War II began to proliferate. Ever since, not a year goes by without a collection of written or audiovisual testimonies of the war

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being published. One of the most eloquent recent examples is NHK’s online publication of hundreds of interviews in 2010. Such publications have considerably enriched the history of the war, giving greater weight to the accounts of soldiers, women, and ordinary citizens: a former soldier who served in China, for example, described the army as a penal colony “worse than a prison for thieves and criminals”; one woman confided that families would secretly weep when their sons left for battle; another said that the Japanese at the time “were a bit like North Koreans” today; and one of the last survivors of the Battle of Attu concluded his account by describing war as “forcing innocent people to kill one another.”14 With the passing of time, speech has been partially set free. Yet in general there is nothing either heroic or vengeful about the view of the past that emanates from the accounts of the older generations. The way individuals describe their own past changes irremediably based on their age and the length of time that has passed since the events in question. It is important we fully measure these fluctuations in historical consciousness brought about by the passing of time.

CONTINUITY, CONCEALMENT, AND RESIDUAL MEMORY

Across the board in Japan, whether in politics, the economy, science, or culture, those who were influential during the war retained an important role after the defeat. This is particularly true in the political arena. The most famous example is Kishi Nobusuke (1896–1987), who began the war as a close ally of General Tōjō’s. He was appointed minister of commerce and industry in October 1941 and remained in the government until the fall of his mentor. Imprisoned in 1945, he was released in December 1948 and returned to politics in 1952 when the purge was lifted. He went on to become one of the main figures in Japan’s right wing and was instrumental in creating the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) in 1955. He was appointed prime minister in 1957, a position he held for three years. Despite his resignation in July 1960, the faction he led retained its influence, with Kishi’s younger brother, Satō Eisaku (1901–1975), serving as prime minister from 1964 to 1972. In total, almost half a dozen members of the Kishi family have held high-level posts since the war, one of the

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most recent being his grandson Abe Shinzō, who led the country between 2006 and 2007 and is currently prime minister. Many other similar cases exist—for example, Koizumi Jun’ichirō (b. 1942), who served as prime minister from 2001 to 2005, was the son of Koizumi Jun’ya (1904–1969), a representative from 1937 to 1945 who was purged during the occupation before later regaining his seat in the Diet and occupying various government positions thanks to Kishi’s backing. In total, out of the fifteen or so prime ministers who headed the government between 1980 and 2010, eight have fathers or grandfathers who held national-level positions during the war.15 This situation is thus the rule rather than the exception, one partially attributable to the strength of Japan’s patron-client networks. The country’s current leaders have personal and family ties linking them to Japan’s different wartime factions. To rephrase, for forty of the seventy years separating 1945 and 2015, Japan was governed by individuals who had either held positions of responsibility themselves between 1937 and 1945 or whose immediate relatives had done so. It is thus a euphemism to say that there has been no clean break in the political class since the late 1930s. Along similar lines, we must mention those involved in conducting biological experiments on humans during the war, many of whom “were able to assume leading roles in the postwar Japanese medical and scientific communities. Many became presidents of universities; others served as deans of medical schools.”16 Still others became renowned researchers, in part thanks to the data they had collected during the war. Nevertheless, while this continuity is clear, it remains incomplete. It should more correctly be described as a manufactured or interpreted continuity, due on the one hand to the relative absence of descendants of the militarists and, on the other, to the high proportion of relatives of moderates such as Konoe and Yoshida. In other words, the current political class reflects history as it was written during the occupation. Moreover, while this continuity by bloodline exists and is well known to both the families in question and to the friend and client networks, it is hardly advertised publicly. Although greater transparency is enjoyed today thanks to websites like Wikipedia, for many years dictionaries and reference books were extremely succinct about the wartime activities of public figures, and retracing their genealogy was no simple affair. This is particularly true for writers, artists, and intellectuals. In the Dictionary of Modern Japanese Literature, an authoritative reference in this field, the wartime activity of writers who held positions of responsibility in the military associations or

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patriotic societies receives only the most cursory, biased, or embellished treatment: the information given for Mushanokōji, for example, merely states that he “took up his pen in support of the war”;17 the entry for Takamura Kōtarō notes that he “was head of the poetry section at the Patriotic Society for Japanese Literature” but also stresses that he “vigorously denounced the blind conformity shown by writers who worked for the army”;18 finally, for Satō Haruo the dictionary mentions that he published “collections of patriotic poems designed to promote a fighting spirit,” but the paragraph nonetheless concludes on a positive note by stating that “we must not regret the fact that he openly expressed the intensity of his passions.”19 For many others whose involvement in the war was somewhat less visible, this period in their lives is quite simply ignored. It was only in the early 1990s, when the generations who had been adults during the war began to disappear, that the active role played in the conflict by the vast majority of Japan’s great writers, artists, and scientists of the era began to be known and accepted outside the restricted circle of far-left militants. That this truth took so long to emerge is due in part to the existence of a similar phenomenon in the West. In 2010, for example, an American critic writing on the subject of Kurosawa’s wartime film The Most Beautiful (1944), was still capable of stating that “The film’s theme—the necessity of complete self-sacrifice to the nation—was in harmony with the repressive state ideology of kokutai, but it was not an idea that Kurosawa personally believed in.”20 And yet, only directors who were trusted by the propaganda services were still allowed to work at this advanced point in the war, and Kurosawa left behind enough vehement articles that it is difficult to doubt the sincerity of his support for the national policy.21 Moreover, he was not content to merely direct this film; he also wrote the screenplay and considered it one of his favorites.22 This propensity to describe internationally known Japanese as victims of the militarist regime or as having been forcibly conscripted into the war effort stems from the highly vague and biased manner in which the Allies dealt with the question of war responsibility in particular and people’s level of commitment to the war effort in general. Accordingly, those responsible for promoting Japanese culture overseas (translators, critics, gallery owners, or producers) acted in line with their own interests, with the majority preferring to perpetuate the opacity that prevailed in Japan for the sake of image, because it was easier to act this way than to face complex discussions on the meaning of the war. There is thus a dual-faceted phenomenon

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at hand: first, a de facto continuity in which many politicians, industrialists, scientists, and intellectuals who supported the war effort have successfully continued their activities post-1945; and second, an occultation or watering down of the role of individuals during the early 1940s. This system is based not only on a denial of responsibility but also on a lack of discussion and on a kind of hypocrisy, the causes of which are to be found both inside and outside Japan. Nevertheless, this continuity between war and postwar is not confined to the elites and to questions of power and legitimacy. Many other equally important forms of continuity exist, notably in terms of values, social behavior, language, and representations. Let us take the example of sport, which was remarkably brought to the fore by Igarashi Yoshikuni.23 The author uses two striking case studies in particular, that of the wrestler Rikidōzan (1924–1963) and the women’s volleyball team at the 1964 Tokyo Olympics. Rikidōzan’s fights, which enthralled the crowds between 1954 and the early 1960s, were instrumental in the development of television in Japan. In return, his performance evolved in tandem with the technology, with the advent of color television leading to matches in which bloodshed was routine. Rikidōzan rose to media fame in 1954 through a series of televised bouts against the Sharpe Brothers, who had traveled to Japan especially for the event. Although Rikidōzan was Korean, his origins remained a secret and he was presented to the public as the prototype of the Japanese wrestler, particularly since he hailed from the world of sumo. As for the Sharpe Brothers, they were originally from Canada but made perfect Americans. The promoters of the fight, which ended with a victory for Japan, played shamelessly on the war reference. The Sharpe Brothers, for example, took on the stereotypical role of the bad guys by employing a variety of dirty tricks. Opposite them, Rikidōzan and his partner Kimura also adopted typical wrestling theatrics, respectively playing the role of the noble avenger and the expiatory victim. Kimura, a former judoka, was mauled repeatedly by the Sharpe Brothers until Rikidōzan finally stepped in and felled the two Western giants with a series of karate chops. This spectacle closely echoed the ideas championed by Japan’s wartime propaganda. We need only think back to the scene in Sugata Sanshirō: Part II, a Kurosawa film from 1945, in which Sugata, the quintessentially pure and sincere fighter, triumphs in similar conditions against an arrogant and brutal American boxer incapable of self-control. Here the continuity

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of  wartime values is total. Yet whereas the fiction from 1945 was contradicted by Japan’s military defeat, the “reality” of 1954 ended with a Japanese victory. These wrestling matches pitting body against body served openly as revenge and as an outlet for the nation’s frustration. The location chosen for these bouts was also emblematic. They were held at the former Kokugikan, a venerable prewar sumo stadium, which was used during the hostilities as a weapons factory (making exploding balloons for use against the United States) before being renamed the Memorial Hall by the Americans in 1945 in memory of the Allied soldiers killed on the Pacific front. Rikidōzan’s victory in this highly symbolic venue also represented the victory of the Japanese memory over that of the Americans. And yet, as Igarashi demonstrated, no matter how much Rikidōzan’s fights played on the image of a war still awaiting its victor, they also confirmed the abandonment of certain “Japanese”24 values. Indeed, this combat was American in form and primarily a commercial performance, worlds apart from the pure heroism glorified in the early 1940s. Even worse, of Rikidōzan and Kimura it was the judoka who was the weaker, while the stronger fighter was the one using karate techniques, a complete turnaround from the wartime message as seen in Sugata Sanshirō. Judo was associated with control and strength, in other words “true Japanese values,” while karate had connotations of brutality, violence, and thus something Western in nature, as embodied in the film by the character of Higaki. To achieve a symbolic victory over America in the 1950s, it was not enough to reenact the war as it had originally been waged; it had to be reenacted differently, using the weapons of the former enemy. This example illustrates the well-known idea that behind all signs of continuity and all reminiscences there are always elements that betray the past and merely serve the interests of the present. The final of the women’s volleyball tournament at the Tokyo Olympics in 1964, in which Japan trounced the Soviet Union, was watched by 66.8 percent of viewers, which as a percentage remains one of the highest audience figures in Japanese history and holds the record for a sporting event. The Olympic Games marked a turning point in Japan’s postwar history in that, henceforth, almost every trace of the destruction of 1945 had disappeared from the capital. In some ways Japan found itself as it had been in 1940, when the Twelfth Summer Olympics had been scheduled to take place in Tokyo. Symbolically speaking, the chapter of the war and Japan’s defeat had come to a close.

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The Japanese women’s volleyball team was coached by Daimatsu Hirobumi (1921–1978), an ex-soldier who had survived the terrible Burma Campaign and passed through a POW camp. His experiences on the front consciously determined his approach to training, as he stressed in two best-selling books, one of which, Follow Me!, was made into a film in 1965.25 In it, Daimatsu wrote in detail about how he owed his survival in 1944–1945 to sheer willpower, whereas those among his regiment who had lacked such determination and had allowed themselves to relax, even for a moment, had been unable to recover their strength and had rapidly perished. His philosophy can be summed up as a belief in the power of mind over matter, even in the most extreme conditions, and in willpower being the secret to survival and victory. Applied to the realm of sport, this philosophy translated into a considerable increase in the number of hours spent training, a permanent desire to toughen the body, sleep deprivation, and even the systematic denial of the effects of sickness, injuries, and menstrual fatigue. Even in the run-up to the Olympic Games, the athletes were allowed only three and a half hours of sleep per night and on the day of the final were forced to train for four hours before the match. The individuality of the athletes was also systematically disparaged and the group presented as the only thing worthy of interest. “[He] runs the team in the same way he ran a crack guerrilla outfit as a cadet officer in Burma, the Solomons and the Philippines in World War II,”26 wrote Life in its presentation of the 1964 Olympics. Superiority of the mind over the body, surpassing one’s own physical limits, total abnegation of the individual, glorification of the group: the values promoted by Daimatsu echoed those upheld by the wartime regime. As Igarashi wrote, “The volleyball players became substitutes for the wartime soldiers. Through the familiar trope of self-sacrifice for a larger cause, the players and the workers lived the wartime within the postwar. The bodies of the players, which were covered with joint bands and tape, were the remains of pre-1945 days.”27 This effect was reinforced by the fact that volleyball was already extremely popular during the war, as illustrated by Kurosawa’s repeated use of the motif of volleyball matches in The Most Beautiful to show the solidarity and enthusiasm of his heroines. However, volleyball games were not merely a means of reenacting the war, for the polarity of the events had changed. Indeed, the defeat had been accompanied by a radical reevaluation of the myth of Japanese self-sacrifice. Sakaguchi Ango, for example, explained in 1946 that “given

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that Japanese soldiers, who are impervious to hardship and privations, were beaten by the Americans, who can resist neither, it is clearly the Japanese spirit itself, and its tendency to make a virtue of austerity, that was defeated. It was considered unhealthy and decadent to take the elevator up to the fifth or sixth floor, on the grounds that people have legs! It was considered decadent to forget the beauty of physical effort and rely on machines! It is this ridiculous and retrograde mentality that led to the utter defeat of Japan today.”28 The success of Daimatsu’s methods reaffirmed exactly the opposite— namely, that the country had been right to fight the way it had, and that its value system was neither absurd nor retrograde. What touched the crowds in the early sixties was that, thanks to the victories of the national team, the ideology for which Japan had fought was no longer associated with folly, defeat, and ruin but rather with the winning of an “Olympic” title against a former enemy. Accordingly, the death of all those who had believed in the virtues of national heroism during the war, such as the kamikaze pilots, regained some meaning and could once again stand as a positive reference. In return, survivors were forced to admit that if Japan had lost the war, it was perhaps because they had lacked the necessary willpower. The theatricalized victories of soldierly stamina in the world of sport surreptitiously restored credit to those who had argued against the surrender in 1945. In consequence, they stoked deeply reactionary tendencies, while their profound impact and formative power were merely reinforced by the fact that their political dimension was not apparent. The economic successes achieved during the years of the postwar miracle inspired similar feelings. Indeed, there is a link between the sporting victories and the boom in Japanese industry. Note, for example, that the players coached by Daimatsu overwhelmingly hailed from a textile factory’s company team, where volleyball served to boost the workers’ productivity. The expansion of Japanese businesses was due partly to a conscious reactivation of the spirit of sacrifice glorified during the war. This in turn led the Japanese to develop a nostalgic and sentimental view of the war. For the more this spirit of sacrifice proved its efficiency, the more the suffering of the past took on an abstract and positive hue. As the huge media success of the sporting events discussed here suggests, this phenomenon was not limited to a specific social class or political tendency but rather concerned the whole of society.

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POLITICAL RATIONALES

The decisions made during the occupation are clearly responsible for the complex relationship contemporary Japan has with the war, yet the reasons this complexity has persisted must be sought elsewhere, notably in the way political power is organized and functions in Japan. If we were to apply Darwinian logic to politics, at the very least we could say that the country has not found a reason to resolve this situation. The supervised democracy of the postwar neither enabled a consensus to be reached nor paved the way for the emergence of a strong political line or charismatic figure with sufficient authority to bring about change. The communists, who have polled between 2 and 13 percent of the vote at legislative elections since 1946,29 were the quickest to denounce the crimes and responsibility of the nation’s wartime leaders. Nevertheless, there has always been a discrepancy between the party chiefs, such as Tokuda Kyūichi and Miyamoto Kenji, who spent the war in prison and whose return to the forefront of the political arena symbolized the people’s “resistance,” and the rank-and-file militants and intellectual sympathizers who did not share the same experience of the war, having, at best, experienced the resistance vicariously. The socialists, who until the emergence of the Democratic Party of Japan in the 1990s represented between 15 and 33 percent of the electorate,30 campaigned for Japan to acknowledge its responsibilities. As soon as they found themselves at the head of the country between 1994 and 1996, they thus issued powerful statements on the subject, notably through Murayama Tomiichi (b. 1924), who, in 1995, expressed remorse for Japan’s “colonial rule and aggression,” as well as for the suffering it had inflicted on the peoples of Asia, particularly through the system of forced prostitution. On the other hand, their position on individual issues was considerably less clear. Still in 1995, Murayama rejected any suggestion that the emperor had been responsible, explaining that he had “constantly prayed for world peace and had even, during the Last Great War, sought to avoid it at all cost.”31 Generally speaking, the socialists can be said to have respected and perpetuated the historic compromise that emerged from the Tokyo Trials. The right, which dominates the political sphere and governed the country continuously from 1948 to 1994, quickly took advantage of the left’s rejection of the war to position itself as the sole defender of the national

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honor, an electorally advantageous role. Nevertheless, pressure from Chinese and Korean victims, in addition to the work of a certain number of historians, has seen the center-right move toward a similar stance to that of the socialists. In 1972, for example, Japan accepted its responsibility for “inflicting untold sufferings on the Chinese people.”32 Since then, several right-wing governments have explicitly extended the issue to include colonialism and expressed remorse for the suffering caused to the Koreans and Chinese. These small steps, dictated more by economic considerations than by true convictions, have nonetheless brought about an evolution in Japan’s right wing. Yet its overall stance remains unclear, notably due to the fact that the far right is not autonomous and remains part of the LDP, although its political space has been enlarged since the party started down the road to recognizing the nation’s responsibilities. Opinion polls conducted between 2004 and 2006 tended to show that on a sensitive subject like the official visits to Yasukuni, a little under 40 percent of people were in favor, a little under 40 percent were opposed, and a quarter of respondents declined to answer or fluctuated from one survey to another.33 Political discourse reflects these divisions. The support shown by numerous LDP leaders for the official visits to Yasukuni or remarks like those made in 2000 by Mori Yoshirō, who described Japan as a “land of the gods” and used the term kokutai to refer to the nation, are not “blunders” or unfortunate comments that go beyond the speaker’s intentions. They reflect genuine ideological stances that satisfy part of the electorate. Yet those in power have never been able to defend such categorical positions for long. Conservative governments in particular have always ended up adopting a middle-of-the-road position in order to avoid alienating centrist voters and creating problems for themselves on the international stage. Japanese governments experience a chronic difficulty in imposing their views. There is little point in blaming the political class. The difficulty of passing major reforms, such as the creation of a national memorial to Japan’s victims in Asia, in a context of peace, prosperity, and democracy should not be overlooked. Indeed, with hindsight it seems that the only thing to have truly brought about a shift in positions has been the negotiations undertaken with China and South Korea. The right’s acceptance of Japan’s responsibilities has almost always come about in response to regional power dynamics. There is nothing in East Asia that resembles the European Union, a project that has not only helped alleviate interstate

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disputes but also encouraged the various peoples to accept their own errors. France’s admission in 1995 of the state’s responsibility in the deportation of Jews was made possible only by developments in FrenchGerman cooperation during the preceding decade. Whereas the European Union occasionally allows politicians to impose decisions on their citizens that would otherwise have been impossible, no intergovernmental structure in Asia has the necessary power to enable its politicians to break the status quo. On the contrary, Japan has neighbors for whom reviving the memory of Japanese crimes serves as a means of uniting the masses. The war against Japan constitutes a seminal event for the two Chinas, just as decolonization does for the two Koreas, and this will no doubt remain the case for as long the issue of reunification is unresolved. In the People’s Republic of China in particular, the creation in 1937 of a “United Front against Japan” is still presented today as the genesis of the contemporary nation—for example, in The History of China’s Anti-Japanese War, published in late 2011.34 In a similar vein, the Memorial for Compatriots Killed in the Nanking Massacre by Japanese Forces of Aggression (or Nanking Massacre Memorial Hall), built in 1985 and renovated in 1995, the Chinese People’s Anti-Japanese War Memorial Hall, opened in Beijing in 1987 and extended ten years later, as well as the previously

A school group sings in front of the Chinese People’s Anti-Japanese War Memorial Hall in Beijing, 2011.

FIGURE 9.1 

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mentioned Korean monuments, are as much intended as a commemoration of local victims as they are an indictment of Japan. In comparison, during this same period the French government chose the very nondescript name of Centre de la mémoire (memorial center) for the museum commemorating the massacre that took place in Oradour-sur-Glane.35 There is no reference either to the Germans or to the Nazis, indicating the government’s desire to avoid reigniting old tensions. For partly geopolitical reasons, South and North Korea, China, and Japan have been unable to create the conditions necessary for a reconciliation of the different memories; on the contrary, since the early 1980s they have chosen the path of confrontation, despite the growth in scientific and cultural cooperation. Ending this situation will be a long and arduous task, since the institutions created on the continent are substantial in both physical and financial terms, play a national educational role, and would not be best served by adopting a more neutral position.

NATIONAL APOLOGIES

“How many times must we say we are sorry? We have been apologizing for years, but it is never enough for China and Korea! What more can we do?” These comments made by a young woman during a dinner in Tokyo are far from unique. Such views have appeared in numerous publications and interviews for several years, in both right-wing and center-left circles.36 On several occasions since 1990, Japan, through its emperor and prime ministers, has expressed “feelings of remorse” for the “hardships,” “damage,” or “suffering” it caused during the war.37 Yet many overseas believe that Japan should do more: “Now is the time for the Japanese government to acknowledge its war crimes responsibility if Japan wants to maintain a rightful place in the international family of nations,” claimed, for example, Peter Li in 2003.38 Japan is not the only country to be criticized for the way it faces up to its past. In the Netherlands, the extent of the country’s responsibility in the persecution of Jews continues to spark debate. France has never apologized to Algeria for the colonization in general or for specific crimes, such as the Sétif massacre in 1945. Any number of examples could be given. The case of Japan must be considered in a global context in which

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moral reparations are increasingly emphasized and are now fairly clearly distinguished from the issue of financial compensation. Although the Japanese may feel that their country apologized long ago and has simply been repeating itself ever since, an analysis of the official statements reveals a slow but genuine evolution in the wording of the apologies. In the 1950s the country expressed its “remorse” (hansei). In the 1970s it acknowledged its “responsibility” (sekinin). Since the 1990s it has presented its “apologies” or “excuses” (wabi), depending on the translation. The evolution in terminology is clear. The words currently used convey a strong feeling of contrition. However, there has also been a significant change in the content of the statements. Until 1990 Japan apologized only for having initiated and waged the war. Since then, the government has occasionally expressed the nation’s remorse for more specific events, such as the deportation of Korean laborers to Sakhalin or the exploitation of women in military prostitution centers. In response to international pressure, as well as an evolution in domestic mentalities, Japan has made efforts to meet the demands of its neighbors. Nonetheless, this step-by-step approach frustrates the complainants as much as it antagonizes the Japanese. When East Germany, following four decades of denial, decided in April 1990 to accept responsibility for the Nazi’s crimes, it did so in one clear and definitive statement that read, “We ask the Jews of the world to forgive us.” It also chose to specify which acts in particular it was apologizing for—namely, “the humiliation, expulsion, and murder” that led to “genocide.”39 The Japanese statements have never been so clear-cut. Admittedly the notion of forgiveness is not as well established in Japan as it is in monotheistic countries. However, a similar idea does exist—namely, that those who cause offense must appease their victims. By this way of thinking, it is the responsibility of the aggressor to find adequate solutions, but “naming the offense is the first requirement of apology.”40 This has rarely been the case in Japan. There is no mention in the official communiqués of the words “crime,” “massacre,” “murder,” “rape,” “forced labor,” “sexual slavery,” “pillaging,” or even “act of violence.”41 In 1995, when Jacques Chirac gave a speech in which he recognized the state’s role in deporting Jews, he did so in a literary style. He spoke movingly of the events, including the Vel’ d’Hiv Roundup launched by French police on July 16, 1942: “On that day, in the capital and the Paris area, close to ten thousand Jewish men, women, and children were arrested in

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their homes at dawn and held in police stations. Appalling scenes were witnessed: families torn apart, mothers separated from their children, elderly men—some of whom were veterans of the First World War and had spilled their blood for France—were unceremoniously thrown into Parisian buses and police vans. . . . For all those arrested, there began the long and painful journey to hell. How many of them would never see their homes again? How many felt betrayed at that moment? How great was their distress?” The French president attempted through the use of rhetoric to show that the nation not only recognized its mistakes but also felt empathy for the victims. In contrast, the Japanese declarations singularly lack warmth; they are succinct and betray little emotion. They are not addressed to the victims but rather to diplomats well versed in the history of the negotiations. They are meaningful only when considered alongside previous statements, to which they constantly refer as if to legal texts. An analysis of their content suggests that the Japanese government sees the issue of apologizing as a power struggle in which the aim is to take a step toward the other, but not too quickly. Although Japan has gone further than many other countries in accepting its errors—for example, regarding its recognition of the suffering caused by colonialism—the method chosen and the cold, measured tone adopted have not only diluted the impact of the declarations but also fueled resentment, because apologies, as symbolic gestures, are not compatible with the spirit that prevails during a negotiation. Although the so-called Nanking events have been mentioned in school textbooks (which are approved by the Ministry of Education) since the early 1950s, the term “massacre” appeared only in the mid-1960s, in the book by Ienaga Saburō, which was the subject of a lengthy legal battle between the author and the government, notably over his treatment of this very topic.42 Textbooks describing these events gradually became commonplace during the 1980s.43 Yet even today, treatments of the subject remain somewhat vague. The history book published by Yamakawa has been used in half of all senior high schools in Japan since 2005 and is by far the market leader.44 On the page devoted to the invasion of China, the following brief description can be read in the footnotes: “During the fall of Nanking, the Japanese army pillaged and committed many acts of violence both in and around the city, as well as murdering a large number of Chinese prisoners and civilians, including women and children (the Nanking Events).”45 Although the events themselves are described, the term “massacre” is absent, and the fact that no figures are given leaves

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the subject open to interpretation. Another Yamakawa textbook, which is used in preparation for the university entrance exams, carries an even vaguer description. There is no mention of the term “massacre,” and a note explains that even a broad estimate—ranging from a few thousand deaths to three hundred thousand—cannot be considered certain.46 This wording is thus not incompatible with virtually revisionist stances. The books published by Yamakawa, which in reality represent the dominant view of history in Japan, employ the same type of rhetoric as the official apologies. Just as the government expresses its remorse for the war without going into detail or providing a death toll, so the aforementioned textbooks discuss Nanking without excluding the possibility that nothing truly criminal took place there. While it is true that most other textbooks address the existence of large-scale massacres head-on, these are less widely used, and, conversely, there is even a textbook that insists on the uncertain nature of these events.47 The majority of schools thus adopt a vague and ambiguous position, and the Ministry of Education merely adds to the confusion by authorizing textbooks presenting contradictory views. In contrast to the ambiguous treatment given to the suffering inflicted by the Japanese, the country’s status as victim features prominently. Presentations of the war systematically conclude with an estimation of Japan’s human and material losses. This Japan-centric view of history and emphasis on suffering, which originated with the victims’ and repatriates’ associations, has gradually come to dominate across the board. While it hardly casts Japan in a flattering light, it has the advantage of enjoying a domestic consensus and being relatively easy to defend at the diplomatic level. An analysis of the special war-related television programs that are traditionally broadcast in August reveals that, between 1991 and 2005, 50 percent centered on the bombings, repatriates, and other subjects with a “victimist” slant. The public broadcaster NHK stands out for the number of programs focusing on survivors of the atomic bombs. Conversely, less than 10 percent of programs dealt with the crimes committed by the Imperial Army or the views of those occupied or invaded.48 Given the impossibility of reconciling the progressive and conservative stances on the country’s values and the role of its leaders during the war, the only narrative capable of uniting the nation consists in highlighting all that it endured. Over time, this focus on the nation’s suffering, which originally represented the lowest common denominator between opposing political forces, has become the epicenter of Japan’s memory work, leading to the

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illusion overseas that there is a national consensus on the war in general, which is simply not the case. Powerful ideological and religious antagonisms do exist and structure the political sphere behind the scenes. Many examples illustrate the Japanese government’s extremely cautious approach to the issues of war memory and national symbols. This is true in the realm of diplomacy and education but also in the field of public media. We must therefore make a fairly clear distinction between politicians, whose categorical stances and grand gestures are very rarely followed by institutional change, and senior civil servants, who hold considerable power and steadfastly defend a minimum consensus on the idea that the country was a victim of the war, all the while preventing the development of any position likely to generate conflict. The treatment reserved for a complaint made by a group of teachers disciplined for having refused to stand before the flag or during the national anthem is characteristic of the way the Japanese government operates.49 In the background of this affair are two opposing interpretations of history: the teachers in question see the anthem and flag as invoking Japan’s militaristic past, while the local authorities, in particular the conservative former governor of Tokyo, Ishihara Shintarō, reject the attitude of contrition adopted since the defeat. In 2011, following a lengthy legal battle, the Supreme Court recognized the right of school principals to insist that teachers stand. However, in January 2012 it demanded that sanctions be lifted against teachers who had simply disobeyed passively, maintaining them only in cases where ceremonies had been actively disrupted—for example, when one teacher forcibly lowered the flag. While these decisions give national values precedence over individual conscience, individuals remain free to not support them. Consequently, this approach avoids the appearance of divisions and thus elicits compromise. Just as before the war, the government’s primary concern is to maintain national unity. Its overriding goal is popular harmony, and to achieve this it does not hesitate to take the time necessary to reconcile the different points of view, nor to adopt ambiguous solutions or antagonize the international community. It is from this perspective that we must understand Japan’s caution regarding the massacres and atrocities committed in China. With the various political tendencies unable to find a middle ground, the government prefers to favor ambiguous language and stalling tactics while in the meantime retaining its centrality and reinforcing its legitimacy.

10 MEMORY AND RELIGION

CHIDORIGAFUCHI MEMORIAL AND THE UNKNOWN SOLDIERS

n 2001, Koizumi Jun’ichirō tasked an ad hoc committee with studying the possibility of building a new site for commemorating the nation’s dead. The following year, in December, the committee delivered its first report. It recommended creating a new memorial dedicated to “praying for peace” and “remembering the dead,” not only Japanese nationals but also “all the foreign soldiers and civilians who lost their lives in the wars initiated by Japan,” thus beginning with Chinese victims. The report emphasized that this new monument’s purpose should not be to “console the spirits of the dead” but rather that it would “be national and secular, in contrast to Yasukuni Shrine, which from a legal standpoint is a religious institution.”1 This innovative proposal enjoyed the support of the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ), the Communist Party, the Social Democratic Party, and the Kōmeitō.2 However, it came up against opposition from the ruling LDP, as well as from the Federation of Veterans’ Associations, which considered Yasukuni and Chidorigafuchi National Cemetery to be sufficient for honoring the nation’s dead. Faced with protests from within its own ranks, the government was forced to bury the project. In fact, it is quite possible that Koizumi’s intention in setting up this committee was merely to create a diplomatic diversion and stall for time:

I

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it was a publicity stunt designed to counteract the negative impact of his visits to Yasukuni.3 Chidorigafuchi is infinitely less well known than Yasukuni, despite its being the principal national memorial built and managed by the Japanese government to commemorate the fallen soldiers of World War II. The construction of this site came about in response to the closure of Japan’s military cemeteries in late 1945, which resulted from the dissolution of the country’s armed forces. This event left the government facing an accumulation of unidentified human remains. In 1956 the Ministry of Health, which was responsible for veteran and commemorative affairs, listed around eighty-two thousand anonymous urns.4 With the country’s having regained its independence, finding a home for them became a pressing issue. However, the plan to construct a new memorial also satisfied two other requirements announced by the government—namely, providing citizens with a commemorative site devoid of religious connotations and creating a venue at which to hold official ceremonies and welcome foreign delegations, similar to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier under the Arc de Triomphe in Paris, where services for the war dead have been conducted since the end of World War I.5 Launched by Prime Minister Yoshida Shigeru in May 1952, the project took seven years to complete. One of the main stumbling blocks encountered by the project managers, who included former generals, was finding a suitable location. Among the solutions considered, a proposal to build the new memorial within the grounds of Yasukuni received particular attention, the idea being to create an ossuary either behind the shrine or at its entrance. Ultimately, problems concerning nearby buildings that would have overlooked the memorial, coupled with opposition from certain officials, prevented this idea from ever coming to fruition.6 This initial desire to combine spiritual commemoration of the soul and physical burial of the dead in a single location is noteworthy, however, since it echoes the prevailing logic of the early Meiji period. Nevertheless, the proposed plan ended in failure, a clear sign of differing sentiments among the population and the elites, regarding particularly the role and meaning of Japan’s religions. In other words, the contentious nature of commemoration in Japan stems in part from the state’s inability to establish Shinto as the religion of mourning. The site eventually chosen, Chidorigafuchi moat, lies five hundred meters below Yasukuni, toward the Imperial Palace. It is thus well located

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but relatively modest in terms of the surface area covered. A renowned architect was given the task of constructing the monument,7 while a line of cherry trees, their blossoms a botanical metaphor for the fallen soldiers, was planted along the banks of the moat. The design of the ossuary proper is enlightening, since it reveals a relationship with mourning and the past that differs slightly from what we know in the West. It is also intriguing from a symbolic point of view. The main building takes the form of an open-sided hexagonal pagoda made from concrete. A ceramic tomb stands in its center and can be approached by visitors. Made using materials sourced from the Asian and Oceanic territories where Japanese soldiers fell, it constitutes the heart of the monument and contains a golden urn commissioned especially by the emperor. Inside this urn, whose shape is reminiscent of a heart, are six white cloth bags containing bone fragments. These remains were chosen to represent the six main battlefronts—namely, Japan, Manchuria, China, the Philippines, Southeast Asia, and for some reason combined together, the Pacific and the Soviet Union. Underground is a crypt that is not accessible to visitors. It is divided into six funerary chambers representing each of the aforementioned geographical zones. It originally held eighteen large earthenware jars containing a fragment taken from each of the tens of thousands of anonymous urns retrieved by the government.8

FIGURE 10.1  Chidorigafuchi

Memorial in Tokyo.

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In contrast to the monuments dedicated to unknown soldiers in the West, the solution adopted in Japan is not purely symbolic. It is not one body designed to represent all others. There is a desire to conserve something of each individual. Furthermore, the dividing of the bones by geographical area suggests a wish to establish several distinct groups. This approach reveals the same metonymic logic that drove Japan’s wartime procedures for retrieving and disposing of the dead. Whenever the issue arises, the Japanese tend to choose solutions that maintain a physical link between the dead and the living. They favor traces, relics, an imagined contact—anything that might create a feeling of a direct link. While metaphorical images such as cherry blossoms are sometimes employed, these remain peripheral, and grand abstract symbols are avoided. The result in a case like Chidorigafuchi is that not all bereaved families are on an equal footing. For the relatives of deceased soldiers, this ossuary functions as a grave, for it potentially contains a relic of their loved one. For other families, however, this can be a source of discomfort. This site thus blends private mourning with public commemoration, which no doubt explains in part why it never became the national monument it was intended to be. The most sacred place at Chidorigafuchi is the central tomb. In offering the main urn, the emperor indicated his acknowledgment of the past and his desire to watch over the dead. He also demonstrated that he was not merely a “symbol” of the nation, akin to the president of Germany, but rather that he is physically tied to each of his citizens. Behind this memorial is thus a philosophy reminiscent of Japan’s wartime rhetoric— namely, that the One (the individual) is indissociable from the Whole (the empire) and from the Plurality (the comrades-in-arms, the nation). It is this three-way interdependence that the memorial at Chidorigafuchi seeks to express. For all this, Hirohito visited the memorial on just three occasions: in 1959 for its unveiling, in 1965 for the twentieth anniversary of the war’s end, and then one final time in 1970.9 He generally preferred to send a member of the imperial family in his place. From 1959 until his death, he thus visited Yasukuni once more than Chidorigafuchi (1959, 1965, 1969, 1975), suggesting a hierarchy between the two establishments.10 Chidorigafuchi could have served as a “tomb of the unknown soldier” and united the nation in memory of its dead, but there has never been sufficient political will for this to occur. Neither the imperial house nor the country’s succession of governments has been prepared to abandon Yasukuni for a secular memorial. This is because secularizing

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commemoration would mean adopting a “Western”11 solution and, above all, would imply a definitive break with the Meiji ideal of an intertwining of state and religion, something that the emperor continues to embody despite the limitations on his powers. In the summer of 2008, Sasaki Yūko took part in an excavation in Khilok, in the Transbaikal region of Russia. She was accompanied on this fifteen-day mission by two bureaucrats from the Ministry of Health, an interpreter, and nine other volunteers. Born in 1979, this young woman belongs to an association dedicated to recovering the bodies of Japan’s war dead. She had already taken part in two previous excavations, one in Burma and one in Siberia.12 The aim of this new mission was to retrieve the buried remains of Japanese who had died between 1947 and 1956 in a Soviet labor camp where they were held after being captured in Manchuria in 1945. In total, 217 corpses were recovered and cremated. The bones were then placed in urns, returned to Japan, and entrusted to Chidorigafuchi. In 2009 the ossuary listed the remains of 354,332 unidentified individuals, essentially soldiers but also a number of civilians. In her report, Sasaki wrote that “today a ceremony was held to celebrate the handing over of the urns. Many bereaved families were present. As we entered Chidorigafuchi carrying the bones, one person in tears stared fixedly at the box I had the honor of holding. I prayed with all my heart that the hero I held within my arms might be his father. Tears came to my eyes at the thought of the unfathomable suffering he had endured for so long.”13 Some families attend such ceremonies at Chidorigafuchi when they know that their loved one was in the region where the bones were found. However, the bodies are not returned to the families, for the simple reason that identification is almost never possible. This is yet another indictment of the Imperial Army’s failed system for retrieving and disposing of corpses. The identification tags used by Japanese soldiers were not like their American equivalents, which have been popularized in Hollywood films. In the United States Army, each soldier wears two tags stamped with their name and regimental number. In the event of death, one is collected for notification and the other left with the body. In the Japanese army it was only officers who carried name tags. The small brass plates worn by rank-and-file soldiers merely detailed their company number and an ID code that could be passed from one soldier to another in the event of death or transfer. Given that the majority of military registers containing such administrative information were destroyed when Japan surrendered, an ID tag alone is rarely

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enough to identify a corpse. The vast majority of bodies retrieved since 1959 have thus remained anonymous and have been laid to rest at Chidorigafuchi. State involvement in this process has been minimal given the extent of its responsibility. From 1952 to 1966 the issue barely went beyond electoral promises and hype. It was only in the mid-1960s, twenty years after defeat, that the government truly committed itself to actively recovering bodies, at a time when the economy was back on its feet and the principal battle scars had disappeared from the cities.14 Symbolically, the major excavation campaigns were carried out only after the Tokyo Olympics. Priority was thus given to the competitions of the present rather than the victims of past conflicts. Moreover, the growing discrepancy since the 1980s between media coverage of politicians’ visits to Yasukuni and the state’s gradual disengagement from the excavation programs has long created an impression of cynicism. This did not escape the notice of DPJ leaders, who after coming to power in 2009 promptly revived the search for the dead and ruled out visiting the shrine. It is from this perspective that Prime Minister Kan Naoto’s visit to an excavation site on Iwo Jima in December 2010 must be understood.15 In the international sphere, the issue of retrieving soldiers’ remains has frequently featured in negotiations with Russia and China, countries with which relations have always been strained. China’s long-standing refusal to allow Japan to recover its dead reveals the depth of its resentment. However, this stance also serves a political end, for it enables China to maintain pressure on Japan and saves it from digging up the past—both literally and figuratively—since the official figures established in the chaos of civil war are much more convenient than undertaking a detailed reexamination of the responsibilities of the main parties in the war—namely, Japan, the Kuomintang, and the Communist Party of China. Finally, the importance of citizens groups cannot be overstated, since volunteer associations have played a vital role in the bone-collection campaigns. Their efforts have enabled tens of thousands of families to feel that the relatives they lost were not merely abstract heroes and that they have not been forgotten as individuals. Many young people take part in these fairly grueling missions. In 2009, over fifty such volunteers were involved in excavations in Siberia, Mongolia, New Guinea, and Okinawa.16 A number of participants demonstrate strong patriotic, or even nationalistic, proclivities. In Europe, and the West in general, little importance seems to have been attached to the manner in which corpses retrieved from the battlefield

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were  handled. In contrast, the Japanese bone-collecting missions are highly ritualized. The first statutory text on the subject was issued in 1954 and stipulated the following sequence of events: “Excavation and collection of bones; classification of objects found; identification of the person; cremation; extraction of bones for repatriation; disposal of remaining ashes.”17 While this is indeed the procedure observed, the administrative language fails to convey the care taken during these operations, particularly today as the number of bodies being found diminishes. The bones are carefully washed before being stacked into small individual piles. The skeletons are then cremated side by side, but separately, and during a ceremony, the aim of cremation being simply to purify the relics through fire and not to reduce them to ashes. The bones are then washed again and collected one by one to be placed in an individual urn. This time-consuming process elicits an intense feeling of being in contact with the deceased.

FIGURE 10.2  Former

Japanese soldiers are cremated in the Philippines.

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Generally speaking, Japanese culture attaches great importance to bones.18 Modern literature often contains descriptions of the “bone gathering” (kotsuage) ceremony that follows cremation, an intensely emotional moment during which relatives place the charred remains of the deceased in an urn, one fragment at a time. Depictions of this ritual also appear in film—for example, Graveyard of Honor (1975) by Fukasaku Kinji, which includes a scene in which the hero carefully gathers the bones of his wife with chopsticks and then proceeds to bite into one in order to show his adversaries that he is determined to die. Also noteworthy are the white Buddhas, a type of sculpture made from powdered human bones. This was the theme of a novel by Tsuji Hitonari, in which the author writes, “Upon opening his father’s grave, Minoru found an urn containing a compact heap of bones, as pale as fragments of coral. He picked one up between his fingers. He recalled his father’s sturdy frame when he was alive. His stern expression as he worked. Memories flashed through his mind one by one, as if transmitted by the bones.”19 While in the West the practice of worshipping bones has waned considerably since the nineteenth century, in Japan it has only grown stronger thanks to the widespread recourse to cremation and the collecting of relics. It implies being palpably in contact with a stable and purified form of death. The effect created is one of incarnation, of a pleasant transference from the dead to the living. This sense of the bones embodying the deceased is palpable in the texts drawn up as part of the excavation missions. The following comments were taken from the bulletin of a youth volunteer association: —Unfortunately, rain meant that we could work for only an hour; we did, however, discover another body resting nearby. From tomorrow, the remaining work will be carried out by the group that departed after us, but at least we were able to completely excavate this pit and ensure that no bones were left behind. I feel sorry and my heart is heavy when I think that we made them wait sixty years.20 —I found a tooth; it was white and clean, as if it had been alive all this time. At first I simply thought of it as a thing, but when I held it in my hands once our work was finished, I realized that it had been alive.21 —I was lucky enough to light the fire. “Finally you can return to Japan! Sorry to have made you wait so long,” I thought as I lit the fire. I even had a feeling that, just for a moment, the bones seemed at peace.22

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The expressions used often betray a personification of the corpses: they are said to be “resting” underground, the volunteers “come to meet them,” and when it rains during an excavation, it is described as the falling of “heroes’ tears.”23 An aura of magic surrounds the retrieval of soldiers’ remains. Although these practices concern a very small section of the population, they continue to exist and have a profound effect on people. In this respect, commemoration in Japan differs markedly from that in France, where the ceremonies held at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier have essentially lost their magic. Responsibility for repatriating the remains and commemorating unidentified soldiers has been coordinated by the state. As such, and in accordance with the constitution, these tasks have escaped religious control. However, the state has not sought to empty them of all religious sentiment in order to pursue a secular ideal; it has simply ensured that none of the dominant religions takes precedence. In other words, as on so many other occasions during Japan’s long history, it has encouraged the emergence of a kind of Shinto-Buddhist syncretism. While any religion may hold obituary rites at Chidorigafuchi, including Christian churches, the focus of the rites—in other words, the bones themselves— has a truly syncretic dimension. Cremation and the worshipping of relics are essentially Buddhist practices.24 This is why in the vocabulary of commemoration, even in official texts, cremation is referred to as dabi, a term that, unlike the more neutral kasō, has a marked Buddhist connotation.25 Yet Buddhist crematory practice prior to the twentieth century left bone matter blackened with ash. The carbonized remains could be used to animate an altar or a statue or to consecrate a building, but viscera or blood could also serve the same purpose. This is no longer the case today, with an effort now being made to obtain relics that are as clean as possible. The bones are scrubbed and washed, with only the palest retained. This suggests the influence of Shinto, where the taboos surrounding pollution and defilement have always been extremely strong. Given this fact, it is remarkable that the Shinto term hashira is used to count bodies.26 Corpses can also be referred to as “heroic souls” (eirei), as is the custom at Yasukuni. This evolution toward a “cleanliness of death” has been accompanied by a loss of appetite for the display of corpses, despite this having been a common practice in Buddhism throughout its history. The national commemoration of unidentified soldiers is thus characterized by a renewed fusion of Shinto  and

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Buddhist elements. This syncretism has not led to a disenchantment of mortuary rites; on the contrary, it has perpetuated a magical relationship with the past.

THE DISSEMINATION OF SHINTO

Beginning in the mid-nineteenth century, Shinto acted as a “mediator of modernity.”27 Its rites underwent radical changes, many popular practices were rejected, and Buddhist references, eradicated. It was adapted to the centralizing logic of the Meiji government, which saw this as a means of countering the influence of Christianity. It rapidly established itself as a natural and mythical order that was above the level of ordinary religion. As such, it is not simply an archaic embodiment of Japanese beliefs, as it was occasionally presented in the American wartime press. On the contrary, in its official form it represents a kind of modern theologization of the national sentiment, the efficiency of which has been largely proven since the Meiji period. The role and workings of Yasukuni have changed little since 1945. In 2007 its registers listed 2,466,532 souls, including 2,133,915 for the “Greater East Asia War,” 191,250 for the “China Incident,” and 17,176 for the “Manchurian Incident.” Note that the names given to the conflicts by the shrine have not changed since the war. For comparative purposes, just over 60,000 souls are registered at the military shrine in Mie, which is proportional with the size of this prefecture. Yasukuni has thus retained a national dimension,28 but the dead (now divinities) are always venerated at several shrines simultaneously—not to mention in graveyards, ossuaries, and at other public or private monuments. Yasukuni is thus not the only place where the nation’s dead are commemorated, which merely underlines the political nature of the visits made by Japanese leaders. In addition to Yasukuni and the fifty-two prefectural shrines that form a uniform network throughout the country, a number of other Shinto institutions exist. These shrines vary in size and are dedicated to specific military figures, such as Admiral Tōgō and General Nogi. I have identified close to eighty such establishments, whose geographical distribution around the country is relatively even, although less so than the prefectural shrines. Around twenty of these shrines still go by the name of gokoku

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jinja (shrines for protecting the nation), although they are not officially recognized as such. Accordingly, in total there are approximately one hundred thirty shrines where the spirits of the nation’s heroes are venerated, either collectively or individually, a figure that is very close to the number of military shrines listed by the Americans in 1945.29 This is why it is possible to speak of a seventy-year status quo in Shinto commemoration. In purely quantitative terms, there has been neither growth nor sharp decline. With the network of military cemeteries having been abandoned in 1945, many families opted to erect a grave in a public cemetery or one managed by a Buddhist temple, but using a Shinto-style stele similar to the steles employed by the armed forces.30 These distinctive obelisks are easy to recognize, particularly since they generally stand slightly taller than other tombstones. They may carry information on the soldier’s regiment and rank, or even a star or the symbol of an honorary distinction received. The presence of military graves is immediately apparent. They can be easily identified at Higashiyama, on Kyoto’s “spirit mountain,” as well as in numerous small cemeteries located inside or outside the capital—for example, at Shōunji, a Zen temple in Tokyo. Although relatively plain in style, as the regulations stipulate, they are not inconspicuous and in fact have been made more visible than other tombstones. The absence of a dedicated area for soldiers’ graves does not prevent most Japanese cemeteries from possessing monuments commemorating the war. These days the vast majority of Japanese victims from the various modern conflicts are enshrined at Yasukuni. This includes the soldiers killed in action, of course, but also those who died of sickness or injury, those who disappeared, civil servants who died overseas, members of the patriotic societies, conscripted laborers, women and youths mobilized as part of the defense groups, members of the civilian volunteer corps, and any Okinawans, because of the widespread participation of the local population in the battle that took place in the spring of 1945. Finally, some 1,068 convicted war criminals who were executed or died in prison during the occupation were also registered at Yasukuni between 1959 and 1978.31 The categories not enshrined at Yasukuni, notably children and the elderly, are thus in a minority and, above all, represent sections of the population that were not present in the cities during the bombings of 1945. Relatively speaking, they suffered little during the war. Nevertheless, the exclusion of certain victims from Yasukuni clearly illustrates that its mission is not

FIGURE 10.3  The inscription on the left-hand stele reads, “Grave of Kawabe Toyojirō, senior private in the infantry, eighth rank military medal, Order of the Golden Kite seventh class.” The right-hand stele reads, “Grave of Ishizu Taizō, senior private in the infantry, eighth rank military medal, Order of the Golden Kite seventh class.” Ōtani Cemetery, Kyoto.

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to perpetuate the memory of all those who died for the nation but rather to glorify heroism and the spirit of sacrifice, since it is this that justifies the deification of certain individuals. The role of Yasukuni is thus primarily political and ideological. Visiting figures at Japan’s military shrines vary considerably from one prefecture to the next, but these shrines systematically contain steles dedicated to the memory of a particular regiment. The Hyōgō military shrine in Himeji, founded in 1938, has half a dozen such monuments. Among the most important of these memorials is one constructed in 1982, dedicated to fallen members of the 17th Regiment of the 23rd Field Artillery Division, as well as a stele erected in 1992 for the 139th Infantry Division of Himeji. The military shrine in Kyoto is older and more prestigious. It has over twenty monuments dedicated to various units, such as the 53rd, 109th, and 128th Infantry Regiments, or the 128th Field Artillery Regiment. These were constructed gradually after the 1960s and are clearly maintained since several have been rebuilt or augmented with a plaque. Most of them are marble or granite steles with a square cross section, but others have a more original form, such as a helmet and machine gun located to the right of the Kyoto shrine and which were brought back from a Burmese battlefield in 1975.32 Most of these memorial steles were donated by war-bereaved families’ associations, which may be headquartered at the shrine. Not only are shrines a place of contemplation and prayer for those who suffered during the war, but they may also serve as a gathering, meeting, or even work space, similar to French town halls, which frequently house veterans’ associations. It stands to reason that these activities will decrease substantially in the years to come as the generation that experienced the war disappears. Nevertheless, the role of the public authorities continues to be a point of contention. During the occupation, American orders were that politicians could visit temples and shrines only in a personal capacity. Yet on September 10, 1951, two days after the San Francisco Peace Treaty was signed, the Ministry of Education and the Repatriates Assistance Agency issued a circular authorizing politicians and local bureaucrats to attend funerary or commemorative ceremonies organized by religious movements.33 Although this measure was a reaction to the American-imposed separation of state and religion, it nonetheless appears to contravene article 20 of the constitution, which stipulates that the state and its

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organs “shall refrain from religious education or any other religious activity.” This legally surprising measure saw a rising number of visits made to Yasukuni, notably by Yoshida Shigeru on October 18, 1951, an event that was accompanied by a parade through the streets of Tokyo, clearly demonstrating the desire of part of Japan’s political class to reestablish a form of State Shintō.34 Conservative leaders made a series of visits over the following decades, including Ikeda Hayato and Satō Eisaku in the 1960s, Tanaka Kakuei and Miki Takeo in the 1970s, Suzuki Zenkō, Nakasone Yasuhiro in the 1980s, Koizumi Jun’ichirō between 2001 and 2006, and, most recently, Abe Shinzō in December 2013, with the majority of prime ministers visiting Yasukuni in an “exceptional,” “personal,” or “ex officio” capacity. Each visit has triggered intense debate, particularly since the enshrining of war criminals in 1978, merely underlining the symbolic importance of Yasukuni in people’s minds. It is true that both before and during the war, regular visits to Yasukuni were the norm for all Japanese officials, most notably the emperor. In this respect, the period beginning in 1951 was merely a continuation of the past. And yet shrines can be said to have increased their legitimacy as places for commemorating the nation’s dead during the postwar years. This is evident in two songs, the first of which was released in 1939 to huge popular acclaim. Titled “A Mother in Kudan,” it portrays an elderly woman who makes the long journey to the capital in order to pay tribute to her son who died in combat.35 But as she stands before the altar at Yasukuni, she clasps her hands together, falls to her knees, and begins to recite the nenbutsu, a Buddhist prayer. Suddenly realizing her mistake, for she is at a Shinto shrine and not a temple, she cries out, “Forgive me, son, I am but a lowly peasant!” These lyrics clearly suggest the predominance of Buddhism and a relative ignorance of Shinto practices among the working classes. Yet this no longer seems to have been the case twenty years later. “I’ve Come to See You, Father” is the title of a song that explores the same theme.36 Modeled closely on its predecessor, it follows the same melodic line and features several of the same expressions in its lyrics. In this version, however, the mother has been replaced by a young boy, who represents the new generation and has no difficulty performing the correct gestures: he no longer kneels but clasps his hands in silent prayer. This change suggests that the use of Shinto rites to commemorate the dead had gained ground. This evolution was due primarily to the tremendous impact of wartime propaganda, which brought

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millions of people into the shrines. However, one could also posit that the restrictions put in place by the Americans provoked a popular reaction and firmly established the national importance of these rites in people’s minds. Nevertheless, Shinto commemoration has always been problematic. It struggled before the war to carve out a place for itself alongside Buddhism; it has fought ever since the occupation against the separation of politics and religion. Despite providing a framework for bereaved families and former soldiers to mourn the war dead, it was and continues to be an instrument of the state, the imperial household, and the political elites.

BUDDHISM, ABOVE AND BEYOND HISTORY

In contrast to the Shinto faith, Buddhism does not content itself simply with signaling the sacredness of the dead and their abstract participation in the divine; it possesses a structured and detailed eschatological discourse. Although it upholds the fundamental equivalence of life and death, it offers each individual an elaborate description of the afterlife, including hells, intermediate states, reincarnations, and forms of heaven or Pure Lands. By providing precise answers to people’s questions concerning their fate after death, in addition to rules of conduct and a moral code for them to achieve their aim, Buddhism has established itself as the religion of death since ancient times. There is a long tradition of Buddhist temple-cemeteries built as a place to store remains and comfort the souls of soldiers killed in action. The most famous example of such establishments is the network of temples known as Ankokuji, a name whose corresponding characters could also be pronounced Yasukunidera. This network was established by the shogun Ashikaga Takauji (1305–1358) and entrusted to the Rinzai school of Zen Buddhism following the civil war that pitted him first against the Hōjō clan then against Emperor Go-Daigo (1288–1339). Even in the early twentieth century, following the wars with China and Russia, several temples around Japan erected lanterns and small funerary towers in memory of the victims. There is thus a historical coherence to Buddhism’s having retained a role in the mourning and glorification of the dead after World War II.

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Today it is Shingon and Shin Buddhism that have the greatest involvement in celebrating the nation’s dead; however, the Tendai sect and Zen schools also play their part. The Buddhist role in commemoration takes the form of prayer and collective celebrations but also the construction of temples, statues, bells, and stupas. However, this work has been undertaken at a nonnational level, on the initiative of sects, local communities, associations, or individuals. Indeed, in contrast to shrines, temples vary greatly in size. Some are tiny pavilions; others are vast, like Jingoji on Mount Hachimen in Kyushu, where a peace park was built in memory of the victims of World War II. Similarly, while certain temples are dedicated entirely to the war dead, in the majority of cases a pavilion or funerary tower was simply erected within or near an existing temple. This is true of the vast cemetery on Mount Kōya, where several recent monuments to the war dead can be found next to Kūkai’s mausoleum, including one dedicated to war criminals. In total, more than two hundred temples fall into this category, which is slightly more than the number of Shinto shrines. However, the geographical distribution of these temples across Japan is extremely uneven. In prefectures like Fukushima, Ishikawa, or Shimane, for example, I did not find any, whereas there are forty-seven in Tokyo, twenty-two in Kanagawa, and thirteen in Tokushima.37 The authorities have made no move to centralize or harmonize Buddhist rites. These are determined solely by the initiatives of sects and private individuals. Nevertheless, although it is not on the same scale as the Shinto faith, Buddhism does play an important role in terms of individual practices. The temple Ryōzen Kannon is one of the most important of this type. Founded in Kyoto in 1955 thanks to the donation of a rich businessman, its centerpiece is a twenty-four-meter-high statue in painted concrete and steel.38 Most significantly, however, it is situated immediately below the military shrine. The presence of a temple in this symbolic place illustrates the commemorative role assigned to Buddhism after the war. Beneath the statue of Kannon is the temple itself, where the memorial tablets of two million victims of the war are venerated. Every day, four services are held in their memory. Note that this figure of two million corresponds to the number of souls enshrined at Yasukuni. In fact, virtually all Japan’s war dead are honored using both Shinto and Buddhist rites, with the two religions appropriating the deceased with little regard for their personal convictions. Behind the statue is a small memorial unveiled in 1958 that contains an English inscription to the “unknown soldiers killed during

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World War II.” The temple’s garden also features a dozen monuments dedicated to various army units and regiments. These stone constructions, the oldest of which dates from the 1960s, are occasionally more rectangular in shape than those seen at shrines but in many cases are identical. Similarly, funerary towers (tō) are no longer systematically ossuaries, and steles (hi) can be found equally in temples and shrines. The commemorative paraphernalia of each religion is thus virtually indistinguishable. Last, note that in the inscriptions found on war memorials, the notion of comfort and consolation has largely replaced the former glorification of loyalty. The hope for peace has supplanted the desire for order. Temples systematically contain representations of divinities from the Buddhist pantheon. Most common is the bodhisattva Kannon, the embodiment of divine compassion who guides the deceased to the western Pure Land. The location of these statues or a nearby plaque generally indicates their purpose. In some cases the war reference is explicit—for example, at Kōonji temple, where the bodhisattva is shown holding a small pilot in her right hand.39 However, it is not only in temples that statues are found. In Hiroshima, for example, a wonderful representation of Kannon stands near the city’s former castle. Crafted from shiny metal by the sculptor Kitamura Seibō, it is a prayer for all the victims of the atomic bomb. The statues known as Peace Kannons are another type of representation of the goddess that is more or less directly linked to the memory of the war. It is not rare for these statues, which are generally white, to be built on a monumental scale. This is the case of a giant seventy-eight-meter-high Kannon on the island of Awaji, but other examples exist in Kurume, Futtsu, Kamaishi, and Aizu-Wakamatsu. In total there are over twenty Peace Kannons across Japan measuring more than twenty meters. Almost all were built between 1960 and 1990 thanks to donations from rich patrons who made their fortunes during the economic boom of these three decades. As such, they can be described as spectacularly marking the revenge of Buddhism—and in some ways of entrepreneurship and merchant capitalism—on the state and Shintoism following almost a century of privation and all manner of frustrations. Kannon is not the only divinity invoked to commemorate the dead. The bodhisattva Jizō,40 revered for his compassion and unfailing ability to deliver the faithful to the afterlife, is also frequently depicted. More particularly, a certain number of Peace Jizōs exist. Although uncommon, they can be found in several cities—in Tokyo, for example, but also in

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FIGURE 10.4  Statue

of the bodhisattva Kannon at Ryōzen Kannon temple in Kyoto.

Osaka, Kawasaki, and Hiroshima. Representations of Jizō are generally small in stature and set into little shrines located on street corners. Monumental examples are rare. In the Tokyo neighborhood of Sendagi,

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one such depiction of the divinity is dedicated to comforting the souls of twenty-three local residents killed during an air raid in March 1945. The wisdom king Fudō is also regularly represented, since he is the main tutelary deity of soldiers and is said to protect them in both life and death. Notable postwar depictions of Fudō include a large painting by Kawabata Ryūshi titled Copy of Red Fudō.41 Kawabata created this painting in 1946, shortly after learning that his son had died two years earlier in Borneo. However, he replaced the wisdom king’s two habitual companions with portraits of his grandsons. Finally, temples dedicated to the war dead occasionally contain statues of the Buddha on his deathbed, known as nehanzō in Japanese. Examples exist at Jingoji and Ryōzen Kannon-dō. We must keep in mind, however, that Buddhist divinities, just like Christian saints, are meant to be above history. From time to time statues representing them may be connected to specific events, but they have neither the same purpose nor the same temporality as memorial steles. They possess a metaphysical dimension that precludes any restriction of their significance to a particular episode. The fate of the Three Human Bullets epitomizes the sensitivity of the Japanese to the fluctuating and transitory nature of things. This sculpture, originally located near a Zen temple in central Tokyo, glorified the sacrifice of three soldiers killed in China in 1932. It was the fruit of a public fund-raising initiative to which several important figures of the period contributed, notably Prince Konoe. Bone fragments from the three men were placed in the sculpture’s base in an effort to make it more powerfully affecting. When the war ended, the authorities dismantled the statue without awaiting the commission of inquiry’s verdict.42 For a number of years it lay forgotten behind the temple. However, when the occupation came to a close, it was decided that the statue should be given a new lease on life. One of the three figures was thus placed in a cemetery overlooking the temple where it had lain abandoned, while the second was offered to the Shinto shrine in the soldier’s home village. This decision conveyed the message that Shinto and Buddhism were the natural depositories for the national memory. Finally, and most interestingly, the third figure was melted down and transformed into an effigy of Kannon:43 in the space of a few weeks, a soldier running with a bomb in his arms became a compassionate bodhisattva. This remarkable example illustrates how the transition from commemorating heroes to praying for their souls took place. No distinction was made between a war sculpture and a peace sculpture;

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on the contrary, this act underlined the fact that war and peace, courage and mourning are simply transitory states that are literally consubstantial with reality.

FIGURE 10.5  Part

temple, Tokyo.

of the Three Human Bullets statue in the cemetery at Seishōji

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GRAY AREAS

In Yokkaichi, a small town near Nagoya, an arrow measuring more than twenty meters high was erected in a park just outside the town center in 1978. This monument, inscribed with the words “tower to loyal spirits” (chūreitō), stands atop a large slab into which the remains of a thousand soldiers from the region were embedded. It is thus an ossuary, like others constructed in the 1940s. At first glance this monument appears to be purely secular, since it was built by the local war-bereaved families’ association and is located in a public park. Yet the name “funerary tower” and the presence of human remains lend it a distinctly Buddhist coloration, despite the discovery of a plaque at the park’s exit enjoining visitors to “support the official visits to Yasukuni!” Even away from temples and shrines, the presence of religion—be it Buddhism or Shintoism—is constantly palpable. Examples of this type are numerous, both before and after the war.44 The interpenetration of public and religious commemoration is not unique to Japan. In France, for example, the Douaumont ossuary, located on the battlefields of Verdun, was managed by a military chaplain until 1996. Generally speaking, in Europe, as in Japan, the day-to-day celebration of the nation’s dead has largely been delegated to the religions. For the most part this does not cause any particular problem. Occasionally, however, conflicts do arise, as illustrated by a lengthy legal battle between property developers and critics of a proposal to move a stele near Osaka. In 1976, Communist militants lodged a complaint against the local authorities in Minoo, which had agreed to provide a small piece of land to an association in order to rehouse a monument located on the site of a proposed new school. To support their case, the complainants drew on the constitution, which stipulates that “the State and its organs shall refrain from religious education or any other religious activity” and that “no public money or other property shall be expended or appropriated for the use, benefit, or maintenance of any religious institution or association.”45 The stele in question had been erected in 1916 in memory of the Japanese children who died during the Russo-Japanese War. In 1947, in the troubled context of the American occupation, it was knocked down and buried, before being unearthed and reconstructed in the autumn of 1951, just after the signing of the San Francisco Peace Treaty. Its fate was thus eventful, though ultimately fairly characteristic of this type of monument.

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The lawsuit dragged on for over a decade, going to appeal before finally being presented before the Supreme Court. In 1987, the Supreme Court ruled that the affair did not contravene the principle of the separation of state and religion as set out in the constitution, for the act of loaning a piece of land to a war-bereaved families’ association “did not constitute a religious activity.” It was also argued that, while the steles in question (chūkonhi) had originally been religious in character, this had diminished since 1945 and it was therefore “not possible to consider them as being of the same nature as Yasukuni.”46 In its ruling the Supreme Court also authorized local councilors to take part in religious ceremonies held before such monuments. The judicial authorities found in favor of the municipality, on the grounds that there had been a “secularization” of ritual commemorative practice. It is interesting to note, however, that although this resolutely left-wing accusation was dismissed, the court’s decision did not satisfy the nationalist Shinto movement either, which felt that it had been deprived of its rightful property and quickly undertook to list similar monuments in order to reassert their ties to the Way of the Gods and the imperial cult.47 This court case clearly demonstrates that any impression of a consensus existing in Japan over World War II is merely superficial. As soon as the law becomes involved, the deep divergences in Japanese society are revealed for all to see. The court ruling in the Minoo affair is difficult to understand from a strictly historical point of view, since the intertwining of the secular and the religious has been the rule for more than a century. The idea that steles and celebrations have been secularized is supported neither by the history of monuments in particular nor by the evolution of commemorative practice in general. The religious purpose of steles was ambiguous at their inception, and nothing has truly changed on this point. Since history is unable to clarify the situation, perhaps we should attempt a semiological analysis. Indeed, there is a fundamental difference between stone monuments like steles and the statues of Buddhist deities. What is a stele? To what category of signs does it belong? What place does it have in the memorial landscape? Answering these questions may provide a clearer understanding of certain characteristics of modern-day Japan’s commemoration of the dead and its relationship with the past. If we borrow the classification developed by Charles Sanders Peirce, the nineteenth-century American philosopher who was instrumental in developing semiology, neither statues nor epigraphic monuments are icons or

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indices; they are symbols that refer to the objects they represent in a codified manner. Yet despite steles’ being symbols, they differ from figured representations, since the latter are generally anthropomorphous and rely on mimesis. Steles, on the contrary, do not imitate anything. They are essentially self-referential; an epigraphic stone, as its name suggests, is first and foremost a stone. Buddhist statues are fundamentally synthetic in nature: they encapsulate the initiating event in a discourse of transcendent and ahistorical truth, integrating it into a codified iconographic scheme. Their religious dimension is impossible to deny.48 In this sense they are metachronical, for they contain several temporalities, either real or virtual. In a statue of Kannon commemorating the nation’s dead, one person may see an allegory of the pity these men deserve; others will see a promise of peace and collective salvation; still others will relate it to a specific personal experience; and, finally, some will simply see a piece of art, or even a fetish; and so on. Moreover, it is easy to adapt the meaning of these statues to the course of events. For example, the huge white statue erected in 1970 on a hill overlooking the port of Kamaishi, as a prayer for “peace on earth and in the afterlife,” has since been transformed into a place of reverence for the victims of the tsunami that devastated the town in March 2011. The same cannot be said for steles and standing stones, which by their very nature refer to a specific point in space and time. They imply a back-and-forth movement between a mobile present and a fixed past. They signify to the present, “On this date in history, such and such an event took place,” a coded relationship that is extremely difficult to escape. Accordingly, they more closely resemble “witness objects” (objets témoins). Indeed, the stone from which they are made is not manufactured; it is “authentic,” particularly since it is generally left more or less in its rough state. Last, the epigraphs they carry frequently use cursive or semicursive script and generally present themselves as having been handwritten by a particular well-known figure. Contemporary Japan prefers objects belonging to the category of relics and material traces, such as steles, ossuaries, epigraphic inscriptions, pieces of clothing, or even photography, to more synthetic forms, which until 1945 generally meant depictions of national heroes and which since the war have appeared only in allegorical personifications of peace and a few Buddhist statues. Over the past seventy years in Japan, whether in the sphere of religion or in civil commemorations, a metonymic approach to history has developed. This is not specific to contemporary Japan, since

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the practices in question have no doubt always existed and a similar evolution can be seen in the West. This type of commemoration is not forward looking; the past does not serve to contemplate the future. Rather, it imposes a dead-end understanding of history on the present, one leading only to the emotion of loss. It is a solution adopted by default, by a society with little to no shared vision or common goal.

11 FROM MONUMENT TO MUSEUM The Difficult Path to Healing

HIROSHIMA AND NAGASAKI: EMPHASIZING THE EXCEPTIONAL

he majority of residents in Hiroshima and Nagasaki can go days without thinking about the atomic bombs. Even the indirect consequences, such as the presence of Western visitors in greater numbers than in other Japanese cities, have been assimilated over time and have finally entered the realm of the unconscious. For all this, the tragedies have not been forgotten; they have been internalized. During visits to these two cities I have been known to ask passers-by or colleagues for directions to the memorial parks, either to go there or simply to get my bearings. I have never met anyone for whom this posed a problem. Everyone knows where the bombs exploded: “Over there,” they say, “it was over there.” Despite the explosions’ being far removed from everyday concerns, people have their spatial coordinates etched into their personal geography. It is almost as if a huge tower rose up from the hypocenter, visible from all around. Whereas in Tokyo no one would be capable of pointing out where the bombs fell, in Nagasaki, and even more so in Hiroshima, the nature of the explosion and the way in which the memory of the event has been constructed have erected an imaginary column in space and time. The unique characteristics of the atomic bombs seem to delineate a natural history of the memory of these disasters. The ferocity of the

T

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explosions caused time to stand still and introduced the idea of the suddenness of the event, while the huge plumes of smoke billowing upward ingrained in people’s minds the uniqueness of the site of these catastrophes. These two points, one temporal, the other spatial, structure the memory of the nuclear bombs. This is most eloquently illustrated by the ruined dome of Hiroshima’s Commercial Exhibition Hall, which stands as a reminder of both the time and place where the bomb fell. Other examples can be given: the steles marking ground zero, the watches stopped at 8:15 a.m. or 11:02 a.m., the bells or gongs used during annual commemorations, and countless texts all tend to establish the bombs as instantaneous and local events, albeit using different means. This mode of representation is not entirely false, since memory is constructed based on fact. Nonetheless, it remains ambiguous. Indeed, considerable artifice and outside intervention are involved in the way memory is created and passed on. Take, for example, the testimonies of Hachiya Michihiko, Nagai Takashi, or Hara Tamiki, which were written shortly after the events occurred, in 1945–1946, although they could not be published immediately.1 What comes to the fore most forcefully in the descriptions by these three survivors is the chaos. Present in the two cities on August 6 and 9, 1945, they were hurled through the air by the blast, covered in debris, and naturally unable to see the column of smoke that enveloped them and rose into the air above them. They lost all notion of time, no longer aware what day it was. Wounded and suffering the effects of radiation, it was weeks before any semblance of normalcy returned to their lives. Providing a coherent account of their experiences was made possible only through a considerable effort to reestablish the historical context. It is significant (though anything but surprising) that virtually none of those writing about the bombs belonged to the working classes. It was the scientists, scholars, and men of letters, with their solid intellectual backgrounds, who were able to provide an inside account of what had transpired. The famous account published in the United States by John Hersey in 1946 is quite different. In contrast to the Japanese texts, which begin by describing their authors’ daily activities before the disaster occurred, Hersey’s piece opens with the precise date and place of the attack: “At exactly fifteen minutes past eight in the morning, on August 6, 1945, Japanese time, at the moment when the atomic bomb flashed above Hiroshima, Miss Toshiko Sasaki . . . was turning her head to speak to the girl at the

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next desk.”2 This effort to place the events at Hiroshima and Nagasaki in a minutely detailed and precisely timed framework is missing from the survivors’ testimony. It belongs to the journalists, soldiers, and bureaucrats who arrived after the explosions and were the first to describe the events, using terms that were both rational and yet nonsensical. At first glance there appears to be a rationality to such descriptions: they borrow from scientific language, use dates and figures, pinpoint locations, and provide elements of truth. And yet they are not exclusively rational. The terse language and abrupt tone are designed primarily to underline the trauma suffered. Parataxis is abundant: “A flash of light, intense heat rays and radiation, a tremendous blast. In the sky, a mushroom cloud of smoke spiraled upward; on the ground, fires raged. Such was the scene at the time: in an instant, an area measuring approximately two kilometers around the hypocenter was reduced to rubble,”3 is a typical description from one novelist. In fact, the precise information and minimalist form create much pathos. The juxtaposition of facts, figures, dates, and places underlines the suddenness and intensity of the shock. In other words, the utmost effort is made to crystallize and safeguard the memory of the bombs, rather than to stretch it by providing perspective or a historical context. The same phenomenon is visible concerning the number of fatalities. In 1980, thirty-five years after the war ended, three atomic-bomb survivors from Hiroshima published a newspaper dated August 7, 1945. The aim of this initiative was to plunge people back into the past but also to symbolically fill the information void that Hiroshima experienced in the immediate aftermath of the disaster. The front page headline ran, “Special New Bomb Hits Hiroshima. Around 170,000 Dead.”4 However, while it is indeed possible that 170,000 people lost their lives in Hiroshima, these deaths occurred over several months, notably due to radiation sickness, something the newspaper’s editors knew very well. On August 6 itself, 50,000 people are estimated to have perished. And most of these deaths occurred over the course of the day and were the result of a fairly diverse range of causes, including radiation burns, collapsed buildings, carbon monoxide poisoning, fire burns, or being drowned in the panic. The number of people killed instantly by the explosion was in any event significantly less than 50,000. While the authors’ stance and desire to avoid distinguishing between the victims is understandable from a moral point of view, it is not historically correct to say that the majority of deaths

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occurred on August 6, and even less so during the explosion itself, as is often claimed. There is a deliberate tendency when undertaking memory work to round figures up or down as far as possible—for ethical but also promotional and pedagogical purposes. This is clearly visible in Nanjing, where the figure of 300,000 fatalities, written in huge letters over the entrance to the memorial, has literally become part of the scenery. Although scientific in appearance, the dominant discourse—the one that comes first—on Hiroshima and Nagasaki is characterized primarily by a deictic and peremptory dimension designed to fire the imagination and inspire terror. By relying on expressions underlining the “total” and “instantaneous” nature of the destruction, by using stopped watches and panoramas of the devastation, by presenting objects symbolizing the presence of the bomb, history is trapped in a system that upholds the atomic explosions as unprecedented, mythical, and magical events. Memory work has its own logic and legitimacy. Unfortunately, its impact on historical discourse means that it also determines more generally how World War II is understood. By compressing the tragedy into something instantaneous, journalistic and memorialist discourse has established Hiroshima and Nagasaki as unique and incomparable events. Incomparable with the bombings inflicted on other cities; incomparable with other acts of violence. Or rather, the only elements remaining for comparison are the approximate death tolls. One hundred seventy thousand killed here, ninety thousand there, three hundred thousand elsewhere. And then what? Nothing, or very little. By proceeding in this way, each memory shuts itself off, both sure of its specificity and alone battling the reign of the absurd. Kobayashi Yoshinori is a right-wing cartoonist who has published a series of best-selling manga on the war since the 1990s. In one of his earliest works, On War, published in 1998, he expounds the idea that Japan was the pawn of the great Western powers and has no reason to feel guilty about its conduct in battle. His treatment of the atomic bombs is typical of his work. One side of a double-page spread shows passers-by and one or two cars peacefully crossing Hiroshima’s Aioi Bridge, while the opposite page presents the same scene during the explosion. Everything is streaked with black to create an impression of disintegration. No text accompanies the images. Over the following pages, Kobayashi offers a resolutely victimist analysis of the event and criticizes the racist nature of the American decision to attack Japan with nuclear weapons.5 The order in

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which these messages are presented is important: it is the graphic violence and suddenness of the image that justifies a radical explanation. The manner in which the atomic bombs are represented has created a closed memory that sits with difficulty within a wider narrative. Although a certain number of panels and screens at the memorial museums of Hiroshima and Nagasaki do explain the invasion of China and present the general context of the war, these are rendered virtually invisible by the limited space dedicated to such information, the presence of spectacular reconstructions, scale models, and other relics nearby, and the dramatically convincing sound effects. In contrast, significant space is devoted in both cities to examining the world’s nuclear forces, the international conventions on atomic weapons, and peace movements. As Lisa Yoneyama writes, “Whether within mainstream national historiography, which remembers Hiroshima’s atomic bombing as victimization experienced by the Japanese collectivity, or in the equally pervasive, more universalistic narrative on the bombing that records it as having been an unprecedented event in the history of humanity, Hiroshima memories have been predicated on the grave obfuscation of the prewar Japanese Empire, its colonial practices, and their consequences.”6 Whether in Hiroshima or Nagasaki, the authorities have chosen to disconnect the atomic bombings from the conflicts initiated by Japan in East Asia and the Pacific. This is due partly to the local dimension of the commemoration of these events. Both cities’ administrations have positioned themselves as if they were unconnected to the war. Their victimist reading of the events stems from a refusal to support the national policy. This attitude is due in large part to the way the issue of war responsibility was handled. With the emperor exonerated and the verdicts of the Tokyo Tribunal criticized across the political spectrum, how could these ravaged cities have taken it upon themselves to link their ordeals to a history for which no one was willing to take responsibility? Furthermore, such a stance would have been perceived as a direct attack on the national policy, and neither Hiroshima nor Nagasaki could afford a confrontation with the state. Particularly since the government had taken steps to contain the bitterness felt by survivors. In concrete terms, the emperor’s visits to Hiroshima in late 1947 and Nagasaki in 1949, the passing of reconstruction laws that same year concerning these two cities, and the gradual recognition of the status of hibakusha, or A-bomb victims, all enabled local resentment to be deflected away from the capital. The unveiling of

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national memorials in these two cities in 2002 and 2003 clearly shows that Japan’s failure since the end of the occupation to contextualize the bombings has suited the government well, since it not only neglected to seize this opportunity to reestablish a more historical reading of the events but also on the contrary preferred to focus commemoration firmly on mourning and prayer. While the memories that have developed in Hiroshima and Nagasaki each have their own particularities, in both cases they stem from a kind of collusion between the state and local authorities. Naturally this compromise also conveniently suits the United States, which is keen to avoid an overly historical analysis of the issue revealing that both the atomic bombs and the massacres perpetrated by the Imperial Army in China were driven by similar motivations—namely, a desire to break the enemy’s resistance, shorten the war, limit losses, and test new weapons. Nevertheless, there is an undeniably positive aspect to commemorating the disasters in this way. By defining the atomic bombs not as the consequence of Japanese policies since the 1930s but as heralding a new atomic age, Hiroshima and Nagasaki have uncoupled the nuclear menace from causal explanations and anything that might downplay the events, following a rationale that is sometimes observed in Europe concerning the extermination of the Jews. The decision to maintain the disasters in a representational framework intended first and foremost to inspire fear reflects a civilization choice by the Japanese and as such falls beyond the historian’s scope. The fact that despite the huge stockpiles of nuclear weapons in existence around the world none has ever been deployed in combat since 1945 appears to prove the effectiveness of this strategy. Viewed from this perspective, the atomic bomb resembles a kind of demon, and like all demons, it is hardly suited to historical scrutiny.

HIROSHIMA: WHAT ROLE FOR THE SURVIVORS?

In an interview conducted in the early 1990s, one woman who survived the bomb angrily exclaimed, “Everyone wants to forget Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but people are still dying there today!” or, “Bones are still being found in Hiroshima. That’s what it is: a city of the dead!”7 Many survivors have felt a painful disparity between the intensity of their personal recollections and the form given to the memory of the events. The issue

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of odors is evocative in this respect. Tens of thousands of people perished throughout the month of August 1945, and with the city in turmoil, many corpses were incinerated in haste. “The bodies floating in the river were retrieved with a stick, piled up onto trucks, taken to an empty piece of land, and burned. The foul stench that blended into the hot August air lingered for a long time,”8 remembers one survivor. Another recalled that, “the bodies that were completely burned and blackened were the easiest. Not only did they have no smell, they had already lost half their body weight. The half-burned corpses didn’t smell too bad either. I don’t know why, but some even smelled quite nice, like grilled meat. As we transported them we would joke, ‘Oh! This one smells like steak!’ The worst were the decomposing bodies that had barely burned at all. The stench was appalling, and when we turned them over, they were teeming with maggots.”9 Dozens of similar accounts appear in the Chronicles of Atomic-Bomb Damage (Genbaku sensai shi) published by the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The odors of burned and decomposing flesh that hung over the city are a recurrent theme in atomic bomb literature. Despite being dispersed rapidly by the wind, they remained engrained in people’s minds. This explains why, half a century after the bombing, the same survivor interviewed by Morioka Todeschini was still unable to eat certain foods: “They remind her too much of the corpses that resembled grilled squid or sardines after the blast. When incinerated, they gave off a sickly sweet odor of hot fish.”10 My aim in presenting these examples is to convey the extremely vivid nature of the memories of death. There are certain olfactory, visual, and auditory sensations that never go away, that cling to the survivors and contaminate their everyday perceptions of the world.11 Since the 1950s, there has been no continuity in Hiroshima between the horror of people’s experiences and the ordered nature of the new reality. On the contrary, the bright, airy feel of the city’s parks, modern architecture, huge monuments, and long, wide avenues provides a striking contrast to the haunting and painful memories shared by survivors. This observation holds all the more true when we consider the physical consequences of the A-bombs on their victims. Radioactivity generated its own particular range of pathologies, including heart, digestive, and respiratory disease, hemorrhages, immune-system damage, leukemia and cancer, keloids and other scar-tissue abnormalities, cataracts, psychological disturbances, and a certain number of fetal malformations. Tens of thousands of people suffered serious medical issues or even died prematurely

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as a result of the secondary effects of the nuclear explosion. Yet to this day, accurate figures remain difficult to come by and open to criticism. The Radiation Effects Research Foundation (RERF), the authority on this matter, provides no global estimate to the public. The general report it publishes is overflowing with statistics and data but offers nothing resembling a comprehensive assessment of the number of fatalities. In response to the question, “How many cancers in atomic-bomb survivors are attributable to radiation?” presented in its FAQ section, RERF notes that “the total number of cancers attributable to radiation exposure through 2000 may be about 1,900 cases.”12 Although this answer is often quoted in the media, it is valid only for the period from 1950 to 2000 for incidences of leukemia, and from 1958 to 1998 for all other types of cancer.13 In other words—and saying nothing of the fact that other pathologies are treated separately—the figures provided by RERF do not take into account those who died between early 1946 and late 1949, a period in which few incidences of leukemia and cancer are said to have occurred but on which ultimately little information exists. As for the data concerning 1945, they are provided in a uniform block, the argument being that it is impossible to know how many deaths were attributable to the explosions and how many to radiation.14 Clearly from a scientific point of view it would be extremely difficult to ascertain the number of deaths linked to radioactivity between August 1945 and the present day. Yet this piecemeal approach to the issue casts doubt on the authorities’ willingness to provide anything other than this number of 1,900 deaths (representing less than 1 percent of survivors), which is liable to reassure the local populations somewhat. The dearth of information on the period from 1945 to 1950 stems in part from a lack of awareness at the time, but also from a denial of the dangers of radioactivity. When we see the efforts of the French authorities in 1986 (following Chernobyl) and the Japanese authorities in 2011 to distort the truth when confronted with a nuclear disaster, we can easily imagine how keen America’s postwar leaders would have been to conceal the effects of radiation, the aim being to avoid a classification of nuclear weapons, which had been so costly to produce and which afforded a decisive strategic advantage, as chemical weapons and thus falling within the scope of the Geneva Protocol, which admittedly the United States had not ratified but which it had signed in 1925. This explains why the American biologists sent to Japan in 1946 to work at the Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission were not tasked with providing medical care to survivors, which would

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have helped disseminate knowledge on the effects of the bomb, but merely with collecting scientific data. This same phenomenon is visible in the American press. In late September 1945, following a visit to the first nuclear test site in New Mexico organized by the army to refute the idea that radiation posed a danger, the magazine Life reported that “the War Department said that most of the Japanese had been killed by blast and heat. A few may have died of radioactive effects suffered at the instant of the explosions but none died from radioactivity afterward. Hiroshima and Nagasaki were safe for human habitation after the great fires had died away.”15 The article then took the example of the New Mexico crater, which was still radioactive. However, this alarming information was quickly turned around: the New Mexico test had been conducted at ground level and it was only natural that the earth still be radioactive, whereas the bombs dropped on Japan had exploded at altitude and the danger had dissipated. According to the magazine, this offered “strong evidence that the Japs were wrong” and that “it seemed certain that Japanese in Hiroshima and Nagasaki had died within the grotesque legality of wartime killing.”16 Despite the reporter’s qualifying this legality as “grotesque,” his article served to propagate the idea that the impact of the radiation was insignificant and that the use of the bomb had been entirely legal. In Japan, the code of silence was even stronger. Throughout the occupation the press was unable to discuss the effects of radiation or the physical consequences of the explosion in any detail. This gave victims the impression that their suffering was being denied, while the rumors and suspicions born of the information blackout added to the survivors’ physical pain by forcing them to contend with various forms of social exclusion, not to mention the tendency of the disfigured and maimed to isolate themselves. Komine Hidetaka, injured in Nagasaki at the age of four, recalls the bullying he endured at elementary school, where he was nicknamed “crab foot.”17 Kan Jutae, who was wounded in Hiroshima at the age of six, remembers how he was rejected by other children, who said that he was nothing but an “A-bombed, ill-omened Korean.”18 Others struggled to find work or a marriage partner, a problem Ibuse Masuji helped bring to public attention with his novel Black Rain.19 Certainly, Japan’s recovery of political autonomy in 1952 led to improvements in the support provided to A-bomb victims, notably thanks to the adoption two years later of a law providing for free medical care.20 The story of Sadako, a young girl who died from leukemia in 1955,21 moved the entire country and brought

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attention to the plight of the hibakusha; yet if the testimonials recorded by the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum are anything to go by, many survivors have never managed to overcome their injuries and trauma. In 1946 the Hiroshima authorities conducted several censuses of the population based on their distance from the hypocenter. At less than 1 kilometer, only 1,455 inhabitants remained by January 1, 1946, representing less than 2.5 percent of the population present on August 6, 1945. Over the year, this figure was multiplied by nine to reach 13,855 inhabitants in December. At less than 2 kilometers, 11,472 inhabitants were registered in January 1946, or 18 percent of the population on the day of the bomb. This number grew slowly, finally reaching 20,278 in December that year. As we can see, close to the hypocenter there was a radical contraction of the population followed by a gradual return of survivors, evacuees, and demobilized soldiers. Conversely, at a distance of 3 kilometers or more, on the edge of the city, the population had swelled considerably compared with 1944.22 Such was the context in which the authorities tackled the problem of reconstructing the city. Initially there was a considerable divergence of opinion over the best way to proceed. As early as September 1945 the prefectural authorities announced their desire to set aside “a plot of land close to the center of the explosion and transform it into a commemorative site.”23 Kusunose Tsunei,24 the governor of Hiroshima Prefecture, was in favor of rebuilding the city along entirely new lines and rejected the idea of a simple reconstruction. Aware of the practical difficulties facing the project, he recommended that the city take its time and launch a major international drive to raise funds. The novelist Ōta Yōko suggested that the riverbanks be transformed into parks and small buildings constructed rapidly on the outskirts of the city in order to rehouse survivors. Kōra Tomiko,25 who was mayoral chief of staff in Kure at the time, advocated rebuilding Hiroshima elsewhere, away from the actual site of the disaster, the ruins of which she wanted to preserve as a memorial dedicated to peace in the world.26 Unsurprisingly, the solution adopted closely resembled the suggestion of Hiroshima’s main authorities. The heart of the city was not reconstructed in haste. Following lengthy negotiations with the state and the occupation forces, the National Diet unanimously passed a law in 1949 designating Hiroshima a “peace memorial city.” This enabled the municipality and prefectural authorities to bring their planned memorial park to fruition. Located close to ground zero between the two branches

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of the Ōta River, it became the symbolic and operational heart of the new city. It was completed in 1954, just in time to host the tenth-anniversary ceremonies that marked the end of the first phase of the reconstruction. Among the specialists tasked with rebuilding Hiroshima, few were survivors of the bomb, since most of the city’s officials had perished in the explosion. One of these rare survivors was Takeshige Teizō (1905–1997), who headed the urban planning section in the prefectural government. It was he who took on the task of preparing for the reconstruction work in late 1945. His suggestions included organizing the city around wide avenues, leaving the dome of the Commercial Exhibition Hall untouched and transforming the old Nakajima neighborhood into a memorial park. Although not all his plans were approved, they laid the groundwork for the various architectural firms that would join the project later.27 Nevertheless, despite the immensity of the devastation wreaked on the city, Takeshige did not work ex nihilo. During the final months of the war, major works had been undertaken in Hiroshima to create firebreaks as part of the air raid defense strategy. The banks of the Ōta River had been cleared, and several avenues were in the midst of being widened; in fact, it is well known that on the morning of the explosion many soldiers and civilians were engaged in demolition work. These alterations provided the basis for the new plans. The broad avenues seen today are a legacy of these works undertaken during the closing months of the war. In the brightness of Hiroshima, City of Peace, lies the framework of a city under siege. The construction of the peace memorial museum in the early 1950s also indicates a continuity with the war years. The building, designed by the renowned architect Tange Kenzō (1913–2005),28 consists of three concrete structures lying next to one another in a linear formation. The two wings flanking the central edifice are identical. The use of pillars lends a transparency and powerful rhythm to the entire composition. Through the center of the main building, which serves as an exhibition hall, runs an axis of symmetry linking the museum to both a cenotaph located around one hundred meters away and the A-Bomb Dome on the other side of the river. The three buildings form a series of perspectives and alignments, reflecting a desire for transparency and order. Although Tange realized few constructions during the war, he was seen as a promising architect and participated in a number of prestigious nationwide competitions. In 1942, for example, he submitted a design for a planned memorial to dead soldiers, which he proposed to build at the base of Mount Fuji.

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An examination of the plans reveals striking formal similarities with the Hiroshima peace memorial. Both feature a ternary, symmetrical composition with a central axis passing through the middle building, as well as trapezoids and a focus on horizontality. Additionally, the roof of the cenotaph located in front of the Hiroshima memorial museum has a distinctive form that was already visible in Tange’s 1942 design. This resemblance long received only cursory attention from scholars, who were content to simply see it as reflecting a consistency in the style of Tange’s work. However, in the 1990s Inoue Shōichi took a more critical stance on the issue, concluding his detailed study with an assertion that this similarity was an example of the recycling of projects from the fascist era by the new Japanese democracy.29 This remark can be interpreted in two ways. The first amounts to saying that the Hiroshima peace memorial expresses a retrospective attachment to Japan’s wartime values, and thus to considering it a reactionary and nostalgic endeavor. However, there is nothing to indicate that Tange remained attached to the values of Imperial Japan. The second consists in illustrating that the 1950s memorial and its predecessor from the 1940s share a certain manner of envisioning the future. Tange seems to have held a progressive and modernist view of his role. The project he headed, and more generally the way in which Hiroshima was rebuilt, points to the survival of a voluntarist mentality. Great efforts were made during the conflict to lend a positive meaning to the sacrifices of soldiers and civilians. War was presented as the road to peace, and action, as liberating the people. The straight lines and sweeping perspectives of the newly rebuilt Hiroshima follow this same logic. They are designed to convey the message that meaning has been found in calamity, that the negativity of destruction has given way to the positivity of a project—namely, that of transforming Hiroshima into a modern and international city of peace, guardian of the memory of the atomic disaster. More than anything else, it is in this ability to turn catastrophe into an ideal that post-1945 Hiroshima most resembles wartime Japan. From this point of view, Hiroshima is a remarkable case. It constitutes the exception rather than the rule. No other city in Japan has rebuilt itself in this way by making the memory of disaster the central pivot of its development. Nowhere else can we see the open urban design or wide boulevards that symbolize the “martyred city.” The contrast with Tokyo is striking. As far as we can imagine the imperial capital using postcards, photographs, paintings, and films from the prewar period, the city appears

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to have been much more structured than it is today. This was thanks to its monuments, for statues and arches of triumph do not merely serve to commemorate a particular hero or victory; they create focal points, convergence lines, and define order in the urban space. In the guidebook he wrote in 1920, Thomas Terry describes Tokyo as a “wide-open” city.30 He stressed the beauty of its parks and avenues and made numerous references to statues that catch the eye.31 Nothing like the feeling of confusion the capital has inspired in travel guides since the war. Indeed, Tokyo was rebuilt with no vision of the future. Although some neighborhoods, like Shinjuku and Shibuya, were completely reorganized, generally speaking the city rose from its ashes even more confused than before because of the monuments it had lost. The construction in the 1950s of a vast network of elevated expressways above the existing roads merely reinforced the impression of spatial and symbolic chaos that characterizes the capital. The overpasses and suffocating arteries that imprison the eye are absent from Hiroshima. Instead, the city rapidly erected monuments. The way Japan’s major cities negotiate their past and the way they physically look are intimately connected. In Tokyo, as in many other cities, nothing ambitious or indeed positive was proposed in the wake of defeat. The capital was reconstructed rather haphazardly. The city’s chaotic appearance is not merely the result of concepts hailing from deep within Japanese culture, as is too often suggested. It is above all, and on a much shorter time scale, the consequence of Tokyo’s postwar relationship with history. This contrasts with Hiroshima, where the determination of a few men established commemoration of the bombs as the project of an entire region and, by extension, the whole nation, which, as Dower has noted, was quick to use the city as “a way of forgetting Nanjing, Bataan, the Burma-Siam railway, Manila, and the countless Japanese atrocities.”32 The importance of the victims in this memorial system appears to have been secondary. “Tange’s intention was not to build a memorial for the victims of the bomb as individuals but rather a memorial for the future of peace.”33 While he may have erected a monument to the dead in the park, in his mind this was merely a concession to their families.34 More widely, officials of the era seem at no point to have been aware that the effects of the atomic bombs have their own peculiar residual effects, that they remain active for decades, and that they necessitate a different approach to commemoration. The new city, with its monumental side and its tourist sites, was designed for the dead and for the living, not for the survivors.

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THE NAGASAKI PEACE STATUE

When traveling around Japan, at station exits, in front of public buildings, or in parks, it is not rare to come across a statue of a young woman, which a plaque affixed to the base describes as depicting peace. In Tokyo alone there are many: in front of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building, the Supreme Court, the Chūō-ku ward office, at station entrances, or inside parks. Indeed, these days the entire country likes to imagine itself as a pacifist nation. Yet peace is a broad and complex notion that encompasses quite different perceptions. What exactly is meant when those in Japan talk of peace since 1945? The Nagasaki Peace Park is located in the neighborhood of Matsuyama, close to where the atomic bomb detonated in August 1945. It features a number of monuments offered to the city as a sign of solidarity by various foreign nations, in particular former Soviet states. Through the middle of the park runs a long esplanade leading to a huge bronze statue that depicts a man seated, one arm pointing upward, the other extending out horizontally. Known as the Peace Statue, this almost ten-meter-high monument was unveiled to the public on August 9, 1955, in commemoration of the tenth anniversary of the disaster. Ever since, politicians and local residents have gathered before the statue on the morning of August 9 for an annual ceremony that is often led by the prime minister. Pupils in school uniform stand with their backs to the monument. They form one body with it, the children illustrating the promise of the present, the statue representing the bomb and a certain order that is necessary to prevent such an event ever being repeated. It is this fusion of past, present, and future that is celebrated by the watching crowds. The Peace Statue is thus one of the most important objects of worship in democratic Japan. On the same date each year, the different strata of the nation—the citizenry, the local community, and the state— come together to recall the contract uniting Japanese society on the fundamental issues of its history, its security, and its relationship to others. Although this statue is extremely well known, it is often considered quite unattractive. One English-language tourist guide describes it as “a little grotesque, the head being too small for the body” and concludes that “it is scarcely worth going to see.”35 It thus has an unusual status, as suggested by its Japanese title, which designates it as a “prayer” for peace.

FIGURE 11.1  Peace

Statue, Nagasaki Peace Park.

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Indeed, it is regarded more as a monument or cenotaph than a work of art. Few books have been written about the artist behind the statue, Kitamura Seibō, who was born around forty kilometers from Nagasaki in 1884. Yet Kitamura left behind a considerable number of commemorative or religious bronze statues and, within Japan, was one of the most influential and prolific sculptors of the twentieth century. In the 1920s and 1930s he was commissioned to create several grand equestrian statues of generals or military heroes. His works were displayed in prestigious locations, notably in front of the Diet, where his statue of Marshal Yamagata Aritomo (1838–1922) stood until it was dismantled during the occupation. Consequently, when the municipal authorities of Nagasaki commissioned him to create the Peace Statue in the early 1950s, they did so in the knowledge that they were dealing with one of the great official sculptors of Imperial Japan.36 It is true, however, that at the end of the war Kitamura completely changed the direction of his work and took to exploring different means of representing peace. In 1947 he exhibited a first sculpture on this theme, Onward to Peace. It depicted what appears to be a terribly tired and worndown figure seated on a horse, although the horse was not yet leaping as it would be in subsequent works. Three years later, in 1950, he created a monument that caught the eye of officials at Nagasaki City Hall. Yet despite a marked evolution in the themes he explored, there was a great consistency in Kitamura’s work. The new subject matter and rupture brought about by the defeat and occupation did not radically alter his artistic practice. Leaping horses were a feature of his work both during the war, to glorify Japan’s conquest of Asia, and after, to symbolize the peaceful orientation of the new Japan. The expression of peace is not confined to one particular language or style. On the contrary, beneath the subject matter, form imposes its own autonomous logic; once we enter the realm of exaltation and allegory, war and peace tend to merge together. In parallel to these creations, Kitamura began the task of memorializing the victims of the war. He completed a first statue in 1950, a small sculpture representing a pilot in uniform. This statue remained a plaster model for many years. However, in 1976 the sculptor donated a bronze casting to an association of air force veterans’ families, and this was placed inside the military museum at Yasukuni Shrine.37 A larger replica was subsequently cast and placed at the entrance to the museum’s new exhibition hall in 2002. In other words, statues by the same artist can be found in

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Nagasaki as a symbol of pacifist Japan and at Yasukuni as an emblem of a heroic and revanchist Japan. This paradox is not an isolated example. In truth, many monuments are ambiguous or surprising in nature, so much so that Japan’s entire commemorative system since World War II must be examined and analyzed if the country hopes to one day reconcile the differing perspectives on its history. The divisions that pervade Japanese society are not static. They vary according to place and context. Someone who is a pacifist in Nagasaki can be nostalgic for Imperial Japan in Tokyo. The war memory in Japan is not only fragmented, it is fluid. Discussions between Kitamura and the Nagasaki municipal authorities began in late 1950. The previous year, the new mayor had made a peace declaration in which he appealed for “humankind to never again be threatened by the horror of war” and stated the city’s desire to become a “symbol of peace.”38 In the wake of this declaration the city administration envisaged erecting a monument, but according to Kitamura, its primary concern was to construct something that “would recall the atomic bomb.”39 He claimed that it was after his visit to Nagasaki in early 1951 that the city agreed that the new monument should first and foremost be dedicated to peace.40 Whatever the sequence of events, Kitamura began work on his sculpture with the idea that it should represent three themes— namely, “the atomic bomb, peace, and consoling the souls of [Nagasaki’s] martyrs.”41 After a few months of negotiations the city officially commissioned the statue, and it was financed through international donations. The solution adopted in Nagasaki is thus radically different from that chosen in Hiroshima. In building Tange’s memorial museum—a place for the conservation, documentation, and dissemination of memories of the atomic bomb—Hiroshima opted to politicize pain and memory, whereas Nagasaki chose a composite and spiritual approach, the aim being to unite past and future, pain and hope, within a single monument. Just as the writings of Nagai Takashi made a mystical experience of the devastation, so Kitamura’s statue has helped shape an image of Nagasaki as a city lost in mourning, in contrast to Hiroshima, militant in its demand for peace. The Peace Statue was evidently designed with its front perspective in mind. That it was intended to be viewed from a specific direction is clear not only in the sketches known to have been made by Kitamura but also in the monument’s position at the end of a long esplanade. In fact, it cannot be viewed easily from other angles; the viewer is either too close

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or hampered by vegetation. Furthermore, it becomes clear if we move around to the side that the artist neglected the statue’s profile. This does not reflect a lack of skill; rather, it indicates that the artist favored a certain type of perception. This becomes evident if we trace the key elements of the statue, which leads to the discovery of a highly structured front perspective. Indeed, the statue fits perfectly into a swastika whose epicenter lies just below the thorax. While this cross frequently found on the chest of Buddha statues is not visible in Kitamura’s monument, it nonetheless serves as its organizing principle. One may wonder if Kitamura deliberately sought to structure his statue within a swastika. In discussions of its composition he merely mentions a desire to incorporate the figure into a triangle in order to give it greater stability.42 Yet while there is indeed a triangle linking each knee to the top of the head, this is far from immediately apparent to the eye. Furthermore, we discover that the statue was slightly different at its conception. In the sculptor’s initial drawings, as in the full-length statue he created on the theme in 1950, the arms are less rigid, the angles softer, almost like a dancer’s pose. It was thus at a later stage that the sculptor set about refining, stylizing, and formalizing his statue. Since the swastika does not appear to have provided the starting point for his work, one may posit that he arrived at this composition gradually, through a process of trial and error, following an aesthetic principle that was independent of his conscious will. As he crafted away at the plaster he gradually found a familiar form, one he had known since his earliest childhood. It is extremely interesting to note that the swastika featured prominently on the family urn made by Kitamura’s father.43 It was thus a motif that the artist associated with mourning. That it resurfaced here in this particular statue is entirely logical. The Sanskrit word svastika means “auspicious” and is derived from the noun svasti, denoting a salutary sign. It is a symbol that has eschatological connotations and is thus entirely appropriate for a statue like that in Nagasaki. More importantly, however, the swastika is one of the rare figures—found in almost every civilization—that could be described as perfect. It unites within its form the cross, the square, and the circle. By dynamically combining conflicting elements it constitutes a perfect symbol of balance and harmony, so much so that the esoteric philosopher René Guénon linked it directly to what he called the “primordial tradition”44— in other words, in his language, to something like divine inspiration.

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My aim here is not to dwell on the symbolism of the swastika. In all likelihood it was not in Kitamura’s mind when he created his peace statue, and we should instead consider that it found its way into his work as pure form. The point of this analysis is to illustrate that at the end of the creative process, peace came to be represented within a known framework for harmony. In other words, if peace is to be imposed on the world as a political and moral necessity, it can ultimately truly be expressed only through a higher order. The effectiveness of the “pact” (pax, pactum) that forcefully unites those searching for “peace” (pax) is correlated with the simultaneous realization of an ideal formal structure. Consequently, the statue in Nagasaki combines multiple semiological layers: postwar rationalism enmeshed in the Imperial Way of the 1930s; modern peace (heiwa) underpinned by classical harmony (chōwa). The Peace Statue embodies, in its very aesthetic form, the foundation of the contemporary Japanese nation, with on the one hand a wish to organize society according to laws decreed by man and, on the other, the perpetuation of a desire for a harmonious order that is independent of man, or, more precisely, beyond man; in other words, the belief in points of equilibrium that stabilize nature and the cosmos. To return to historical considerations, is it not precisely something of this order that has structured Japanese political life since the end of the occupation? The constitution, which in its current form is one of the great democratic constitutions, places firm constraints on both individuals and the state. Yet it also provides rights, notably the right to democracy. Nonetheless, Japan is distinctive for having waited many years before testing out a change of political power (in 2009). It is as if the Japanese people, just like Kitamura with his block of plaster, had tirelessly sought to re-create a figure of perfect harmony in the “space of possibilities” (espace des possibles) available to them. By its very nature, the model embodied by the Peace Statue lacks clarity and transparency. It is fundamentally ambiguous, ambivalent, and, as noted by the aforementioned guidebook, struggles to find a harmonious balance between the head and the body. For all this, it has the virtue of proposing an original blend of rationalism and divine order. Although the statue in Nagasaki was built as a call for peace, it was also intended, as previously mentioned, as a prayer for the repose of the victims’ souls. This virtually systematic pairing of commemoration for the dead and appeals for world peace is one of the chief characteristics of memorial practice in postwar Japan. The monuments constructed after

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Japan’s capitulation are frequently dedicated to both the war dead and to peace. The line dividing the two is never clear. While this propensity was apparent during the occupation, and encouraged by the Americans,45 it continues to be visible today. One need only think of the Prayer and Exhibition Hall for Peace, which opened in one of Tokyo’s Shinjuku towers in 2000. Given that this museum is “dedicated to peace,” one would expect to find testimonials or works illustrating the links between different cultures or promoting the attainment of social liberties and the freedom of expression; instead, all that is exhibited are documents on Siberian prison camps and the difficulties encountered by repatriated colonists.46 In reality, this should come as no surprise. The authorities have long used the calls for peace that favor specific categories of the population—which also happen to be categories of voters—for their own agenda. This linking of appeals for peace with commemoration of World War II enjoys a broad consensus in Japanese society. It features in state or public authority initiatives in general but can also be seen at a local level. To this day, and regardless of political persuasion, Japan continues to associate peace with the memory of its war dead, to connect the present to the terror of the past. Indeed, this argument was put forward in the report submitted to Koizumi in 2002 by the committee tasked with studying the issue of national commemoration.47 It states, for example, that “we must never forget that in the shadow of the peace Japan now enjoys lie a great number of precious lives, and this message must be passed on to future generations if peace is to come to Japan and the world,” and that “commemorating the dead and praying for peace are indissociable.”48 However, systematically associating peace with the memory of the dead in this way means perpetuating a conception of peace that is solely empirical and emotive. In other words, the raison d’être of peace is not peace itself but rather a refusal to see the tragedy of war return. It is not a value in its own right and cannot be isolated form the war memory. This line of thinking is not peculiar to Japan, although it is particularly visible there. It is also found in France, Great Britain, the United States, and Germany; in fact, in every country that has experienced the calamity of war on a large scale. In France, the majority of the country’s memorials to the dead were erected between 1919 and 1922, many of them as a call for peace. As reported by Antoine Prost, World War I veterans upheld the idea that November 11 should be made a day of national commemoration and defended the pacifist nature of their demand, asserting in 1923 that

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“the purpose of these parades is to eliminate war by remembering its victims, whom the marchers wish to mourn and honor.”49 Even today, when heads of state gather to commemorate an event such as the Normandy landings of 1944, it is partly to assert the importance of the peace that has been restored and partly to lay wreaths on the soldiers’ graves. Beyond the importance of the dead in every civilization, this phenomenon can be considered a by-product of modern war—in other words, of a time when man is placed entirely, and ad mortem, in the service of technology. In this context, the civil commemoration of the dead is a rational act aimed at preventing future wars through a system of rituals. Nevertheless, it is merely one aspect among others of the “duty to remember.”50 For peace in Europe does not rely solely on the memory of past horrors. It is also a result of the closer links that have been forged gradually between the different states and populations. It is connected to the war, but not exclusively; it is created on a daily basis through political discussions and negotiations, through actions designed to promote the free movement of citizens at a cultural level. This is not the impression one has in Japan, whose relations with its neighbors, notably China and North Korea, remain strained despite healthy trade and tourism links. The war dead have always constituted an exceptionally symbolic issue. For intertwining in their fate are the two fundamental meanings of peace as it is universally understood: the peace desired for those who died—a peace of the soul—and the tangible peace with one’s neighboring countries, which the victims’ sacrifice either exhorts or on the contrary precludes. This confusion over the meaning of peace is long standing and common to many languages. As far back as Japan’s Heian period it was believed that peace in the visible world depended primarily on the tranquility of the deceased, whose spirits were thought to lead people astray, incite war, and bring about devastation. It was necessary to protect oneself from the dead, in particular the angry spirits of those who had died a violent death. This “belief in vengeful spirits” led to the appearance of ritual practices designed to help them enter a world where they would no longer present a danger to the living. These included the chinkonsai, or “spirit pacification rites,” which have evolved over the centuries but whose trace remains visible today. Each year on August 9, when the mayor of Nagasaki makes his declaration before the Peace Statue, he ends his speech by directly addressing those who died, generally using an expression such as “May your souls be appeased!” Japanese culture sees peace

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as a matter of prayer, a process at the end of which—and only at the end—a new order will be possible. Certainly, religion is considerably less pervasive today. No one seriously believes that world peace depends on pacifying the dead. And yet in the sites, customs, and language of memorialization, something of this has survived. There is a superposition of different strata, with the modern approach to managing collective memory borrowing, or even manipulating, ancient forms of beliefs.51 In its own way the statue in Nagasaki perpetuates these conceptions. Despite being commissioned by the city authorities and located in a public park, an inscription on its base presents it as “sometimes Buddha, sometimes God.” In itself, the fact that commemoration superposes or even confuses two differing perceptions of peace is neither surprising nor worrying. Nations generally need to make peace with their dead in order to make peace with their neighbors, despite these being two separate exercises. It is nonetheless problematic in the case of Japan, for the peace imposed on the country by article 9 of the constitution is an experimental peace. Having come about in the peculiar circumstances of the occupation, the Japanese constitution, more than any other, is founded on the conviction that peace is not a natural state, that, on the contrary, humans will spontaneously rise up against one another. Following this logic, it is laws and only laws that establish peace, despite the cultural heritage discussed here being in direct conflict with such an interpretation. In this peculiar context one may question the political implications of Japan’s habit of systematically pairing its discourses on peace with the memorializing of its dead. Either it reflects an attempt to use the memory and spectacle of death as a means of preventing history from repeating itself, echoing the German approach to the Holocaust and that of Hiroshima regarding the atomic bomb; or it is a means of asserting that peace is not only a rational and mechanical affair, but that it depends on a higher order, a harmonious order, in line with the discourse of religions. Nagasaki clearly opted for the latter, an approach that is less spectacular than the alternative but no doubt more comforting for the victims. Nevertheless, it should not be forgotten that those in Japan who evoke the importance of a harmonious order are generally less motivated by true faith than by a desire to downplay the importance of a rationalism that is still perceived as “Western.” Paradoxically, harmony is often used as a means of upholding a divided view of the world.

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TŌJŌ’S RELICS

When Tōjō, Matsui, and five other Class A war criminals were executed, the American authorities had originally planned to dispose of their remains, just as the Soviets and Americans had done in Germany with the Nazi dignitaries. Conserving nothing of their bodies was seen by the victors as the best way of preventing the relics from giving a materiality to the memory of these men. Despite the existence of neo-Nazi groups and sympathizers who help fuel the market in Third Reich memorabilia, it must be acknowledged that the procedure adopted in Germany has been rather effective. The seven Japanese leaders in question were hanged in Sugamo Prison during the night of December 23, 1948, and their bodies transported to Yokohama for cremation. Three days later, at night, one of their lawyers entered the building where their remains were being held, stole the urn, and secretly passed it to a temple north of Yokohama. A few months later the urn was moved to Kōa Kannon Hall (Kōa Kannon-dō, or “Kannon for a Prosperous Asia Hall”), a temple dedicated to the victims of the Sino-Japanese War and located atop a mountain in the seaside town of Atami, around a hundred kilometers southwest of Tokyo.52 The worshipping of these remains provides a good yardstick for measuring the extent to which promilitarist sentiment has pervaded postwar Japan. The end of the American occupation was followed by a reactionary phase aimed at restoring glory to the country’s actions during the war. This movement included a major campaign to collect signatures for a petition to free the prisoners, in addition to the publication of around fifteen collections of texts written by the accused during and after the trials.53 However, this phenomenon was not completely embraced, as evidenced by the case of the Love Statue (Ai no zō). This monument was intended to recall the sacrifice of the men who were executed or died in prison during the occupation years.54 After months of procrastinating it was finally decided that it should be erected in the heart of Tokyo, in front of the main station, but that it would carry no inscription explicitly stating its purpose. Unveiled in the presence of Tōjō’s relatives, it no doubt remained an important monument for certain individuals nostalgic for the country’s former empire; however, in the absence of a panel or cartouche explaining the reason for its existence, time rapidly consigned it to oblivion. Even under the most conservative governments, Japan has

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respected its international commitments by never officially acquitting its war criminals. Everything has been carried out covertly, in an ambiguous manner, playing on the subtle distinction between private and public support. As an example, the stele erected in Atami in 1959 over the remains stolen from the Americans is engraved with a calligraphy by Yoshida Shigeru, who was prime minister at the time of Tōjō’s execution but not at the end of the 1950s. Although the state is restricted by article 11 of the San Francisco Peace Treaty, which stipulates that “Japan accepts the judgments of the International Military Tribunal of the Far East,” Japan’s political leaders, in allowing their support to be literally written in stone (as in the aforementioned example of Yoshida Shigeru), have not only asserted the need to pay tribute to the actions of their predecessors but also obliged their compatriots to deal with the issue for years to come, so difficult it is to remove a monument, especially one bearing the name of a former head of government. The recent interest shown by historians and the general public in monuments linked to World War II is partly the consequence of this reorientation of memorial policy that appeared in the 1950s. Kōa Kannon was the site of the first grave to be built for the seven executed leaders. However, a plan to construct a monument dedicated entirely to their memory emerged no sooner than the end of the occupation.55 Accordingly, a portion of the bones was retrieved in 1960 and placed in a mausoleum erected at the top of Mount Sangane, in a public nature reserve not far from Nagoya.56 This mausoleum takes the form of a stele in pink granite bearing the epitaph, “Tomb of the Seven Great Men.” Aside from the fact that this is yet another example of an ambiguous tribute that is part public, part private, it is interesting to note that the site was unveiled on August 16, 1960. Dates are far too important in Japan for this to be a mere coincidence, particularly since everything where commemoration is concerned has a symbolic significance. August 16 is the day after the anniversary of the war’s conclusion. In making reference to this particular date, those defending the memory of Japan’s former high-ranking officials sought to show that the death of these men was linked to the emperor’s decision for the nation to lay down its arms. They also underlined the fact that Tōjō, Matsui, Itagaki, and their ilk remained faithful to the end by accepting their fate as soon as the war was over, reflecting the image portrayed in the quintessential poem of wartime Japan, “Umi yukaba” (If I go away to sea): “I will die at His Majesty’s

FIGURE 11.2  Grave of

Tōjō Hideki, Doihara Kenji, Itagaki Seishirō, Hirota Kōki, Matsui Iwane, Kimura Heitarō, and Mutō Akira, at Kōa Kannon temple in Atami. The gravestone inscription features a handwritten text by Yoshida Shigeru. The cracks in the stone were caused by an explosive device placed by a group of far-left extremists in 1971.

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feet and have no regrets.” It is thus a tribute to the emperor and at the same time an accusation against him—in other words, one sign among many of the feud that smoldered for decades between the palace and militarist circles. After the defeat, Hirohito continued to maintain a distance from these circles, a fact that made waves in the 1980s when it was revealed that he had ceased visiting Yasukuni following its decision to honor Class A war criminals.57 The palace’s point of view contrasts with that of the empire nostalgists. It is a moderate position similar to what these individuals call “the American view of history.” This is a painful reality for the heirs of militarism, as evidenced by an abundant literature of secret histories attempting to prove the attachment of the imperial house to the memory of the former generals, despite everything pointing to the opposite. Consider, for example, one recently revealed anecdote in which Hirohito, during a visit in 1979 that brought him close to Mount Sangane, is said to have prayed for thirty minutes, his eyes riveted in the direction of Tōjō’s grave.58 What the emperor thinks about the war is of vital importance to the nationalists. This issue could even be said to structure the balance of power within the right wing. Even today there are factions that vie to outdo one another in their patriotism, all of them seeking the emperor’s recognition, even if that means fabricating it or betraying the palace, a practice that fundamentally differs little from the situation prior to 1945. Since the 1960s other graves and monuments dedicated to the memory of the nation’s wartime leaders have been erected throughout Japan, illustrating the strength of this mode of thinking.59 Yet the temple in Atami and the mausoleum on Mount Sangane hold a unique place in the memorial field. Kōa Kannon belongs to the Buddhist sphere, whereas the mausoleum can be considered a secular and semipublic memorial. If we think about the history of commemoration in postwar Japan, where we almost invariably find the Buddhist-Shinto-public triptych, all that was needed to place these men on an equal footing with the rest of the war dead was their inclusion at Yasukuni. The names of the fourteen convicted Class A war criminals—the seven that were executed and the seven that died in prison—were inscribed at the shrine in October 1978, two months after the Sino-Japanese Peace and Friendship Treaty was signed. Their souls have been ritually joined with the other enshrined deities, a process that, according to the Shinto clergy, cannot be undone.60 This incorporating of

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their spirits into the shrine is the culmination of a long and patient process in which, if not the state, several prime ministers took part. Accordingly, it should not be seen as a first gesture or the minimum the nation needed to do, thirty years after the Tokyo Trials, to pay some small tribute to these men and thereby appease their “spirits.” On the contrary, it represents a relatively advanced step in a strategy that was implemented well in advance. What stands out most on a visit to Kōa Kannon in Atami today is the humble and desolate nature of the place. There is no car park, nor any of the vending machines so commonly found in Japan. This is not a tourist destination, despite the beauty of the surroundings. Only a lone banner at the end of the ramp indicates that the temple is a stop on an organized sightseeing tour. Yet the site has not been abandoned. Ceremonies are held here regularly, notably on December 23, the date on which Tōjō and his cohorts were executed and that, in a happy coincidence that is taken as a sign of fate by those who have picked up the militarist baton, is also Emperor Akihito’s birthday. These ceremonies are attended by a few dozen or a few hundred individuals at most. The sites dedicated specifically to commemorating Japan’s wartime leaders are not popular in the same way as one might describe the Chiran Peace Museum, which prompts millions to take an interest in the kamikaze pilots. They concern only a small section of the conservative elite, particularly since the left, which long fought against the existence of these memorials, has now ceased its preoccupation with the issue.61 The 1990s were marked by a “neo-nationalist counterattack.”62 It was in this context that an association was created in 1994 to revive the temple in Atami. Its main founders included Tanaka Masaaki (1911–2006), former personal secretary to Matsui, Tokutomi Tasaburō (b. 1925), grandson of Tokutomi Sohō, known for his role before and during the war, and Matsudaira Nagayoshi (1915–2005), chief priest at Yasukuni from 1978 to 1992 and the man responsible for inscribing the names of the principal war criminals at the shrine.63 Most of the association’s members are elderly men. The surge of nationalism seen during the 1990s was partly the result of a final attempt by the militarists to pass on the flame of their fifty-year-long opposition to the consequences of defeat. In the eyes of this association, the crux of the historical problem is not the Pacific War, the American air raids of 1945, or the Westernization of the Meiji period; it is the invasion of China and the Nanking

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massacres that capture their entire attention. To rephrase, from 1939, when the temple in Atami was created, through to the very recent past, a group of men belonging to the highest spheres of government and the military attempted to justify their war on the Asian continent, an episode they made the central focus of World War II and around which they patiently built a commemorative system that differs markedly from the view defended by the imperial house. The causes of this phenomenon are twofold and intertwine in proportions that are difficult to evaluate: the first is a psychological trauma born of the sense of injustice felt by these men regarding the meaning assigned to the war they waged in Asia during the 1930s; the second is an instrumentalization of the war memory with a view to retaining power. Regardless of its causes, the sheer scale of the memorial system this group has put together suggests that it will be extremely difficult to eradicate. Even if Yasukuni should one day completely reverse its stance and agree to remove the names of the war criminals from its registers, or if a new national memorial should see the light of day, this would not alter the fact that there is a network of stones and relics throughout Japan portraying a heroic image of the actions of the nation’s main wartime leaders. The state will be forced to deal with this situation for many years to come. There is a long tradition of resilience in Japan among the losers of history. Not to mention a literary taste for deep-rooted desires for revenge. In France, when the Duke of Guise was assassinated in 1588, his body was burned and his ashes thrown into the Loire River. He became a romantic figure but disappeared from the political landscape. In Japan, the defeat and death of the heirs of Toyotomi Hideyoshi at the beginning of the seventeenth century did not cause him to fall from public memory, if such a comparison can be made. After having been reduced to relative silence for more than two centuries, Hideyoshi’s supporters took advantage of the Meiji Restoration in 1868 to restore his actions to glory by constructing major shrines in Osaka (1879) and Nagoya (1885). Even very recently, a best-selling novel adapted to the big screen featured characters purportedly descended from Hideyoshi and who are portrayed as having secretly transformed Osaka into a state within the state, a popular image in local political discussions.64 This propensity to develop parallel histories, which is firmly entrenched in Japanese culture, underpins the country’s postwar “revisionism,” to borrow a term from Western historiography that is poorly suited to the Japanese logic.

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MIMETISM AND COMPETITION

The city of Himeji faces the Seto Inland Sea. Despite its modest size it is featured in every guidebook thanks to its castle—held to be one of Japan’s most beautiful—which was built in the seventeenth century and is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Each year thousands of foreign visitors flock to the site, taking advantage of the city’s location on the Shinkansen line between Kyoto and Hiroshima, midway between the eternal Japan and the martyred Japan. Nevertheless, it must not be forgotten that the castle owes its reputation partly to the fact that it miraculously emerged unscathed from the flames of 1945, while others, such as those in Nagoya and Wakayama, sustained considerable damage. Himeji possesses another historical building of national importance. Built on a hilltop in 1956, this monument is dedicated to all those who perished in the air raids carried out on Japan’s cities during the Pacific War. It is the only public monument in Japan that was built to collectively celebrate the memory of the hundreds of thousands of people—most of them civilians—who died in the bombings of 1944–1945.65 Despite this, the state was not involved in this project. Its intention was no doubt to convey to local authorities that it would not finance the rebuilding of the cities nor provide assistance to the victims. Generally speaking, and with the exception of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the civilians who suffered physical and material damage in the bombings have never received either support or compensation from the state, unlike the repatriates or military veterans.66 For their part, the city councils, after the initial impetus that saw them join forces and build a collective monument, each returned to their geographical borders, preferring justifiably to focus on local projects. Ever since the unique endeavor undertaken in Himeji, commemoration of the air raids seems to have followed a series of trends. Thus, the 1950s and 1960s were characterized by a flourishing of steles and monuments to the dead; the 1970s and 1980s by the publishing of reports and studies listing the damage suffered and the number of victims;67 and the 1990s by a sudden increase in museums.68 Thereafter, municipal authorities have focused their attention on web-based information. It is no surprise that commemoration obeys a cyclical pattern, since these cycles result from economic and technological evolutions that affect everyone. This is eloquently illustrated by the simultaneous launching of works to construct

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several major memorial museums around 1990, at the peak of Japan’s prosperity. Nevertheless, not all local communities have adopted the same point of view. While they do tend to imitate one another, they have also sought ways to distinguish themselves. In the context of democracy, and in the absence of an active state policy, forms of competition have naturally emerged, born of each community’s desire to convey similar experiences in the most effective way possible, all the while attempting to highlight the singularity of its own history or point of view. Memorial museums are places of compromise that combine a variety of functions. Designed to stand as a reminder of the destruction of Japan’s cities and the suffering endured by its populations, they frequently present themselves as spaces dedicated to peace. Gathering within their walls the vestiges of war, despite the fact that all traces of destruction have disappeared from the outside world, they rely on historical research that is both national and regional in scope. Japan is the country with the largest number of war museums in the world, possessing around fifty in total or approximately thirty if we include only those dedicated to the bombings.69 Although they undertake a variety of missions, education is a central part of their role. More than one million elementary, junior, and senior high school students visit an institution of this type each year. “Consequently, a high percentage of Japanese children visit a war museum at some stage during their school education,” and the impact of these visits is felt to be highly significant.70 Several universal characteristics can be identified in the museography of destruction in Japan. All the museums are divided into three sections: life during the war, the bombings and their impact, the reconstruction. The first section includes information on the mobilization orders, photos of soldiers, signed flags, postcards from the battlefront, fireproof clothing, and propaganda magazines. The second features photographs or films showing American bombers and maps detailing the extent of the ruins and the damage sustained. Displays in the third section are more diverse. In some cases there may be images of the immediate aftermath of the war, in others views of the city entirely rebuilt. At first glance, all these exhibitions appear to be alike. And yet if we consider the question objectively, it becomes clear that significant differences may exist from one museum to another, depending on whether the focus has been placed on local history or national history. The museum in Himeji is typically one centered on local history, whereas that in Sakai—and until very recently Osaka—provides a resolutely global view of the war. Although the

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destruction inflicted on this city is described in detail, an effort has been made to place this information in the general context of the war.71 Until 2015, when it underwent a complete reorganization, the Osaka International Peace Center included an entire room aimed at re-creating the suffering of the populations occupied or invaded by Japan. The taking of Nanjing was described briefly but in precise and powerful terms.72 The strategy of pacifying China through terror—implemented after 1940— was also mentioned. However, the number of history museums that have adopted this stance—around a dozen in total—represents a very small minority.73 In fact, over a period of some twenty years, the two Kansai museums (Sakai and Osaka) took a distinctly broader and more ambitious approach to the 1937–1945 period than the National Museum of Japanese History (Sakura) or the National Shōwa Memorial Museum (Tokyo), two national institutions that prefer to focus on the daily life and suffering of the people. This phenomenon reflects both the state’s withdrawal from historical issues—a combination of tactics and lack of courage—and the strength of Japan’s democracy, which is first and foremost a local democracy. The fragmented nature of Japanese war memories echoes the diversity of its society. Japan does not hold the same conception of the state’s role as France, particularly when it comes to symbolic issues. It seeks the widest possible consensus, and where this consensus is absent, it does nothing, or merely contents itself with the lowest common denominator. This is evident at the National Museum of Japanese History, which waited almost forty years before examining World War II, finally proposing in 2011 a handful of display cases that carefully avoid any contentious subjects. Among the objects exhibited in these memorial museums are implements and clothing items donated by local residents. This is in addition to the numerous military documents, which once again are primarily local in origin. The sourcing of these documents reflects the former system of conscription. They were provided by local families whose men were enlisted in the area and subsequently returned to their home region once the war ended. In a country like France, the conscription system was designed to achieve a certain mixing of the population, the aim being to wrest conscripts from their local identity and install a national identity in its place.74 When they returned home they generally found no one who had served in the same unit as them. They were thus free to distort reality, take credit for

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the exploits of others, and no one could contradict them. In Japan, ordinary regiments were composed of local men. When Japan’s armed forces were dismantled in 1945, all the veterans who returned to their native regions found comrades-in-arms nearby, despite the mix of units on the fronts. This phenomenon is particularly noticeable in small towns. In such contexts it was presumably not so easy to invent stories, or allow one’s words to distort and rearrange one’s recollections. There was a limited potential to introduce fiction, and thus the war memory remained essentially collective, anchored in the local community, and faithful to the truth. The way memorial museums were designed in the 1990s reflects this phenomenon. As we can see in the Himeji museum, for example, army life and civilian life remained indissociable, with everyday objects and military equipment being presented in the same display cases. This is not the case in French museums, where civilian and military spaces are clearly separated. Seventy years after defeat, the structure of Japanese society prior to 1945 continues to influence the way memory is created and passed on.

HISTORICAL TOURISM: OKINAWA AND CHIRAN

In late 2011 the travel website TripAdvisor, which is based on reviews written by the online community, published a list of the most popular museums in Japan (excluding art museums). The results were as follows: 1. 2. 3. 4.

Chiran Peace Museum for Kamikaze Pilots Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum Fukui Prefectural Dinosaur Museum Japan Air Self-Defense Force Air Park and Museum in Hamamatsu 5. National Museum of Nature and Science 6. Yamato Museum 7. Nagasaki Atomic Bomb Museum75 History museums linked to World War II dominate the list, ahead of the museums dedicated to natural history, science, and local history. This list suggests that certain memorials have a national visibility and are major tourist attractions.

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Hiroshima is certainly the best-known example. Any foreigner who has visited the city will have noticed that, in addition to many street signs being in English, the memorial museum provides information and publications in languages like French, German, and Spanish. Similarly, a wide range of guides and documentation is available to visitors, such as maps showing monuments from the period or trees that were irradiated. Memorial tourism is omnipresent and has contributed to the city’s development. The tendency since the 1950s has consistently been to highlight the spectacular nature of commemoration.76 Hiroshima’s monuments are not maintained simply as a means of preventing deterioration; they are promoted by the city authorities in the same way as other cultural facilities. Memorial sites are not isolated from the world but are heavily dependent on the political and market economy. As the TripAdvisor list indicates, there are other sites in Japan that embody the memory of World War II. Examples include Chiran, Nagasaki, Kure—where the museum dedicated to the Battleship Yamato is located—and of course Itoman in Okinawa. Note that all these cities are located in southern Japan. Whereas prior to the war the main site for commemorative tourism lay to the west, in Lüshun (Port Arthur), this Chinese port—which is now closed to foreign visitors77—has since been replaced by sunnier destinations. The Ryukyu Islands form a eight-hundred-kilometer-long chain off the coast of continental China. The southernmost of these islands, Yonaguni, lies just one hundred kilometers to the east of Taiwan. In late June 1945, following fierce fighting in which local authorities estimate that two hundred thousand people—over half of them civilians—lost their lives,78 the largest island of Okinawa fell to the Americans, who set up a military government there to oversee the entire zone. Japanese nationals originally from the country’s four main islands were evacuated, while native Ryukyuans residing on Honshu, Shikoku, or Kyushu were swiftly “repatriated.”79 The Ryukyus remained under American administration until they were returned to Japan in 1972. Consequently, their history differs from that of the rest of Japan, and the specificity of the memory that has developed there is all the greater for the islands’ having been a recent addition to the empire. The first monuments to the dead appeared in Okinawa in late 1945. In the years that followed, a growing number of steles were erected in memory of the victims, particularly in the southern part of the island, which had seen the most ferocious fighting. Over fifteen years a total of

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160 monuments were built, including a certain number erected on the initiative of Japan’s prefectures, each of which has its own memorial on the island.80 However, Okinawa is not a commemorative site only for the Japanese. The Americans also sustained heavy losses there. In fact, the Battle of Okinawa was the deadliest of the Pacific War for the United States Army, which lost 12,500 men. The scale of human loss and the distance separating families from the island explain the emergence in the 1950s of a commemorative tourism, planting the seeds of the presentday prefecture’s huge tourist economy. In 1960, bereaved families traveling almost exclusively on organized tours represented the majority of the 30,000 annual visitors to the region. The adoption of the dollar in 1958 and the relaxation of exchange controls in Japan beginning in 1964 stimulated the Okinawan economy. Although they were aware of the importance of funerary tourism, local authorities wanted to diversify the range of tourist attractions on offer: “There are limits to the visits made by victims’ families, and if we do not offer something other than ‘battlefields,’ tourism in Okinawa will not last long,” stated a report written in 1962.81 With vegetation having regrown, it was decided that beach tourism should be developed. “We must rapidly change Okinawa’s image from that of an island of battlefields, military bases, and demonstrations to a paradise of blue lagoons, ‘the birthplace of the Japanese soul,’ ” suggested another document ten years later.82 Given that Okinawa’s other trump card was the presence of American culture, which provided an atmosphere of modernity to visitors from the metropole, the idea of transforming the island into a “Japanese Hawaii”83 gained ground. The retrocession of Okinawa enabled this policy to be implemented, thereby mutilating the island’s coastal areas once more. The evolution of tourism not only allowed Okinawa to attract a new public to its shores, it also heralded a change in the way people related to the war memory. Indeed, the monuments to the dead have given way to more imposing buildings with a liturgical or historical purpose, such as the Okinawa Prefectural Peace Memorial Museum (1975), the Okinawa Peace Hall (1978), or the Himeyuri Peace Museum (1989). Over time, the funerary dimension of commemoration has receded and been replaced by educational and moralizing discourses. The museum that in 2000 replaced the original 1975 building of the Prefectural Peace Memorial is today at the heart of an entire commemorative complex. It receives approximately 400,000 visitors per year. In 2007,

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for example, from a total of 409,000 paying visitors, 13,500 came from Okinawa Prefecture, 390,500 from other parts of Japan, and 5,000 from overseas. Of this total, 245,000 were part of a school group,84 many of which also visit a memorial in their home prefecture, thus reestablishing a more direct link with the past. However, for the majority of these individuals the World War II battle sites are merely part of a wider trip that includes many other activities. Given its dimension as a tourist attraction, this museum does not escape the pressure to be competitive. One of the chief characteristics of the Himeyuri Peace Museum is the openly critical tone it has adopted toward the Imperial Army, a strategy designed to underline the debt owed by the metropole to the prefecture. No other institution of this type in Japan denounces the cruelty and blindness of the country’s military leaders in such a direct and detailed manner. Accusations include the abandonment of civilians on the Pacific Islands, the enlisting of children and elderly people into the Okinawa volunteer corps, the inability of the army to protect and feed civilians during the battle of the spring of 1945, the discrimination or even physical cruelty endured by the local populations because of their language and culture, the massacre of Korean laborers present on the island, the incitement to commit mass suicide, and the abandonment or killing of the wounded. The resulting impression is that the Imperial Army sacrificed a population that was not considered fully Japanese. And yet the comments left by visitors at the museum or on its website reveal no signs of any unease at this presentation of history. On the contrary, the opinion frequently expressed is that the museum and surrounding park help raise awareness of the horrors of war and the value of peace. The suffering endured by the residents of Okinawa is recognized, suggesting that it is easier in Japan to acknowledge the violence of the military when the victims are fellow nationals rather than foreigners. More generally, it can be seen as resulting from the malleability of the Japanese view of the war, which varies noticeably according to the situation and the person or group being addressed. The Chiran Peace Museum is dedicated to the memory of the kamikaze pilots. It attracts between seven hundred thousand and one million visitors per year (double the Caen war memorial in Normandy, France). Chiran is a small, landlocked town in Kagoshima Prefecture, which covers the southernmost tip of the island of Kyushu, a highly conservative region where the LDP generally receives two-thirds of the vote. Like many other towns and villages in the region it possessed a small air base that was used

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by the special attack units between April and July 1945. In the first years after the defeat, the name Chiran had no particular historical significance. The opening of a small museum in 1975 was one of the first attempts to give the memory of the kamikazes a tangible geographical presence.85 Nevertheless, it can be said that prior to the opening in 2000 of the current Peace Museum for Kamikaze Pilots, there was no mass tourism in Japan devoted to this particular historical issue. This is therefore a recent phenomenon, which came about as part of a policy of local development. For all this, the kamikazes were never forgotten. For decades the memory of these men resided in books, and more particularly in collections of letters that were among the best sellers of the postwar period.86 The museum in Chiran, which exhibits hundreds of handwritten pages, clearly reflects how important these texts have become. Itatsu Tadamasa, the museum’s first director, is a survivor of the kamikaze squadrons. It was he who over the years amassed the majority of the documents and objects on display. Yet he also heavily influenced the museum’s choices regarding its exhibition design, which shows a marked bias: the historical context is covered only very briefly, with the focus primarily on the inexorable retreat of the Japanese troops; the decision to create the kamikaze squadrons is presented as something natural and is neither criticized nor even questioned; little explanation is given to the power of propaganda, the stranglehold of stereotyped phrases, and, more generally, to the context in which the pilots’ letters were produced. Conversely, the museum’s microhistorical approach reveals countless moving details, while the many weapons from the period, photographs, and other military relics lend the “heroes” a kind of presence. This explains the unease felt by the majority of historians visiting the museum. As commented by Ian Buruma, who was one of the first to make the existence of the museum known, “There is no reason to suppose that they [the pilots] didn’t believe in the patriotic gush about cherry blossoms and sacrifice, no matter how conventional it was at the time. Which was exactly the point: they were made to rejoice in their own death. It was the exploitation of their youthful idealism that made it such a wicked enterprise. And this point is still completely missed at the Peace Museum today.”87 The image presented of the suicide missions in Chiran thus resembles the one developed during the war—namely, that these were noble and moving acts. In the current political context this constitutes a conservative point of view that is extremely concerned with moral virtue and loyalty

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to the nation, as suggested by interviews given by Itatsu: “Senior high school students in particular will be surprised by the skillful writing of these young men, some of whom were the same age as them when they died. And despite the passing of time, they cannot fail to be moved by the sincerity that drove these pilots to fly away and sacrifice everything for their country and families,” explains the museum’s former director, while criticizing in passing the “pacifist education” of postwar Japan and the country’s main teaching union, the Nikkyōso.88 The Chiran Peace Museum is run by Minamikyūshū City (formed by the merger of three towns, including Chiran). At its entrance stands a stele inscribed with a calligraphy “by Prime Minister Koizumi Jun’ichirō” and dated May 2004. It consists of two characters signifying “absolute purity” (shijun), a clear sign that Koizumi subscribed to this image of the kamikazes. This site thus presents itself as a public museum that has received the backing of the highest authority of the state, excepting the emperor. As we can see, two public museums, such as those in Okinawa and Chiran, may offer radically different perspectives on the war. Local rationales, which blend political and economic interests, take precedence over national coherence. The Japanese are torn between conflicting narratives whose endorsement by the state makes them all the more difficult to appraise objectively. While blogs expressing critical opinions on the country’s history museums certainly exist, overall the public is inclined to be taken in by emotive documents, remembrances, and reconstructions, particularly today, when the discovery of history must compete with other tourist activities. In this context, the political polarization that dominated Japanese memory until the 1980s has tended to give way to a model in which conflicting representations of history are superposed. Many Japanese today are both perfectly aware of the violence and aggression that characterized the Imperial Army from 1937 to 1945 and convinced that the country ended the war a victim. There is a Janus-like dimension to the Japanese war memory. The risk for Westerners is to see only one side of the issue. And even when we do see both, it is tempting to interpret it as a sign of duplicity. Yet the existence of this complexity must be accepted at face value, for it underpins the pacifist sentiment that drives the majority of Japanese. This is judging by the fact that article 9 of the constitution remains intact, despite all the LDP’s efforts to repeal or bypass it via successive reinterpretations that now make it possible for the self-defense forces to defend allies in the event that war is declared upon them.

CONCLUSION

reams (1990) was one of the last films to be made by Kurosawa. It  is composed of eight vignettes, each narrating a dream or nightmare. In one of them, titled “The Tunnel,” we see a demobilized officer walking through a strange tunnel. As he emerges from the other end he hears footsteps echoing behind him. He is joined in turn by a soldier, then by an entire company. These are the men who died under his command. In each case a conversation ensues, at the end of which the commander manages to convince the ghosts to return to the darkness. Kurosawa explored the themes of war (Seven Samurai, I Live in Fear, Ran) and power (The Bad Sleep Well, Throne of Blood, Kagemusha) extensively. It was not until Dreams, however, that he made specific reference to World War II. Several possible explanations can be given for the presence in this film of the ghosts of dead soldiers and the apologies of their commander. One is the filmmaker’s advanced age, which perhaps prompted him to confess his own responsibilities in a dreamlike form; another is the partnership with his great friend the Godzilla director Honda Ishirō, who, unlike Kurosawa, fought on the front. It is noteworthy, however, that the period in which the film’s locations were scouted and principal photography took place coincided exactly with the protracted death throes and passing of Hirohito, which occupied the front

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pages of the media for months. “The Tunnel” in particular was filmed between February 11 and February 15, 1989, one month after the emperor’s death.1 This event heralded the end of an era that had been indelibly marked by war. Although the script was written back in 1986, at the time of the film’s release the tunnel with its ferocious guard dog echoed the transition from one era to another, reflecting the death of Hirohito and the accession of his son Akihito to the throne. Considered from this angle, the spirits we see in Kurosawa’s film are the ghosts of the Shōwa period. After haunting Japan for decades, their time has now come to “go back and rest in peace.” As their footsteps fade into the distance, the demonic-looking dog reemerges and begins to growl. It is on this snarling that the story ends: the consequences of the war have finally been faced, remorse expressed, and the ghosts of the past driven out, but a menacing sound still resonates in the dark.

R At no point since 1945 have the Japanese demonstrated unity in their perception of history, whether during the occupation, the 1970s, or more recent years. Divisions have always existed, mirroring in part the left- and right-wing political divide, but not exclusively. The veterans, bombing victims, and repatriates constitute separate categories that, through having been constantly in competition for state support and popular attention, have each developed their own distinct discourses. Geographical factors also play a considerable role: Okinawa does not remember the war in the same way as Hokkaido. Japan is a pluralistic and democratic society in which a multitude of opinions is expressed. Nor is it possible to contrast the population on the one hand with the elites on the other.2 The LDP leaders and senior government officials who have led the country do not form a homogeneous group. Significant differences exist between traditional conservatives like Miyazawa Kiichi, who have asserted the need to go further in acknowledging the nation’s war responsibilities, and those nostalgic for the empire. The question is thus, what is it that gives the Japanese people its unity? The first answer is—nothing; it is merely an optical illusion. The postulate that the Allies were fighting a just war, along with the propensity of peoples to defend their nation in the face of overseas criticism, are two factors that combine to create an impression in the West that the Japanese, because they hold a different perspective

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on the war and show national pride, all share the same view of history. Nonetheless, a second element must also be taken into consideration. Since 1945 the Japanese state has not developed a strong national historical narrative. It has refrained from adopting uncompromising stances and favored solutions intended to stall for time, both on a domestic level and vis-à-vis the People’s Republic of China and South Korea, whether this be to escape paying compensation, prevent others from making claims, avoid taking risks, or to retain the upper hand. It has made concrete commitments only where an overwhelming political majority existed on an issue, and always with great financial parsimony: this was the case in the early 1950s, when faced with the issue of awarding pensions to veterans or repatriating the bodies of dead soldiers, but also in the 1990s regarding the construction of national memorials in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. At the government level, the discourse focusing on Japanese victimhood is more a common core on which all the political tendencies agree, rather than the expression of a genuine memorial policy. It is not difficult to see that the nationalists, for example, who defend the honor of the imperial armed forces, have shown their support purely for tactical reasons. We must rid ourselves of this idea that Japanese culture is characterized by consensus. It no more exists on the subject of World War II in general than it does for the issue of nuclear power, to give a closely related and topical example.3 Going back in my analysis to the 1930s has highlighted the fact that these divisions did not appear at the end of 1945 but rather reflect ideological rifts that were already present during the war. The disparity in popular experiences, notably regarding the bombings and repatriation, certainly played a part in the plurality of memories; however, defeat also exacerbated forces that had previously been obliged to cooperate because of the total mobilization of the nation. In other words, the divisions we see today are a reminder that society in wartime Japan was not monolithic; it was shaped by diverse groups that joined forces for the sake of a sacred union. The totalitarian dynamic of 1940–1945 was not an instinctive reaction by the Japanese to danger. Neither the policy of indoctrination and legal control implemented in the late nineteenth century nor the gloom mongering and fears of the dark years were able to prevent the plurality of opinions. Nevertheless, it is impossible to ignore the consistency with which the state apparatus has striven to maintain (or reinforce) national unity, and the efficiency of the imperial institution, which acts

270CONCLUSION

as an anchor linking the country’s political forces in times of peace and rallying them in times of major crisis.

R The tsunami and explosion of several nuclear reactors in March 2011 prompted countless comparisons with the horrors of 1945. As on numerous occasions in the past, a twofold question emerged: Do these events mark Japan’s entry into a new era? Has Japan finally left the postwar behind? Yet posing these questions already provides a partial response. Contemporary Japan will continue to have World War II as its starting point as long as any events that occur there are spontaneously compared to 1945. In the case of the Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami, two particular elements were evocative of the war period: the images of ravaged coastal towns and the dissemination of radioactive particles. The disasters of 2011 did not displace those of 1945 but on the contrary reactivated them. Prime Minister Kan Naoto immediately alluded to the devastation caused by the Allied bombings in order to situate historically the destructive power of the tsunami;4 as for Fukushima, the reference to Hiroshima was all the more natural for the phonetic resemblance between the two cities’ names. The links connecting the two periods are threefold. The first, and also the most obvious, relate to memory. They correspond to initial impressions and associations of images. They are characteristically expressed by elderly people in the form of comments such as, “I hadn’t seen anything like it since 1945!” However, they are also apparent among all those who, while not eyewitnesses themselves, have superimposed, either consciously or unconsciously, images of 2011 with those taken from war accounts or reports that particularly affected them. Yet whether or not people made such comparisons themselves ultimately has little importance, for the media and cultural organizations were quick to do so. From March 2011 to March 2012, parallels were drawn between the two events in numerous television programs, debates, and on blogs, either to convey through the war reference the enormity of the destruction caused by the tsunami or, conversely, to enable people to imagine more clearly the state of the country’s cities at the time of defeat via pictures of the ravaged ports of the Tōhoku region. The connections between the two disasters are bidirectional.

CONCLUSION271

The second type of link relates to historical knowledge. These links are a response to the need for reliable data enabling a present-day event to be compared with past happenings, thereby making a more precise evaluation of the situation possible and allowing decisions to be made. Specifically, it is useful for town planners and economists involved in the rebuilding of the Tōhoku coast to study how the ruined cities of 1945 were able to recover. Similarly, analyzing the medical reports and radioactivity recorded in Hiroshima and Nagasaki serves to evaluate the risks run by residents living in proximity to the Fukushima plant. Nevertheless, the historical reference is not always appropriate. Recall in particular the uncertainty surrounding epidemiological data on the atomic bombs. History, in its scientific dimension, is often sidelined. Yet conversely, it is also greatly overestimated in its role as an identity-defining narrative. As an example, the recent dissemination in Japan and elsewhere of information on the way the Japanese have responded historically to disaster tends to influence people’s reactions rather than enable a rational analysis of the issue. The role of historical discourse is very often to program people: it aims, whether consciously or unconsciously, to determine their behavior. When references began to appear in March and April 2011 comparing the actions of the Fukushima firefighters with kamikaze pilots, the aim was to offset the dangers of contamination with heroization. Similarly, references to the postwar reconstruction are intended to give victims hope for the future. History is a tool of social control. Although in the West the point of view is different, the end result is the same. The recent refrain that the Japanese are impassive or fatalistic serves to characterize the other while implicitly defining ourselves as masters of our own destiny and to reassure ourselves of our ability to guarantee the safety of nuclear reactors. The usefulness of the culturalist or identity-defining historical narrative is questionable, particularly when cloaked in an apparent rationality. The relationship between World War II and a disaster like that of March 2011 is not merely historical and memorial in nature; it is also narrative. It implies not only images, references, and a shared vocabulary; it also shapes the way history is retold in general. We saw earlier that the Japanese show a penchant for dating important events as precisely as possible, in particular traumatic ones. These dates expressed to the exact minute are in the realm of time what steles and relics are in the realm of space—namely, points of contact, means of collapsing distance, metonymical figures. This is how we must understand the government’s

272CONCLUSION

decision in 2012 to hold a minute’s silence at 2:46 p.m. to mark the first anniversary of the Tōhoku disaster. While this earthquake stands apart in history for having caused a nuclear incident whose consequences will be felt for decades, the Japanese authorities, just as in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, have elected to treat this event as if it were instantaneous, and what is more, as if it were natural, since the minute of silence chosen marks the time that the earthquake struck and not the explosion of the first nuclear reactor, for example. Although these practices date back to the 1920s, as I indicated earlier, they are strongly associated with World War II, whose major dates continue to be marked in this way. The presence of Emperor Akihito at the national ceremony held on March 11, 2012, merely reinforced this impression. In other words, the way in which the war is commemorated provides the basic narrative structure for commemoration in general. In Japan, as elsewhere, World War II stands as the contemporary form of hell, symbolizing evil, suffering, terror, and blind power. If it were made into a Buddhist statue it would be depicted trampling on emaciated bodies, in reference to the wholesale slaughter of the conflict, and would hold an atomic bomb in its outstretched arms. By helping to structure retellings of the past in general, it has acquired a status that transcends and embraces both history and memory: it has become a mythical figure.

NOTES

INTRODUCTION 1.

2.

In Japanese, reigning emperors are referred to as Tennō Heika (His Majesty the Emperor) or using other similar, nonnominative expressions. Posthumously, emperors are referred to using the name of the era corresponding to their reign (Meiji, Shōwa, etc.). Thus, Emperor Hirohito was referred to as Emperor Shōwa (Shōwa Tennō) only after his death in 1989. On the other hand, in Japan emperors are never referred to by their given name, such as Mutsuhito, Hirohito, or Akihito, or only with an extremely pejorative connotation. Note that in Chinese, recent Japanese emperors are referred to by their given name, as in Western languages, but the pronunciation is different. For example, the characters for Hirohito are pronounced Yùrén. The screenplay for Dokkoi! Kono yari (The lifted spear) was inspired by a sixteenthcentury historical event in which the great warlord Oda Nobunaga (1535–1582) was attacked by his neighbor and rival, whose troops outnumbered his own. Nobunaga was faced with a dilemma: launching a frontal assault would be suicidal, as would any attempt to hold out at his castle. After some thought he decided to take a small contingent of men and launch a surprise attack on his rival, whom he managed to kill. The resulting confusion allowed the rest of his army to join the battle and emerge victorious. Taking this historical event as the film’s backdrop, Kurosawa proposed the humorous and moralizing tale of a samurai warrior who has a spear he believes to be worth a fortune but who comes to realize that the most important thing is not to use one’s possessions as a bargaining chip but rather to die for one’s master. The film was to end with a scene in which Nobunaga warns the film’s hero, “Don’t think we have one chance in a thousand of staying alive!” Kurosawa

274INTRODUCTION

3.

4.

5. 6. 7.

8. 9.

10.

Akira, “Dokkoi! Kono yari,” in Taikei Kurosawa Akira, ed. Hamano Yasuki, 5 vols. (Tokyo: Kōdansha, 2010), bekkan (suppl. vol.), 201–36. Tora no o wo fumu otokotachi (The men who tread on the tiger’s tail), directed by Kurosawa Akira (Tokyo: Tōhō, 1952), in The First Films of Akira Kurosawa, Criterion Collection, Eclipse Series 23, 2010, DVD. In his autobiography Kurosawa places responsibility with the Japanese censors, whom he accuses of not appreciating the comical treatment of certain scenes and of failing to submit his film to the American authorities. It should be noted, however, that The Subscription List (Kanjinchō) was one of the Kabuki plays censored by the Americans during the early days of the occupation. It is therefore unlikely that it would have been authorized, even if it had been examined. See Kurosawa Akira, Something Like an Autobiography, trans. Audie E. Bock (New York: Vintage Books, 1983), 150; Samuel L. Leiter, ed., Rising from the Flames: The Rebirth of Theater in Occupied Japan, 1945–1952 (Plymouth, U.K.: Lexington Books, 2009), 94, 190. “To tread on the tiger’s tail” (Tora no o wo fumu) is a Chinese expression that means “If you play with fire, you’ll get burned.” Roland Barthes, Empire of Signs, trans. Richard Howard (New York: Hill and Wang, 1983), 4. Miyazaki Hayao, “Jubaku kara no kaihō,” Sekai (June 1988), reprinted in Shuppatsuten 1979–1996 (Tokyo: Tokuma Shoten, 1996), 266 (this text was published in English by Viz Media in 2014 as Starting Point: 1979–1996, trans. Beth Cary and Frederik L. Schodt, but does not include the “Jubaku” article). Philip A. Seaton, Japan’s Contested War Memories: The “Memory Rifts” in Historical Consciousness of World War II (Oxon, U.K.: Routledge, 2007), 6. Kikou Yamata (Yamata Kiku, 1897–1975) was a woman of letters. Born to a Japanese father and a French mother, her work included the novel Masako (1925). Léonard Foujita (Fujita Tsuguharu, 1886–1968) was a painter from the School of Paris. Pierre Grosser, Pourquoi la Seconde Guerre mondiale? (Brussels: Éditions Complexe, 1999); George Mosse, Fallen Soldiers: Reshaping the Memory of the World Wars (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991).

1. THE NATION OUT TO CONQUER 1. 2. 3.

It was not until December 9, 1941, that war was officially declared between China and Japan. The “three human bullets” are known in Japanese as nikudan san’yūshi or bakudan san’yūshi. See, for example, “Japan Is a War Machine of 70,000,000 Gods,” Life 7, no. 2 (July 10, 1939): 50; Ian Morrison, Our Japanese Foe (New York: Putnam’s, 1943), 12. See also the film Our Enemy: The Japanese, U.S. Office of War Information, 1943, 19:51.

1. THE NATION OUT TO CONQUER275

4.

5.

6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11.

12. 13.

14. 15.

16.

The theory of a “fifteen years’ war” (jūgonen sensō) was first suggested and upheld by the historian of ideas Tsurumi Shunsuke in 1956. Tsurumi Shunsuke, An Intellectual History of Wartime Japan, 1931–1945 (New York: Routledge, 1986), 2. In times of peace, military service lasted two years in the army (eighteen months in the infantry for those who had completed their military training) and three years in the navy. Individuals were then discharged into the reserves until the age of forty. After the age of forty they were eligible to join the Association of Former Combatants, from where they could continue to support the armies. As of 1938, the duration of military service in the army was declared “indefinite.” Edward Drea, Japan’s Imperial Army: Its Rise and Fall, 1853–1945 (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2009), 68. Ichinose Toshiya, Kōgun heishi no nichijō seikatsu (Tokyo: Kōdansha, 2009), 28–31. According to the data presented in Yoshida Yutaka, Nihon no guntai, Iwanami shinsho (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 2002), 197. Ibid., 198. Note that the pronoun used by the emperor to refer to himself (chin) is used by no one else. Translated from the French, which itself was based partly on a translation from the Dictionnaire historique du Japon (Tokyo: Maison franco-japonaise de Tokyo; Paris: Maisonneuve et Larose, 2002), 1:816. In its full version the Imperial Rescript to Soldiers and Sailors includes some more nuanced passages. For example, it states that while soldiers should be valiant in combat, they should avoid anger and physical violence. It further states that superiors should show consideration to their subordinates, except in official circumstances, when they should demonstrate their authority. In 1888, 76.5 percent of conscripts were of peasant origin and 5.6 percent from the working class. See Yoshida, Nihon no guntai, 159. See the original and a French translation of the rescript in Pascal Griolet, “L’élaboration du Rescrit sur l’éducation, Kyōiku chokugo,” in La nation en marche: Études sur le Japon imperial de Meiji, ed. Jean-Jacques Tschudin and Claude Hamon (Arles: Picquier, 1999), 60–61. Carol Gluck, Japan’s Modern Myths: Ideology in the Late Meiji Period (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1985), 127. Ōhama Ikuko, “Shobō gijiku sankōsho no seitei katei ni miru Taiwan no shokuminchiteki kindai kyōiku no keisei,” in Nihon no Chōsen Taiwan shihai to shokuminchi kanryō, ed. Matsuda Toshihiko and Yamada Atsushi (Kyoto: Shibunkaku Shuppan, 2009), 169. Although an abridged, twelve-point version (jūni no tokumoku) existed, Gluck points out that between 1890 and 1940 the rescript was the subject of “595 booklength commentaries, hundreds of ministry of education directives and teachers’ guides, and countless evocations in print and oratory” (Japan’s Modern Myths, 127).

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17.

18.

19. 20.

21. 22. 23.

24.

25. 26. 27. 28.

Sasaki Mitsurō, “Shōwa senzenki ni okeru shōnen kyōgoin no ‘chōkai,’ ” Kiyō (Shizuoka: Shizuoka Eiwa Gakuin Daigaku, 2010), 180, http://www.shizuoka-eiwa .ac.jp/media/kiyou08-14.pdf. Only the Imperial Rescript to Soldiers and Sailors contains a single reference to the “army,” but the term is used in its most general sense and not in the sense of a public institution. Herbert P. Bix, Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan (New York: HarperCollins, 2000), 79–80. A decree dated September 4, 1912, established the following ten holidays: the Festival of Origin (Genshi-sai, January 3); New Year celebration (Shinnen Enkai, January 5); the anniversary of the enthronement of the first emperor (Kigen-setsu, February 11); Shunki Kōrei-sai (spring festival venerating the imperial ancestral spirits, ca. March 21); festival commemorating Emperor Jimmu (Jimmu Tennō-sai, April 3); anniversary of the death of Emperor Meiji (Meiji Tennō-sai, July 30); anniversary of the birth of the emperor (Tenchō-setsu, August 31, changed to October  31 in 1914 to avoid the summer heat); autumn festival venerating the imperial ancestral spirits (Shūki Kōrei-sai, ca. September 21); Festival of the Divine Tasting (Kanname-sai, October 17); Festival of the First Tasting (Niiname-sai, November 23). This decree was modified slightly in 1927, shortly after Emperor Shōwa ascended the throne, to replace the anniversary of the death of Emperor Meiji with that of Emperor Taishō (December 25) and to take into account the birthday of the new emperor (April 29) in replacement of his predecessor. Natsume Sōseki, I Am a Cat, trans. Aiko Ito and Graeme Wilson (North Clarendon, Vt.: Tuttle, 2002), 19. Natsume Sōseki, “Shumi no iden” (The heredity of taste), in Ten Nights of Dream, trans. Aiko Ito and Graeme Wilson (North Clarendon, Vt.: Tuttle, 2005), 117. Humanity and Paper Balloons, or Ninjō kamifūsen in Japanese (86 min.). For more information on Yamanaka Sadao (1909–1938), see Katō Tai, Eiga kantoku Yamanaka Sadao (Tokyo: Kinema Junpōsha, 1985). Yukiguni (Snow Country, trans. Edward G. Seidensticker [New York: Knopf, 1956]) was published in installments between 1935 and 1937. It appeared in book form in June 1937; Bokutō kitan (A Strange Tale from East of the River, trans. Edward G. Seidensticker [North Clarendon, Vt.: Tuttle, 1965]) was published in April 1937. Louise Young, Japan’s Total Empire: Manchuria and the Culture of Wartime Imperialism (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998), 156–65, 170–78. Michael Lucken, Grenades et amertume: Les peintres japonais à l’épreuve de la guerre (Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 2005), 26. Law no. 55, April 13, 1937, “Kokka sōdōin hō,” article 1. This article stated that the law applied in the case of “an incident [jihen] comparable to war [sensō].” On the mobilization of citizens for the war effort, see Nagahama Isao, Kokumin seishin sōdōin no shisō to kōzō: Senjika minshū kyōka no kenkyū (Tokyo: Akashi Shoten, 1987).

1. THE NATION OUT TO CONQUER277

29.

30.

31. 32.

33. 34. 35. 36.

37.

38.

Nakai Masakazu (or Shōichi, 1900–1952) was a philosopher specializing in aesthetics. See Kinoshita Nagahiro, Nakai Shōichi: Atarashii bigaku no kokoromi (Tokyo: Heibonsha, 2002). The Public Security Preservation Law (Chian iji hō), adopted in 1925, gave police the power to arrest anyone suspected of questioning the kokutai principle and the capitalist economy. Waves of arrests began at the end of the winter of 1928 and continued until 1933. Those targeted by the law included members of the clandestine Japanese Communist Party (estimated to be between one thousand and two thousand), labor unionists, and students actively involved in the proletarian movements. This was by far the most repressive movement, with 57,468 arrests, representing 80 percent of all arrests made during the period 1928–1945, with the peak situated between 1931 and 1933. See Okudaira Yasuhiro, Chian iji hō shōshi (Tokyo: Chikuma Shobō, 1977), 114–17; Ogino Fujio, Shisō kenji (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 2000), 59. Banba Toshiaki, Nakai Masakazu densetsu (Tokyo: Potto Shuppan, 2009), 182–219. Shinmura Takeshi, “ ‘Sekai bunka’ no koto,” in Shinmura Takeshi chosakushū, 3 vols. (Tokyo: San’ichi Shobō, 1994), 2:69. Shinmura Takeshi (1905–1992) translated Diderot and Romain Rolland but was also known for having taken over the work of his father, Shinmura Izuru (1876–1967), and compiled the famous Japanese dictionary Kōjien. He was imprisoned from November 1937 to August 1939. Kitagawa Kenzō, Sensō to chishikijin (Tokyo: Yamakawa Shuppansha, 2008), 63. Hino Ashihei (1907–1960) was the author of novels such as Wheat and Soldiers (Mugi to heitai, 1938). Umemoto Takemata (or Samaji, 1906–1973). Umemoto Takemata, Kaimetsu: Akahata chika haifu buin no kiroku (Tokyo: Shiraishi Shoten, 1987). The Akimaru report, which Arisawa Hiromi (1896–1988) helped draft, deemed Japan to be at its peak production capacity in 1941, but the United States to have considerable leeway and thus a significant advantage in the event of war. This report was immediately rejected and destroyed by army officials. See Saitō Nobuyoshi, “Kenkyū nōto: Ajia Taiheiyō sensō kaisen kettei katei ni okeru sensō ‘shūmatsu’ kōsō ni ataeta Akimaru kikan no eikyō,” Shien, no. 60 (1999): 167–84. Takiguchi Shūzō (1903–1979) worked for the Association for the Promotion of International Culture (Kokusai Bunka Shinkō Kai), founded in 1934 under the supervision of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Within this organization he worked on a book on the history of Japanese culture. Saigō Takamori (1828–1877) was one of the founders of the Meiji state. In 1877 he opposed the government and committed suicide after the failed Satsuma Rebellion. Also noteworthy are the cases of Mutsu Munemitsu (1847–1897) and Enomoto Takeaki (1836–1908), who were both imprisoned at the beginning of the Meiji period for taking part in a rebellion, before being pardoned and enjoying glittering ministerial carriers.

2781. THE NATION OUT TO CONQUER

39.

40.

41. 42. 43.

44. 45. 46.

47. 48.

49. 50.

In June 1944, 2,435 people (those under investigation, prisoners serving time, those on parole, former detainees) were under surveillance as part of the law on the prevention and surveillance of thought crimes. There were 2,026 such individuals in October 1945 when the law was repealed. Ogino Fujio, Shisō kenji, 88–91. On the handful of Japanese resistance groups overseas, notably in China, see Fujiwara Akira et al., Nihon jinmin hansen dōmei shiryō—bekkan (Tokyo: Fuji Shuppan, 1995). Yamamoto Taketoshi, Kindai Nihon no shinbun dokusha-sō (Tokyo: Hōsei Daigaku Shuppan-kyoku, 1981), 219–40. Furukawa Takahisa, Senjika no Nihon eiga (Tokyo: Yoshikawa Kōbunkan, 2003), 20. Unless otherwise stated, for the data on radio, songs, and newspapers, see Nihonshi jiten (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1999), 1769. More generally, on wartime media and popular culture, see Sakuramoto Tomio, Sensō wa rajio ni notte: 1941.12.8 no shisō (Tokyo: Marujusha, 1985); Sakuramoto Tomio, Uta to sensō: Minna ga gunka wo utatte ita (Tokyo: Atene Shobō, 2005). Law no. 66, April 5, 1939, “Eiga hō,” article 1. Law no. 41, May 6, 1909, “Shinbunshi-hō,” articles 23, 24, and 27. Allow me to quote some passages from Listen to the Voices from the Sea, a wellknown collection of letters and private diaries written by young men who died during the war: “The whole China Incident is a war started in order to fuel the Army’s self-serving ambition” (1943, page 56); “What an irony of fate, and of life, that I should have passed the cadetship exam! . . . Four more years in a military which I have always hated ever since I was a little child? Why should I want to spend four or even five more years? Darn it! I want to be dead” (1943, page 79); “I heard that an organization called ‘Bijutsu Hōkoku-kai’ (Serving the Nation Society for the Arts) was founded. . . . They talk out loud and in a grandiose manner without even thinking about what ‘hōkoku’ really means. I am both concerned and hopeful that what they are doing will not turn out to be ‘bōkuku’ (destroying the nation) rather than ‘hōkoku’ (serving the nation). No matter where I look, I see evidence of the same phenomenon, i.e., an abundance of ritualistic and superficial sycophancy toward us” (1943, page 146) (Listen to the Voices from the Sea, ed. and trans. Midori Yamanouchi and Joseph L. Quinn [Scranton, Pa.: University of Scranton Press, 2000]). Terada Torahiko, “Shikenkan,” Kaizō, September 1933, in Terada Torahiko zenshū, Iwanami bunko (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1997), 377. Oguma Eiji, A Genealogy of Japanese Self-images, trans. David Askew (Melbourne: Trans Pacific Press, 2002); Arnaud Nanta, “Koropokgrus, Aïnous, Japonais, aux origines du peuplement de l’archipel,” Ebisu, no. 30 (2003): 123–54. Sheldon Garon, Molding Japanese Minds: The State in Everyday Life (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1997), 142. See the Nippon nyūsu (Japan news, 1940–1945) broadcasts available for viewing at the NHK website, http://www.nhk.or.jp/shogenarchives. Hereafter referred to as NHKA.

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51. 52. 53. 54. 55. 56. 57. 58.

59.

60.

61.

62. 63.

64. 65.

66.

Sabine Frühstück, “Managing the Truth of Sex in Imperial Japan,” Journal of Asian Studies 59, no. 2 (2000): 353. Wolfram Manzenreiter, Sport and Body Politics in Japan (New York: Routledge, 2013), 70. Law no. 105, April 8, 1940, “Kokumin tairyoku hō” (National physical strength law). Law no. 107, May 1, 1940, “Kokumin yūsei hō” (National eugenic law), article 1. “Mune ni aikoku. Te ni kokusai: Shina jihen kokusai,” Ōkura-shō, ca. 1938, part of the Kyoto Museum for World Peace collection at Ritsumeikan University, Kyoto. United States Strategic Bombing Survey, Summary Report (Pacific War), 1945. NHKA, Nippon nyūsu, no. 1 (June 11, 1940). See, for example, Seikatsu to bunka (Tokyo: Aoyama Shuppansha, 1941), or “Senjika no bunka undō” (1942), in Kishida Kunio zenshū (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1991), 25:329–41. Quoted by Anne Bayard-Sakai, “Bruine de neige: Notice,” in Tanizaki, Pléaide collection (Paris: Gallimard, 1998), 2:1391. Tanizaki’s novel was translated into English as The Makioka Sisters by Edward G. Seidensticker (New York: Knopf, 1957). On the rationalization of social time during the Meiji period, see Stefan Tanaka, New Times in Modern Japan (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2004), 12. Miyamoto Yuriko, “Chi no shio bungaku no shio,” Kenshōkai 6, no. 4 (February 1940), in Miyamoto Yuriko zenshū, 30 vols. (Tokyo: Shin Nihon Shuppansha, 1980), 11:393. Kenneth J. Ruoff, Imperial Japan at Its Zenith: The Wartime Celebration of the Empire’s 2,600th Anniversary (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 2010), 56–59. It is unclear why the government chose this specific time, which has no links to any historical event. It is likely that it was chosen to facilitate the mobilization of employees before their lunch break. Note that the attack on Pearl Harbor was celebrated on December 8, the date the attack took place according to Japanese time. Saitō Yoshihisa, “Shisha ni sasageru mushūkyō girei: Mokutō e no kaigi,” Seiron, February 2006, 328–30. Sugimoto Ryōkichi (1907–1939) was a filmmaker affiliated with Japan’s proletarian movements. His mistress, Okada Yoshiko (1902–1992), acted in the films of such heavyweight directors as Mizoguchi Kenji. The couple met in 1936. Fujita Tsuguharu (Léonard Foujita, 1886–1968) was a painter and member of the School of Paris. During the war he was one of the main painters for the army. He emigrated to France after the hostilities ended and became a naturalized French citizen. Hijikata Yoshi (1898–1959) founded the Tsukiji Little Theater, a temple for avant-garde theater during the 1920s. He attempted to emigrate to the Soviet Union in 1934 but was expelled in 1937. He moved to Paris before returning to Japan after France’s defeat and subsequently spent the rest of the war in prison. For information on Fujita’s wartime activity, see Lucken, Grenades et amertume, 155–75.

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67. 68. 69. 70.

71.

72. 73.

74. 75. 76.

77. 78. 79. 80.

81.

Takashima Ryūhei, “Kankō panfuretto ga kataru senjika no ryokō jijō,” Hōsei Joshi kiyō, no. 23 (2005): 72–77, in particular 74; http://ci.nii.ac.jp/naid/110004852486. Ruoff, Imperial Japan, 84–105. Kusaka Yōko, “Haishoku no kioku,” in Kusaka Yōko sakuhin shū (Tokyo: Rokkō Shuppan, 1978), 103. Ichiban utsukushiku (The most beautiful), directed by Kurosawa Akira (Tokyo: Tōhō, 1944), in The First Films of Akira Kurosawa, Criterion Collection, Eclipse Series 23, 2010, DVD. The emblem of Imperial Japan was the taka, a term that applies to birds of prey in general and to the goshawk in particular. This explains why translations vary and include “eagle,” “goshawk,” and “falcon.” Ruoff, Imperial Japan, 115. Ichinose Toshiya, “Senseki to katari: Nichiro sensō no Ryōjun senseiki megutte,” in Sensō kioku ron, ed. Sekizawa Mayumi (Tokyo: Shōwa Dō, 2010), 103–6. Louise Young reports that between 1931 and 1941 the number of employees at the Japanese Tourist Bureau in Dalian increased from 91 to 1,408 (Japan’s Total Empire, 262). Kubo Ritsudō, “Pekin,” Kokusai shashin shinbun, no. 249 (February 20, 1940), 7. Samuel Guex, Entre nonchalance et désespoir: Les intellectuels japonais sinologues face à la guerre (1930–1950) (Berne: Lang, 2006). “Kaigaichi hōjin no gendō yori mitaru kokumin kyōiku shiryō,” in Jūgonen sensō gokuhi shiryōshū, ed. Takasaki Ryūji, 30 vols. (Tokyo: Ryūkei Shosha, 1976), 1:10–11. Ibid., 46. Ibid., 30. Ibid., 15. Ishiwara Kanji, Saishū sensō-ron; Sensō-shi taikan, in Ishiwara Kanji senshū, 10 vols. (Tokyo: Tamai Rabo, 1986), 3:42. Ishiwara Kanji (1889–1949) was an army officer. An advocate for the militarization of Japan from the early 1930s onward, he played an essential role in the plan to occupy Manchuria. He was a strong proponent of pan-Asianism and opposed the policy of invading China as of 1937. In 1941 he was put into retirement by his bitter enemy General Tōjō. Guex, Entre nonchalance et désespoir, 92.

2. A TOTALITARIAN DYNAMIC, 1940–1945 1.

2.

See in particular Alfred Smoular’s harsh criticism of this book in Sont-ils des humains à part entière? L’intoxication antijaponaise (Lausanne: L’Âge d’homme, 1992), 98–113. Robert Guillain, I Saw Tokyo Burning: An Eyewitness Narrative from Pearl Harbor to Hiroshima (London: Murray, 1981), 31.

2. A TOTALITARIAN DYNAMIC, 1940–1945281

3. 4. 5. 6.

7. 8.

9.

10. 11.

12.

13. 14.

15. 16.

Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism (New York: Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, 1973), 392–418. Robert Guillain, Le peuple japonais et la guerre (Paris: Julliard, 1947), 49. Ibid., 145–46. Edwin O. Reischauer, “The Origins of Totalitarianism in Japan,” in The Quest for Political Unity in World History, Annual Report of the American Historical Association, ed. Stanley Pargellis (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1944), 3:213–20. Ibid., 213, 218. Juan Linz, Totalitarian and Authoritarian Regimes (Boulder, Colo.: Lynne Rienner, 2000), 9; Stanley G. Payne, A History of Fascism, 1914–1945 (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1995), 328–37. Ben-Ami Shillony, Politics and Culture in Wartime Japan (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1981), 16; Ben-Ami Shillony, “Traditional Constraints on Totalitarianism in Japan,” in Totalitarian Democracy and After, ed. Yehoshua Arieli and Nathan Rotenstreich (London: Cass, 2002), 158–64; Gregory J. Kasza, The State and the Mass Media in Japan, 1918–1945 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988), 287. Maruyama Masao, “Seijigaku ni okeru kokka no gainen” (1936), in Senchū to sengo no aida 1936–1957 (Tokyo: Misuzu Shobō, 1987), 32. Yamagiwa Yasushi, “ ‘Ko’ to ‘zen,’ aruiwa Nihon to Seiyō,” in Kōdō geijutsu-ron (Tokyo: Nihon Daigaku Geijutsuka Gakuen, 1941), 51. Yamagiwa Yasushi (1901– 1952) was a professor in aesthetics at Tōyō Daigaku, then Nihon Daigaku. He was notably the author of Geijutsu tsūron (General theory of the arts, 1940). Sugiura Takeo, “Zentaishugi,” in Zentaishugi seisaku, kōryō, ed. Nakano Seigō (Tokyo: Ikuseisha, 1939), 176. Nakano Seigō (1886–1943), a politician and founder of the ultranationalist party Tōhōkai, advocated the development of a totalitarian system in Japan. Opposed to military expansion and the adventurist policy of Tōjō, he was arrested in October 1943 and later committed suicide. See Leslie Oates, Populist Nationalism in Pre-War Japan: A Biography of Nakano Seigō (Oxon: Routledge, 2011). Masaki Katsuji, Hijō jikyoku tokuhon (Tokyo: Keibunsha, 1939), 106–10. Kishida Kunio, “Bungei no sokueiteki ninmu,” in Bunka to seikatsu (Tokyo: Aoyama Shuppansha, 1941), 249–50. Kishida Kunio (1890–1954) was a playwright and literary critic who wrote a number of important plays in the prewar theatrical repertoire. Between late 1940 and June 1942 he was head of the Cultural Affairs Bureau at the Imperial Rule Assistance Association. Yamagiwa, “ ‘Ko’ to ‘zen,’ 51. See, for example, the somewhat unconvincing argument put forward by Louise Young on the concept of “total empire,” Japan’s Total Empire: Manchuria and the Culture of Wartime Imperialism (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998), 13–14.

2822. A TOTALITARIAN DYNAMIC, 1940–1945

17.

18.

19. 20.

21. 22.

23.

24. 25. 26.

27. 28.

29.

Known in Japanese as Taisei Yokusankai. The word taisei literally means “great power”—in other words, the imperial power, or throne. It was used above all in the mid-nineteenth century in opposition to the bakufu, the power delegated to a military commander, the shogun. Suetsugu Nobumasa (1880–1944) was an admiral and politician. He served as home minister from December 1937 to January 1939. From 1940 to 1941 he was chairman (gichō) of the IRAA’s Central Cooperative Council (Chūō Kyōryoku Kaigi). NHKA, Nippon nyūsu, no. 28 (December 18, 1940), http://www.nhk.or.jp /shogenarchives. Kitagawa Kenzō, ed., Sōryokusen to bunka—shiryōshū (Tokyo: Ōtsuki Shoten, 2000), 3; English translation adapted from David J. Lu, Japan: A Documentary History (New York: M.E. Sharpe, 1997), 441–42. Victor Klemperer, The Language of the Third Reich: LTI—Lingua Tertii Imperii, trans. Martin Brady (London: Bloomsbury Continuum, 2006), 229–33. The decision to oblige citizens to form neighborhood associations was taken in September 1940 by the home minister (Burakukai chōnaikai-tō seibi yōryō), reviving a system that had existed during the Edo period. Each association was subdivided into “neighborhood protection units” (rinpo-han), commonly known as tonarigumi. Theoretically each unit comprised between five and ten households. Their purpose was to facilitate mutual surveillance among citizens and establish a channel through which the government could transmit its directives and slogans; see Ebato Akira, Senji seikatsu to tonarigumi kairanban (Tokyo: Chūō Kōron Jigyō Shuppan, 2001). Matsuda Kōichirō, “Senkanki no hō shisō to dantai no riron kōsei,” in Senkanki Nihon no shakai shūdan to nettowāku, ed. Inoki Takenori (Tokyo: NTT Shuppan, 2008), 228. See, among others, Thomas R. Havens, Valley of Darkness: The Japanese People and World War Two (New York: Norton, 1978), 77–81. Yamaguchi Hōshun, “Hisshō ema: Kennō tenmatsu yōroku,” Bijutsu, May 1944, 43–44. Many similar events were organized throughout the war. A small percentage of these works are held at the National Museum of Modern Art in Tokyo. These artworks were known in Japanese at the time as kennōga (offered paintings) or ema (votive paintings). In Japanese, Naikaku Jōhōkyoku. An adventure story written between 1935 and 1939, translated into English by Charles S. Terry (in an abridged form) as Musashi (Tokyo: Kodansha International, 1995). On Tanizaki Jun’ichirō (1886–1965), see Tan’o Yasunori, “Le traitement allusif de la guerre dans la peinture: Un oubli,” in Japon pluriel 2, ed. Jean-Pierre Berthon and Josef Kyburz (Arles: Picquier, 1998), 13. On the painter Matsumoto Shunsuke

2. A TOTALITARIAN DYNAMIC, 1940–1945283

30. 31. 32. 33.

34.

35.

36. 37.

38. 39. 40.

41.

42.

(1912–1948) and his wartime activities, see Bert Winther-Tamaki, “Embodiment/ Disembodiment: Japanese Painting during the Fifteen-Year War,” Monumenta Nipponica 52, no. 2 (summer 1997): 145–80; Michael Lucken, “Matsumoto Shunsuke et les années de guerre,” Cipango, no. 7 (1998): 7–30. On Japan’s wartime policy toward art, see Michael Lucken, Grenades et amertume: Les peintres japonais à l’épreuve de la guerre (Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 2005), 19–96. Yoshihara Jirō, Kiku (chrysanthemum), oil on canvas, 1942 (reproduced in Yoshihara Jirō-ten [Ashiya: Ashiya Shiritsu Bijutsu Hakubutsukan, 1992], 74). According to the statutes of the Great Japan Crafts Association (Dai Nippon Kōgeikai); see “Dai Nippon Kōgeikai ni tsuite,” Kōgei nyūsu, May 1943, 58. In Japanese, Nihon Bungaku Hōkokukai (Patriotic Society for Japanese Literature); Nihon Bijutsu Hōkokukai (Patriotic Society for Japanese Art); Nihon Sashie Gaka Hōkokukai (Patriotic Society of Japanese Illustrators); Nihon Hanga Hōkōkai (Association for the Support of Japanese Woodblock Prints); Dai Nippon Kōgeikai (Great Japan Crafts Association); Dai Nippon Shashin Hōkokukai (Patriotic Society for the Photography of Great Japan); Dai Nippon Shodō Hōkokukai (Patriotic Society for the Calligraphy of Great Japan); Nihon Manga Hōkokukai (Patriotic Society for Japan Manga). Takahashi Kenji (1902–1998) was a specialist in German literature and translator of Goethe, Heine, and Hesse. He replaced Kishida Kunio as head of the IRAA’s Cultural Affairs Bureau in June 1942, before handing over the reins to the painter Suzuki Toshihiko (1894–1993) in June 1944. Kitagawa, Sōryokusen to bunka, 360–63. Kitakyūshū is a city located in northern Kyushu. In 1942 it did not yet have its own administrative status and included several towns, including Kokura and Moji. Ibid., 361. Yokomitsu Riichi (1898–1947) was a novelist close to Kawabata who worked within the school known as New Sensations (Shinkankaku-ha). Tanikawa Tetsuzō (1895– 1989), a philosopher specializing in ethics and aesthetics, was a professor at Hōsei University. Kitagawa, Sōryokusen to bunka, 365–76. Kido Kōichi (1889–1977) served as lord keeper of the privy seal from 1940 until his arrest by the Americans in November 1945. Watsuji Tetsurō (1889–1960) was a philosopher specializing in ethics and a historian of ideas in the Kyoto school. He was notably the author of Fūdo (translated into English by Geoffrey Bownas as Climate and Culture: A Philosophical Study [New York: Greenwood Press, 1988]). For more information on Suzuki Kurazō, see Satō Takumi, Genron tōsei: Jōhōkan Suzuki Kurazō to kyōiku no kokubō kokka (Tokyo: Chūō Kōron Shinsha, 2004), in particular 14–48, 334–47. Michel Vié, Le Japon et le monde au XXe siècle (Paris: Masson, 1995), 186–96.

2842. A TOTALITARIAN DYNAMIC, 1940–1945

43.

44. 45.

46.

47.

48. 49.

50. 51. 52.

53. 54. 55.

56.

Mushanokōji Saneatsu (1885–1976), a writer belonging to the Shirakaba movement, was known for his humanistic and mystical prose. Hasegawa Nyozekan (1875–1969) was an influential essayist who sought to adapt Anglo-American liberalism to Japan. The author in question was Kōsaka Masaaki (1900–1969), a philosopher in the Kyoto school specializing in Kant. Miki Kiyoshi (1897–1945) was a philosopher who attempted, outside the academic world, to bring together phenomenology and Marxism. A member of the Shōwa Research Group (Shōwa Kenkyūkai) founded by Prince Konoe, he helped legitimize the concept of the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. Arrested and imprisoned in 1945 for helping a friend who was wanted by the police, he died in September 1945, a few weeks after Japan’s surrender. In order to describe this state of modern Japanese thought, the philosopher Tsurumi Shunsuke (b. 1922) spoke of a world “without a Pythagoras.” See “Nihon no shisō hyakunen” (1966), in Tsurumi Shunsuke chosakushū, 5 vols. (Tokyo: Chikuma Shobō, 1975), 3:3–11. Hosokawa Karoku (1888–1962) was a political journalist. He was arrested on suspicion of being a communist and interrogated twice, in 1933 and 1941. Arrested for the third time in September 1942 in connection with the Yokohama Incident, he spent three years in prison. He was elected to the Diet after the war as a Communist Party deputy. Ogino Fujio, Yokohama jiken to chian iji hō (Tokyo: Kinohanasha, 2006), 8–40. Michael Lucken, “Histoire et prophétie: L’après-guerre vu depuis les années 1930,” in La société japonaise devant la montée du militarisme, ed. Jean-Jacques Tschudin and Claude Hamon (Arles: Picquier, 2007), 212–16. Vié, Le Japon et le monde, 209–21. Inose Naoki, Shōwa 16 nen natsu no haisen (Tokyo: Chūō Kōron Shinsha, 2010). The youth training centers (seinen kunrenjo) were established for young men aged sixteen to twenty who had left the education system. They were replaced in 1935 by youth schools (seinen gakkō); see Yui Masaomi, Gunbu to minshū tōgō (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 2009), 157–73. Yui dates Japan’s realization that any future conflicts would be total wars to 1916 (see page 159). The dictionary Nihon kokugo daijiten lists the following two meanings for kessen: “to fight for the final victory or defeat” and “to be willing to die fighting.” Herbert P. Bix, Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan (New York: HarperCollins, 2000), 450, 456–61, 463–70, 477–84. Tokutomi Sohō (1863–1957) was a journalist, historian, and politician. He founded the monthly journal Kokumin no tomo in 1887, followed by the daily newspaper Kokumin shinbun in 1890. In the early twentieth century his political leanings shifted from a form of popular conservatism to nationalist conservatism. Before the war he was considered one of the most influential voices in the public arena. In 1942 he was appointed chairman of the Patriotic Society for Japanese Literature. Sohō Tokutomi Iichirō, Saitō Tadashi, “Jimu jūdan,” Kaizō, May 1944, 2–3.

3. THE MEANING OF THE WAR285

3. THE MEANING OF THE WAR 1.

2. 3.

4.

5. 6. 7.

8.

9. 10. 11.

12.

Beginning in 1937, the armed forces sent many writers behind the front line so that they could better describe the war. The best-known authors to have participated in such missions were Ozaki Shirō (1898–1964), Hayashi Fumiko (1903–1951), Satō Haruo (1892–1964), Ishikawa Tatsuzō (1905–1985), Hino Ashihei (1907–1960), Ibuse Masuji (1898–1993), and Unno Jūza (1897–1949); see Sakuramoto Tomio, Bunkajin-tachi no Daitōa sensō (Tokyo: Aoki Shoten, 1993). Cécile Sakai, Histoire de la littérature populaire japonaise: Faits et perspectives (1900–1980) (Paris: L’Harmattan, 1987), 233. Tōkyōdō geppō 28, no. 1 (January 1941): 60; Dokushojin 2, no. 2 (February 1942): 110; Dokushojin 3, no. 2 (February 1943): 108; Dokushojin 4, no. 2 (February 1944): 72. The total number of publications, all genres included, was 6,123 in 1940, 7,357 in 1941, 9,833 in 1942, and 7,790 in 1943. There is no data available for 1944 and 1945. A similar phenomenon can be observed in several European countries. “Kōson dokusho undō” (September 1942), in Shiryōshū: Sōryokusen to bunka; Kōsei undō, kenmin undō, dokusho undō, 2 vols., ed. Takaoka Hiroyuki (Tokyo: Ōtsuki Shoten, 2001), 2:470–72. It was translated into Japanese only in 1938, by Yanaihara Tadao (1893–1961). Nitobe Inazō (1862–1933) was originally a scholar specializing in agronomics but made a name for himself chiefly as an educator. He also had a political and diplomatic career. Suzuki Daisetsu (Daisetz Suzuki or D. T. Suzuki, 1870–1966) was a professor of English and specialist in Buddhist studies. His first writings on Zen were published in 1900. Essays in Zen Buddhism, his first major book to be translated into English, was published in three separate volumes between 1927 and 1934. Suzuki began studying Swedenborg in 1897 while living in the United States (see vols. 22–24 of his collected works, Iwanami Shoten, 1999). See also Karatani Kōjin, “Buddhism, Marxism and Fascism in Japanese Intellectual Discourse in the 1930’s and 1940’s,” in Approches critiques de la pensée japonaise du XXe siècle, ed. Livia Monnet (Montreal: Les Presses de l’Université de Montréal, 2001), 194. Stefan Zweig, Romain Rolland: The Man and His Work, trans. Eden and Cedar Paul (London: Forgotten Books, 2012), 288. See in particular the account of Gandhi’s visit to Rolland in Romain Rolland, Inde: Journal 1915–1943 (Paris: Albin Michel, 1960), 308–62. Chinmoy Guha, “En quête d’un nouvel espace: Romain Rolland et l’Inde,” Cahiers de la SIELEC, no. 4 (Paris: Kailash, 2005), viewable online at the SIELEC (Société Internationale d’Étude des Littératures de l’Ère Coloniale) website, http://www. sielec.net/pages_site/DESTINATIONS/ASIE/INDE/chinmoy_guha_romain_rolland/romain_rolland_chinmoy_guha1.htm. Didier Chiche, “L’accueil de Romain Rolland au Japon,” Cahiers de Brèves, nos. 17–18 (January 2006 and September 2006), http://www.association-romainrolland .org/image_articles17/Chiche17.pdf; http://www.association-romainrolland.org /image_articles18/Chiche18.pdf.

2863. THE MEANING OF THE WAR

13.

14.

15. 16.

17. 18.

19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25.

Kaname Nakamura, “La réception et le rayonnement de la pensée rollandienne au Japon,” Cahiers de Brèves, no. 14 (December 2004): 17. Romain Rolland continued to be highly influential after World War II, a period in which he was one of the most widely read foreign authors in Japan. Between 1949 and 1969 four new translations of Jean-Christophe were published, while the author’s forty-three-volume collected works (Misuzu Shobō, 1981–1985) can be found in most university libraries. A wealth of books and articles were written on his oeuvre up until the 1990s, notably in the journal Studies on Romain Rolland (Roman Roran kenkyū), of which two hundred issues have already been published. Quoted by Ninagawa Yuzuru, “Roman Roran,” in Ōbei sakka to Nihon kindai bungaku, ed. Fukuda Mitsuharu et al., 5 vols. (Tokyo: Kyōiku Shuppan Sentā, 1974), 2:234. Kitagawa Kenzō, Sensō to chishikijin (Tokyo: Yamakawa Shuppansha, 2008), 47. The Soul Enchanted (in French, L’âme enchantée, 1922–1933) was translated into Japanese by Miyamoto Masakiyo (1898–1982) and published in the Iwanami bunko collection in 1941–1942. However, certain passages in the translation were censored. The biography written by Katayama Toshihiko (1898–1961), first published in 1936, was rereleased in 1943; see Katayama Toshihiko, Roman Roran (Tokyo: Rokugeisha, 1943). See in particular the monthly journal Sekai bunka, February 1935 to October 1937. Shimazaki Tōson (1872–1943), a poet and novelist, inspired the creation of Japanese romanticism. During the war he served as chairman of the Japanese PEN Club and was an honorary member of the Patriotic Society for Japanese Literature. Katayama, Roman Roran, 117. Romain Rolland, “Introduction,” in Le prêtre et ses disciples (Paris: Rieder, 1932), 16–17. Roman Roran zenshū (Tokyo: Misuzu Shobō, 1979), 36:379–524. The number of letters decreased significantly after 1931. Kurata Hyakuzō, Nihon shugi bunka sengen (Kyoto: Jinbun Shoin, 1939). NHKA, Nippon nyūsu, no. 79 (December 9, 1941), http://www.nhk.or.jp /shogenarchives. Hasegawa Minokichi, ed., Sengo no shisō mondai (Tokyo: Daiichi Shobō, 1939); the preface is unpaginated. Abe Isoo (1865–1949) was one of the founders of the short-lived Social Democratic Party (Shakai Minshu-tō, 1901), the forerunner to all Japan’s left-wing parties. In 1926 he became the secretary-general of the Social People’s Party (Shakai Minshū-tō), a movement that attempted to unite the noncommunist left through a plan to reform capitalism. He was subsequently elected as a deputy to the lower house of the Diet in 1928, where he sat virtually without interruption until 1940. At the time the book was written in 1939, he was chairman of the newly created Social Mass Party (Shakai Taishū-tō), a socialist party that unreservedly supported pan-Asian expansion and increased nationalism.

3. THE MEANING OF THE WAR287

26. 27.

28. 29. 30. 31. 32. 33. 34. 35. 36.

37. 38.

39. 40. 41. 42. 43. 44. 45. 46. 47. 48. 49.

Abe Isoo, “Tsugi no jidai shisō,” in Sengo no shisō mondai, ed. Hasegawa Minokichi, (Tokyo: Daiichi Shobō, 1939), 96–97. Murobuse Kōshin (1892–1970) was a journalist actively involved in Japan’s socialist movements. He was one of the founders of the Shinjinkai, launched by Yoshino Sakuzō (1878–1933) in 1918. He was a respected essayist whose positions evolved from minponshugi (a kind of enlightened populism) in the late 1910s to pan-Asianism in the 1930s. Murobuse Kōshin, “Sengo no shisō,” in Sengo no shisō mondai, ed. Hasegawa Minokichi (Tokyo: Daiichi Shobō, 1939), 40–41. Ibid., 70. Ibid., 72. Ibid., 41, 46, 49. Ibid., 53. Ibid., 65. Ibid., 72–73. Kobayashi Hideo, in Kindai no chōkoku, by Kawakami Tetsutarō et al. (Tokyo: Sōgensha, 1943), 242. Abe Tomoji (1903–1973) was a novelist and literary critic who became known to the public through his novel A Winter Lodging (Fuyu no yado, 1936). Like many intellectuals, as he felt the ideals of his youth crumble he sank into a kind of skepticism and disengagement that came to an abrupt end in 1937. When war broke out he came to the conclusion that military action was the best way to resolve the tensions agitating the nation. Abe Tomoji, “Sengo no bunka mondai,” in Sengo no shisō mondai, ed. Hasegawa Minokichi (Tokyo: Daiichi Shobō, 1939), 244–45. Nishida Kitarō (1870–1945) was a philosopher, author of A Study of Good (Zen no kenkyū), and the man responsible for introducing Husserl’s work into Japan. He was a key figure in the Kyoto school. Nishida Kitarō, “Seimei,” part 2, Shisō, no. 268 (August 1945): 6. Ibid., 10–12. John Dower, Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II (New York: Norton, 1999), 19. Tsurumi Shunsuke, An Intellectual History of Wartime Japan, 1931–1945 (New York: Routledge, 1986), 79. Ibid., 80. Karatani, “Buddhism, Marxism and Fascism,” 199. Kamei Katsuichirō, Geijutsu no unmei (Tokyo: Jitsugyō no Nihonsha, 1941), 42. Ibid., 46. Mori Ōgai (or Mori Rintarō, 1862–1922). A doctor, novelist, Germanist, and chronicler, he was one of the leading intellectual figures of the late Meiji period. Kamei, Geijutsu no unmei, 49. Ibid., 53.

2883. THE MEANING OF THE WAR

50.

51. 52. 53. 54. 55. 56. 57.

58. 59. 60.

61. 62.

63. 64. 65. 66. 67. 68. 69.

Kusunoki Masashige (late thirteenth century to 1336) was a samurai who fought against the Ashikaga clan on behalf of Emperor Go-Daigo. He committed suicide after his army was defeated and consequently came to symbolize loyalty to the emperor. See note 38 in chapter 1 of this book. Toyotomi Hideyoshi (ca. 1536–1598) ruled Japan from 1587 to 1598. His family was unable to retain power after his death and was destroyed. The Taira were one of the most powerful clans of the Heian period. They were decimated at the battle of Dan-no-Ura (1185). Kamei, Geijutsu no unmei, 49. Ibid., 52. Ibid., 53. Hashikawa Bunzō, Nihon roman-ha hihan josetsu, Bungei bunko (Tokyo: Kōdansha, 1998), 50; Hashikawa Bunzō chosakushū, 10 vols. (Tokyo: Chikuma Shobō, 1985), 1:36. Kasahara Tokushi, Nankin jiken, Iwanami shinchō (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 2004), 143–44. Awaya Kentarō, Yoshimi Yoshiaki, eds., Dokugasu-sen kankei shiryō II: Kaisetsu, jūgonen sensō gokuhi shiryōshū (Tokyo: Fuji Shuppan, 1989), 18:27. Kasahara Tokushi, “Sankō sakusen to wa nan datta no ka,” in Chūgoku shinryaku no shōgensha tachi, ed. Okabe Makio et al. (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 2010), 114– 15. For a more detailed presentation of the Three Alls Policy, see Kasahara Tokushi, Nankin jiken to sankō sakusen (Tokyo: Ōtsuki Shoten, 1999). “Kaigaichi hōjin no gendō yori mitaru kokumin kyōiku shiryō,” in Jūgonen sensō gokuhi shiryōshū, ed. Takasaki Ryūji, 30 vols. (Tokyo: Ryūkei Shosha, 1976), 1:48. Tanaka Ryūkichi (1893–1972) was an army officer. In 1946 he published Haiin wo tsuku (Understanding the causes of the defeat), a book in which he revealed the hidden side of army affairs in Manchuria and China. He was called on by the Americans to give testimony but escaped charges; see Awaya Kentarō, Tōkyō saiban e no michi, 2 vols. (Tokyo: Kōdansha, 2006), 1:180–231. Sasaki Tōichi, “Nankin kōryaku ki,” in Shōwa sensō bungaku zenshū, 16 vols. (Tokyo: Shūeisha, 1965), bekkan (suppl. vol.), 254. Samuel Guex, “Les spécialistes de la Chine et l’armée impériale,” Ebisu, no. 35 (2006): 148–53. Hasegawa Shin, in Listen to the Voices from the Sea, ed. and trans. Midori Yamanouchi and Joseph L. Quinn (Scranton, Pa.: University of Scranton Press, 2000), 178. NHKA, Shōgen, testimony of Sumioka Giichi, June 24–July 31, 2011, http://www .nhk.or.jp/shogenarchives. “Kōga ihoku no seisō,” Tōkyō Asahi shinbun, March 31, 1938, 2. Ichinose Toshiya, Ryōjun to Nankin, Bungei shinsho (Tokyo: Bunshun Shunjū, 2007), 223. Kuwabara Jitsuzō, “Shina waidan,” Gaikō jihō 43, no. 1 (January 1926), in Kuwabara Jitsuzō zenshū, 6 vols. (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1968), 1:84.

3. THE MEANING OF THE WAR289

70.

71. 72. 73.

74. 75.

76. 77.

78. 79.

80. 81. 82. 83. 84.

85.

86.

Bunten-shū Shōwa 17 nen (Tokyo: Asahi Shinbunsha, 1942), 9, 35, 46, 51. See in particular Nanpō rakudo (Paradise of the southern seas) by Higashiyama Kaii and Jawa no sarasa (Javanese cloth) by Takamura Shinpu. Okakura Kakuzō, The Ideals of the East, with Special Reference to the Art of Japan (New York: Dutton, 1920), 1. Ishiwara Kanji, Saishū sensō-ron; Sensō-shi taikan, in Ishiwara Kanji senshū, 10 vols. (Tokyo: Tamai Rabo, 1986), vol. 3. Note that at a theoretical level there were many different interpretations of Asianism (Ajiashugi), a notion that was inherently vague and shifting. There was a leftwing and a right-wing Asianism, an expansionist and a nonexpansionist Asianism. For more information on these debates, see Sven Saaler and J. Victor Koschmann, Pan-Asianism in Modern Japanese History: Colonialism, Regionalism and Borders (Oxon: Routledge, 2007), and Eri Hotta, Pan-Asianism and Japan’s War 1931–1945 (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007). Franck Michelin, “La rencontre de deux destins,” Ebisu, no. 30 (2003): 5–31. The “Main Principles of Basic National Policy” (Kihon kokusai yōkō) was published by the Konoe cabinet July 26, 1940. For more information on the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere, see Wada Haruki et al., Ajia Taiheiyō sensō to Daitōa kyōeiken: 1935–1945, Iwanami kōza (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 2011), 347–67. NHKA, Nippon nyūsu, no. 164 (July 27, 1943); no. 226 (February 28, 1944). Nishitani Keiji, “Atarashiki ningen no keisei: Daitōaken ni okeru rinri no mondai,” Kaizō, April 1942, 8–18. Nishitani Keiji (1900–1990) was one of the main philosophers of the Kyoto school. NHKA, Nippon nyūsu, no. 226 (September 28, 1944). The illustrated magazine Shashin shūhō was published by the Cabinet Information Service (Naikaku Jōhōbu, then Naikaku Jōhōkyoku); Front was an illustrated magazine designed to be a vehicle for propaganda aimed at foreign audiences. The task of producing it was entrusted to the publisher Tōhōsha by the army and navy. Alain Delissen, “Ense et abaco, la formation de l’empire colonial japonais, 1895– 1910,” Historiens et géographes, no. 344 (June–July 1994): 209. NHKA, Nippon nyūsu, no. 125 (October 28, 1942); no. 135 (January 6, 1943); no. 137 (January 19, 1943). Delissen, “Ense et abaco,” 211. NHKA, Nippon nyūsu, no. 122 (October 6, 1942). In Japanese, Atago Hokuzan, Yudaya to sekai sensō (Tokyo: Daiyamondosha, 1943); Oyama Takeo, Tōa to Yudaya mondai (Tokyo: Chūō Kōronsha, 1941); Takeda Seigo, Shinbun to Yudaya-jin (Tokyo: Ōa Tsūshinsha, 1944). Shimizu Norio, Nachisu no Yudaya seisaku (Tokyo: Arusu, 1941). Shimizu Norio (1902–after 1973) studied aesthetics at Kyoto University. During the war he worked for the army’s information service. In 1955 he was appointed chief executive of the Association of School Excursions. Ibid., 79.

2903. THE MEANING OF THE WAR

87. 88. 89.

90. 91. 92.

93. 94. 95.

96. 97.

98. 99. 100.

101. 102.

103. 104.

Ibid., 128. On this subject, see also Sugawara Ken, Doitsu ni okeru Yudaya-jin mondai no kenkyū (Tokyo: Nippon Hyōronsha, 1941), 445. Ben-Ami Shillony, Politics and Culture in Wartime Japan (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1981), 162. Note that the conductor Joseph Rosenstock was put under house arrest in Karuizawa along with hundreds of other foreigners in 1944. Oyama, Tōa to Yudaya mondai, 128; see also Shillony, Politics and Culture, 169. Oyama, Tōa to Yudaya mondai, 70, 77. “Yudaya hinanmin ni kansuru ken,” quoted in Nishiyama Katsunori, “Senkanki Nihon ni okeru Yudaya-jin mondai ni tsuite: Oboegaki 2,” Kokusai kankei, hikaku bunka kenkyū 8, no. 2 (March 2010): 213. Shillony, Politics and Culture, 165. Nishiyama, “Senkanki Nihon ni okeru Yudaya-jin mondai,” 220. Shiōden Nobutaka (1879–1962) was an army officer. He was chairman of both the Anti-Jewish League of Japan and the Great Japan Islamic Society. In April 1942 he was elected deputy of the Fifth Ward of Tokyo on the back of an openly anti-Semitic platform. Arrested by the Americans in December 1945, he was released two years later. Shimizu, Nachisu no Yudaya seisaku, 2. Kashima Ken, Beikoku ni okeru Yudaya-jin mondai (Tokyo: Dōbunkan, 1942); Kamiya Shigeru, Amerika Yudaya-jin mondai (Tokyo: Kokumin Hyōronsha, 1942); Nagano Toshikazu, Ōbei ni okeru chōkokka seiryoku no kenkyū (Tokyo: Yūseidō Shuppanbu, 1944). See John Dower, War Without Mercy: Race and Power in the Pacific War (New York: Pantheon Books, 1986). Michael Lucken, Grenades et amertume: Les peintres japonais à l’épreuve de la guerre (Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 2005), 39–40. Itō Hirobumi (1841–1909) was a Japanese politician. He served as prime minister on several occasions, notably between 1885 and 1888, then again between 1892 and 1896. He was assassinated in Harbin in 1909. David Duncan, ed., The Life and Letters of Herbert Spencer (Whitefish, Mont.: Kessinger, 2004), 323. Madama Butterfly is an opera by Giacomo Puccini that features a young Japanese woman who is abandoned by her American husband, a sailor named Pinkerton. After he demands that she return their son, the young woman commits suicide with a sword bearing the inscription, “He who cannot live with honor shall die with honor.” On the reception of Madama Butterfly in Japan, see Michel Wasserman, “Madame Butterfly en situation,” Corps écrit, no. 17 (1986): 121–24. Ishiwara, Saishū sensō-ron, 3:106. The principle of racial equality was proposed in January 1919 by Japan to the commission responsible for writing the charter of the future League of Nations. Although it was accepted at a vote by the majority of nations present—including

4. HEROES AND THE DEAD291

105. 106.

107. 108.

109. 110. 111. 112. 113. 114. 115. 116. 117.

France and Italy—Britain and the United States, which had both abstained, maneuvered under Australian pressure to have it struck from the final declaration; see Naoko Shimazu, Japan, Race and Equality: The Racial Equality Proposal of 1919, The Nissan Institute/Routledge Japanese Studies (London: Routledge, 1998). The Rotary Clubs were banned in Japan in September 1940. At the time, forty-seven clubs were listed. The number of Western films being shown in Japan dropped from 134 to 52 between 1939 and 1940; see Furukawa Takahisa, Senjika no Nihon eiga (Tokyo: Yoshikawa Kōbunkan, 2003), 20. See Dower, War Without Mercy, 77–93, 169–80. Ernest Fenollosa (1853–1908), an American art historian, helped to reassess the importance of the artistic heritage of ancient Japan during his stay there from 1878 to 1890. Okugai Chōkoku Chōsa Hozon Kenkyūkai, Okugai Chōkoku Chōsa Hozon Kenkyūkai kaihō, no. 3 (November 2004): 50. Ibid., 209–10. Watsuji Tetsurō, “Amerika no kokuminsei,” Shisō, no. 261 (February 1944): 2–8. Ibid., 14. Ibid., 17. Ibid., 22. NHKA, Nippon nyūsu, no. 164 (July 27, 1943). NHKA, Nippon nyūsu, no. 141 (February 16, 1943). Sohō Tokutomi Iichirō, “Jikyoku mondō,” Kaizō, April 1944, 5.

4. HEROES AND THE DEAD 1.

2. 3. 4.

5.

Ōuchi Tsutomu, Fashizumu e no michi, Nihon no rekishi, 31 vols. (Tokyo: Chūō Kōronsha, 1971), 24:480–85; Peter Wetzler, Hirohito and War: Imperial Tradition and Military Decision Making in Prewar Japan (Honolulu: University of Hawai`i Press, 1998), 199–202. Stephen S. Large, Emperor Hirohito and Showa Japan: A Political Biography, The Nissan Institute/Routledge Japanese Studies (London: Routledge, 2003), 76–131. Awaya Kentarō, Tōkyō saiban e no michi, 2 vols. (Tokyo: Kōdansha, 2006), 1:177. Herbert P. Bix, Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan (New York: HarperCollins, 2000), 387–92, 439–86. Edward J. Drea, In the Service of the Emperor: Essays on the Imperial Japanese Army (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1998), 168–215. In 1879, a document titled The Imperial Will on the Great Principles of Education (Kyōgaku seishi) stated, “Accordingly, as soon as they have received the images, elementary schools will display portraits and photographs of warriors loyal to the emperor, children showing filial respect, and virtuous women, past and present,

2924. HEROES AND THE DEAD

6. 7. 8. 9.

10.

11.

12. 13. 14.

and these will be shown to pupils as soon as they begin school” (note that the term translated here as “photographs” [shashin] referred at the time to any realistic portrait). The original text is available on the website of the Japanese Ministry of Education, http://www.mext.go.jp/b_menu/hakusho/html/others/detail/1317935 .htm. Kita Renzō (1876–1949), a painter in the Western style, is still known for his landscapes and theater sets. He painted several war scenes between 1937 and 1945. Kawamura Kunimitsu, Seisen no ikonogurafi: Tennō to heishi, senshisha no zuzō, hyōshō (Tokyo: Seikyūsha, 2007), 37. Michael Lucken, Grenades et amertume: Les peintres japonais à l’épreuve de la guerre (Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 2005), 106–15. In Japanese, arahitogami or akitsumikami. The idea that the emperor was a deity, which appeared in the Kojiki, was revived in 1937 when the Ministry of Education published an influential text titled Kokutai no hongi, or the Cardinal Principles of Our National Polity. Jean-Jacques Wunenburger, “L’image, le double, le dédoublement: L’impossible mystification de l’idole politique,” in L’idole dans l’imaginaire occidental, ed. Ralph Dekoninck et al. (Paris: L’Harmattan, 2005), 274. Minobe Tatsukichi (1873–1948) was a legal expert and statesman who defended the idea—which dominated during the Taishō period—that the Meiji Constitution of 1889 considered power to lie with the state and the emperor to be the organ of the state. He was openly accused of lèse-majesté in 1934–1935 by those in favor of an absolutist interpretation in which the emperor held power by virtue of his sacred origin. Minobe’s books were banned and he left his seat in the upper house in September 1935. Hashikawa Bunzō, Nihon roman-ha hihan josetsu, Bungei bunko (Tokyo: Kōdansha, 1998), 64. For more information on this song, see Kindaichi Haruhiko and Anzai Aiko, eds., Nihon no shōka, 3 vols. (Tokyo: Kōdansha, 1982), 3:253. In August 1871, shortly after the Meiji Restoration, the Ministry of the Military adopted the first national plan on funerals and commemorations for soldiers. The idea was to establish a coherent and centralized system based around the Shinto faith. The plan rested on three pillars: the creation of a network of shrines throughout the country, the adoption of shared celebratory practices at a national level and the creation of graveyards attached to the shrines. It thus raised the possibility of Shinto funerals becoming commonplace, a revolutionary suggestion. Yet in reality no cemeteries were ever built on the grounds of a shrine, except in Osaka. See Harada Keiichi, “Rikukaigun bochi seido-shi,” in Irei to haka, Kokuritsu Rekishi Minzoku Hakubutsukan kenkyū hōkoku, ed. Arai Katsuhiro and Ichinose Toshiya, no. 102 (Sakura: Kokuritsu Rekishi Minzoku Hakubutsukan, 2003), 97–159. See also, in the same volume, the highly detailed study by Yokoyama Atsuo, “Kyū-Sanadayama rikugun bochi hensen shi,” 11–93.

4. HEROES AND THE DEAD293

15.

16. 17.

18. 19.

20.

21. 22. 23. 24.

25. 26. 27. 28. 29. 30.

The main priests in charge of Yasukuni were appointed by the military—Suzuki Takao (1869–1964), who served as chief priest at Yasukuni from 1938 to 1946, was a retired general. The names of those to be enshrined were also suggested by the armed forces. Finally, the shrine’s funding depended on the military. Imai Akihiko, “Kyūhan ni okeru gokoku jinja no sōken,” in Arai and Ichinose, Irei to haka, 567–68. A shrine dedicated to protecting the nation was built in Harbin, Manchuria, in 1921. More widely, in 1945 there were approximately seventy Shinto shrines outside Japan, including twenty or so in Manchuria, the same in Taiwan, a dozen in Korea, eight on Sakhalin, and five in China. Helen Hardacre, Shintō and the State, 1868–1988 (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1989), 91. Postcards show the existence in Lüshun (Port Arthur), on Mount Baiyun, of an “ossuary-shrine,” a name that suggests the presence of human remains within the sacred grounds, just as in Osaka until 1918. It was built between 1905 and 1908 and was most likely destroyed at the end of World War II. See, for example, Emmanuel Kattan, Penser le devoir de mémoire, Questions d’éthique (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 2002), 29. Translated into English as Duty to Remember (London: Profile Books, 2000) (out of print). Imai Akihito, Kindai Nihon to senshisha saishi (Tokyo: Tōyō Shorin, 2005), 259. “Bochi oyobi maisō torishimari kisoku” (Regulations concerning graves and burials), November 18, 1884, article 7; see Hōrei zensho, 1884, 19:507. Murakami Shigeyoshi, Irei to shōkon (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1974), 178. Fujii Tadatoshi, “Mura hasshin no tokui na zaigō gunjin bunkai-shi,” in Mura to senjō, Kokuritsu Rekishi Minzoku Hakubutsukan kenkyū hōkoku, ed. Fujii Tadashi and Sekizawa Mayumi, no. 101 (Sakura: Kokuritsu Rekishi Minzoku Hakubutsukan, 2003), 173. Veterans’ associations were also responsible for organizing ceremonies of a funerary, national, and military nature, organizing youth military training programs, overseeing reservists, providing support to wounded servicemen and the families of victims, maintaining correspondence with soldiers, and publishing newsletters. A first stele was erected in May 1923 but was destroyed in September that same year by the Great Kantō Earthquake. It was rebuilt in 1925. Tama shishi, no. 4 (1990): 440–42; Tama chōshi, 1970, 317. Kawano Chūji, Gakuseihei no shuki (Tokyo: Sanseidō, 1942), 92. Ichinose Toshiya, Furusato wa naze heishi wo koroshita ka (Tokyo: Kadokawa Shoten, 2010), 93–102. NHKA, Nippon nyūsu, no. 238 (December 21, 1944), http://www.nhk.or.jp /shogenarchives. Kim Nan-gu, “Senzen senchūki ni okeru shōi gunjin engo seisaku ni kansuru kenkyū: Shokugyō hogo taisaku no nikkan hikaku,” Kyūshū Kango Fukushi Daigaku kiyō 7, no. 1 (2005): 45–57.

2944. HEROES AND THE DEAD

31. 32.

33.

34. 35.

36.

37. 38.

39. 40. 41.

42. 43.

44. 45. 46. 47. 48.

Ichinose, “Furusato wa naze,” 93. “Gunjin engo kyōiku yōkō.” This circular from the Ministry of Education, dated February 27, 1940, stressed the need to (1) nurture a spirit of gratitude toward soldiers, (2) help and support the war wounded, and (3) support the families of both soldiers and victims. For a case study, see Aoki Shōji, “Nōsonbu ni okeru gunjin engo kyōiku no seiritsu to tenkai,” Yamagata Kenritsu Hakubutsukan kenkyū hōkoku, no. 26 (January 2008): 1–25. Ichinose Toshiya, “Kami no chūkonhi,” in Arai and Ichinose, Irei to haka, 604–7. On these departure ceremonies, sometimes known as red paper celebrations (akagami no matsuri) in reference to the color of the draft notice, see Kira Yoshie, “Shōwa-ki no chōhei, heiji shiryō kara mita heishi no miokuri to kikan,” in Fujii Tadatoshi and Sekizawa Mayumi, Mura to senjō, 285–304. In 1939 the management of cemeteries was delegated by the government to the Great Japan Society for Celebrating Loyal Souls (Dai Nippon Chūrei Kenshōkai), which contained as many subdivisions as there were military zones; see Inoue Shōichi, Senjika Nihon no kenchikuka, Asahi shosen (Tokyo: Asahi Shinbunsha, 1995), 138. Yamabe Masahiko, “Zenkoku rikukaigun bochi ichiran,” in Arai and Ichinose, Irei to haka, 696–611 (reverse pagination). This provision is regularly cited in administrative texts, suggesting that it was difficult to implement. Among the first occurrences, see the Army Ministry decree of July 24, 1886, reprinted in Harada, “Rikukaigun bochi seido-shi,” 118. Tsuchi to heitai (Mud and soldiers) was directed by Tasaka Tomotaka (Nikkatsu Tamagawa Eiga, 1939), based on the popular novel by Hino Ashihei. See, for example, the description by Isaac Titsingh, Cérémonies usitées au Japon pour les mariages et les funérailles (Paris: Nepveu, 1819), 178. Namihira Emiko, “Heishi no itai to heishi no irei,” in Arai and Ichinose, Irei to haka, 496; reprinted in Namihira Emiko, Nihonjin no shi no katachi (Tokyo: Asahi Shinbunsha, 2004), 122–206. Harada, “Rikukaigun bochi seido-shi,” 119. Arakawa Shōji, “Heishi ga shinda toki: Senshisha kōsō no keisei,” in Kokuritsu Rekishi Minzoku Hakubutsukan hōkokusho, ed. Sekizawa Mayumi, no. 147 (Sakura: Kokuritsu Rekishi Minzoku Hakubutsukan, 2008), 35–63. Bernard Faure, L’imaginaire du Zen, Japon collection (Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 2011), 40, 133. Harada, “Rikukaigun bochi seido-shi,” 141. Ibid., 125. Ibid., 143–44. Ossuaries were generally inaugurated following both Shinto and Buddhist rites. The late 1930s seem to have been marked by a resurgence of religious symbols, notably with the appearance of small water basins (mizubachi) and flowers in front of graves, as in Buddhist cemeteries.

4. HEROES AND THE DEAD295

49.

50. 51. 52.

53. 54.

55. 56.

57. 58. 59. 60.

61. 62. 63. 64. 65.

Three categories of ossuaries were envisaged in 1939: (1) overseas memorials; (2) memorials in major Japanese cities, located primarily inside military cemeteries; and (3) those for small towns and villages with no military graveyard of their own. In this last case, monuments were required to be constructed on “public land,” but in reality many can be found standing alongside commemorative steles in Shinto shrines (military or otherwise); see Harada, “Rikukaigun bochi seido-shi,” 144; Murakami, Irei to shōkon, 182. The regulation size for urns was approximately ten centimeters across by twenty centimeters high (article 10 of the decree of May 5, 1938). Yokoyama Atsuo and Morishita Tōru, “Ōsaka-funai no Takatsuki to Shinodayama no rikugun bochi,” in Arai and Ichinose, Irei to haka, 176. Funerary towers were popular throughout the Sino-Japanese War: all the great architects (Kishida Hideto, Sakakura Junzō, Maekawa Kunio), as well as many young professionals who rose to fame later (such as Tange Kenzō), were invited to work on this theme. Although the basic design differed little from the monuments constructed in Europe after World War I, they were distinguished by their resolutely minimal aesthetic, combining the modernism of an architect like Le Corbusier with a reinvented Japanese tradition in the style of the Katsura Imperial Villa. “Picture of the Week,” Life, May 22, 1944, 34–35. The first picture of dead American soldiers was published in Life in September 1943 (September 20, 1943, 34–35). Even after this date it was forbidden to publish images deemed violent; see Andrew J. Huebner, The Warrior Image: Soldiers in American Culture from the Second World War to the Vietnam Era (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2008), 104–5. John Dower, War Without Mercy: Race and Power in the Pacific War (New York: Pantheon Books, 1986), 15–146. “Your Bones in My Arms, Comrade” (Sen’yū no ikotsu wo daite, 1942) was a military song written by Tsujihara Minoru. It was promoted by the army and released in several different versions by four separate record companies. NHKA, Shōgen, personal account by Satō Haruo (2007), http://www.nhk.or.jp /shogenarchives. Namihira, “Heishi no itai,” 500. Kageyama Masao, Marē kessen kamera senki (Tokyo: Arusu, 1943), 252–53. NHKA, Shōgen, personal accounts by Miyazaki Yoshishige (June 24, 2007), Takahira Saburō (June 1, 2007), Sasajima Shigekatsu (March 2008), and Satō Tomoharu (June 11, 2008). NHKA, Shōgen, personal account by Sekiguchi Sakae (June 3, 2008). Namihira, “Heishi no itai,” 501. Sensō taiken no kiroku to katari ni kansuru shiryō chōsa, 2 vols. (Sakura: Kokuritsu Rekishi Minzoku Hakubutsukan, 2004). Ibid., 2:775. Ibid., 2:988, 1312.

2964. HEROES AND THE DEAD

66. 67.

68. 69. 70. 71.

72.

Quoted by Namihira Emiko in “Heishi no itai,” 509. Nakamura Tokurō, in Listen to the Voices from the Sea, ed. and trans. Midori Yamanouchi and Joseph L. Quinn (Scranton, Pa.: University of Scranton Press, 2000), 157. Letter signed Kentarō and dated April 27, 1945; visible online at http://www.warbirds .jp/senri/12-3/02tubasa/12inudoo/index.html (accessed June 2015). See the diary of Maeda Shōko, in Chiran tokubetsu kōgekitai, ed. Muranaga Kaoru (Kagoshima: Japuran, 1989), 78. http://www.warbirds.jp/senri/jasdf/16kuri/03toko.html (accessed June 2015). Jean Larteguy, ed., Ces voix qui nous viennent de la mer (Paris: Galimard, 1954), 205–6. This section does not appear in the English translation, Listen to the Voices from the Sea. NHKA, Nippon nyūsu, no. 235 (November 30, 1944).

5. FEAR AND DESTRUCTION 1. 2.

3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12.

“Tekki wa kanarazu kuru,” Shashin shūhō, no. 252 (December 23, 1942): 12. Unno Jūza, Bakugeki-ka no teito: Kūshū sōsōkyoku, in Unno Jūza zenshū, 15 vols. (Tokyo: San’ichi Shobō, 1990), 1:325. Unno Jūza (1897–1949) was a popular novelist and one of the founding fathers of Japanese science fiction. During the war he worked for the navy from time to time. In 1947 he was investigated as part of the drive to purge certain individuals from public office, which was instigated at the request of SCAP (Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers), but in the end no charges were made. Ibid., 421. Ibid., 407. Ibid., 353. Ibid., 418. Ōba Yahei, “Kūshū to Nihon,” Kaizō, September 1933, 156. Ibid., 160–61. Kuroda Yasuhiro, Teikoku Nihon no bōkū taisaku (Tokyo: Shinjinbutsu Ōraisha, 2010), 93–119. Kenneth P. Werrell, Blankets of Fire: U.S. Bombers over Japan during World War II (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1996), 38–40. T. J. Betts, “The Strategy of Another Russo-Japanese War,” Foreign Affairs 12, no. 4 (July 1934): 596. Kiryū Yūyū (1873–1941) was an editorial writer at the Shinano Mainichi shinbun. In his article he added that “no matter how much we are told to ‘Stay calm,’ ‘Keep your composure,’ or made to do drills every day, when the time comes, not only will we see the instinct of fear in the panic-stricken eyes of fleeing citizens, we can imagine that the bombs dropped will cause fires to break out and spread all around,

5. FEAR AND DESTRUCTION297

13. 14. 15. 16.

17. 18.

19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25.

26. 27.

creating the kind of hellish scenes witnessed during the Great Kantō Earthquake. What is more, it is possible that such attacks might be repeated. Consequently, combating enemy planes over the Kantō region, over the imperial capital, necessarily implies the defeat of our armies.” Although the views expressed in this article were widely supported, its tone was deemed defeatist and Kiryū was forced to resign after the Veterans’ Association launched a boycott of the newspaper. Kiryū Yūyū, “Kantō bōkū dai-enshū wo warau,” Shinano Mainichi shinbun, August 11, 1933; viewable online at http://www.aozora.gr.jp/cards/000535/files/4621_15669.html. Implementing orders subsequently extended the law’s scope of application to include Korea and Taiwan. Ishikawa Shōji, “Daiikkai Kitakyūshū bōkū enshū (1931.7),” Hōsei kenkyū, no. 55 (1989): 352. Ibid., 351. Kiyosawa Kiyoshi, A Diary of Darkness: The Wartime Diary of Kiyosawa Kiyoshi, trans. Eugene Soviak and Kamiyama Tamie (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1999), 111. Kiyosawa Kiyoshi (1890–1945) was a journalist specializing in the United States. During the war he kept a private journal in which he revealed himself to be extremely perceptive on military matters and highly critical of the government. Miyamoto Yuriko, “Tabata no kisha sono hoka,” Fujin, no. 1 (July 1947), in Miyamoto Yuriko zenshū, 30 vols. (Tokyo: Shin Nihon Shuppansha, 1980), 17:714. Tanabe Heigaku, “Sokai to funen toshi no kensetsu,” Kaizō, March 1943, 41–48. Tanabe Heigaku (1898–1954) was a professor of architecture and a specialist in fire prevention measures. Ibid., page 45 in particular. “Dokugun, sōretsu no funsen,” Asahi shinbun, June 27, 1944, 1. NHKA, Nippon nyūsu, no. 228 (October 12, 1944), http://www.nhk.or.jp /shogenarchives. “Tekigun no raishū hinpan,” Asahi shinbun, June 26, 1944, 1. NHKA, Nippon nyūsu, no. 141 (February 16, 1942); no. 230 (October 26, 1944). John David Chappell, Before the Bomb: How America Approached the End of the Pacific War (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1997), 76–77, 177. No fewer than 315 million cinema tickets were sold throughout the whole of 1944 in Japan; see Furukawa Takahisa, Senjika no Nihon eiga (Tokyo: Yoshikawa Kōbunkan, 2003), 209. Ōnuki Ken’ichirō, Tokkōtai shinburyō: Shōgen kikanhei wa jigoku wo mita (Tokyo: Kōdansha, 2009). “Umi yukaba” (If I go away to sea) is a poem taken from the Man’yōshū (Collection of Ten Thousand Leaves, eighth century) and attributed to Ōtomo no Yakamochi. It was set to music in 1880, then again in 1937. It is this final version that was used both as a patriotic anthem and a funeral song during the war.

2985. FEAR AND DESTRUCTION

28.

29.

30.

31. 32. 33.

34.

35. 36. 37. 38. 39. 40.

41.

42.

Engelbert Kaempfer, The History of Japan: Together with a Description of the Kingdom of Siam, 1690–92, trans. Johann Caspar Scheuchzer, 3 vols. (London, printed for the translator, 1727), 3 (appendix VI): 58. “Kokunai tokkōtai sono ta kore ni rui suru minkan undo no shidō torishimari ni kansuru ken,” April 25(?), 1945, in Jūgonen sensō gokuhi shiryōshū, ed. Takasaki Ryūji, 30 vols. (Tokyo: Ryūkei Shosha, 1976), 23:6. The Civilian Volunteer Corps (Kokumin Giyūtai) was established in June 1945 to replace the Imperial Rule Assistance Association. Its members included both men and women. Soon after, on June 23, 1945, a Volunteer Military Service Law was passed (Giyūhei ekihō), which mobilized men aged fifteen to sixty and women aged seventeen to forty. It was virtually never implemented. It is thus important we make a clear distinction between the noncombatant civil defense units, which were highly active in the final weeks of the war, and the fighting corps, of which only three were ever created in the railway and shipping sectors. It is easy to confuse the two, particularly since one of the activities undertaken by the civil defense units was military training. NHKA, Nippon nyūsu, no. 237 (December 15, 1944). John Hersey, “Kamikaze,” Life 19, no. 5 (July 30, 1945): 75. “Kaishū de ageyo, jūgo no daisenka,” Taisei Yokusankai Hiroshima-ken Shibu, ca. December 1944, http://www.pcf.city.hiroshima.jp/virtual/img/ex1102_img/110203 .jpg. Part of the collection at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum. See Hirase Reita, “Sensō to bijutsu korekushon,” in Kōza Nihon bijutsu-shi, ed. Kinoshita Naoyuki, 6 vols. (Tokyo: Tōkyō Daigaku Shuppankai, 2005), 6:144–45. See also “Tōkyō no dōzō (14): Mubō na sensō no gisei,” Tōkyō shinbun, November 16, 1959. Okugai Chōkoku Chōsa Hozon Kenkyūkai, Okugai Chōkoku Chōsa Hozon Kenkyūkai kaihō, no. 3 (November 2004): 59, 69, 232, and 285. Ibid., 265. Ibid., 105, 237, 249. Ibid., 326. Tadayoshi Sakurai, Human Bullets: A Soldier’s Story of Port Arthur, trans. Masujiro Honda and ed. Alice M. Bacon (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, 1907). Nakazato Kaizan, Hyakushō Yanosuke no hanashi, in Nakazato Kaizan zenshū, 20 vols. (Tokyo: Chikuma Shobō, 1972), 19:18. Nakazato Kaizan (1885–1944) was the author of Daibosatsu tōge (Great Bodhisattva Pass), an epic novel published in forty-one volumes between 1913 and 1941. The reading shinpū was used chiefly in the army. The more natural reading of kamikaze was used by the Japanese media beginning in November 1944; see NHKA, Nippon nyūsu, no. 232 (November 16, 1944). Yasuoka Masahiro, “Mainichi shi wo narau kokoro,” Asahi shinbun, August 21, 1944, 2. Yasuoka Masahiro (1898–1983) was a neo-Confucian thinker and political adviser. He is credited with having helped draft the Imperial Surrender Rescript of August 15, 1945.

5. FEAR AND DESTRUCTION299

43. 44. 45. 46. 47. 48. 49.

50.

51. 52. 53. 54. 55.

56.

57.

58.

Takamura Kōtarō, Kamishio tokubetsu kōgekitai, in Shūkan shōkokumin (April 1945); see also Takamura Kōtarō zenshikō (Tokyo: Nigensha, 1967), 2:634. Maurice Pinguet, Voluntary Death in Japan, trans. Rosemary Morris (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1993), 229. Emphasis added. Emiko Ohnuki-Tierney, Kamikaze Diaries: Reflections of Japanese Student Soldiers (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006), 3. Ibid., in particular pages 69, 101, 133. Satō Shinpei, in Chiran tokubetsu kōgekitai, ed. Muranaga Kaoru (Kagoshima: Japuran, 1989), 21. Sasaki Hachirō, quoted in Ohnuki-Tierney, Kamikaze Diaries, 62. Cherry blossoms are associated with male courage. The first kamikaze pilots in October 1944 were described as wakazakura, or “young cherry blossoms.” The chrysanthemum symbolizes the imperial house of Japan; see Emiko Ohnuki-Tierney, Kamikaze, Cherry Blossoms, and Nationalisms: The Militarization of Aesthetics in Japanese History (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2002), 10. See also NHKA, Nippon nyūsu, no. 232 (November 9, 1944); no. 237 (December 15, 1944); no. 252 (June 9, 1945). On the other hand, manufacturing delays meant that very few films were made on the kamikaze before August 1945. The most famous is Ai to chikai (Love and the vow, 1945, 74 min.) by Imai Tadashi and Choi In-kyu and starring Shimura Takashi, which tells the story of a Korean pilot who joins the Special Attack Corps. Having been authorized for release in the early summer of 1945, it received virtually no screenings. A copy was recently discovered after having been long thought to be lost. Inoue Shōichi, Senjika Nihon no kenchikuka, Asahi shosen (Tokyo: Asahi Shinbunsha, 1995), 180. Werrell, Blankets of Fire, 150. Ibid., 163. Unno Jūza, Kūshū miyako nikki, in Unno Jūza zenshū, 15 vols. (Tokyo: San’ichi Shobō, 1993), bekkan (suppl. vol.), 34. “Rapport récapitulatif de la Commission d’étude des États-Unis sur les bombardements stratégiques,” in Le Japon après la guerre, ed. Michael Lucken (Arles: Picquier, 1997), 358. This chapter on the United States Strategic Bombing Survey does not appear in the English translation of this book (Japan’s Postwar, trans. J. A. A. Stockwin [Oxon: Routledge, 2011]). The Asahi archives feature the example of an article that was censored for having listed the names of places that had been destroyed; see Asahi Shinbun Shusai Han, ed., Sengo 50 nen: Media no kenshō (Tokyo: San’ichi Shobō, 1996), 62. The majority of newspapers and magazines carried this same photograph; see, for example, Shashin shūhō, nos. 364–65 (March 28, 1945) (unpaginated); Asahi gurafu, no. 167 (March 28, 1945): 3. NHKA, Nippon nyūsu, no. 248 (March 22, 1945).

3005. FEAR AND DESTRUCTION

59.

60. 61. 62. 63. 64. 65. 66. 67.

68.

69. 70.

71.

72.

73. 74.

Tadama Eikichi, ed., Kokubō to shashin no satsuei (Tokyo: Hakubunkan, 1941), 1, reprinted in facsimile in Gunki hogo hō, Genron tōsei bunken shiryō shūsei, ed. Okudaira Yasuhiro, vol. 18 of 21 (Tokyo: Nihon Tosho Sentā, 1992). Ibid., 15. Kiyosawa, Diary of Darkness, 202–3. Tadama, Kokubō to shashin, 17, 18, and illustrations. “Kūshū-ji ni okeru bōchō sochi ni kansuru ken,” May 7, 1942, quoted in Nakazawa Akira, Tōkyō ga senjō ni natta hi (Tokyo: Kindai Shōbōsha, 2001), 29. Kaigunshō, “Shinbun keisai jikō kyohi hantei yōryō,” quoted in “Shashin ga kataru sensō,” Asahi shinbun, September 14, 2006, 20. Ishikawa Kōyō, Tōkyō daiōūshū no zenkiroku (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1992), 5. Elias Canetti, “Doctor Hachiya’s Diary of Hiroshima,” in The Conscience of Words, trans. Joachim Neugroschel (New York: Seabury Press, 1979), 185. Takamura Kōtarō, “Shigoto wa kore kara,” in Takamura Kōtarō zenshū, 18 vols. (Tokyo: Chikuma Shobō, 1957), 9:365; see also, in the same volume, “Risai no ki,” 362, 363. Takamura Kōtarō, “Shō konouchi ni ari,” in Takamura Kōtarō zenshikō, 2 vols. (Tokyo: Nigensha, 1967), 2:640 (poem dated July 18, 1945). See also, in the same volume, “Kunpū no gotoku,” 639. See, for example, “Rittai wa itsuka naishi hangetsu,” Asahi shinbun, March 22, 1945, 4. Sakaguchi Ango, “A Personal View of Japanese Culture,” trans. James Dorsey, in The Columbia Anthology of Modern Japanese Literature, ed. J. Thomas Rimer and Van C. Gessel (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007), 835. Sakaguchi Ango (1906–1955) was a novelist and the author of “Darakuron” (“Discourse on Decadence,” trans. James Dorsey, in Literary Mischief: Sakaguchi Ango, Culture, and the War, ed. James Dorsey and Douglas Slaymaker [Lanham, Md.: Lexington Books, 2010]) and “Hakuchi” (“The Idiot,” trans. George Saitō, in Modern Japanese Stories, ed. Ivan Morris [Rutland, Vt.: Tuttle, 1961]). Kikuchi Kan et al., “Kessen goraku dangi,” Kaizō, June 1944, 51. Kikuchi Kan (1888–1948) was a novelist and literary critic. Founder of the journal Bungei shunjū and creator of the Akutagawa and Naoki literary prizes, he was chairman of the Patriotic Society for Japanese Literature’s executive board during the war. Kaneko Mitsuharu, “Sabishisa no uta,” in Kaneko Mitsuharu shishū (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1991), 190. “Sabishisa no uta” is dated May 5, 1945. It was first published in Rakkasan in 1948. The English translation, “Song of Loneliness,” is by Howard Hibbett, in Contemporary Japanese Literature: An Anthology of Fiction, Film, and Other Writing Since 1945 (New York: Knopf, 1983), 312. “Risai shitai shori yōkō,” in Tōkyō daikūshū sensaishi, 5 vols. (Tokyo: Tōkyō Daikūshū wo Kiroku Suru Kai, 1974), 5:576–78, 584, 593. Theodor Adorno, Minima Moralia: Reflections on a Damaged Life, trans. E. F. N. Jephcott (London: NLB, 1974), 56.

5. FEAR AND DESTRUCTION301

75. 76. 77. 78.

79.

80.

81.

82.

83.

84.

85. 86. 87.

88. 89.

“Risai shitai shori yōkō,” 576. Ibid., 580. Lisa Yoneyama, Hiroshima Traces: Time, Space, and the Dialectics of Memory (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999), 152. Hiroshima genbaku sensai shi, 5 vols. (Hiroshima: Hiroshima-shi, 1971), 2:13–14, 61, and 68 (page numbers taken from the electronic version available on the website of the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum, which differs from the paper version), http://a-bombdb.pcf.city.hiroshima.jp/pdbj/common/download/sensai2.pdf. Ibid. Given the many uncertainties linked to the military debacle, scholars often work on the assumption that there were 340,000 people in Hiroshima on August 6, 1945, a number that corresponds to the census of February 1944. Nagai Takashi, Nagasaki no kane (Tokyo: Hibiya Shuppansha, 1949), in Shōwa sensō bungaku zenshū, 16 vols. (Tokyo: Shūeisha, 1965), 13:140; in English, Paul Nagai, The Bells of Nagasaki, trans. William Johnston (Tokyo: Kodansha International, 1994), 21. Radiation Effects Research Foundation, ed., A Brief Description (Hiroshima: RERF, 2008), 44. Note that the paper version of this document differs from that currently downloadable at the RERF website, http://www.rerf.jp/shared/briefdescript /briefdescript_e.pdf. Hiroshima, Nagasaki: Genshi bakudan no kiroku (Tokyo: Heiwa no Atorie, 2000). English, French, Spanish, German, and Esperanto versions of this book all exist. For more information on Yamahata Yōsuke (1917–1966), see Michael Lucken, “Hiroshima, Nagasaki, des photographies pour abscisse et ordonnée,” Études photographiques, no. 18 (May 2006): 4–25; Michael Lucken, 1945—Hiroshima: Les images sources (Paris: Hermann, 2008), 128–43. Yamahata Yōsuke, “Nagasaki satsuei memo,” in Genbaku no Nagasaki, ed. Kitajima Muneto (Tokyo: Daiichi Shuppan, 1952), 24. English translation by Myriam Sas, “Photographing the Bomb, a Memo,” in Nagasaki Journey: The Photographs of Yosuke Yamahata, August 10, 1945, ed. Rupert Jenkins (San Francisco: Pomegranate, 1995), 44–47. Hiroshima wa dō kiroku sareta ka (Tokyo: NHK Shuppan, 2003), 200. Lucken, 1945—Hiroshima, 45. Hayashi Hirofumi, “Shinten suru Amerika no sensō kankei shiryō no kōkai: Bei kokuritsu kōbunshokan shiryō chōsa hōkoku 2,” Kikan sensō sekinin kenkyū, no. 37 (September 2002): 93. This information was known thanks to the testimony of several individuals but remained unverified until Hayashi’s discovery, in 2002, of documents in the U.S. National Archives. Lucken, 1945—Hiroshima, 43–44. Hachiya Michihiko, Hiroshima Diary: The Journal of a Japanese Physician, August 6–September 30, 1945, ed. and trans. Warner Wells (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1995), 183–84.

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90.

91. 92.

93. 94.

95.

96.

97. 98. 99. 100. 101. 102. 103.

“Press Code for Japan,” in GHQ shirei sōshūsei, ed. Takemae Eiji, 15 vols. (Tokyo: Emuti Shuppan, 1993), 2:61. This article also appears in the Radio Code of September 22, 1945 (ibid., 2:72). Monica Braw, The Atomic Bomb Suppressed: American Censorship in Occupied Japan (London: M.E. Sharpe, 1991), 41. Ann Sheriff, Japan’s Cold War: Media, Literature, and the Law (New York: Columbia University Press, 2009). See also Kenji Ito, “Robots, A-bombs, and War: Cultural Meanings of Science and Technology in Japan around World War II,” in Filling the Hole in the Nuclear Future: Art and Popular Culture Respond to the Bomb, ed. Robert Jacobs (Plymouth, U.K.: Lexington Books, 2010), 87–89. Braw, Atomic Bomb Suppressed, 12. “Imperial Rescript on the Termination of the War,” quoted in Herbert Bix, “The Shōwa Emperor’s ‘Monologue’ and the Problem of War Responsibility,” Journal of Japanese Studies 18, no. 2 (1999): 301. Ōta Yōko (1906–1963) was a writer from Hiroshima who began her literary career in the 1930s. Present in Hiroshima on August 6, 1945, she published “A Light as If at the Bottom of the Sea” (Kaitei no yō na hikari) in the Asahi on August 30, ostensibly the first literary treatment of the disaster. She subsequently published City of Corpses (Shikabane no machi, 1948) and Human Rags (Ningen boro, 1951). NHKA, Nippon nyūsu, no. 257 (September 22, 1945); Takei Takeo, Genshi bakudan (Tokyo: Dōmei Tsūshinsha, 1945), 31 pages; Sagane Ryōkichi, Genshi bakudan (Tokyo: Asahi Shinbunsha, 1945), 57 pages. Braw, Atomic Bomb Suppressed, 19–20. Based on Herbert Bix, “Shōwa Emperor’s ‘Monologue,’ ” 303. NHKA, Nippon nyūsu, no. 257 (September 22, 1945). “Hiroshima ni toritsuita akurei,” Asahi shinbun, August 25, 1945, 2. Lucken, 1945—Hiroshima, 152–54. NHKA, Nippon nyūsu, no. 257 (September 22, 1945). John Dower, Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II (New York: Norton, 1999), 291.

6. POSTWAR COMPLEXITIES 1.

2.

Hara Hiroko, “Sōuru de no 1945 nen 8 gatsu 15 nichi,” in Kodomotachi no 8 gatsu 15 nichi (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 2005), 186. Hara Hiroko (b. 1934) is an anthropologist who has contributed to the development of gender studies in Japan. The first national mourning ceremony for the war dead was held on August 15, 1963, in Hibiya Public Hall (Hibiya Kōkaidō). In 1964 it was transferred to Yasukuni Shrine. Since 1965 it has been held annually at the Nippon Budōkan (Martial Arts

6. POSTWAR COMPLEXITIES303

3. 4.

5.

6.

7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12.

13.

14.

15. 16. 17.

18.

Hall of Japan), which was built symbolically in 1964 on the site of the former barracks of the Imperial Guard. “Kyū-kokkakan no maisō hi,” Tensei jingo, Asahi shinbun, August 15, 1946, 1; “Heiwa kinen dē,” Yomiuri shinbun, August 15, 1946, 1. See, for example, the text by Oda Sakunosuke, “Shūsen zengo,” Shinsei Nippon, November 1945. This article, which does not appear in the author’s collected writings, can be viewed online at http://www.aozora.gr.jp/cards/000040 /files/46352_26687.html (accessed October 2015). Note that on the night of August 14/15, 1945, a group of officers advocating armed resistance attempted to obtain the recording of the emperor’s message, purportedly in a desire to save the imperial system. One of the earliest descriptions of this incident can be found in Masuo Kato, The Lost War (New York: Knopf, 1946), 237–45. Michihiko Hachiya, Hiroshima Diary: The Journal of a Japanese Physician, August 6–September 30, 1945, ed. and trans. Warner Wells (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1995), 89. Oda, “Shūsen zengo.” NHKA, Nippon nyūsu, no. 255 (September 6, 1945), http://www.nhk.or.jp /shogenarchives. See the plates presented by Satō Takumi in Hachi gatsu jūgo nichi no shinwa (Tokyo: Chikuma Shobō, 2005), 264–70. Komori Yōichi, Tennō no gyokuon hōsō (Tokyo: Asahi Shinbun Shuppan, 2008), 32–42, 48–49. Satō, Hachi gatsu jūgo nichi, 21–67. The actual title of the surrender declaration is the “Imperial Rescript on the Termination of the Greater East Asia War.” For a discussion and translation of this text in English, see Herbert Bix, “The Shōwa Emperor’s ‘Monologue’ and the Problem of War Responsibility,” Journal of Japanese Studies 18, no. 2 (1999): 300–307. Avner Ben Amos, “La commémoration sous le régime de Vichy,” in La France démocratique, ed. Christophe Charle et al. (Paris: Publications de la Sorbonne, 1998), 398. Chaen Yoshio, Misshitsu no shūsen shōchoku (Tokyo: Yūshōdō Shuppan, 1989); Takeyama Akiko, Gyokuon hōsō (Tokyo: Banseisha, 1989); Satō, Hachi gatsu jūgo nichi; Komori, Tennō no gyokuon hōsō. NHKA, Nippon nyūsu, no. 257 (September 22, 1945). Note, however, that the Russian offensive in Japan’s Northern Territories continued until early September 1945. Toyoshima Yoshio, “Aratana sekai shugi,” in Toyoshima Yoshio chosakushū, 6 vols. (Tokyo: Miraisha, 1967), 6:393. Toyoshima Yoshio (1890–1955) was a novelist and academic specializing in French literature. He translated Victor Hugo’s Les misérables and Romain Rolland’s Jean-Christophe into Japanese. Eiji Takemae, The Allied Occupation of Japan (New York: Continuum, 2003), 60–73.

3046. POSTWAR COMPLEXITIES

19. 20.

21. 22.

23.

24. 25.

26.

27. 28. 29.

Ibid., 67–68. The Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers was the title held by General MacArthur and his successor, General Matthew Ridgway. However, it also referred by extension to the administration he commanded. Ara Takashi, “Senryōki ni okeru higunjika to busō kaijo: Tokuni senryōgun no katanagari wo chūshin toshite,” Shien, no. 51 (March 1993): 15–40. Miyamoto Yuriko, “Sensō wa watashitachi kara subete wo ubau,” in Gendai josei jūni kō (Tokyo: Naukasha, 1950), in Miyamoto Yuriko zenshū, 30 vols. (Tokyo: Shin Nihon Shuppansha, 1980), 15:322. The General Government Building (Chōsen Sōtokufu) was constructed between 1916 and 1926 based on plans drawn up by the German architect Georg de Lalande (1872–1914). From 1986 to 1995 the building housed the National Museum of Korea. Sejong (1397–1450) was the fourth monarch in the Joseon dynasty and reigned from 1418 to 1450. Yi Sun-shin (1545–1598). The exhibition space devoted to these two men is located inside the Sejong Cultural Center (Sejong Munhwa Hoegwan) in Gwanghwamun. On August 25, 2011, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea and the Republic of Korea issued a joint statement in Pyongyang in which they declared, “The Japanese imperialists cooked up the said treaty in the wake of the ‘Ulsa Five-Point Treaty,’ bringing the disgrace of a stateless nation to the Koreans and imposing unspeakable misery and pain and enormous sacrifices upon them. This [sic] being hard facts, Japan has made neither apology nor reparation for the shuddering crimes since its defeat. On the contrary, it has become more frantic in its hostile acts against the Korean nation”; http://www.kcna.co.jp/item/2011/201108/news25/20110825–20ee .html (accessed September 2012). Nitchūkan Sankoku Kyōtsū Rekishi Iinkai, ed., Mirai wo hiraku rekishi: Higashi Ajia sankoku no kingendaishi (Tokyo: Kōbunken, 2005), 67–84, 136–45. Ibid., 88–91. Ibid., 221. The nationalist textbook in question was written by the Japanese Society for History Textbook Reform (Atarashii Rekishi Kyōkasho wo Tsukurukai): Atarashii rekishi kyōkasho—shihanbon (Tokyo: Fusōsha, 2001).

7. THE AMERICAN OCCUPATION, OR THE PRESENT VERSUS THE PAST 1. 2.

NHKA, Nippon nyūsu (2), no. 2 (January 24, 1946); no. 5 (February 14, 1946); no. 24 (June 27, 1946), http://www.nhk.or.jp/shogenarchives. Richard Finn, Winners in Peace: MacArthur, Yoshida, and Postwar Japan (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992), 157.

7. THE AMERICAN OCCUPATION, OR THE PRESENT VERSUS THE PAST305

3.

4. 5.

6.

7. 8.

9.

10. 11. 12.

13. 14. 15. 16. 17.

18. 19. 20.

Sodei Rinjirō, ed., Shizue Matsuda, trans., Dear General MacArthur: Letters from the Japanese During the American Occupation (Lanham, Md.: Rowman and Littlefield, 2001), 7. Tsuruoka Masao (1907–1979), Heavy Hand (Omoi te), 1949, part of the collection at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo. The Civil Information and Education Section was created in September 1945. CIE and SCAP archives can be consulted at the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration and in Japan at the National Diet Library. William P. Woodard, The Allied Occupation of Japan 1945–1952 and Japanese Religions (Leiden: Brill, 1972), 54–74; Mark R. Mullins et al., eds., Religion and Society in Modern Japan (Berkeley: Asian Humanities Press, 1993), 49–72. Helen Hardacre, Shintō and the State, 1868–1988 (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1989), 138. Shidehara Heiwa Zaidan, ed., Shidehara Kijūrō (Tokyo: Shidehara Heiwa Zaidan, 1955), 668. Shidehara Kijūrō (1872–1951), a diplomat and politician fluent in English, served as prime minister between December 1945 and May 1946. For a discussion of Hirohito’s Declaration of Humanity in English, see John Dower, Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II (New York: Norton, 1999), 308–18. Asahi shinbun, January 1, 1946, 1. Yomiuri hōchi, January 1, 1946, 1. It was read out, for example, on February 11, 1946, by Nanbara Shigeru (1889–1974) during a lecture he gave upon his appointment as chancellor of Tokyo University; see Karube Tadashi, Maruyama Masao and the Fate of Liberalism in TwentiethCentury Japan (Tokyo: International House of Japan, 2008), 109. “Shūkyō hōjin rei,” law no. 719, December 28, 1945, in Shiryō: Nihon gendai-shi, ed. Awaya Kentarō, 2 vols. (Tokyo: Ōtsuki Shoten, 1980), 1:33–38. See the CIE Conference Report, notes no. 10975 from 11/29/1946; no. 11284 from 12/11/1945; no. 14231 from 2/6/1947; no. 27387 from 11/29/1946, etc. These two dates, which are specific to Yasukuni, must be distinguished from Army Day (Rikugun Kinenbi, March 10) and Navy Day (Kaigun Kinenbi, May 27). Yasukuni jinja hyakunen-shi: Jireki nenpyō (Tokyo: Yasukuni Jinja, 1987), 485. See, for example, the account by Jacob Van Staaveren in his memoir An American in Japan, 1945–1948: A Civilian View of the Occupation (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1994), 236–53. “Kōsō-tō ni kansuru tsūchō,” November 1, 1946, in Yasukuni jinja hyakunen-shi, 88. The signing of the treaty by the Japanese representative in July 1929 was not ratified by the Diet. Soejima Jirō, Sensō to hanzai no kankei ni kansuru kenkyū (Tokyo: Shihōshō Chōsabu, 1940), 108–26; Yoneda Yukio, Shina jihen to gunji hanzai: Tokuni bōchō hanzai ni tsuite (Tokyo: Shihōshō Chōsabu, 1941).

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21.

22. 23. 24. 25. 26. 27.

28. 29. 30. 31. 32. 33. 34.

35. 36. 37.

38. 39.

For more information on the charges of crimes against humanity and crimes against peace, see Arieh Kochavi, Prelude to Nuremberg: Allied War Crimes Policy and the Question of Punishment (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1998), and Hayashi Hirofumi, “Rengōkoku sensō hanzai seisaku: Rengōkoku sensō hanzai iinkai to Eibei,” Shizen ningen shakai, nos. 36/37 (January 2004/July 2004): 1–42, 51–77. NHKA, Nippon nyūsu (2), no. 11 (March 28, 1946). Permanent Court of International Justice, Procès-Verbaux of the Proceedings of the Committee (The Hague: Van Langenhuysen, 1920), 497. For an English bibliography, see Jeanie M. Welch, The Tokyo Trial: A Bibliographic Guide to English-Language Sources (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 2002). Tōjō Hideki, Doihara Kenji, Itagaki Seishirō, Hirota Kōki, Matsui Iwane, Kimura Heitarō, and Mutō Akira. “Jap War Criminals,” Life, May 27, 1946, 47. This building was relocated in 1998 and only one section was conserved, in which a small, little-visited museum was created to present a certain number of documents relating to the war crimes trials. Unno Jūza, Kūshū miyako nikki, in Unno Jūza zenshū, 15 vols. (Tokyo: San’ichi Shobō, 1993), bekkan (suppl. vol.), 68. See, among others, Asahi shinbun, December 2 and 5, 1945, 1. Kochavi, Prelude to Nuremberg, 29, 102; Hayashi, “Rengōkoku sensō hanzai seisaku,” 12–16. On the purge of nationalists conducted by the Americans, see Finn, Winners in Peace, 82–88. Ibid., 83. Awaya Kentarō et al., Sensō sekinin, sengo sekinin: Nihon to Doitsu wa dō chigau ka (Tokyo: Asahi Shinbunsha, 1994). Odagiri Hideo, “Bungaku ni okeru sensō sekinin no tsuikyū,” in Sengo shisō no shuppatsu, sengo Nihon shisō taikei, ed. Hidaka Rokurō, 16 vols. (Tokyo: Chikuma Shobō, 1968), 1:224; Chōki Seiji, “Ongaku ni okeru ‘sensō hanzai’ ron no shatei,” in Nihon bunka no renzokusei to hirenzokusei 1920–1970, ed. E. Klopfenstein and Suzuki Sadami (Tokyo: Bensei Shuppan, 2005), 421; Michael Lucken, Grenades et amertume: Les peintres japonais à l’épreuve de la guerre (Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 2005), 207–15. Lucken, Grenades et amertume, 218–23. NHKA, Nippon nyūsu (2), no. 13 (April 11, 1946). Inoue Masao, Bunka to tōsō (Tokyo: Shin’yōsha, 2007). In English, see Kyoko Hirano, Mr. Smith Goes to Tokyo: Japanese Cinema under the American Occupation, 1945–1952 (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1992), 234. Sodei, Dear General MacArthur, 63–102. NHKA, Nippon nyūsu, no. 262 (November 30, 1945). Tokuda Kyūichi (1894–1953) was the first postwar secretary-general of the JCP. Imprisoned in 1928, he was set free in October 1945 and officially took up his position in the party on December 3, 1945.

7. THE AMERICAN OCCUPATION, OR THE PRESENT VERSUS THE PAST307

40. 41. 42. 43.

44. 45.

46. 47. 48. 49. 50. 51. 52. 53.

54.

55. 56. 57. 58. 59. 60.

Dower, Embracing Defeat, 326. Ibid., 321, 329. Sheldon Glueck, War Criminals: Their Prosecution and Punishment (New York: Knopf, 1944), 11, 77, 129. On the debates in the United States over the emperor’s war guilt, see Dale M. Hellegers, We the Japanese People: World War II and the Origins of the Japanese Constitution, 2 vols. (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2002), 1:223–33. Hayashi, “Rengōkoku sensō hanzai seisaku,” 67. “Incoming classified message from CINCAFPAC Adv Tokyo, Japan, to War Department,” no. SDDF (B)00065, microfiche, National Diet Library, Tokyo. See also the comments in Herbert P. Bix, Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan (New York: HarperCollins, 2000), 567–68. Dower, Embracing Defeat, 328. Ibid., 325. Ibid., 326–27. Hellegers, We the Japanese People, 231. Awaya Kentarō, Tōkyō saiban e no michi, 2 vols. (Tokyo: Kōdansha, 2006), 1:140–48. Shōsha no saiban; see Asahi shinbun, September 12, 1945, 1. NHKA, Nippon nyūsu (2), no. 1 (ca. January 10, 1946). Senpan kisojō: Kyokutō kokusai gunji saibansho jōrei (Tokyo: Nihon Taimususha, 1946); Asahi Shinbunsha hōtei kisha dan, Tōkyō saiban, 8 vols. (Tokyo: Nyūsusha, 1946–1949); Yagishita Sōichi et al., Tōkyō saiban hōkoku, 4 vols. (Tokyo: Yuijinsha, 1946–1948) (vol. 4 focuses partially on the emperor); Tōkyō saiban hanketsu: Kyokutō kokusai gunji saibansho hanketsubun (Tokyo: Mainichi Shinbunsha, 1949). See, for example, Seishirō Sugihara, Between Incompetence and Culpability: Assessing the Diplomacy of Japan’s Foreign Ministry from Pearl Harbor to Potsdam, trans. Norman Hu (Lanham, Md.: University Press of America, 1997), 145. Sugihara Seishirō is vice-chairman of the Society for History Textbook Reform, or Tsukurukai. Miyamoto Yuriko, “Binjō no zue,” Hikari, September 1948, in Miyamoto Yuriko zenshū, 30 vols. (Tokyo: Shin Nihon Shuppansha, 1980), 16:173. Etō Jun, Tozasareta gengo kūkan: Senryōgun no ken’etsu to sengo Nihon (Tokyo: Bungei Shunjū, 1994), 221–23. Matsumura Takao, Saiban to rekishigaku: 731 saikinsen butai wo hōtei kara miru, ed. Matsumura Takao and Yano Hisashi (Tokyo: Gendai Shokan, 2007), 75–76. Oguma Eiji, “Minshu” to “aikoku”: Sengo Nihon no nashonarizumu to kōkyōsei (Tokyo: Shin’yōsha, 2002), 111. Watanabe Kiyoshi, Kudakareta kami (Tokyo: Hyōronsha, 1977), 7. Cited in Oguma, “Minshu” to “aikoku,” 109. Miyamoto Yuriko, “Fashizumu wa ikite iru,” Warera no nakama, no. 6 (February 1949), in Miyamoto Yuriko zenshū, 16:318–19.

3087. THE AMERICAN OCCUPATION, OR THE PRESENT VERSUS THE PAST

61. 62. 63. 64. 65. 66. 67. 68.

69. 70. 71.

72. 73.

74.

75. 76. 77.

78. 79. 80.

Tsurumi Shunsuke, Satō Tadao, et al., eds., Sengo manga shi 1: Gendai manga, 27 vols. (Tokyo: Chikuma Shobō, 1970), 14:21. NHKA, Nippon nyūsu (2), no. 136 (August 17, 1948). Thomas W. Burkman, ed., The Occupation of Japan: Arts and Culture (Norfolk, Va.: General Douglas MacArthur Foundation, 1988), 203. Ibid., 177. Michael Lucken, “Le sort des statues et monuments commémoratifs durant l’occupation américaine,” Cipango, no. 14 (2007): 136n15. CIE Conference Report, no. 01208, May 10, 1948; no. 03174, May 20, 1948. Woodard, Allied Occupation of Japan, 154. Takemae Eiji, Nakamura Takafusa, eds., GHQ Nihon senryō-shi: Shūkyō (Tokyo: Nihon Tosho Sentā, 2000), 21:22. Also quoted in Woodard, Allied Occupation of Japan, 153, from which the English translation is taken. “Kōsō-tō ni kansuru tsūchō,” 88. “Chūreitō, chūkonhi-tō no sochi ni kansuru tsūchō,” November 27, 1946, in Yasukuni jinja hyakunen-shi: shiryō hen (gekan), 89–90. The first translation of “ultranationalism” in administrative texts appears to have been kageki kokkashugi, or “radical nationalism.” Also regularly found is kyokutan na kokkashugi (extreme nationalism). It was more than a year before the term chō-kokkashugi (ultranationalism) was finally adopted. Ninomiya Sontoku (1787–1856), alias Kinjirō, was an economist and philosopher. Although born to a peasant family, he was later ennobled by his local overlord. Note that these pavilions (hōanden) and the photographs of the imperial couple had already been the focus of official measures in January 1946. In French, see Éric Seizelet, “Les portraits impériaux: Contribution à l’étude du culte impérial,” Cipango, hors-série: Mélanges offerts à René Sieffert, June 1994, 448. The list was published in newspapers on May 6, 1947. See also “Tōkyō no dōzō (14): Mubō na sensō no gisei,” Tōkyō shinbun, November 16, 1959; Hirase Reita, “Sensō to bijutsu korekushon,” in Kōza Nihon bijutsu-shi, ed. Kinoshita Naoyuki, 6 vols. (Tokyo: Tōkyō Daigaku Shuppankai, 2005), 6:153. “Chūreitō, chūkonhi-tō no sochi ni kansuru tsūchō,” November 27, 1946, 89–90. NHKA, Nippon nyūsu (2), no. 69 (May 6, 1947); see also no. 81, July 29, 1947. According to Hirase Reita, the statues and monuments relating to the Meiji-period wars were destroyed under pressure from the Americans, who were concerned about relations with their Soviet and Chinese allies. This possibility must be taken into account, for discussions are known to have been held on the issue of monuments between SCAP and the Chinese embassy; see Hirase, “Sensō to bijutsu korekushon,” 154–55. “Tōkyō no dōzō (15): Sengo no junan,” Tōkyō shinbun, November 17, 1959. Ebine Isao, ed., Gunma-ken no chūreitō-tō (Takasaki: Gunma-ken Gōkoku Jinja, 2002), 394–95. Tan’o Yasunori, Kawata Akihisa, Imēji no naka no sensō (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1996), 34. The inscription hakkō ichiu was reengraved on the monument in 1965.

8. THE PLURALITY OF HISTORY309

8. THE PLURALITY OF HISTORY 1.

2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9.

10. 11.

12. 13. 14. 15.

16.

17. 18. 19.

Christian Galan, “The New Image of Childhood in Japan during the Years 1945–49 and the Construction of a Japanese Collective Memory,” in The Power of Memory in Modern Japan, ed. Sven Saaler and Wolfgang Schwentker (Folkestone, U.K.: Global Oriental, 2008), 194. NHKA, Nippon nyūsu (2), no. 7 (February 28, 1946); no. 42 (October 29, 1946), http://www.nhk.or.jp/shogenarchives. Kubo Yoshizō, Tainichi senryō seisaku to sengo kyōiku kaikaku (Tokyo: Sanseidō, 1984), 97, 161. “Taiheiyō sensō-shi,” Asahi shinbun, December 10, 1945, 2. Nakaya Ken’ichi, trans., Taiheiyō sensō-shi: Hōten jiken yori mujōken kōfuku made (Tokyo: Takayama Shoin, 1946). “Daitōasen no jin’in sonmō,” Asahi shinbun, September 6, 1945, 2. “Gunbatsu dokusai no higeki,” Asahi shinbun, December 8, 1945, 2. Miyamoto Yuriko, “Ashita no chisei,” Josei kaizō, February 1947, in Miyamoto Yuriko zenshū, 30 vols. (Tokyo: Shin Nihon Shuppansha, 1980), 13:132. We can cite, for example, the attempted murder of Shimanaka Hōji (1923–1997) and his wife in February 1961. Shimanaka was head of the journal Chūō kōron and was attacked for having published a fictional story of a popular revolution that involves the imperial family. Takemae Eiji, The Allied Occupation of Japan (New York: Continuum, 2003), 196. Civil Historical Section, GHQ/SCAP, History of the Nonmilitary Activities of the Occupation of Japan, 1945 through December 1951, 55 vols. (microfilm, HNA-1 roll no. 2, National Diet Library), 7:19. Ibid., 16. Ibid. Ibid., 29. On SCAP and the CIE’s hand in drafting the first history textbooks during the occupation, see Umeno Masanobu, Shakaika rekishi kyōkasho seiritsu shi: Senryōki wo chūshin ni (Tokyo: Tosho Sentā, 2004), 19–32. Edwin O. Reischauer (1910–1990). For a biography, see George R. Packard, Edwin O. Reischauer and the American Discovery of Japan (New York: Columbia University Press, 2010). Dale M. Hellegers, We the Japanese People: World War II and the Origins of the Japanese Constitution, 2 vols. (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2002), 1:231–33. Edwin O. Reischauer, Japan, Past and Present (Tokyo: Tuttle, 1953), 229; Edwin O. Reischauer, The Japanese (Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press, 1981), 245ff. Leonard Mosley, Hirohito: Emperor of Japan (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1966) (Japanese translation published by Mainichi Shinbunsha, 1966); David Bergamini, Japan’s Imperial Conspiracy (New York: Morrow, 1971) (Japanese translation published by Reopōru Shobō, 1973).

3108. THE PLURALITY OF HISTORY

20.

21.

22.

23.

24. 25. 26. 27.

28.

29. 30.

Tanaka Masaaki, ed., Nihon muzai ron: Shinri no sabaki (Tokyo: Taiheiyō Shuppansha, 1952). Tanaka Masaaki (1911–2006) was private secretary to Matsui Iwane. Hattori Takushirō, Daitōa sensō zenshi, 4 vols. (Tokyo: Masu Shobō, 1953), translated into English as The Complete History of the Greater East Asia War (Tokyo: United States Army Forces in the Far East, 1953–1954). Hattori Takushirō (1901– 1960) was an army officer during the war. He was private secretary to Tōjō Hideki and ran the Operations Section of the Army General Staff. During the occupation, from 1947 to 1952, he worked with SCAP’s Military History Section. Kanki Haruo, ed., Sankō: Nihonjin no Chūgoku ni okeru sensō hanzai no kokuhaku (Tokyo: Kōbunsha, 1957). For information on the medical experiments conducted by the Ishii unit (the term “Unit 731” was not used at the time), see the testimony of Watanabe Yasunaga, 38–54. Ienaga Saburō, Taiheiyō sensō (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1968), 23. The Japanese term Nankin daigyakusatsu, or “Great Nanking Massacres,” is translated in the English version of this text as “Rape of Nanking,” however, the literal translation has been preferred here; The Pacific War: 1931–1945, trans. Frank Baldwin (New York: Pantheon Books, 1978), 184. Ienaga Saburō (1913–2002) was a history professor at the Tokyo University of Education (now called University of Tsukuba) until 1978. He published New Japanese History (Shin Nihon shi) in 1947. In 1952, along with his publisher, he began to draft a textbook based on this work and applied for authorization from the Ministry of Education. The ministry constantly created hurdles and requested alterations to the text. In 1965, Ienaga initiated a lengthy legal battle with the ministry in order to obtain redress for the damage suffered. The government was ultimately ordered to pay ¥400,000 to Ienaga for abuse of discretion; see Yoshiko Nozaki, War Memory, Nationalism, and Education in Postwar Japan, 1945–2007: The Japanese History Textbook Controversy and Ienaga Saburo’s Court Challenges (Oxon: Routledge, 2008). Hayashi Fusao, Daitōa sensō kōtei ron, 2 vols. (Tokyo: Banchō Shuppan, 1964– 1965). The text was serialized in Chūō kōron beginning in September 1963. Ibid., 2:9. Ibid., 1:23–25. Hiroshima genbaku sensai shi, 5 vols. (Hiroshima: Hiroshima-shi, 1971); Tōkyō daikūshū sensai shi, 5 vols. (Tokyo: Tōkyō Kūshū wo Kiroku Suru Kai, 1974); Nagasaki genbaku sensai shi, 5 vols. (Nagasaki: Nagasaki Kokusai Bunka Kaikan, 1977–1984). Honda Katsuichi, Chūgoku no tabi (Tokyo: Asahi Shinbunsha, 1972). Senda Kakō, Jūgun ianfu, 2 vols. (Tokyo: Futabasha, 1973–1974). Morimura Seiichi, Akuma no hōshoku: Kantōgun saikinsen butai kyōfu no zenbō (Tokyo: Kōbunsha, 1981). Suzuki Akira, Nankin daigyakusatsu no maboroshi (Tokyo: Bungei Shunjū, 1973). For an in-depth presentation of Japanese historiography on the Pacific War, see Narita Ryūichi, “Sensō keiken” no sengo shi (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 2010).

9. INDIVIDUAL CONSCIENCE AND COLLECTIVE INERTIA311

31. 32.

Philip A. Seaton, Japan’s Contested War Memories: The “Memory Rifts” in Historical Consciousness of World War II (Oxon: Routledge, 2007), 3. “Shūdanteki jieiken kōshi mitomeru: Jimin ga kenpō kaisei sōan; Tennō wa kokka genshu ni,” Yomiuri shinbun, February 28, 2012, 2.

9. INDIVIDUAL CONSCIENCE AND COLLECTIVE INERTIA 1.

2. 3. 4. 5.

6.

7. 8. 9.

10. 11.

12. 13. 14.

15.

Hino Ashihei, “Kanashiki heitai,” Asahi shinbun, September 11, 13, 1945, 2. David Rosenfeld, Unhappy Soldier: Hino Ashihei and Japanese World War II Literature (Lanham, Md.: Lexington Books, 2002), 66–68. Rosenfeld, Unhappy Soldier, 113–14. Takamura Kōtarō, Tenkei (Tokyo: Chūō Kōronsha, 1950), unpaginated preface. Ibid., 78–79. Miyamoto Yuriko, “Sensō wa watashitachi kara subete wo ubau,” in Gendai josei jūni kō (Tokyo: Naukasha, 1950), in Miyamoto Yuriko zenshū, 30 vols. (Tokyo: Shin Nihon Shuppansha, 1980), 15:329. “Memorandum on the Removal of Restrictions on Political, Civil, and Religious Liberties”; see William P. Woodard, The Allied Occupation of Japan 1945–1952 and Japanese Religions (Leiden: Brill, 1972), 51–53. Maruyama Masao, “Sengo hajimete no kōgi no kōgian,” Maruyama Masao techō, no. 35 (2005): 4. See the biography of Nakai proposed in Banba Toshiaki, Nakai Masakazu densetsu (Tokyo: Potto Shuppan, 2009), 238–60, 270–78. Hani Gorō (1901–1983), a historian and philosopher, was responsible for introducing the work of Benedetto Croce into Japan. He fought against fascism and was imprisoned on two occasions, in 1933 and 1945. Taketani Mitsuo (1911–2000), a physicist, nuclear specialist, and historian of science, was also imprisoned twice between 1933 and 1945. Banba, Nakai Masakazu densetsu, 261–70. On this subject, see in particular Franziska Seraphim, War Memory and Social Politics in Japan, 1945–2005 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Asia Center, 2006), 159–88. This information was obtained by searching the online catalogue of the Kokuritsu Jōhōgaku Kenkyūjo (NII), http://webcat.nii.ac.jp. The book in question is Gendai no sensō (Modern warfare) by Takagi Sōkichi. NHKA, Shōgen; see, in order of presentation, the accounts of Asai Chōkō (November 6, 2008), Ōkawa Sumiko (February 10, 2010), Suda Hatsue (January 20, 2009), and Takahashi Tomimatsu (July 24, 2010), http://www.nhk.or.jp/shogenarchives. Takeshita Noboru (1924–2000) was prime minister from 1987 to 1989. His father, Takeshita Yūzō (1900–1984), was a councillor in Shimane Prefecture and local head of the Imperial Rule Assistance Association. He was purged during the occupation.

3129. INDIVIDUAL CONSCIENCE AND COLLECTIVE INERTIA

16. 17. 18. 19. 20.

21.

22. 23.

24. 25. 26.

Miyazawa Kiichi (1919–2007) was prime minister between 1991 and 1993; son of Miyazawa Yutaka (1884–1963), representative in the Diet from 1928 to 1946, assistant director of rail transport in 1940, he was purged in 1946. Hosokawa Morihiro (b. 1938) served as prime minister between 1993 and 1994. His maternal grandfather was Konoe Fumimaro, prime minister from 1937 to 1939 and from 1940 to 1941. His paternal grandfather was Hosokawa Moritatsu (1883–1970), member of the upper house and well-known cultural figure. Hada Tsutomu (b. 1935) served as prime minister for two months in 1994. His father, Hada Bujirō (1903–1979), representative between 1937 and 1946, was purged in 1946. Hashimoto Ryūtarō (1937– 2006), prime minister from 1996 to 1998, was the grandson of Ōno Rokuichirō (1887–1985), director general of the national police from 1932 to 1936, vicegovernor-general of Korea from 1936 to 1942, and Diet representative from 1942 to 1946. He was purged in September of that year. Fukuda Yasuo (b. 1936) was prime minister between 2007 and 2008. His wife’s grandfather, Sakurauchi Yukio (1880–1947), was finance minister between January and July 1940. Asō Tarō (b. 1940), prime minister from 2008 to 2009, is the grandson of Yoshida Shigeru, prime minister from 1946 to 1947 and again from 1948 to 1954. During the war Yoshida was close to Konoe and served as a diplomat. Hatoyama Yukio (b. 1947) was prime minister from 2009 to 2010. His grandfather was Hatoyama Ichirō (1883–1959), representative from 1915 to 1946, purged during the occupation, and prime minister from 1954 to 1956. Military Medical Ethics (Falls Church, Va.: Office of the Surgeon General, 2003), 2:494. Nihon kindai bungaku daijiten (kijōban) (Tokyo: Kōdansha, 1992), 1443. Ibid., 852. Ibid., 688. Stephen Prince, “Eclipse Series 23: The First Films of Akira Kurosawa,” Current, Criterion Collection, August 3, 2010, https://www.criterion.com/current/posts /1539-eclipse-series-23-the-first-films-of-akira-kurosawa. See the articles and screenplays written by Kurosawa during the war, in Taikei Kurosawa Akira, ed. Hamano Yasuki, 5 vols. (Tokyo: Kōdansha, 2009–2010), vol. 1 and bekkan (suppl. vol.). Kurosawa Akira, Something Like an Autobiography, trans. Audie E. Bock (New York: Vintage, 1983), 135. Yoshikuni Igarashi, Bodies of Memory: Narratives of War in Postwar Japanese Culture, 1945–1970 (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2000), 122–29, and 155–63. Igarashi, Bodies of Memory, 128. Daimatsu Hirobumi, Ore ni tsuite koi (Tokyo: Kōdansha, 1963); Daimatsu Hirobumi, Naseba naru (Tokyo: Kōdansha, 1964).  Lee Griggs, “Rough Creed: There’s No Success without Suffering,” special issue Japan, Life, September 11, 1964, 42.

9. INDIVIDUAL CONSCIENCE AND COLLECTIVE INERTIA313

27. 28. 29. 30. 31. 32.

33.

34. 35.

36. 37.

38. 39.

40. 41.

42.

Igarashi, Bodies of Memory, 159 Sakaguchi Ango, “Dekadan bungakuron,” Shinchō 43, no. 10 (October 1, 1946), in Sakaguchi Ango zenshū, 18 vols. (Tokyo: Chikuma Shobō, 1998), 4:213. The JCP’s lowest score dates from 1953, when it won just 1.90 percent of the vote. It recorded its highest score of 13.08 percent in 1996. The Japan Socialist Party achieved its highest score in 1958 with 32.9 percent of the vote. Its lowest score of 15.43 percent was recorded in 1993. Murayama Tomiichi, Murayama naikaku sōri daijin enzetsu shū (Tokyo: Nihon Kōhō Kyōkai, 1998), 317–21. See the joint communiqué of the governments of Japan and the People’s Republic of China (September 29, 1972), at the website of the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, http://www.mofa.go.jp/mofaj/area/china/nc_seimei.html (accessed August 2015). To the questions “Do you agree with the prime minister’s visits to Yasukuni?” or “Should the prime minister continue to visit Yasukuni?” respondents to polls conducted by the Asahi shinbun between 2004 and 2006 gave the following answers (in percentages): April 19, 2004: yes 42, no 39; November 29, 2004: yes 38, no 39; May 31, 2005: yes 39, no 49; June 28, 2005: yes 36, non 52; August 23, 2006: yes 49, no 37. Zhongguo Kangri Zhanzheng Shi Bianxie Zu, ed., Zhongguo kangri zhanzheng shi (Beijing: Renmin Chubanshe, 2011), 140–42, 670–72. Translator’s note: on June 10, 1944, the village of Oradour-sur-Glane, in central France, was the scene of a Nazi-perpetrated massacre that led to the deaths of 642 men, women, and children (virtually the entire population) and saw the village razed. Takahara Akio, “Nitchū kankei no kadai to tenbō,” Gaikō, no. 1 (September 2010): 69. For the links to the different government websites, see the Wikipedia page “Nihon no sensō shazai hatsugen ichiran” (List of war apology statements issued by Japan), https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/᮹ᴀȃ៺ѝ䃱㔾ⱎ㿔ϔ㽻 For the equivalent page in English, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_war_apology _statements_issued_by_Japan. Peter Li, ed., Japanese War Crimes: The Search for Justice (New Brunswick, N.J.: Transaction, 2003), ix. “DDR—Erklärung der Volkskammer: Bekenntnis zu Verantwortung und Mitschuld für Vergangenheit und Zukunft,” April 12, 1990, in Texte zur Deutschlandpolitik (Bonn: Deutscher Bundes-Verlag, 1990), 158–60. Jane Yamazaki, Japanese Apologies for World War II (Oxon: Routledge, 2006), 19. The corresponding Japanese terms are hanzai (crime), gyakusatsu (massacre), satsugai (murder), gōkan (rape), kyōsei rōdō (forced labor), seiteki dorei (sexual slavery), gōdatsu (pillaging), and bōkō (act of violence). Yoshiko Nozaki, War Memory, Nationalism, and Education in Postwar Japan, 1945–2007: The Japanese History Textbook Controversy and Ienaga Saburo’s Court Challenges (Oxon: Routledge, 2008), 26–135.

3149. INDIVIDUAL CONSCIENCE AND COLLECTIVE INERTIA

43.

44. 45.

46. 47.

48.

49.

Yoshida Takashi, “For the People or for the Nation: History and Memory of the Nanjing Massacre in Japan,” in The Power of Memory in Modern Japan, ed. Sven Saaler and Wolfgang Schwentker (Folkestone, U.K.: Global Oriental, 2008), 23. Naigai kyōiku, nos. 5532, 5620 (Tokyo: Jiji Tsūshinsha, 2005, 2006), 8–10. Shōsetsu Nihonshi B (Tokyo: Yamakawa Shuppansha, 2003), 330. Note that the accompanying teacher’s guide mentions the “Nanking Massacre,” citing a minimum of 42,000 civilian victims and a maximum, “which seems somewhat exaggerated,” of 300,000 (Shōsetsu Nihonshi B: Kyōju shiryō, 691–92). The presentation of this information is thus left to the teachers’ discretion. The fact that there is no illustration in the textbook to highlight this tragic event makes it even easier to avoid. See also Gendai no Nihonshi A (Tokyo: Yamakawa Shuppansha, 2007), 124. Gomi Fumihiko et al., eds., Shōsetsu Nihonshi kenkyū (Tokyo: Yamakawa Shuppansha, 1998), 441n2. Atarashii rekishi kyōkasho, ed. Nishio Kanji (Tokyo: Fusōsha, 2001), 295. While this textbook is used in very few junior high schools, it received considerable media coverage upon its publication; see Arnaud Nanta, “L’actualité du révisionnisme historique au Japon (avril–août 2001),” Ebisu, no. 27 (2001): 129–38. Philip A. Seaton, Japan’s Contested War Memories: The “Memory Rifts” in Historical Consciousness of World War II (Oxon: Routledge, 2007), 113–14. The remaining programs explore strictly military issues and diverse subjects relating to the war and the postwar. It was only in 1999 that a law officially recognized Hinomaru as the national flag and “Kimigayo” as the national anthem.

10. MEMORY AND RELIGION 1.

2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8.

Tsuitō, Heiwa Kinen no Tame no Kinenhi-tō Shisetsu no Arikata wo Kangaeru Kondankai, “Hōkokusho,” December 24, 2002, http://www.kantei.go.jp/jp/singi /tuitou/kettei/021224houkoku.html (accessed September 2015). The Kōmeitō, founded in 1964, is a center-right party linked to the Buddhist sect Sōka Gakkai and modeled on the Christian democratic parties. Sven Saaler, Politics, Memory and Public Opinion: The History Textbook Controversy and Japanese Society (Munich: Iudicium, 2005), 119. Chidorigafuchi senbotsusha boen: Sōken gojūnen shi (Tokyo: Chidorigafuchi Senbotsusha Boen Hōshikai, 2009), 47. Ibid., 46. Ibid., 3, 48, 49. The architect Taniguchi Yoshirō (1904–1979) also designed the National Museum of Modern Art in Tokyo (1969), among others. Chidorigafuchi senbotsusha boen, 5–6, 51–56.

10. MEMORY AND RELIGION315

9. 10. 11.

12.

13. 14.

15.

Emperor Akihito has never visited Chidorigafuchi since he ascended the throne in 1989. A more recent example is Koizumi Jun’ichirō, who visited Yasukuni six times during his term as prime minister but went just three times to Chidorigafuchi. This refusal to adopt a Western solution is visible in the name chosen for the site, which was originally to be called the tomb of the unknown soldier (numei senshi no haka) or national cemetery (kokuritsu boen). However, these names, which are reminiscent of similar Western memorials, were rejected in favor of a more Japanesesounding title (Chidorigafuchi Senbotsusha Boen); see Chidorigafuchi senbotsusha boen, 3. Sasaki Yūko, “Eirei no katagata to no yakusoku,” Ima nani wo kataran: Heisei 20 nendo nenji katsudō hōkokusho (Tokyo: JYMA Nihon Seinen Ikotsu Shūshū Dan, ca. 2009), 73. Ibid., 71. The Ministry of Health’s Welfare Office launched the “bone collection campaigns” (ikotsu shūshū jigyō) in 1952. These operations can be divided into four phases. Initially they were carried out in areas under American control, before being extended to Thailand, the Philippines, and Indonesia as diplomatic relations were normalized. Fewer than 12,000 bodies were recovered during this first phase, which was limited to emptying mass graves and a few cemeteries. From 1967 to 1972 the search was extended to South Korea, the Marshall Islands, and the Gilbert Islands, with considerably more resources committed, enabling excavations to be carried out on battlefields and around ruins. In the space of six years more than 115,000 bodies were repatriated. The third phase ran from 1973 to 1975. It was during this period that the search for remains was the most efficient. While continuing to contribute significant funds, the government worked alongside the associations of bereaved families. Almost 100,000 bodies were repatriated in just three years. Since 1976 the government has reduced its level of funding and relied heavily on the associations. The only significant effort made in recent years concerns the excavations conducted in the former USSR and the Mongolian People’s Republic, made possible by the fall of the Soviet system in 1991. During this fourth phase, which has lasted now for forty years, 87,000 bodies have been retrieved, a rate of just over 2,000 per year. In total, the remains of 310,000 individuals have been returned to Japan since 1952, out of approximately 1.5 million. Finally, note that China has only very recently begun to accept the presence of Japanese missions on its soil. On the other hand, discussions with North Korea are at a standstill, since Tokyo has never recognized the Pyongyang regime. See Kōseishō Engo Kyoku, ed., Hikiage to engo: 30 nen no ayumi (Tokyo: Kōseishō, 1977), 312–15, 670; Chidorigafuchi senbotsusha boen, 64. For the most recent information, see http://www.mhlw.go.jp/bunya/engo /seido01#jouhou (accessed September 2015). See the Mainichi and Asahi editorials: “Iōtō ikotsu shūshū: Kuni no sekimu toshite suishin wo,” Mainichi shinbun, December 16, 2010, 5; “Ikotsu ga tou sengo,” Asahi shinbun, December 27, 2010, 3.

31610. MEMORY AND RELIGION

16. 17. 18.

19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24.

25. 26.

27. 28. 29. 30. 31. 32.

33. 34. 35.

Ima nani wo kataran: Heisei 21 nendo nenji katsudō hōkokusho (Tokyo: JYMA Nihon Seinen Ikotsu Shūshū Dan, ca. 2010), 12. Kōseishō, “Kaigai senbotsusha no ikotsu shūshū jisshi yōryō ni tsuite,” July 6, 1954, in Hikiage to engo, 671. Yamaori writes, “In the case of Japan, rather than employing the dualistic schema of spirit and flesh, a tripartite, three-dimensional structure of ‘spirit, flesh, and bone’ is effective, and perhaps necessary” (Yamaori Tetsuo, Wandering Spirits and Temporary Corpses [Kyoto: Nichibunken, 2004], 240). Hitonari Tsuji, Le Bouddha blanc, trans. Corinne Atlan (Paris: Gallimard, 2001), 262. The most famous of these white Buddhas can be found at the temple Isshinji in Osaka. Ima nani wo kataran: Heisei 21 nendo, 39–40. Ibid., 133. Ima nani wo kataran: Heisei 20 nendo, 113. Ibid., 127. Cremation developed in Japan as a Buddhist tradition. On the other hand, the practice of worshipping bones has a more complex history. Various forms of double burial or bone washing that have little connection to Buddhism were practiced for a long time. These practices survived in certain parts of Japan until the early twentieth century, notably in Okinawa. See, for example, François Macé, La mort et les funérailles dans le Japon ancien (Paris: Publications orientalistes de France, 1986), 232–34. Dabi is derived from the Pali word jhāpeti (meaning something that burns or creates fire). The Japanese language, which uses many counters, has several different ways of counting the dead. In everyday language tai (body) or even nin (person) are used. The Shinto equivalent is hashira (column, pillar, divinity). François Macé, “Le Shintô désenchanteur,” in “Mutations de la conscience dans le Japon moderne,” special issue, Cipango (spring 2002): 60. The city of Fuchū possesses a shrine dedicated to soldiers from Tokyo. SCAP listed 148 military shrines; see William P. Woodard, The Allied Occupation of Japan 1945–1952 and Japanese Religions (Leiden: Brill, 1972), 157–58. In Japanese these are known as shintōgata boseki. The 1,054 Class B and C criminals were registered at Yasukuni in 1959. The 14 Class A criminals—the most important wartime leaders—were enshrined in 1978. Prior to World War II, weapons were frequently encountered in Shinto shrines, notably cannons brought back from the 1894–1895 war against China and the 1904–1905 conflict with Russia. Murakami Shigeyoshi, Irei to shōkon (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1974), 206–7. Yasukuni jinja hyakunen-shi: Jireki nenpyō (Tokyo: Yasukuni Jinja, 1987), 518. “A Mother in Kudan” (Kudan no haha, 1939), written by Ishimatsu Shūji, was first sung by Shio Masaru. Kudan is the name of the Tokyo neighborhood in which Yasukuni is located.

10. MEMORY AND RELIGION317

36. 37.

38. 39. 40. 41.

42.

43. 44.

45.

46. 47.

48.

“I’ve Come to See You, Father” (Ai ni kimashita otōsan, 1958) was sung by Miyake Kōichi and its lyrics written by Nomura Toshio. These indicative figures are based on field observations, data from the report Kingendai no sensō ni kansuru kinenhi: “Hibunken shiryō no kisoteki kenkyū” hōkokusho, ed. Kokuritsu Rekishi Minzoku Hakubutsukan (Sakura: Kokuritsu Rekishi Minzoku Hakubutsukan, 2003), and information found on various nationalist websites such as Junkoku no ishibumi, http://www.asahi-net .or.jp/~un3k-mn. The statue of Kannon (Skt. Avalokiteśvara) was based on a sculpture by Yamazaki Chōun (1867–1954). Kōonji is located in Komatsuchō, Ehime Prefecture, on the island of Shikoku. Jizō is the Japanese name for the bodhisattva Ks.itigarbha. Red Fudō (Aka Fudō) dates from the twelfth century and is one of the most important iconographic images of Fudō (Skt. Ācala) in Japan. It can be found in the temple Myōō-in on Mount Kōya, where it watches over the dead. Michael Lucken, “Le sort des statues et monuments commémoratifs durant l’occupation américaine,” Cipango, no. 14 (2007): 144–45. On the negative image of this statue after the war, see the news report “Wasurerareta gakudō tachi,” NHKA, Nippon nyūsu (2), no. 7 (February 28, 1946), http://www.nhk.or.jp/shogenarchives. “Tōkyō no dōzō (12/13): Nikudan sanyūshi to Nitta Tōtarō,” Tōkyō shinbun, November 14, 15, 1959. More generally, we know that several Buddhist sects adapted extremely well to the presence of State Shintō and military shrines. For more information on this subject, see Takahashi Tetsuya, Yasukuni mondai, Chikuma shinsho(Tokyo: Chikuma Shobō, 2005), 139–48. The Constitution of Japan, articles 20 and 89; the full constitution can be viewed at the prime minister’s website, http://japan.kantei.go.jp/constitution_and_government _of_japan/constitution_e.html (accessed September 2015). See the Supreme Court judgment of 1987: “H05.02.16 Saikōsai daisanshō hanketsu: Minoo-shi chūkonhi soshō jiken,” Minshū 47, no. 3:1687. Aichikenka eireisha, chūkonhi-tō chōsa hōkokusho, vols. 1 and 2 (Aichiken Gokoku Jinja, 1992, 1998); Shigakennai chūkonhi, ireihi-tō chōsa-shū: Shūsen gojisshūnen kinen (Shigaken Gokoku Jinja, 1997); Chibaken no chūkonhi (Chiba: Chibaken Gokoku Jinja, 1998), etc. In 2001 the court of Matsuyama ruled that the use of public money to finance a statue of Kannon—a divinity closely associated with the notion of peace—was unconstitutional and ordered the local authorities to reimburse the funds used. Steles thus tend to be considered places of public commemoration made available to religions by the state, whereas statues of Buddhist deities are seen as possessing a true religiosity; see “Shingū-mura Kannon-zō soshō,” Hanrei taimuzu, no. 1058 (July 1, 2001): 290–302.

31811. FROM MONUMENT TO MUSEUM: THE DIFFICULT PATH TO HEALING

11. FROM MONUMENT TO MUSEUM: THE DIFFICULT PATH TO HEALING 1.

2.

3. 4.

5.

6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12.

Hachiya Michihiko (1903–1980), a doctor and hospital director, wrote a personal journal in 1945 titled Hiroshima nikki (Tokyo: Asahi Shinbunsha, 1955), translated into English by Warner Wells as Hiroshima Diary: The Journal of a Japanese Physician, August 6–September 30, 1945 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1995). Nagai Takashi (1908–1951), a radiologist, wrote Nagasaki no kane in 1946, published in English as The Bells of Nagasaki, trans. William Johnston (Tokyo: Kodansha International, 1994). Hara Tamiki (1905–1951), a novelist, wrote Natsu no hana: Shōsetsushū (Tokyo: Nōgaku Shorin, 1949) in 1946; it was partially translated into English as “The Summer Flower” by George Saitō in 1953, then appeared in full as Summer Flowers in Hiroshima: Three Witnesses, trans. Richard Minear (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1990); Shōwa sensō bungaku zenshū, 16 vols. (Tokyo: Shūeisha, 1965), 13:1–199, 239–53. John Hersey, Hiroshima (New York: Knopf, 1946). The text was originally published in The New Yorker on August 31, 1946, http://www.newyorker.com/magazine /1946/08/31/hiroshima (accessed September 2015). Toyoshima Yoshio, “Hiroshima no koe,” in Toyoshima Yoshio chosakushū, 6 vols. (Tokyo: Miraisha, 1967), 6:419–20. Nakamura Satoshi et al., “Hiroshima ni shingata tokushu bakudan: Shisha oyoso 17 man,” Hiroshima tokuhō (August 7, 1945), August 7, 1980; see Hiroshima wa dō kiroku sareta ka (Tokyo: NHK Shuppan, 2003), 314–23. Kobayashi Yoshinori, Sensōron (Tokyo: Gentōsha, 1998), 334–37 (“The Jewish scientists who had fled Germany were determined that the Americans should develop the atomic bomb before the Nazis . . . yet ultimately, there was never any question of using it on Germany. The target was always Japan, right from the start! The aim was primarily to test its efficiency, and this meant trying it out on the Yellows. Since they’re nothing but monkeys, there was no clash of conscience!”). Lisa Yoneyama, Hiroshima Traces: Time, Space, and the Dialectics of Memory (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999), 3. Based on Maya Morioka Todeschini, “Hiroshima au présent,” in Hiroshima 50 ans (Paris: Autrement, 1995), 35. Hiroshima genbaku sensai shi, 5 vols. (Hiroshima: Hiroshima-shi, 1971), 2:171, http://a-bombdb.pcf.city.hiroshima.jp/pdbj/common/download/sensai2.pdf. Ibid., 5:159, http://a-bombdb.pcf.city.hiroshima.jp/pdbj/common/download/sensai5 .pdf. Todeschini, “Hiroshima au présent,” 28. On the life of survivors after 1945, see above all Robert J. Lifton, Death in Life: Survivors of Hiroshima (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1991). Radiation Effects Research Foundation, ed., A Brief Description (Hiroshima: RERF, 2008), 44.

11. FROM MONUMENT TO MUSEUM: THE DIFFICULT PATH TO HEALING319

13. 14. 15. 16. 17.

18.

19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24.

25.

26. 27.

28.

Ibid., 44–45, 58. Ibid., 11, 44. “New Mexico’s Atomic Bomb Crater,” Life, September 24, 1945, 27. Ibid. Komine Hidetaka, Jichan sono ashi dongen shita to: Aru hibakusha no sengoshi (Osaka: Shinpū Shobō, 1997), 56. An English translation is available at the Asahi Shinbun website, http://www.asahi.com/hibakusha/english/others/komine/ (accessed September 2015). This testimonial is available for viewing on the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum’s database, http://www.pcf.city.hiroshima.jp/, recording no. VS00965. For a direct link, see http://a-bombdb.pcf.city.hiroshima.jp/pdbj/detail/208300 (accessed June 2016). Ibuse Masuji, Kuroi ame (Tokyo: Shinchōsha, 1965); translated into English by John Bester as Black Rain (New York: Kodansha America, 2012). Law no. 41–1954 on Medical Care for A-Bomb Survivors (Genshi bakudan higaisha no iryō-tō ni kansuru hōritsu). Sasaki Sadako (1943–1955). See Eleanor Coerr, Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes (New York: Putnam Juvenile, 1977). According to Hiroshima genbaku sensai shi, 1:240, http://a-bombdb.pcf.city .hiroshima.jp/pdbj/common/download/sensai1.pdf. Chūgoku Shinbunsha, ed., Nenpyō Hiroshima 40 nen no kiroku (Hiroshima: Chūgoku Shinbunsha, 1986), 55. Kusunose Tsunei (1899–1988) was a high-ranking civil servant and politician. He was appointed governor of Hiroshima Prefecture in 1945, a position that was subsequently put to a public vote in 1947 in accordance with new legal provisions. He presented himself as a right-wing candidate and beat his adversary, Nakai Masakazu. In 1950 he was elected to the Diet as a candidate for the Jiyūtō, the party headed by Yoshida Shigeru. Kōra Tomiko (1896–1993) was a university scholar and politician. After completing a PhD at Johns Hopkins University she took up a lecturing position at the Japan Women’s University (Nihon Joshi Daigaku). During the war she was actively involved in the Imperial Rule Assistance Association. She was elected to the House of Councilors in 1947 as a member of the Democratic Party (Minshu-tō) and campaigned for the repatriation of Japanese prisoners held in the USSR. Chūgoku Shinbunsha, Nenpyō Hiroshima, 237. Ueda Kazuhiro et al., eds., Iwanami kōza: Toshi no saisei wo kangaeru, 8 vols. (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 2005), 1:83. See also the doctoral dissertation by Benoît Jacquet, “Les principes de monumentalité dans l’architecture moderne: Analyse du discours architectural dans les premières œuvres de Tange Kenzō” (1936–1962) (University of Paris, 2007), 467–68. On the construction of the peace memorial park, see Jacquet, “Les principes de monumentalité,” 464–76.

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29. 30. 31. 32.

33. 34. 35. 36.

37. 38. 39. 40. 41. 42. 43. 44. 45. 46.

47.

48. 49.

Inoue Shōichi, Senjika Nihon no kenchikuka, Asahi shosen (Tokyo: Asahi Shinbunsha, 1995), 274. Thomas Philip Terry, Terry’s Guide to the Japanese Empire (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1920), 131. Ibid., 137, 140, 148, 154–60, 168, 183, 198, 200, 217. John Dower, “The Bombed: Hiroshimas and Nagasakis in Japanese Memory,” in Hiroshima in History and Memory, ed. Michael J. Hogan (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 123. Jacquet, “Les principes de monumentalité,” 470. Tange Kenzō, “Hiroshima keikaku 1946–1953: Tokuni sono heiwa kaikan no kenchiku keika,” Shinkenchiku, January 1954, 7. Ian L. McQueen, Japan: A Travel Survival Kit (Hawthorn, Vic., Aus.: Lonely Planet, 1989), 518. For more information on the life of Kitamura Seibō, see Michael Lucken, “The Peace Statue at Nagasaki,” in Japan’s Postwar, ed. Michael Lucken et al., trans. J. A. A. Stockwin (Oxon: Routledge, 2011), 181–89. “Kaigun hikō yobi gakusei no zō kansei,” Asahi shinbun, May 27, 1976. http://nagasakipeace.jp/japanese/appeal/history/1949.html (accessed September 2015). Kitamura Seibō, Hyakusai no katatsumuri (Tokyo: Nihon Keizai Shinbunsha, 1983), 147. Ibid., 151. Ibid., 148. Ibid., 149. This urn can be found at the childhood home of Kitamura Seibō, near Shimabara, which has since been transformed into a museum (Seibō Kinenkan). René Guénon, Symbolism of the Cross, trans. Angus Macnab (Hillsdale, N.Y.: Sophia Perennis, 2002), 62. Yoneyama, Hiroshima Traces, 20. In article 1 of its statutes, the Prayer and Exhibition Hall for Peace (Heiwa Kinen Tenji Shiryōkan) describes its objective as improving citizens’ knowledge of the suffering endured by three particular groups during the postwar period (nonpensioned veterans, postwar internees, and repatriates). See information panels at the museum or the Japanese government’s official website, Tokubetsu Kikin Jigyō Suishin-shitsu, “Heiwa kinen tenji shiryōkan ni tsuite,” http://www.kantei.go.jp/jp /singi/tuitou/dai2/siryo3_2.html, February 1, 2002 (accessed September 2015). Tsuitō, Heiwa Kinen no Tame no Kinenhi-tō Shisetsu no Arikata wo Kangaeru Kondankai, “Hōkokusho,” December 24, 2002, http://www.kantei.go.jp/jp/singi /tuitou/kettei/021224houkoku.html (accessed September 2015). Ibid. Antoine Prost, “Monuments to the Dead,” in Realms of Memory: The Construction of the French Past, ed. Pierre Nora, 3 vols. (New York: Columbia University Press, 1997), 2:307.

11. FROM MONUMENT TO MUSEUM: THE DIFFICULT PATH TO HEALING321

50. 51.

52.

53.

54.

55.

56. 57.

The expression “duty to remember” (devoir de mémoire) has no equivalent in Japanese. A literal translation (kioku no gimu) does exist, but it is not commonly used. The idea that Japanese culture is one of “vengeful spirits” was revived in the 1990s. It naturally serves the interests of those fighting to retain the current commemorative system as it is, with Yasukuni Shrine at its center. See, for example, Izawa Motohiko, Nihon-shi sai-kentō: Rekishi taidan-shū, vol. 1 (Tokyo: Sekai Bunkasha, 1995). See chapter 1, “It Is the Belief in Vengeful Spirits That Reminds Us of Historical Truths” (Onryō shinkō ga rekishi no shinjitsu wo ukabiagaraseru), and chapter 5, “The Religion of the Japanese Is One of Vengeful Spirits” (Nihonjin no shūkyō wa onryō shūkyō de aru). The Kannon for a Prosperous Asia Hall was erected by order of Matsui Iwane in 1938–1939 for the purpose of praying for the souls of Japanese and Chinese victims of the war; see Michael Lucken, “Autour de quelques os: La mémorialisation des criminels de guerre de catégorie A,” Cipango, no. 15 (2007): 104–7. Over fifteen collections of letters and other texts written by accused former leaders were published between April 1952 and late 1953, including Shi shite sokoku ni ikin: Yon senpan shikeishū no isho (Tokyo: Sōjusha, 1952); Asu no asa no “kuji”: Daitōa sensō de sensō hanzaisha toshite shokei sareta hitobito no isho-shū (Tokyo: Nihon Shūhōsha, 1952); Okada Tasuku, Sugamo no jūsan kaidan: Senpan shokeisha no kiroku (Tokyo: Atō Shobō, 1952); Ware shinu beshi ya: BC-kyū senpansha no kiroku (Tokyo: Atō Shobō, 1952); Sokoku e no isho: Senpan shikeishū no shuki (Tokyo: Mainichi Shinbunsha, 1952); Are kara shichinen: Gakuto senpan no gokuchū kara no tegami (Tokyo: Kōbunsha, 1953); Seiki no isho (Tokyo: Sugamo Isho Hensankai Kankō Jimusho, 1953). This statue was commissioned by the Association for the Compilation of Sugamo Testaments (Sugamo Isho Hensankai), whose previously mentioned collection Seiki no isho (The last testaments of the century) was a resounding success (see “Tōkyō no dōzō [16]: Senpan no Ai no zō to Yokoe Yoshizumi,” Tōkyō shinbun, November 19, 1959). This statue was removed in 2009 as part of construction works to develop the area in front of Tokyo Station. For more information on the construction of this monument, see Miura Shigeo, Mikawa-wan kokutei kōen Sangane-san to junkoku nanashi no haka (Gamagōri: Junkoku Nanashi Byō Hōsankai, 1966). See also Katō Nobuyuki, “Senpan no bohi wo sasaeru hitobito: Kōa Kannon—Junkoku nanashi no hi wo megutte,” Shūkyō kenkyū, March 2007, 159–60. A stele describing the origins and purpose of the monument explains that the chosen location corresponds to the “center of Japan” (Nihon no chūshinchi). The discovery in 2006 of diaries kept by Tomita Tomohiko (1944–2003), former head of the Imperial Household Agency, confirmed Hirohito’s displeasure at the decision to enshrine the Class A war criminals at Yasukuni. The record for April 28, 1988, attributes the following remarks to the emperor: “Although Tsukuba [Fujimaro, chief priest at Yasukuni between 1946 and 1978] acted, one tells me,

32211. FROM MONUMENT TO MUSEUM: THE DIFFICULT PATH TO HEALING

58. 59. 60. 61.

62. 63. 64. 65.

66.

67.

with discernment, whatever possessed Matsudaira’s son, who is the current chief priest, to include [at Yasukuni] the Class A [criminals], and to top it all, even Matsuoka [Yōsuke] and Shiratori [Toshio]? Whereas Matsudaira [Yoshitami, who was the last minister of the Imperial Household] was unquestionably a staunch proponent of peace, I believe that his son has not understood his father’s thoughts. That is why I no longer visit [the shrine]. My heart spoke.” See “Shōwa Tennō, A-kyū senpan Yasukuni gōshi ni fukaikan,” Nihon keizai shinbun, July 20, 2006, 1. Wakasa Kazutomo, Nihonjin ga shitte wa naranai rekishi, 3 vols. (Tokyo: Shuchōsha, 2009), 3:21–22. Lucken, “Autour de quelques os,” 112, 116. Takahashi Tetsuya, Yasukuni mondai, Chikuma shinsho (Tokyo: Chikuma Shobō, 2005), 73–74. On December 12, 1971, an explosive device was planted by members of the East Asia Anti-Japan Armed Front (Higashi-Ajia Hannichi Busō Sensen) at Kōa Kannon. However, the organization was relatively unknown at the time (in fact, the armed front’s name was decided only in February 1972), and so the affair received relatively little attention. Ultimately, the indignation this act elicited seems primarily to have helped normalize the existence of the site. Pierre Lavelle, “La société pour la rédaction de nouveaux manuels d’histoire: Renouveau ou déclin du nationalisme?” Cipango, no. 10 (2003): 23. Tanaka Masaaki, “Kōa Kannon kaiki 60-nen,” Kōa Kannon kaihō, no. 12 (October 18, 2000). Makime Manabu, Purinsesu Toyotomi (Tokyo: Bungei Shunjū, 2009); film adaptation by Suzuki Masayuki (2011). The National League of Devastated Cities (Zenkoku Sensai Toshi Renmei), founded in 1947, announced the construction of a large commemorative tower in Himeji in 1952. The War Memorial Tower for Casualties of the Pacific War Air Raids in the Country’s Cities (Taiheiyōsen Zenkoku Sensai Toshi Kūshū Giseisha Ireitō) was unveiled in 1956 in Tegarayama Central Park. The crypt contains a number of relics. The monument is surrounded by concrete slabs engraved, for each of the 113 cities associated with the project, with the date of the first air raid and the number of fatalities and casualties. In total, 504,734 dead and 9,551,006 casualties are listed. For more information on the construction of this monument, see Sensai fukkō to zenkoku sensai toshi renmei no ayumi (Himeji: Zenkoku Sensai Toshi Renmei, 1962). A bill aimed at providing state compensation to civilian victims of the air raids (Senji saigai engo hōan) was submitted to the Diet in 1973. It was discussed on fourteen occasions until it was withdrawn in 1989 without having been adopted. In addition to the previously mentioned publications on the bombings of Tokyo, Hiroshima, and Nagasaki (Tōkyō daikūshū sensai shi, Hiroshima genbaku sensai shi, Nagasaki genbaku sensai shi; see chapter 8, note 27), see, among others Kōchishi sensai fukkō shi (Kōchi: Kōchi-shi, 1969); Kawasaki kūshū sensai no kiroku

11. FROM MONUMENT TO MUSEUM: THE DIFFICULT PATH TO HEALING323

68.

69. 70. 71. 72.

73. 74. 75. 76. 77.

78. 79. 80.

(Kawasaki: Kawasaki-shi, 1974); Yokohama no kūshū to sensai: Henshū kiroku (Yokohama: Yokohama-shi, 1977); Sendai-shi sensai fukkō shi (Sendai: Sendai-shi Kaihatsu Kyoku, 1981); Kagoshima-shi sensai fukkō shi (Kagoshima: Kagoshima-shi, 1982); Kumamoto-shi sensai fukkō shi (Kumamoto: Kumamoto-shi, 1985). Examples include the Osaka International Peace Center (Ōsaka Kokusai Heiwa Sentā), which opened in 1991; the Kawasaki Peace Museum (Kawasaki-shi Heiwa-kan) and the Kyoto Museum for World Peace, Ritsumeikan University (Ritsumeikan Daigaku Kokusai Heiwa Myūjiamu) in 1992; the Saitama Prefectural Documentation Center for Peace (Saitama-ken Heiwa Shiryōkan) in 1993; the Sakai Municipal Documentation Center for Peace and Human Rights (Sakai Shiritsu Heiwa to Jinken Shiryōkan) in 1994; the Himeji Documentation Center for Peace (Himeji Heiwa Shiryōkan) in 1996; and the National Shōwa Memorial Museum (Shōwa-kan) in 1999. Yamane Kazuyo, “Heiwa hakubutsukan, heiwa hakubutsukan kensetsu undō no genjō to kadai,” Ritsumeikan heiwa kenkyū, no. 4 (2003): 6. Philip A. Seaton, Japan’s Contested War Memories: The “Memory Rifts” in Historical Consciousness of World War II (Oxon: Routledge, 2007), 176. Ibid., 180–85. The panel on Nanjing read, “The Great Nanking Massacre. The Japanese army, which had faced violent fighting in Shanghai, entered the city of Nanking on December 13, 1937, and proceeded to kill vast numbers of Chinese. There were shootings, live burials, torture, decapitations, and drownings. The number of civilians and prisoners killed in the space of a few weeks is said to have been between several tens of thousands and several hundreds of thousands. These events received wide media coverage internationally as the ‘Nanking atrocities,’ but the Japanese public was not informed until the end of the war” (Ōsaka Kokusai Heiwa Sentā, October 2011). Yamane, “Heiwa hakubutsukan,” 6. Philippe Boulanger, La France devant la conscription: Géographie historique d’une institution républicaine, 1914–1922 (Paris: Economica, 2001), 240–52. http://www.tripadvisor.jp/pages/MuseumArtmuseum.html (the original link, accessed September 2012, is no longer viable). Ogawa Hitomi, Sendai Shōichirō, “Hiroshima kinen kōen no keikan keisei,” Nihon kenchiku gakkai Kinki shibu kenkyū hōkokusho, no. 48 (May 2008): 417–20. Foreign visitors are not allowed in the port of Lüshun without special authorization. Japanese delegations occasionally visit to pay tribute to those who died in the wars of 1894–1895 and 1904–1905. Okinawa-ken Heiwa Kinen Shiryōkan sōgō annai (Itoman: Okinawa-ken Heiwa Kinen Shiryōkan, 2001), 2. Lori Watt, When Empire Comes Home: Repatriation and Reintegration in Postwar Japan (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Asia Center, 2009), 193–94. Figures established using data provided by Okinawa no ireitō hi (Naha: Okinawa-ken Seikatsu Fukushi-bu Engo-ka, 1998), 163–88.

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81. 82. 83. 84. 85.

86.

87. 88.

Cited in Kanda Kōji, “Okinawa imēji no hen’yō to kankō no kankeisei,” Kankōgaku, no. 4 (2010): 26. Ibid., 31. Ibid., 27. Okinawa-ken Heiwa Kinen Shiryōkan nenpō, no. 8 (Itoman: Okinawa-ken Heiwa Kinen Shiryōkan, 2008), 45. In its 1998 edition the guidebook Kagoshima-ken no rekishi sanpo (Historical walks in Kagoshima Prefecture) (Tokyo: Yamakawa Shuppansha, 1998) mentions the museum but gives no accompanying entry in the index. Kike Wadatsumi no koe: Nihon senbotsu gakusei no shuki (Listen to the Voices from the Sea: Writings of the Fallen Japanese Students) (Tokyo: Tōdai Kyōdō Kumiai Shuppanbu, 1949). On the letters written by kamikaze pilots, see chapter 4 in the present volume. For an example of such collections, see Kumo nagaruru hate ni: Senbotsu hikō yobi gakusei no shuki (At the end of a long cloud: Writings by the fallen student pilots) (Tokyo: Nihon Shuppan Kyōdō Kabushiki Gaisha, 1952). For more information on these publications, see Hosaka Masayasu, Kike Wadatsumi no koe no sengoshi (Tokyo: Bungei Shunjū, 1999); Franziska Seraphim, War Memory and Social Politics in Japan, 1945–2005 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Asia Center, 2006), 135–58. Ian Buruma, The Wages of Guilt (London: Cape, 1994), 227. “Itatsu jīchan ni kiite miyō,” July 2002, http://www.itatsutadamasa.jp/int/int_itatsu .html (accessed September 2015).

CONCLUSION 1. 2. 3.

4.

Kurosawa Akira, “Yume seisaku nisshi,” 1990, in Taikei Kurosawa Akira, 5 vols. (Tokyo: Kōdansha, 2010), 4:795. Jean-Marie Bouissou, ed., L’envers du consensus: Les conflits et leur gestion dans le Japon contemporain (Paris: Presses de Sciences Po, 1997), 214. Kamata Satoshi, Nihon no genpatsu chitai (Tokyo: Ushio Shuppansha, 1982). An expanded version was published in 2011 under the title Nihon no genpatsu kiken chitai (Tokyo: Seishisha). “The earthquake, tsunami, and the current situation at the nuclear plant constitute the most severe crisis Japan has encountered in the sixty-five years since the end of World War II.” Speech made by Kan Naoto on March 13, 2011. The full Japanese text is available at the prime minister’s website, http://www.kantei.go.jp.

INDEX

Italic page numbers refer to illustrations. Abe Isoo, 54, 286n25 Abe Shinzō, 191, 218 Abe Tomoji, 56, 287n36 absolutism, 85, 292n11 Adorno, Theodor, 128 Advisory Committee of Jurists, League of Nations, 156 An Affirmative Theory of the Greater East Asia War, 181 Agence France-Presse, 29 Air Defense Law (1937), 108–9, 297n13 Akihito (emperor), 255, 268, 272, 315n9 Akimaru report, 277n36 Aleutian Islands, 78, 114 Algerian War, 63 Amaterasu (sun goddess), 83, 173 American occupation of Japan: and church/state separation, 153, 168, 217–19; communist purges of, 145; critical Japanese stances on, 145, 152; decisions taken during, xviii; and democratization of Japan, xix, xx, 160– 61, 164–67, 187, 197; directives imposed

by, xviii; as effect of World War II, xi; ending of, xviii, 141, 145, 251; and images of American soldiers, 151–52; impact on endogenous values, 145; and imposition of American interpretations of history, xx; and Japanese constitution, 250; and Japanese fear of rape, 144; and Japanese government’s destruction of documents at surrender, 132–33; and Japanese recollections of American soldiers, 151; and Japan’s totalitarian regime, 31; and Kurosawa’s The Subscription List, xii, 274n4; as new form of dictatorship, xvi; policies implemented by American officials, xx, 134, 144, 155, 217, 237; preparations for, 152–53; and religious issues, xx, 153–55, 168, 217–19; and war responsibility, 161, 192; and war-versuspeace dichotomy, 57, 144–45, 146; and World War II memory, xix American stereotypes, Japan’s use of, 75, 77, 92, 111, 123, 132

326INDEX

ancient Greece, 88 Anglo-Japanese Alliance (1902), 66 anti-Americanism, 186 antiannexation movements, 18 antifascists, and Rolland, 51, 52 Anti-Jewish League of Japan, 290n95 anti-Semitism, 17 Aomori, Japan, 122 Arendt, Hannah, 31, 32 Arisawa Hiromi, 13, 277n36 Arisugawa, Prince, 171 Army Day (Rikugun Kinenbi, March 10), 305n15 Army Information Board, 13 Arusu (publisher), 70 Asahi gurafu, 75 Asahi shinbun: accusations against staff of, 44; on atomic bombs, 135, 136, 302n95; on August 15 as day for burial of old view of state, 140; on Hirohito’s repudiation of divine origins, 154; on kamikaze operations, 117; obituary columns of, 93; poll on official visits to Yasukuni Shrine, 198, 313n33; on Sino-Japanese War, 64; on World War II bombings, 110, 123, 299n56 Asahi Shinbunsha, 189 Ashikaga Takauji, 219 Ashikaga clan, 288n50 Asia: history textbook establishing common narrative of East Asia, 149; and Japanese colonialism, 66, 68–70; Japanese discrimination against populations of, 28; Japanese domination of, 32, 57, 67–70; Japan’s contradictory discourses on, 66, 67; Japan’s liberation from Western colonialism, xvii, 67, 68, 69, 77, 180, 181; maps of, 25; pan-Asianism, 43, 62, 66–68, 70–71, 280n80, 286n25, 287n27, 289n73 Asō Tarō, 312n15

Association for the Compilation of Sugamo Testaments, 321n54 Association for the Promotion of International Culture, 277n37 Association of Former Combatants, 275n5 Association of Shinto Shrines, 154 Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission, 131, 236–37 atomic bombs: accounts of disasters, 189, 230–31, 318n1; and annual commemorations, 230, 233–34; causal explanations of, 234; contamination from, 129, 131, 136–37, 230, 235–36, 237, 241; death toll from, 131, 231–32, 236–37; images from explosion, 131–34, 137; and Japanese memories of victimhood, xvii, xxi, 203, 221, 233; Kobayashi Yoshinori on, 232–33, 318n5; trauma and destruction from, 129–31, 134, 135–37, 229–34 Australia, 23, 162 Awaya Kentarō, 81 bakufu, 282n17 Barefoot Gen (manga series), xiv Barthes, Roland, xiii Battle of Attu, 78, 190 Battle of Imphal, 100 Battle of Midway, 78 Battle of Nanking, 61, 63 Battle of Okinawa, 262 Battle of Saipan, 110 Behr, Edward, 179 Bergamini, David, 179 biological experiments, 62, 166, 180–81, 182, 191 biological warfare, 62, 108 Bix, Herbert, 179 body, 17–20, 31, 36 Bolshevik Revolution, 72 Borneo, 69 Bowers, Faubion, 168

INDEX327

Brazil, 23 Breton, André, 50–51 Briand-Kellogg Pact (1929), 156 bronze statues, and Japanese recycling for war effort, 115–16, 170 Buck, Pearl, 52 Buddhism: and anthumous relics, 95, 102; and Christianity, 52; and commemoration of soldiers, 219–24, 225, 254, 317n44; funerary rites of, 88, 94, 99, 213, 316n24; and ideal of pure heart, 113–14; and individual/ whole relationship, 57; and Japanese romanticism, 58; and memorial stele, 90; and ossuaries, 96, 294n48; and rebirth, 127; and recycling metal from temples, 115; and relics and physical remains, 87; Shinto-Buddhist syncretism, 213–14; and social class, 218; statues of deities, 220, 221–23, 222, 226, 227, 272, 317n48; and totalitarianism, 56; and transcendent Being, 85; Zen Buddhism, 50, 219, 220, 285n7 Bunce, William K., 152–54, 169 Bungei Shunjū (publisher), 189 Burma, xvi, 67, 68, 124, 209 Burma Campaign, 100, 195 Buruma, Ian, 264 Cabinet Information Bureau, 38–40, 42, 289n79 Caen, France, 105, 263 Cairo Conference, xviii calligraphy: of kamikaze pilots, 102; on memorial steles, 89, 252, 265 Canetti, Elias, 126 cemeteries, 94–96, 215, 294n36 chemical weapons, 61, 108 cherry blossoms, as symbol of kamikaze pilots, 119, 299n49 Chiang Kai-shek, 63

Chidorigafuchi National Cemetery, 205, 206–14, 207, 315n9, 315n10, 315n11 Chikamatsu Monzaemon, 50 China: American strategic bombing campaign launched from, 120; funerary practices of, 96; Hundred Regiments Offensive, 45; Japanese funerals for soldiers in, 100; Japanese occupation of, xviii, xix, 26–28, 45, 62, 67, 175, 198, 204; Japanese policy in, 52, 133; Japanese relations with, 146; Japanese visitors in, 26–28; and Japan’s security perimeter, 108; Jewish population of, 71; and national imagination, 25; political thought in, 56; Shinto shrines in, 293n17; as threat to Japan, 106; totalitarian regime of, 37; and war crimes tribunals, 158. See also People’s Republic of China; Sino-Japanese War (1894–1895); Sino-Japanese War (1937– 1945); Taiwan (Republic of China) China Incident, 1, 54, 214, 278n46 Chinese National Revolutionary Army, 1, 62 Chinese People’s Anti-Japanese War Memorial Hall, Beijing, 199, 199 Chinese stereotypes, 65, 75, 79, 92 Chirac, Jacques, 201–2 Chiran Peace Museum for Kamikaze Pilots, Kyushu, 92, 255, 263–65 Choi In-kyu, 299n50 Chongqing, China, Japanese bombing of, 108 Christians and Christianity: and Buddhism, 52; and cremation practices, 95; and fetishization of corpses, 98; and Japanese culture, 50, 83; and military cemeteries, 95; repression of, 11; and Shinto, 214; and transcendent Being, 85 Chronicles of Atomic-Bomb Damage (Genbaku sensai shi), 235 Chronicles of Japan (eighth century), 117

328INDEX

Chronicles of Wartime Damage, 181 chrysanthemums, as symbol of imperial house of Japan, 119, 299n49 Chūgoku region, 122 Chūō kōron (central debate), 42–43, 44, 181, 309n9 cinemas, wartime operation of, 112, 297n25 Civil Censorship Detachment (CCD), 165–66 Civil Code, xix civilian police, 30 Civilian Volunteer Corps, 298n30 civil registration system, 88 clothing, 18, 38 Cold War, 31, 163 comfort women, 92, 147, 148, 181, 182, 197, 201 comic strips, 75 commemoration of soldiers: and American occupation of Japan, 155, 168, 169; and anthumous relics, 95, 102, 103; and Buddhism, 219–24, 225, 254, 317n44; and cemeteries and ossuaries, 94–96; and epigraphs, 90, 172, 226–27; and funerals for soldiers, 93, 99; and kamikaze operations, 102; Koizumi Jun’ichirō’s proposal for, 205–6; and memorial steles, 89–90, 96, 169, 170, 172, 215, 216, 217, 225–27, 293n25, 317n48; metonymic approach to, 227–28; and monuments, 168, 169–70, 214–15, 217–19, 316n29; and national mourning ceremony for war dead, 140, 302–3n2; and ossuaries, 94–96, 99, 206, 207, 209, 225, 227, 293n19, 294n48, 295n49, 295n50; and peace, 248–50, 265; and remains given to families, 95, 96, 101–2, 103; and repatriation of military dead, 95, 97–103, 208, 209–11, 269; and sacrifice, 86–87, 88, 96; secularization of, 208–9, 226; and

Shinto faith, 87, 88, 89, 292n14; and unknown soldiers, 205, 206–14; and witness objects, 227. See also Yasukuni Shrine communism: and American occupation of Japan, 145, 164, 197; in France, xvii– xviii; as Jewish threat, 72; and Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal, 164; and war responsibility, 161, 164; and World War II meaning, xvi Confucian ethic, in Imperial Rescript on Education, 5 Confucianism, 60, 157 conservatives, xvi, 161 Convention with Respect to the Laws and Customs of War on Land (1907), 155–56 cooperatives, 10, 36–37 Daily Life Improvement Campaign, 18 Daimatsu Hirobumi, 195–96 Darwinism, 60, 197 Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ), 197, 205, 210 destruction of World Trade Center’s Twin Towers (2001), xiv The Devil’s Gluttony (Morimura), 181 Dictionary of Modern Japanese Literature, 191–92 Diderot, 277n32 diet, 18, 20, 36. See also public health Diet. See National Diet Doihara Kenji, 253, 306n25 Dokkoi! Kono yari (The lifted spear), 273n2 Doolittle, Jimmy, 105 Doolittle Raid, 105 Dostoyevsky, Fyodor, 50, 59 Dower, John, 137, 163, 179, 241 Drea, Edward, 3 Dreams (film), 267–68 Dresden, Germany, Allied bombing of, 120, 121 Dutch Indies, 124

INDEX329

East Germany, 201 Edo period, 66, 117, 130, 282n22 “Educational Plan for Assisting Military Personnel” (February 1940), 93, 294n32 Eisenhower, Dwight, 162 English language, as enemy language, 139 Enomoto Takeaki, 277n38 epigraphs, on memorial stele, 90, 172, 226–27 era-name calendar, 21 ethnic identity, perceptions of, 18 eugenic ideology, 19 Europe, 12, 30, 50 European Union, 198–99 exile, 23–24, 51 fascism: fascist aesthetic of memorial stele, 90; in Japan, xvi, 31, 81; Murobuse on, 55, 56; Rolland as antifascist, 51, 52; and Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal, 165 fatalism, xv, 58, 60–61 Federation of Veterans’ Associations, 205 Fellers, Bonner, 162 feminism, 150 Fenollosa, Ernest, 75, 291n108 Festival of the Dead, 141 Festival of the First Tasting, 83 Fichte, Johann Gottlieb, 58 film industry: animated films, xiv–xv; on kamikaze theme, 120, 299n50; and media control, 15–16; and national ideology, 15–16; stability of production of, 15; and themes of self-sacrifice, 192; in Tokyo, 14; and Tokyo War Crimes Tribunals, 165; and war responsibility, 161, 192 Follow Me! (film), 195 forced prostitution, 133 Foreign Affairs, 106, 108 France: admission of deportation of Jews, 199, 201–2; and assassination of Duke of Guise, 256; and Chernobyl,

236; conscription system of, 259–60; Douaumont ossuary, 225; exodus of 1940, 123; German occupation of, 143; historiography of World War II in, xvi, xvii–xviii, 143; Japanese artists known in 1930s, xix; Japanese emigration to, 24, 279n66; and Japanese history, xv; Jewish domination associated with, 73; lack of knowledge of Allied occupation of Japan, xx; law of July 1, 1901, 36; legislation on historiography, 183; memorials to the dead in, 248; monuments following World War I, 90; Nénette and Rintintin dolls in, 38; and Oradour-sur-Glane massacre, 200, 313n35; professional guilds of, 40; state’s role in, 259; Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, 206, 213; World War I in, 38, 75 French colonialism, 68, 200 Front (illustrated magazine), 69, 289n79 Fudō, representations of, 223, 317n41 Fujita Tsuguharu (Léonard Foujita), xix, 24, 82, 161, 274n9, 279n66 Fukasaku Kinji, 212 Fukuda Yasuo, 312n15 Fukushima disaster, 129, 270, 271 funerary practices: and bone gathering ceremony, 212, 316n18; of Buddhism, 88, 94, 99, 213, 316n24; evolution of, xiv, 95; and farewell letters of kamikaze pilots, 112; funerals for soldiers, 93, 99–101; regional differences in, 100– 101; of Shinto, 88, 94, 206, 213, 292n14, 316n26; and urns, 96, 99, 99, 101, 129, 206, 207, 209, 211, 212, 295n50. See also cemeteries; ossuaries funerary towers, 221, 225, 295n52 Gandhi, Mohandas, 51, 285n10 Gaullism, xvii–xviii gender, 44

330INDEX

generational differences, and plurality of discourses, 44, 189, 190 Geneva Convention relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War, 156, 305n19 Geneva Protocol, 236 German romanticism, 58 German-Soviet pact of nonaggression, 67 Germany, 175, 184, 199, 201, 250, 251. See also Nazi Germany Gluck, Carol, 275n16 Glueck, Sheldon, 162 Go-Daigo (emperor), 219, 288n50 Goebbels, Joseph, 16 Gorky, Maxim, 51 Gotō Shinpei, 116 Grave of the Fireflies (animated film), xiv Graveyard of Honor (film), 212 Great Britain: Commonwealth of Nations established by, 67; historiography of, 180; Japanese alliance with, 74; Japanese emigration to, 24; and Japanese joining World War II, 46, 57–58; Japanese narratives on British responsibility for World War II, 53; Japanese treaties with, 156, 157; Japanese victories against, xviii, xix, 43, 77; and League of Nations, 75, 290–91n104; role of monarchs, 82 Great Depression, 25 Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere, 43, 44, 62, 67, 68–69, 134, 156, 284n45 Great Japan Islamic Society, 72, 290n95 Great Japan Society for Celebrating Loyal Spirits, 96, 294n36 Great Kantō Earthquake of 1923, xx, 14, 23, 106, 108, 121, 129, 132, 293n25, 297n12 Guadalcanal, 47, 78 Guadalcanal Campaign, 101 Guangzhou, China, 108 Guénon, René, 246

Guha, Chinmoy, 51 Guillain, Robert, 29–30, 32 Gutai, 39 Gyeongbokgung Palace, Seoul, 147 Hachiya Michihiko, 189, 230, 318n1 Hada Bujirō, 312n15 Hamburg, Germany, 121 Hani Gorō, 188, 311n9 Hara Hiroko, 139, 302n1 Hara Setsuko, 18 Hara Tamiki, 230, 318n1 Harbin, Manchuria, 293n17 harmony (chōwa), 56–57 Hasegawa Nyozekan, 43, 284n43 Hashikawa Bunzō, 60 Hashimoto Ryūtarō, 312n15 Hatoyama Ichirō, 312n15 Hatoyama Yukio, 312n15 Hattori Takushirō, 180, 310n21 Hawaii, Japanese-Americans in, 75 Hayashi Fumiko, 285n1 Hayashi Fusao, 181 Hayashi Hirofumi, 182 Heian period, 249 heroism: collective heroization of victims, 95; and commemoration of soldiers, 227; and funeral ceremonies for soldiers, 92, 213; and Japanese literature, 59–60; and memorial stele, 90; and newspaper obituary columns, 93; in Pacific War, 78; of Sakurai Tadayoshi, 116–17; and suicide missions, 113; and tragic hero narrative, 10 Hersey, John, 114, 230–31 Hesse, Hermann, 51 hibakusha (atomic bomb survivors), xvii, 129, 130–31, 233, 234–41 Higashi Honganji temple, “Offer Your Savings to the Empire at War! We Will Fight On!” Anti-American poster, 76 Hijikata Yoshi, 24, 279n66

INDEX331

Himeji, Japan, War Memorial Tower, 257–59, 260, 322n65 Himeyuri Peace Museum, 262, 263 Hino Ashihei, 13, 161, 185, 285n1, 294n39 Hirase Reita, 308n77 Hirohito (Emperor Shōwa): and American historiography, 178; and balance of power, 44–45; caricatures of, 177; and Chidorigafuchi National Cemetery, 208; commemorations honoring, 22; confidence in Pacific War, 58; death of, 267–68; “Declaration of Humanity,” 154, 305n12; destruction of documents of, 132–33; destruction of portraits of, 132, 133; facial expression of, 85; historical calendar based on reign of, 21; honorific prefixes of, 84, 86; on Japan as peaceful nation, 143–44, 164; on kamikaze operations, 114; Kita Renzō’s His Majesty the Generalissimo, 83; MacArthur’s sparing of, 31; preservation of imperial institution, xi, xiii, 81, 84, 86, 142; press absolving from blame for war, 136; public appearances of, xiii, 82; reign of, 147; religious role of, 83–84; representation of, 82–86, 89, 116; rites performed by, 83–84; role during war, 81–86, 150; as sacred manifest deity, 84, 85–86, 103, 140, 153–54, 292n9, 292n11; surrender in August 1945, 81, 82, 132, 135, 139, 140–43, 252, 303n5, 303n12; and texts of national ideology, 6, 276n20; Tōjō’s losing support of, 44; tour of areas devastated by American bombings, 123–24, 128, 137; visits to Yasukuni Shrine, 88, 154, 208, 218, 254, 321–22n57; and voluntarist dialogue, 47; and war crimes arrests, 159; and war responsibility, xx, 161–64, 166–67, 171, 177, 179, 197, 233; and World War II memory, 187

Hirose Takeo, 171 Hiroshima, Japan: accounts of bombing, 189, 230–31, 318n1; and annual commemorations, 230, 233–34; atomic bombing of, 129–31, 133, 135–36, 229; casualties from atomic bomb, 131, 231–32, 236–37, 239, 271; censuses of population based on distance from hypocenter, 238; Commercial Exhibition Hall, 230, 239; destruction of, 121, 232; Korean forced laborers in, 130, 131; and memory of disaster, 229–34, 235; photographs of aftermath of atomic bomb, 133; population of, 130, 301n79; as possible atomic bomb target, 122; rebuilding of, 238–39, 240; representation of Kannon in, 221; role of survivors, 234–41 Hiroshima–Nagasaki: A Pictorial Record of Atomic Destruction, 131–32 Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum, 180, 182, 233–34, 238, 239–41, 245, 250, 261, 269 Hirota Kōki, 253, 306n25 history: balance of power within, 150; reconstruction of, 173–77. See also Japanese history Hitler, Adolf, 4, 31, 51, 162 hōanden (pavilion), for Imperial Rescript on Education, 5, 89, 170, 308n73 Hokkaido, Japan, 66, 122 Holocaust, 250 Home Ministry: air raid drills of, 106; ban on foreigners taking photographs during air raids, 125; and Imperial Rule Assistance Association, 35; local shrines controlled by, 87, 89; and media control, 15–16; and private associations, 37; and repression and rehabilitation of opponents, 14; and Yasukuni Shrine, 154 Honda Ishirō, 267

332INDEX

Honda Katsuichi, 181 Honshu, B-29s attacking, 110 Hosokawa Karoku, 44, 284n47 Hosokawa Morihiro, 312n15 Hosokawa Moritatsu, 312n15 human bullets (nikudan), 2, 2, 116–17, 274n2 humanism, 43, 55, 56, 132, 284n43 Humanity and Paper Balloons (film), 8 Hutchinson, William E., 177 hygiene, 18, 36 Hyōgo Prefecture, “Air Defense: Air-Raid Drills, July 17, 1932” poster, 107 Ibuse Masuji, 237, 285n1 idealism, 43, 50–51, 52, 66 Ienaga Saburō, 181, 202, 310n23 “If I Go Away to Sea” (patriotic song), 112, 252, 254, 297n27 Igarashi Yoshikuni, 193–95 Ikeda Hayato, 141, 218 The Illusion of the Great Nanking Massacre (Suzuki Akira), 181 Imai Tadashi, 299n50 Imperial General Headquarters, 61, 62 imperial institution of Japan: Allied invasion threatening, 114; American occupation of Japan eliminating symbols of, 144, 153–54; bird of prey as emblem of, 25, 280n71; changes in emperor’s role, xviii; efficiency of, 269–70; and emperor as deity, 84, 85–86, 103, 140, 153–54, 292n9, 292n11; and emperor linked to individuals, 6–7, 35, 36, 68, 134; and emperor’s role during war, 42, 44–45, 46, 81–86, 112, 114, 178, 179; fetishization of, 84–85, 103; and figure of emperor, xi, 184; Hirohito’s preservation of, xi, xiii, 81, 84, 86, 142; and historical calendars, 21, 84; and Imperial Rescript on Education, 5, 6; isolated nature of, 82; and loyalty

to emperor, 90; references to emperors, 273n1; in school textbooks, 173, 175; and unbroken imperial line, 85; and war responsibility, 163–64, 171; and World War II memory, 187 Imperial Japanese Army: air raid drills of, 106; anticipation of total war with Western powers, 46, 115; atrocities committed by, 176, 180; and centralization of commemorative rites for soldiers, 88; and identification tags for Japanese soldiers, 209–10; in Japanese history, xv; nationalists’ denial of brutality and crimes of, xvi; no-surrender policy of, 114; and repatriation of military dead, 95, 97–98, 99, 100–103, 209; retreat from China and Pacific, 110; skirmishes with Chinese National Revolutionary Army, 1; and Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal, 166; violence in Sino-Japanese War, 61–65, 234, 265; and war crimes tribunals, 158–59 Imperial Japanese Army Academy, 158, 306n27 Imperial Palace, 44, 84 Imperial Regalia of Japan, 90, 142 Imperial Rescript on Education, xix, 4, 5–6, 89, 170, 275n16 Imperial Rescript on the Termination of the Greater East Asia War, 303n12 Imperial Rescript to Soldiers and Sailors, 4–5, 6, 114, 275n11, 276n18 Imperial Rule Assistance Association (IRAA): and balance of power, 44–45; “Citizens! General Uprising!” poster from, 33; Civil Volunteer Corps replacing, 298n30; creation of, 35, 45, 47; Cultural Affairs Bureau of, 40, 281n14, 283n34; and dissolution of cooperatives and labor unions, 36–37; and Kishida Kunio, 281n14;

INDEX333

and local cultural associations, 40; and neighborhood associations, 36, 282n22; and Nihonga painters, 38, 39; objectives of, 35, 41; in opposition to bakufu, 282n17; and recycling for war effort, 115 Imperial Surrender Rescript, 298n42 Imperial Will on the Great Principles of Education, 291–92n5 India, xvi, 51, 146 individual conscience, 187 individual/group relationship: and acceleration of time, 21; and American occupation of Japan, 187; and Chidorigafuchi Memorial, 208; and comfort letters to soldiers, 91; and commemoration of fallen soldiers, 87, 96; and control of body, 18–19; and individuals’ subjectivity, 187–88; and Japanese colonialism, 68; and Japanese experience of World War II bombings, 123; in Japan’s totalitarian regime, 30, 32, 34, 37–38, 160; and legitimate rights of individualism, 52; Murobuse on, 55; and national ideology, 6, 7–8, 24–25, 40, 47, 48, 159–60; and World War II memory, 195 Indochina, xviii, 28, 45, 65–66, 67 Indonesia, 67, 68–69 Industrial Patriotic Association, 36 Inoue Shōichi, 240 Instrument of Surrender, 164 International Military Tribunal for the Far East, 159, 165, 167. See also Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal Inudō Kentarō, 102 Ise Shrine, 22, 24, 117, 173 Ishihara Shintarō, 204 Ishii Shirō, 166, 181 Ishikawa Kōyō, 125 Ishikawa Tatsuzō, 28, 285n1 Ishimatsu Shūji, 316n35

Ishiwara Kanji, 28, 67, 74–75, 77, 280n80 Itagaki Seishirō, 252, 253, 306n25 Itagaki Taisuke, 116 Italy, 10, 31, 32, 72, 162 Itatsu Tadamasa, 264–65 Itō Hirobumi, 74, 116, 290n100 “I’ve Come to See You, Father” (song), 218 Iwanami Shoten, 44, 189, 286n16 Iwasaki Shun’ichi, 100 Japan: aggressive diplomacy policy of, 108; air raid drills in, 106, 107, 296–97n12; authoritarian regime of, 31; banning of American films in, 75, 291n106; constitution of, xi, 146, 184, 225, 226, 247, 250, 317n45; coup d’état of February 1936, 42; democracy in, 183, 187, 197, 198, 240, 247, 258, 259, 268; demographics in 1930s, 3; economic successes of, 196, 221, 258; fascist regime of, 31; flag of, 204, 314n49; forced labor in, 147; historical calendars of, 21, 84; industrial production of, 36; and international agreements, 155–57; Jewish population of, 71, 72; lack of resources, 20; militarist regime of, xvi, 31, 53, 108, 135, 156–57, 160, 167–68, 170, 171, 174–75, 182, 254; and national apologies, 200–204; as nation-state, 87; peace treaties signed with foreign nations, 146; relations with U.S., 145; security treaties with U.S., 146, 156, 157; totalitarian regime of, 29–32, 34, 35, 37–38, 160, 281n12; Western population of, 72. See also Japanese colonialism Japanese air force, 108 Japanese art: American censorship of, 144; and expressionism, 39; on kamikaze missions, 120; mobilization of artists for war effort, 38–41; and Nihonga painters, 38, 282n26; and

334INDEX

Japanese art (continued) offered or votive paintings, 38, 282n26; and orientalist style of painting, 66; patriotic exhibitions, 39, 41; performing arts tradition, xiii; on Sino-Japanese War, 65–66; and State Shintō, 168; and suicide missions, 113; and surrealism, 8, 9, 39; and unified art societies and associations, 39–40, 283n33; and war responsibility of artists, 161; and World War II meaning, 186 Japanese censors: and film industry, 15–16; and Japanese literature, 28, 49, 50; and Kurosawa, xii, 274n4; and news media, xx, 16, 135, 136, 165–66, 299n56; restrictions on images of World War II bombings, 124, 125–26, 134; and Rolland, 52; and Suzuki Kurazō’s role, 42 Japanese civilians: announcement of surrender, 135; and calls for effort and sacrifice, 36, 37, 48, 109, 115; deaths from World War II bombings, 128–29; experience of World War II bombings, xv, 122–23, 125–26; and government’s dissociation of physical destruction from idea of defeat, 126; and Imperial Rule Assistance Association, 37; and individual freedom, 188–89; and kamikaze operations, 114; militarization of, 46, 47; mutual surveillance among citizens, 30, 282n22; and noncombatant civil defense units, 298n30; preparation for air raids, 108–9, 123; role in SinoJapanese War, 8–11; sacrifice of workers in factories, 40; and volunteer civil defense units, 114, 130, 298n30; and war responsibility, 159, 161–62 Japanese colonialism: Asian countries’ perceptions of, xvi; and balance of power, 44–45; and conquered space, 23–28; and economic exploitation of

occupied territories, 67, 69; ending of, 146; and expansionist policy, 18, 55, 62, 66–69, 110, 130; and exploitation of human capital, 69; ideology of, 66–67, 69; and independence of occupied territories in postwar period, 68; Japanese historiography of, 180–81; and Japan’s role in Asia, 25, 198, 202; memory of, 146, 198; and military service, 147 Japanese Communist Party (JCP), 11, 13, 44, 162, 164, 186, 197, 205, 277n30, 306n39, 313n29 Japanese culture: censorship of, 16; and Christians, 50, 83; during World War II, xix–xx; and Europe, 50; glorification of gestures of faith, 47; and Imperial Rule Assistance Association, 36; and local cultural associations, 40–41; Manchuria as birthplace of, 18; merger of private associations, 37, 39–40, 283n33; Nakai’s promotion of local culture, 187–88; and national ideology, 7; and parallel histories, 256; theme of war in, xiv–xv; and tragic hero narrative, 110 Japanese elites: attitudes toward United States, 75; history written by, 4; and preemptive action against aerial attack, 108, 296–97n12; and purges of SCAP, 160–61; war responsibility felt by, 57; and Western ideas, 50 Japanese geography, xi, 40, 44, 106, 207–8, 214, 268 Japanese government: and American occupation of Japan, 132–33, 160–61, 172; on China Incident, 1, 278n46; and commemoration of soldiers, 87; and control of images, 132, 133–34; fascist factions in, 81; and Hirohito’s announcement of surrender, 142–43; historical narrative of, 269; information campaigns of, 11; manipulation of

INDEX335

Hirohito, 81; and media control, 15–16; national unification policies of, 6, 10, 13; objectives during World War II, xi–xii; and political rationales, 197–200; preservation of imperial institution, xi, xiii, xvii; protection of elites, 4; purges of persons holding position of responsibility during Pacific War, 160–61, 164, 190, 191, 311–12n15; and readiness for war, 46; and repression and rehabilitation of opponents, xix, 11–14, 37, 277n30, 278n39; and sacred union, xix–xx, 269; and Sino-Japanese War, 1, 8, 9–10; and standardization of commemorative rites, 89; totalitarianism adopted by, xix; and U.S. drafting of legislative texts, 146; and war responsibility, 197, 200–204, 268; and World War II bombings of cities, 126–27; and World War II meaning, 197–200, 204. See also National Diet Japanese history: and August 15 as date of commemoration of end of World War II, 140, 141, 143; and control of images from World War II bombings, 134; and effects of World War II, xi; and glorification of eradication of past, 127; in Japanese culture, xiv– xv; and parallel histories, 256; and representation of national narrative in public space, 116; role of kamikaze missions in, 118–20; in school textbooks, 141, 150; and Westerners’ Japanese stereotypes, xiii–xiv; and World War II meaning, 145, 180–82 Japanese language, time-related expressions in, 21 Japanese literature: and acceleration of time, 21; and aestheticized novels, 8; American censorship of, 144; and American occupation of Japan, 185;

on atomic bombs, 302n95; and epic literature, 113–14; and heroism, 59–60; and historical calendars, 21–22; and Japanese censorship, 28, 49, 50; and Japanese propaganda, 39; and Japanese romanticism, 58–60; and Jewish question, 70–73; on kamikaze missions, 120; Nakai’s examination of, 11–12; and national ideology, 7–8; and Pacific War, 105–6, 126, 127; and Patriotic Society for Japanese Literature, 53, 192, 286n18; and reading clubs, 49–50; and responsibility of writers for war, 161; and Rolland, 51–53; and Sino-Japanese War, 56, 64, 285n1; and suicide missions, 113; and unified art societies and associations, 39–40, 283n33; and World War II meaning, xiii, xx, 49–53, 185, 189; writers’ support for war, 192 Japanese navy, 44, 57–58, 125 Japanese PEN Club, 286n18 Japanese propaganda: and American stereotypes, 75, 77, 92, 132; and comfort letters sent to soldiers, 91–92; and Front, 289n79; and images from Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bomb explosions, 132; and Imperial Rule Assistance Association, 41; and Japanese colonialism, 69; Japan’s opposition to America as revenge for events of 1853, 74; and kamikaze operations, 111–12; and Kurosawa, xii; on military tradition with dead, 94; on Pacific War as total war, 77; and role of Japanese artists, 39; and role of military shrines, 88; and role of Suzuki Kurazō, 42; and Sino-Japanese War, 28; and spirit of sacrifice, 12; and World War II bombings, 75, 126 Japanese relationship with death, and World War II, xiv Japanese romanticism, 52, 58–61, 286n16

336INDEX

Japanese society: collective rituals of, 22–23; fear of aerial attack, xx; and marginal divergence phenomenon, 39; and normative body language, 18; organicist theories in, 44, 48; and readiness for war, 46; structure of, 260; and temporality of Sino-Japanese War, 20–23; texts of, xix, 4–8; Westerners’ perceptions of, 29, 30. See also Japanese civilians; national ideology Japanese Society for History Textbook Reform, 158, 182, 304n29 Japanese stereotypes, xiii–xiv, xix, 32, 75, 97 Japan Is Not Guilty, 180 Japan News (Nippon nyūsu), 20, 25, 112, 123–24, 136, 137, 141, 144 Japan Publishing Association, 37 Japan Romantic school, 58–60 Japan Socialist Party, 197, 313n30 Japan Tourist Bureau, 24 The Jewish Problem, illustration from, 73 Jewish question, 70–73, 79 Jimmu (mythical emperor), 24, 84 Jizō, representations of, 221–23 Judaism, 88 Kaempfer, Englebert, 113 Kaizō (reform), 42–43, 44, 106 Kamaishi, Japan, 227 Kamei Katsuichirō, 58–60 kamidana, as symbolic representation of imperial institution, 84 kamikaze operations: and aesthetic of death, 119–20; and anthumous relics, 102, 118; ceremonies preceding departure, 118, 119; and comfort letters to soldiers, 92; and diving missions, 111; educational level of pilots, 119; and epic literature, 113–14; and farewell letters of pilots, 112, 118, 119; historiographic role of, 118–20, 263–65; and Japanese perceptions of

dead soldiers, 97–98; and Japanese propaganda, 111–12; and names of units, 111; and newspaper obituary columns, 93; origin of term kamikaze, 117; pilots associated with cherry blossoms, 119, 299n49; and pilots defecting or returning to base, 112; and rivalry in acts of bravery, 93; and sacrifice, 92, 98, 114, 118–19, 120, 196; and spiritual mobilization, 118 Kan Jutae, 237 Kan Naoto, 210, 270, 324n4 Kaneko Mitsuharu, 127 Kannon: effigy of, 223; Peace Kannon statues, 221; statue at Ryōzen Kannon, Kyoto, 220, 221, 222, 317n38; statues of, 227, 317n48 Kansai region, 14 Kant, Immanuel, 43, 187 Kantō region, 106, 297n12 Karatani Kōjin, 58 Kasahara Tokushi, 61, 182 Katayama Toshihiko, 286n16 Katō Etsurō, cover of magazine Manga Nihon, 32, 34 Katsura Imperial Villa, 295n52 Kawabata Ryūshi, 223 Kawabata Yasunari, 8, 38 Kawakami Sōroku, 171 Kawamura Kunimitsu, 84 Khabarovsk Trials, 158, 166, 180 Kido Kōichi, 41, 81, 162, 164, 283n39 Kierkegaard, Søren, 55 Kikuchi Kan, 127, 300n71 “Kimigayo,” as national anthem, 314n49 Kimura Heitarō, 253, 306n25 Kimura (wrestler), 193–94 Kinjirō, 170, 308n72 Kiryū Yūyū, 296–97n12 Kishi Nobusuke, 190–91 Kishida Hideto, 295n52 Kishida Kunio, 21, 281n14, 283n34

INDEX337

Kita Renzō, 82, 292n6; His Majesty the Generalissimo, 83 Kitakyūshū area, air raid drills in, 106 Kitakyūshū Culture League, 40–41 Kitamura Seibō, 221, 244–47, 320n43 Kitashirakawa, Prince, 171 Kiyosawa Kiyoshi, 297n16 Klemperer, Victor, 36 Kōa Kannon, 251, 252, 253, 254–56, 321n52, 321n56, 322n61 Kobayashi Hideo, 56 Kobayashi Yoshinori, 232–33, 318n5 Kobe, Japan, xiv, 71, 122 Kōdansha (publisher), 189 Koie Masaki, 100 Koizumi Jun’ichirō, 183, 191, 205–6, 218, 248, 265 Koizumi Jun’ya, 191 Kojiki, 168, 292n9 kokutai (Japanese nation), xix, 6, 7, 12, 36, 38, 91, 159–60, 192, 198, 277n30. See also national ideology Kōmeitō, 205, 314n2 Komine Hidetaka, 237 Komine Misa, 101 Konoe Fumimaro, 10, 35, 67, 191, 289n75, 312n15 Konoe, Prince, 162, 223, 284n45 Kōra Tomiko, 238, 319n25 Korea: “Destination: Korea!” poster, 27; forced labor in, 150, 201, 263; funerary practices of, 96; Imperial Rescript on Education distributed in, 5; Japanese cemeteries in, 94; Japanese emigration to, 24; Japanese General Government Building in, 147–48, 304n23; Japanese occupation of, 28, 66, 67, 68, 122, 147, 148–50, 198, 304n26; and Japanese recycling metal in, 115, 116; Japanese tourism in, 25; Koreans in Japanese armed forces, 147; liberation in 1945, 116, 140, 141, 146; and media based in

Tokyo, 15; Shinto shrines in, 293n17. See also North Korea; South Korea Korean War, 145 Kōsaka Masaaki, 284n44 Kuomintang, 61, 210 Kurata Hyakuzō, 52–53 Kuril Islands, 120, 146 Kurosawa Akira, xii–xiii, 25, 192, 193, 195, 267–68, 273n2 Kusaka Yōko, 25 Kusunoki Masashige, 59, 171, 288n50 Kusunose Tsunei, 238, 319n24 Kwantung Army, 44, 45, 61, 71 Kyoto, Japan, 24, 27, 122 Kyushu region, 120, 122, 124, 129 labor unions, 10, 36–37, 161, 188, 277n30 Lalande, George de, 304n23 Law on Fortified Areas, 124 Law on the Protection of Military Secrets, 124 League of Nations, 75, 156–57 Le Corbusier, 295n52 leukemia, 131, 235, 236 Li, Peter, 200 Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), 184, 190, 198, 205, 265, 268 liberals, xvi, 68 Life magazine, 97, 98, 112, 158, 179, 195, 237, 295n54 Louis XIV (king of France), 85 Love Statue (Ai no zō), 251–52, 321n54 loyalty, 90, 96 Lu Xun, 51 Lüshun, China, 25–26, 116, 261, 323n77 MacArthur, Douglas: and mass psychology of occupation, 151–52; policies implemented by, xx, 134, 168; role in Pacific War, 150; sparing of Hirohito, 31, 153, 162–63, 166–67; as Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers, 304n20

338INDEX

McManus, George, 75 Madama Butterfly (Puccini), 74, 290n102 Maekawa Kunio, 295n52 Maeterlinck, Maurice, 50 Malaysia, Japanese occupation of, 67, 69 Manchukuo, 67, 176 Manchuria: and American strategic bombing campaign, 120; as birthplace of Japanese culture, 18; forced labor in, 147; Japanese occupation of, 28, 62, 149, 209, 214, 280n80; Japanese ossuaries in, 100; Japan’s clashes with China in, 1, 155–56; Jewish population of, 71, 72; Kwantung Army’s domination of, 45; liberation in 1945, 116; and media based in Tokyo, 15; military officials sent to, 42; Shinto shrines in, 293n17 manga, xiv, xv, 40, 232–33 Manga Nihon, “May the Rage of One Hundred Million People Crush the British and Americans!” (cover), 34 Manila, massacres in, 62, 67 Maoism, 31 March 2011 disasters, xv, 227, 236, 270–72, 324n4 Marco Polo Bridge, 1 Mariana Islands, 38, 120 Maruyama Masao, 187 Marx, Karl, 119 Marxism, 59, 145, 150, 182 materialism, 56 Matsudaira Nagayoshi, 255 Matsui Iwane, 63, 251, 252, 253, 255, 306n25, 310n20, 321n52 Matsumoto Shunsuke, 39 May Day parades, 152 media, 14–15. See also news media Meiji Constitution (1889), xix, 5, 81, 84, 178, 292n11 Meiji Jingū shrine, 38 Meiji period (1868–1912): definition of Japanese nation during, xix, 14; and

Japan’s relationship with Asia, 66, 67; legal provisions of, 16; monuments of, 171, 308n77; and return of military dead to prefecture of origin, 94; spirit of institutions in, 13; and suicide missions, 114 Meiji Restoration, 28, 87, 94, 256, 292n14 memorial steles, and commemoration of soldiers, 89–90, 96, 169, 170, 172, 215, 216, 217, 225–27, 293n25, 317n48 The Men Who Tread on the Tiger’s Tail (Kurosawa), xii–xiii Mikasa, Prince, 162 Miki Kiyoshi, 43, 284n45 Miki Takeo, 218 Military Comfort Women (Senda), 181 military officials: arrest of, 159; awareness of strategy of terror, 62; destruction of documents at time of surrender, 132–33; Hirohito’s relationship with, 81, 303n5; and Imperial Rule Assistance Association, 35, 37; increased military budgets of, 108; on Japan’s liberation of Asia from Western colonialism, 67; lack of accountability, 103; military police, 30, 125; on Pacific War, 57–58, 78; press reports on, 136; purges of persons holding position of responsibility during Pacific War, 160, 164; and repatriation of military dead, 101, 102–3; role of, 42; in school textbooks, 173; as trained specialists on China, 63; and war crimes charges, 159; and war crimes concept, 156; and war responsibility, 163, 164, 172; on World War II bombings, 126 military personnel assistance associations, 91–93 Military Protection Agency, “Protect the Families of the Soldiers [Fighting for the] Development of Asia!” poster, 9 military service: and comfort letters to soldiers, 91–92; and conscript laws,

INDEX339

3–4, 50, 115, 147, 260, 275n5; and defection cases, 114; and departure ceremonies for new conscripts, 93, 294n35; and dying in combat as motif in Japan’s epic tradition, 113; and Japanese elites, 4; and place of family origin, 3, 260; and sacrifice of soldiers, 40, 114, 116–17; social status of conscripts, 275n12 Military Service Law (1927), 3 military support groups, 91–92. See also veterans’ associations military training, 46 Military Tribunal. See Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal mimesis, 227 Ministry of Education, 16, 51–52, 86–87, 173–75, 202–3, 217, 292n9, 294n32 Ministry of Finance, “In the Heart, Patriotism; in the Hand, Government Bonds!” poster, 19–20, 19 Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 70–71 Ministry of Greater East Asia, 67 Ministry of Health, 18–19, 92–93, 128–29, 206, 209–13, 315n14 Ministry of Justice, 156 Ministry of the Military, 292n14 Minobe Tatsukichi, 85, 292n11 Minoo, Japan, 225–26 Miracle on 34th Street (film), 165 Miró, Joan, 39 Mishima Yukio, 158 Mitchell, Margaret, 52 Mito school historians, 117 Miyamoto Kenji, 12, 164, 197 Miyamoto Masakiyo, 286n16 Miyamoto Yuriko, 21–22, 109, 145, 165, 167, 176, 186 Miyazaki Hayao, xiv–xv Miyazaki Prefecture, 24 Miyazawa Kiichi, 268, 312n15 Miyazawa Yutaka, 312n15

Mizoguchi Kenji, 279n65 modernity and modernism, 69, 90, 108, 214, 262, 295n52 Mongolia, 210 monuments: and American occupation of Japan, xx, 167–72; and commemoration of soldiers, 168, 169–70, 214–15, 217– 19, 316n29; and memorial museums, 257–60; rebuilding of, 170; and World War II memory, 21 Mori Ōgai, 59, 287n47 Mori Yoshirō, 198 Morimura Seiichi, 181 Mosley, Leonard, 179 The Most Beautiful (film), 192, 195 “A Mother in Kudan” (song), 218, 316n35 Motion Picture Law of 1939, 15–16 Mount Fuji, representations of, 84 Mud and Soldiers (film), 94, 294n39 Murayama Tomiichi, 197 Murobuse Kōshin, 54–56, 287n27 Mushanokōji Saneatsu, 43, 52–53, 192, 284n43 Mussolini, Benito, 31, 162 Mutō Akira, 253, 306n25 Mutsu Munemitsu, 277n38 Mutsuhito (Emperor Meiji), 22, 24, 38, 82, 88, 169 Nagai Kafū, 8, 39 Nagai Takashi, 130, 189, 230, 245, 318n1 Nagasaki, Japan: accounts of bombing, 189, 230–31, 318n1; and annual commemorations, 230, 233–34, 242; atomic bombing of, 129–31, 135–36, 229; casualties from atomic bomb, 131, 231–32, 236–37, 271; destruction of, 121, 232; memorial museum of, 233–34; and memory of disaster, 229–34; photographs of aftermath of atomic bomb, 133; population of, 130; as possible atomic bomb target, 122

340INDEX

Nagasaki Peace Park, Peace Statue, 242, 243, 244–50, 269 Nagazumi Torahiko, 137 Nagoya, Japan, 121–22 Nakai Masakazu, 11–12, 187–88 Nakamura Ken’ichi, Memory of Annam, 65–66 Nakano Seigō, 31–32, 281n12 Nakasone Yasuhiro, 218 Nakazato Kaizan, 117, 298n40 Nanbara Shigeru, 305n12 Nanjing: capture of, 61; massacre in, 62, 63, 175, 181 Nanking Massacre, 8, 61, 63, 181, 202–3, 255–56, 310n23, 314n45, 314n47, 323n72 Nanking Massacre Memorial Hall, 199 National Diet: Abe Isoo’s election to, 286n25; bill for providing state compensation to civilian victims of air raids, 322n66; Geneva Convention not ratified by, 305n19; and Hirohito on Japan as “peaceful nation,” 143; and Hiroshima designated as “peace memorial city,” 238; Hosokawa Karoku’s election to, 284n47; Kitamura Seibō’s works displayed in front of, 244; Koizumi Jun’ya’s seat in, 191; Kusunose Tsunei’s election to, 319n24; purges of members, 311–12n15. See also Japanese government National Diet Library, 187 national ideology: adaptation of, xix; and air raid drills, 109; and body, 17–20; and comfort letters sent to soldiers, 91; and concept of faith, 46–47; discourse on unity, 10, 14, 18, 24, 37, 42, 91, 118, 161, 183, 204, 269; and family, 12; and film industry, 15–16; and Imperial Rescript on Education, xix, 4, 5–6, 89, 170, 275n16; and Imperial Rescript to Soldiers and Sailors, 4–5,

6, 114, 275n11, 276n18; and Imperial Rule Assistance Association, 35, 37; and individual/group relationship, 6, 7–8, 24–25, 40, 47, 48, 159–60; and indoctrination through images, 82, 291–92n5; lack of true synthesis of tactics, 42; and organicist theories, 48; and psychological pressure, 47–48, 92; and Public Security Preservation Law, 277n30; and radio broadcasting, 15; and reading, 50; and repression and rehabilitation of opponents, 11, 13, 14; texts of, 6, 276n20 nationalists: on American occupation of Japan, 145; and Cold War, 163; denial of brutality of crimes of Imperial Japanese Army, xvi; and Japanese historiography, 182, 183; and Japanese victories during World War II, xviii; on Jewish question, 71; and Kurata’s nationalistic texts, 53; on liberation of Asian nations from Western colonialism, xvii; mystical nationalist school of thought, 43; and neonationalist counterattack, 255–56; and school textbooks, 150, 176; and Shinto movement, 226; and ultranationalists, 31, 153, 155, 160, 168, 170, 308n71; and Yokohama Incident, 44 National League of Devastated Cities, 322n65 National Mobilization Law of 1938, 10–11 National Museum of Japanese History, Sakura, 259 National Museum of Korea, 304n24 National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo, 282n26, 314n7 National Shōwa Memorial Museum, Tokyo, 259 national socialism, 54 National Spiritual Mobilization Movement, 10

INDEX341

Natsume Sōseki, 7–8 natural disasters linked with man-made disasters, 121, 129 Navy Day (Kaigun Kinenbi, May 27), 305n15 Nazi Germany: Allied bombing of, 109–10, 120; American and Russian land offensive against, 142; attacks on London, 105; books destroyed in, 50; control over images, 133; invasions of, 25; Japan’s alliance with, 10, 32, 71, 72; and Jewish question, 70, 71, 72; Nazi Party of, 35; and Nuremberg Race Laws, 70; occupation of France, 143; portraits of leaders, 85; professional guilds of, 40; and realist forms of art, 39; totalitarian regime of, 30, 31; and trivialization of violence, xx; and war responsibility, 201 Nazism, 32, 55 neighborhood associations, 36, 282n22 Netherlands, 200 New Guinea, 210 New Mexico, nuclear test site in, 237 news media: access to, 15; on Allied bombings in Europe, 109–10; American censorship of, 134, 144, 165–66, 237–38; on American culture, 77, 78, 79; on arrests for war crimes, 159; on atomic bombs, 135–36; generalinterest magazines in circulation, 42–44; on Hirohito’s tour of areas devastated by American bombings, 123–24; Hirohito’s visibility through, 82–83; and honorific prefixes referring to Hirohito, 84, 86; on independence movements in Japanese occupied territories, 68; and information campaigns on air raids, 108; on Japan as totalitarian, 32; Japanese censorship of, xx, 16, 135, 136, 165–66, 299n56; on Japanese expansionist policy, 69;

and Japanese propaganda, 48; and Jewish question, 70; and kamikaze operations, 111–12, 117, 298n41; and obituary columns, 93; on Pacific war, 78–79; publication of images of public acceptance of Hirohito’s surrender, 142; on scientific and technical superiority of United States, 135, 136; on Sino-Japanese War, 8, 64; and spiritual mobilization, 118; in Tokyo, 14; on Tokyo air raid, 123; on Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal, 164–65; on war responsibility, 161; on World War II bombings of Japan, 123–24, 128. See also specific newspapers Newspaper Law of 1909, 16 New York Times, 112 NHK (radio broadcaster), 15, 122, 190, 203, 314n48 Nicholas II (czar of Russia), 72 Nickerson, Natalie, 97, 98 Nietzsche, Friedrich, 55, 119 Nihon oyobi Nihonjin (Japan and the Japanese), 43, 71 Niigata, Japan, 122 Ninomiya Sontoku (Kinjirō), 170, 308n72 Nishida Kitarō, 57, 287n38 Nishio Kanji, 182 Nishitani Keiji, 68 Nitobe Inazō, 50, 285n6 Nogi Maresuke, 116, 214 Normandy Campaign, 110 Northern Territories, Russian offensive in, 303n16 North Korea: Japan compared to, 190; Japanese relations with, 148, 249, 304n26, 315n14; Soviet invasion of, 145 Nuremberg Race Laws, 70 Nuremberg Trials, 31 obelisks, 90, 96 Oda Nobunaga, 273n2

342INDEX

Oda Sakunosuke, 141 Oguma Eiji, 166–67 Okada Yoshiko, 279n65 Okakura Tenshin, 66–67 Okinawa: American occupation of, 143, 145, 146, 261; American strategic bombing of, 122; fall of, 142; historical tourism of, 261–63; historiography of, 183; and kamikaze missions against Allied warships, 111; and military service, 3; reading clubs in, 50; and repatriation of war dead, 210; and World War II memory, 268 Okinawa Peace Hall, 262 Okinawa Prefectural Peace Memorial Museum, 262–63 Okuma Shigenobu, 116 Ōmura Masujirō, 171 Ōno Rokuichirō, 312n15 Ortega y Gasset, José, 55 Osaka, Japan, 14, 106, 121, 122, 130, 140 Osaka International Peace Center, 259, 323n68 ossuaries, and commemoration of soldiers, 94–96, 99, 206, 207, 209, 225, 227, 293n19, 294n48, 295n49, 295n50 Ōta Yōko, 136, 189, 238, 302n95 Ōtani Cemetery, Kyoto, 216 Ōtomo no Yakamochi, 297n27 Ozaki Shirō, 285n1 Pacific Islands, 66, 100 Pacific War: American historiography regarding, 57, 175–76; American occupation of Japan distinguished from, 145; and imagining postwar period, 53–61; and Japanese defeat, 54; Japanese historiography of, 180–82; in Japanese literature, 105–6, 126, 127; Japanese perception of British during, 74–75, 77–79; and

Japanese perception of regional space, 25, 69; Japanese perceptions of Americans during, 72, 74–75, 77–79; and Japanese public’s access to magazines, 42–44; Japan’s ambivalent stance toward Asia during, 68, 69; organicism prevailing during, 44, 48; and ossuaries, 96; passers-by looking at map of, 26; plurality of discourses during, 42, 44, 45, 69, 268, 269, 284n45; ratio of Japanese to American losses during, 111; and spiritual mobilization, 10, 116–18; Tōjō’s speech on, 53–54; as total war, 77, 115, 116; and tourism, 25; Tsurumi on, 58. See also World War II Pal, Radhabinod, 180 pan-Asianism, 280n80 Patriotic Society for Japanese Literature, 53, 192, 286n18 peace and pacifism, xiv, 186, 248–50, 265 Peace Tower, 172, 308n80 Pearl Harbor attack: Hirohito’s sanctioning of, 82; Japanese commemoration of, 22–23, 279n63; and Japanese relations with United States, 75; Japan’s decision-making process on, 46, 47; and Japan’s declaration of war, 157; and Jewish question in Japan, 72; and World War II imagery, xiv Peirce, Charles Sanders, 226–27 People’s Republic of China: Japanese relations with, xxi, 147, 200, 210, 249; portrayal of Japan as belligerent and colonialist power, xvi, 147; “United Front against Japan,” 199 Percival, Arthur, 77 Perry, Matthew C., 74 Peru, 23 Philippines, 67, 68, 69, 111, 114, 211 Pinguet, Maurice, 119

INDEX343

Popular Front, 11 post–China Incident, 54 postwar period: defining of, 143; independence of Japanese occupied territories during, 68; and Japanese discourse on Asia, 68; Japanese imagining of, 53–61; politicians’ declaration of ending of, xix; and postwar as term, 54. See also American occupation of Japan Potsdam Declaration, 141, 142, 156, 162 price control system, 20 Princess Mononoke, xiv private associations, 36, 37, 40 Problems in Postwar Thinking, 54–56 Prost, Antoine, 248 prostitution centers, and comfort women, 92, 147, 148, 181, 182, 197, 201 The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, 72 public health: and effects of radiation from atomic bombs, 129, 131, 136–37, 146; and Imperial Rule Assistance Association, 36; and school textbooks, 174. See also Daily Life Improvement Campaign; eugenic ideology; Ministry of Health Public Security Preservation Law, 11, 277n30 publishing industry: and books published on Jewish question, 70; books published on sacrifice, 116–17; books published on World War II, 189; effect of World War II on, 49, 285n3; in Tokyo, 14–16 Puccini, Giacomo, Madama Butterfly, 74, 290n102 Qing, and Sino-Japanese War (1894–1895), 64, 94–95, 149 Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung, 4

racial equality, and League of Nations, 75, 290–91n104 Radiation Effects Research Foundation (RERF), 131, 236 radio broadcasting: on American strategic bombings, 122; on arrests for war crimes, 159; on atomic bombs, 136; and Hirohito’s declaration of surrender, 135, 137, 140–41, 142, 303n5; and Japan as totalitarian, 32; and national ideology, 15; as state-run monopoly, 14–15; and timing of life of entire nation, 20 rail network, 24 Rangoon, 67 rapes, of Imperial Japanese Army, 61, 62, 63 rationing system, 20, 49 Record of Ancient Matters (Kojiki), 168, 292n9 Reischauer, Edwin, 30, 163, 179, 309n16 religious issues: and American occupation of Japan, xx, 153–55, 168, 217–19; control of religion in cemeteries, 94, 218–19, 294n38; and emperor’s role, 83–84; and Festival of the Dead, 141–42; and merger of associations, 37; plurality of discourses on, 44; and repression of religious congregations, 11; and State Shintō, 153–55. See also Buddhism; Christians and Christianity; Shinto faith Repatriates Assistance Agency, 217 repatriations: of military dead, 95, 97–103, 208, 209–11, 269; repatriates held in camps, xviii; and World War II memory, xix Ridgway, Matthew, 304n20 Rikidōzan (wrestler), 193–94 Rolland, Romain, 11, 51–53, 60, 119, 186, 277n32, 286n13, 286n16 Rosenstock, Joseph, 71, 290n89

344INDEX

Rotary Club, 75, 291n105 Russia: Japanese relations with, 146, 210; and Northern Territories offensive, 303n16 Russian Revolution, xx, 23, 51 Russo-Japanese War: and anthumous relics, 102; backlash from victims and their families, 92; Japanese recycling bronze statues from, 116; Japanese victory in, 17, 66, 74; and Jewish question, 71; and Kinjirō, 170; and memorial steles, 89, 225; and monuments, 25–26, 170; and postwar period, 54; and repatriation of military dead, 95; and Yasukuni Shrine, 155 Ryōzen Kannon, Kyoto, 220, 222 Ryukyu Islands, xx, 66, 261. See also Okinawa sacrifice: calls for effort and sacrifice from civilians, 36, 37, 48, 109, 115; and commemoration of soldiers, 86–87, 88, 96; in film, 192; and Imperial Rule Assistance Association, 37, 40; in Japanese literature, 53; and Japanese propaganda, 12; and kamikaze operations, 92, 98, 114, 118–19, 120, 196; and military service, 40, 114, 116– 17; movement of sacrifice for nation, 2; and newspaper obituary columns, 93; and recycling of bronze statues, 115–16; and World War II memory, 195–96 Sado-maru, 172 Saigō Takamori, 13–14, 59, 128, 171, 277n38 Saitō, George, 300n70, 318n1 Sakaguchi Ango, 127, 195–96, 300n70 Sakai, Japan, American strategic bombing of, 122 Sakakura Junzō, 295n52 Sakhalin Island: forced labor in, 147, 201; and Japanese colonialism, 66;

and media based in Tokyo, 15; Shinto shrines on, 293n17 Sakurai Tadayoshi, 116–17 Sakurauchi Yukio, 312n15 San Francisco Peace Treaty, xviii, 141, 143, 189, 217, 225, 252 Sasaki Sadako, 237–38 Sasaki Tōichi, 62–63 Sasaki Toshiko, 230–31 Sasaki Yūko, 209 Satō Eisaku, 190, 218 Satō Haruo, 192, 285n1 Satsuma Rebellion, 277n38 School of Paris, 73, 274n9, 279n66 school textbooks: and American occupation of Japan, xx, 173–76, 174, 179; Japan’s national history in, 141, 150, 183; and Nanking Massacre, 202–3, 314n45, 314n47; revisions to, 173–76, 178; strategic nature of, 174; on war crimes tribunals, 158 Schopenhauer, Arthur, 58 science and rationality: and accounts of atomic bombs, 231; and concept of faith, 47; and education, 50; and Japanese propaganda, 126; and totalitarianism, 30, 55; as Western value, 250 Sea of Japan, 122 Seaton, Philip, 182 Sejong (king of Korea), 148, 304n25 Sekai bunka (world culture), 11 Sekiguchi Sakae, 100 Senda Kakō, 181 Seneca the Younger, 55 Seodaemun Prison History Hall, Seoul, 148, 149, 183 Sétif massacre, 200 sexuality, Japanese relationship to, 18 Shanghai: Japanese visitors to, 26–27; Japan’s clashes with China in, 1, 2, 117, 175; war crimes tribunal in, 158

INDEX345

Sharpe Brothers, 193 Shashin shūhō (photo weekly), 69, 70, 124, 289n79 Shestov, Lev, 59 Shidehara Kijūrō, 153–54, 305n8 Shikoku region, 122 Shimanaka Hōji, 309n9 Shimazaki Tōson, 52, 286n18 Shimizu Norio, 289n85 Shimura Takashi, 299n50 Shinano Mainichi shinbun, 296–97n12 Shinjinkai, 287n27 Shinmura Izuru, 277n32 Shinmura Takeshi, 12, 277n32 Shinsō (revelations), 177 Shinto faith: and commemoration of soldiers, 87, 88, 89, 292n14; dissemination of shrines, 214–15, 216, 217–19, 316n32; and divine as always in situ, 85; emphasis on soul, 87; funerary rites of, 88, 94, 206, 213, 292n14, 316n26; and nationalists, 226; and obelisks with diamond-shaped tip, 90, 215, 216; organization into single institution, 83; and ossuaries, 294n48; and prefectural shrines, 155; priests of, 5, 88, 89, 205, 255, 293n15; and recycling metal from shrines, 115; Shinto-Buddhist syncretism, 213–14; State Shintō, 84, 153–55, 168, 170, 218, 317n44; veneration of purity, 127. See also Yasukuni Shrine Shio Masaru, 316n35 Shiōden Nobutaka, 72, 290n95 Shirakaba (white birch) movement, 52–53, 58, 284n43 Shōwa period, 84, 268 Shōwa Research Group (Shōwa Kenkyūkai), 284n45 Siberia, xviii, xx, 209, 210 Siege of Port Arthur, 116 Singapore, 62, 67, 77, 100, 105

Sino-Japanese Peace and Friendship Treaty, 254 Sino-Japanese War (1894–1895): Japanese victory in, 74; and Kawakami Sōroku, 171; and memorial steles, 89, 90; memories of, 64; and Qing, 64, 94–95, 149; and repatriation of military dead, 94–95 Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945): and Abe Tomoji, 287n36; American historiography regarding, 175, 176; and block on emigration channels, 23; China’s Hundred Regiments Offensive, 45; and conquest of Southeast Asia, 65–70; conscripts for, 3; death toll of, 62, 64, 93, 95; and destruction of Chinese territories and populations, 62–64; early stages of, 1, 58, 61, 274n1; financing of, 19–20, 19; and funerals for soldiers, 93; funerary towers of, 295n52; Hirohito’s role in, 82; Japanese historiography of, 180–81; and Japanese imagining of postwar period, 53–61; and Japanese literature, 56, 64, 285n1; Japanese perception of, 64; and Japanese use of biological warfare, 62, 108; and Japanese use of chemical weapons, 61, 108; and Listen to the Voices from the Sea, 278n46; and media control, 15–16; and memorial steles, 89; and nation-protecting shrines, 87; and ossuaries, 96; personal accounts of, 62–63, 64; popular perceptions of, 45, 46; and repression and rehabilitation of opponents, xix, 11–14, 37, 277n30, 278n39; role of civilians in, 8–11; and sacrifice for nation, 2; and shinpū, 117, 298n41; spiritualization of war effort, 20; and strategy of pacification through terror, 61, 62; temporality of, 20–23; and tourism, 24–25; violence of Imperial Japanese Army in, 61–65, 234; and war disablement pensions, 92

346INDEX

social class: and access to press, 15; and American strategic bombing of Tokyo, 121; and atomic bombs, 130; and Buddhism, 218; of conscripts, 275n12; and plurality of discourses, 44; and role of civilians in Sino-Japanese War, 10–11; and Rolland’s novels, 51 Social Democratic Party (Shakai Minshu-tō), 205, 286n25 socialist movements, 54, 58, 60, 197–98, 287n27 Social Mass Party (Shakai Taishū-tō), 286n25 Social People’s Party (Shakai Minshū-tō), 286n25 Solomon Islands campaign, xviii, 97 songs: concerts of patriotic songs, 41; Imperial Rescript to Soldiers and Sailors in song, 5; and kamikaze operations, 112, 297n27; national anthem, 204, 314n49; patriotic songs on radio, 15; and sacrifice of soldiers, 86–87; and sacrifice of three human bullets, 2; on transport of soldiers’ bones, 97, 295n56 Southeast Asia, 66, 67–70, 96, 100 South Korea: historiography in, 183; Japanese relations with, xxi, 141, 146, 147, 148, 200, 304n26; portrayal of Japan as belligerent and colonialist power, xvi, 147, 148, 183; school textbooks of, 150; statues in Gwanghwamun Plaza, 148 South Manchurian Railway Company, 25 South Pacific, 114 Soviet Army, defeat of Japan at Nomonhan, Mongolia, 45, 67 Soviet Union: Communist Party of, 35; in Japanese discourse, 44; Japanese emigration to, 23–24, 279n66; portraits of leaders, 85; repression in, 12, 16; as threat to Japan, 106, 144–45; totalitarian regime of, 31, 37 Spanish Civil War, 25

Special Attack Corps, 117, 119, 299n50 Special Higher Police, 114 Spencer, Herbert, 74 Spencerian thinking, 17 Spirited Away, xiv spiritualism, 56 Stalin, Joseph, 23, 30, 51 Stalinism, ideology of, 55 State Shintō: dismantling of, 153–55, 168, 170; emperor as polymorphic incarnation of, 84; reestablishment of, 218, 317n44; symbolic references underpinning, 84 The Subscription List (Kanjinchō) (Kurosawa), xii–xiii, 274n4 Suetsugu Nobumasa, 35, 282n18 Sugamo Prison, 251 Sugata Sanshirō: Part II (film), 193–94 Sugihara Seishirō, 182 Sugimoto Ryōkichi, 23–24, 279n65 Sukarno, 68–69 Sumioka Giichi, 64 Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers (SCAP): and American historiography, 177–79; arrest of Japanese leaders, 159; Civil Historical Section, 177; Civil Information and Education Section (CIE), 153, 169, 175, 305n5; and freedom of speech and of assembly, 187, 189; and Hirohito, 163; and images of American soldiers, 152; investigation of Unno Jūza, 296n2; Japanese citizens’ letters to, 152, 161–62; and military possession of Japan, 144; and monuments, 169; Press Code issued by, 134, 135; purges of military officials and Japanese government, 160–61, 164, 190, 191, 311–12n15; and school textbooks, 175; and State Shintō, 168, 170; Statistics and Reports Section, 177; as title, 304n20; and war crimes tribunals, 159–61; and Yasukuni Shrine, 155 surrealism, 8, 9, 13

INDEX347

surveillance, 13, 30, 278n39, 282n22 Suzuki Akira, 181 Suzuki Daisetsu, 50–51, 285n7, 285n8 Suzuki Kurazō, 42 Suzuki Takao, 293n15 Suzuki Toshihiko, 283n34 Suzuki Zenkō, 218 swastika symbol, 246–47 Swedenborg, Emanuel, 51, 285n8 Swiss system of civil registration, 3 Tagore, Rabindranath, 51 taiatari (sword-fighting term), 117 Taira clan, 59, 288n53 Taishō period (1912–1926), 7, 276n20, 292n11 Taiwan (Republic of China): and American strategic bombing campaign, 120; Imperial Rescript on Education distributed in, 5; Japanese cemeteries in, 94; Japanese emigration to, 24; and Japanese expedition of 1874, 87; Japanese occupation of, 28, 66, 68, 147; Japanese recycling metal in, 115, 116; liberation in 1945, 116, 146; and media based in Tokyo, 15; portrayal of Japanese colonialism, xvi; Shinto shrines in, 293n17; Taiwanese in Japanese armed forces, 147 Takahashi Kenji, 40, 283n34 Takamura Kōtarō: on American air raids on Japanese cities, 126; and Patriotic Society for Japanese Literature, 192; on sacrifice, 118; and Shirakaba movement, 52, 53; translation of Rolland into Japanese, 51; and war responsibility, 161; and World War II meaning, 186 Takeda Taijun, 27 Takeshige Teizō, 239 Takeshita Noboru, 311n15 Takeshita Yūzō, 311n15 Taketani Mitsuo, 188, 311n9 Takeuchi Yoshimi, 27 Takiguchi Shūzō, 13, 277n37

The Tale of the Heike, 113 Tama (village), memorial stele of, 90, 293n25 Tanaka Kakuei, 218 Tanaka Masaaki, 255, 310n20 Tanaka Ryūkichi, 62, 288n62 Tange Kenzō, 239–41, 245, 295n52 Taniguchi Yoshirō, 314n7 Tanikawa Tetsuzō, 41, 283n37 Tanizaki Jun’ichirō, 21, 39 Tasaka Tomotaka, 294n38 Terry, Charles S., 282n28 Terry, Thomas, 241 Thailand, 69 thought crimes, 13, 278n39 The Three Alls: Revelations on Japanese War Crimes in China, 180–81 Three Alls Policy, 61 three human bullets: “Bronze Statue of the Three Human Bullets (Greater Tokyo),” postcard, 2, 2; media attention on, 2, 274n2; Three Human Bullets sculpture, 223, 224 time, Japanese conception of historical time, 21–22, 84 Todeschini, Morioka, 235 Tōgō Heihachirō, 172, 214 Tōhō film studios, 161 Tōhōkai party, 281n12 Tōhōsha (publisher), 289n79 Tōjō Hideki: and crimes against peace, 156; death sentence of, 158; execution of, 251, 252, 306n25; formal investigation of, 159; grave of, 253, 254; Guillain on, 29; Hirohito compared to, 162; and Ishiwara Kanji, 74, 280n80; and Kishi Nobusuke, 190; loss of Hirohito’s support, 44; and memorial steles, 172; and Nakano Seigō, 281n12; as prime minister, 41–42; relics of, 251–52, 254–56; rise to power, 81; role in Pacific War, 150; speech on Pacific War, 53–54; on war crimes, 156, 163 Tokuda Kyūichi, 12, 162, 164, 197, 306n39 Tokugawa Ieyasu, 116

348INDEX

Tokugawa period, 30 Tokutomi Sohō, 47–48, 79, 255, 284n55 Tokutomi Tasaburō, 255 Tokyo, Japan: American air raid on, 121, 123–26, 130; casualties from bombings, 128–29; metropolitan government’s approach to destruction, 127–29; peace statues in, 242; possible aerial attacks in, 297n12; Prayer and Exhibition Hall for Peace, 248, 320n46; publishing industry in, 14–16; reconstruction of, 241; urban rail network of, 14 Tokyo Olympic Games of 1940, notebook cover announcing, 22 Tokyo Olympic Games of 1964, 193, 194–96, 210 Tokyo Trials. See Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal, 62, 156–59, 162, 163–67, 175, 177, 180, 185, 233, 255 Tolstoy, Leo, 50, 51, 52 Tomita Tomohiko, 321–22n57 Tomoyuki Yamashita, 77 totalitarianism: defining of, 29–32, 34; as ideological movement, 60–61, 269; and individual/group relationship, 30, 32, 34, 37–38, 160; Murobuse on, 55, 56 Total War Research Institute, 45, 46 tourism, 24–26, 146, 260–65 Toyoshima Yoshio, 144, 303n17 Toyotomi Hideyoshi, 116, 256, 288n52 Toyotomi clan, 59, 288n52 Travels in China (Honda), 181 The Treasury of Loyal Retainers (Chūshingura), 168 Tripartite Pact (1940), 45 Tsuji Hitonari, 212 Tsujihara Minoru, 295n56 Tsukiji Little Theater, 279n66 tsunami of March 2011, 132 Tsurumi Shunsuke, 58, 275n4, 284n46 Tsuruoka Masao, Heavy Hand, 152, 305n4

Umemoto Takemata, 13 Unit 731, 62, 166, 181 United Nations War Crimes Commission, 156 United States: American wartime perceptions of Japanese people, 97; Arisawa’s analysis of economic consequences of military conflict with, 13, 277n36; Asian migration banned in, 23; banning of American films in Japan, 75, 291n106; entry into World War II, 46; internment of Japanese Americans, 78; JapaneseAmerican community in, 75; Japanese discourse on American culture, 77–78; and Japanese joining World War II, 46, 57–58; Japanese narratives of American responsibility for World War II, 43, 53; Japanese portrayals as fickle and soulless, 47; and Japanese revenge for events of 1853, 74; Japanese victories against, xviii, 43, 77; Japan’s declaration of war against, 157; and League of Nations, 75, 290–91n104; liberal capitalism of, 72; Murobuse on waging war against, 55; regulations on images of remains of American servicemen, 97, 295n54; relations with Japan, 145; repatriation of dead soldiers, 97, 98; security treaties with Japan, 146, 156, 157; September 2 as ending date of World War II, 140, 141. See also American occupation of Japan U.S. Army, 125, 209 U.S. Marines, 97 Unno Jūza, 105–6, 121, 159, 285n1, 296n2 urban areas: civil population evacuated from, xviii, 126–27, 130; discourse on destruction of, 127; evacuation plans for, 109; Japan’s concentration of population in, 106, 108, 110; postwar food and housing shortages in, xviii;

INDEX349

underground shelters constructed in, 126–27; and World War II bombings, 106, 109, 110, 120–23, 126–28 Utagawa Kokunimasa, Illustration of the Decapitation of Violent Chinese Soldiers, 1894, 65 veterans’ associations, 89–90, 106, 293n24 Vichy regime, xvi Vié, Michel, 46 Vietnam, 25, 68 violence: of atomic bomb explosions, 131, 134–35; on defecting kamikaze pilots, 112; of Imperial Japanese Army in SinoJapanese War, 61–65, 234, 265; Japanese attitudes toward, 58, 64, 65; of Japanese government’s repression of opponents, 12, 37; and Japanese occupation of China, 62; and Japanese occupation of Korea, 150; of Japanese troops abroad, 45, 70; and ossuaries, 96; and rivalry in acts of bravery, 93; Rolland’s criticism of communist methods, 51; and spiritualizing of Pacific War, 118; totalitarianism associated with, 32; of World War II, xiv, 137, 180 Volunteer Military Service Law (1945), 298n30 war crimes tribunals: and American narratives of World War II, xvii; and American occupation of Japan, xx; debates on, 157, 159–60; and Imperial Japanese Army, 158–59; and World War II memory, xix, 158. See also Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal war disablement pensions, 92 Watsuji Testurō, 42, 77–78, 283n40 Watts, Alan, 51 Weimar Republic, 175 Western authoritarian regimes, personality cults of, 84–85

Western colonialism: and Japanese fear of West as predator, xx, 74; Japanese institutions created to counter, xix; Japanese national ideology resisting, 4, 43; Japanese policy of self-assertion in reaction to, 17–18; and Japanese stereotypes, xiii; Japan’s liberation of Asia from, xvii, 67, 68, 69, 77, 180, 181; and Rolland’s anticolonial stance, 52; and World War II meaning, xvi, xvii Western Gregorian calendar, 21 Westernization, 10, 17–20, 50, 59 West Germany, 175 white Buddhas, 212, 316n19 Whitman, Walt, 50 Whitney, Courtney, 162 Wikipedia, 191 Woodard, William, 169 World War I: and anticipation of total war against Western powers, 46; commemoration of, 248–49; in France, 38, 75, 90; Ishiwara Kanji on, 74–75; monuments of, 90, 295n52; and Rolland, 51 World War II: American narratives of “good war,” xvii; chronology of accounts, xviii–xix; consequences of defeat, xi, xix, 145; and evolution of American historiography on, 177–79, 182; evolution of European conflict, 109; French narratives of, xvii–xviii; historiography of, 180–84; Japanese culture during, xix–xx; Japanese narratives of, xvii, xviii, xix, 43, 47, 53–54, 180–82; and Japanese relationship with death, xiv; Japan’s entry into, 46; personal accounts of, 189–90; psychological damage caused by, 146; responsibility for, xvi, 43, 53, 57, 108, 159, 160–61, 180–82; and saving of imperial institution, xi, xiii. See also Pacific War

350INDEX

World War II bombings: Allied rationales for, xvii, 120; American strategic bombing campaign of Japanese cities, 120–23; B-29s used in, 121, 123, 124, 135; bombing of Kobe, xiv, 122; contamination from atomic bombs, 129, 131, 136–37, 230, 235–36, 237, 241; death tolls of, 134, 136–37; Japanese anticipation of, 47, 105–6, 108–11, 121, 127, 128, 130; Japanese censorship of images of, 124, 125–26, 134; Japanese historiography of, 181, 182; and Japanese narratives of victimhood, xvii, xxi, 110, 150, 203, 233; and Japanese propaganda, 75, 126; and Japanese resistance strategy, 110, 127; and Japanese warnings to population, 105; Japan’s national suffering from, xvi, 203–4; and Mariana Islands, 38; and memorial museums, 257–60; monuments to victims of, 257–60, 322n65, 323n68; ordeal of, 44; personal experiences of, xv, 122–23, 125–26, 130, 134; tourism halted during, 25; trauma and destruction from atomic bombs, 129–31, 134, 135–37, 229–34; and vulnerability of Japanese urban areas, 106, 110, 127; and World War II memory, xix, 186. See also atomic bombs World War II meaning: and August 15 as ambiguous date, 139–43; in Japanese art, 186; in Japanese culture, xiii; in Japanese government, 197–200, 204; in Japanese history, 145, 180–82; in Japanese literature, xiii, xx, 49–53, 185, 189; Japanese schools of thought regarding, xvi, 143, 145 World War II memory: and atomic bomb explosions, 129, 131, 229–34, 235; and August 15 as end of World War II, 143; changing perceptions

of, 188–90; and colonial memory, 146; and concealment, 191–92, 193; and conflictual cohesion, xxi; and continuity, 190–94, 235; evolution of, xxi; and fatalism, xv; fragmented nature of, 185–88, 204, 245, 259, 265, 268, 269; and historiography, xv–xvi; and history museums, 260–65; instrumentalization of, 256; and Japanese experience of World War II bombings, 123; and Japanese narratives, xviii–xix, xxi, 180–82; and lingering imprint of war, 146; and March 2011 disasters, xv, 270–72, 324n4; and public versus subjective memory, 146; regional competing discourses of, xxi; and residual memory, 195–96, 241; and Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal, 158; and World War II bombings, xix, 186 Yamada Kōsaku, 161 Yamagata Aritomo, 244 Yamagiwa Yasushi, 31–32, 281n11 Yamahata Yōsuke, 132 Yamakawa (publisher), 202, 203 Yamamoto Isoroku, 78 Yamanaka Sadao, 8 Yamaori Tetsuo, 316n18 Yamata, Kikou (Yamata Kiku), xix, 274n9 Yamazaki Chōun, 317n38 Yasuda Yojūrō, 58–59, 161 Yasukuni Shrine: and American occupation of Japan, 154; Hirohito’s visits to, 88, 154, 208, 218, 254, 321–22n57; and kamikaze missions, 118; Kitamura Seibō’s statue in military museum of, 244–45; Koizumi Jun’ichirō’s visits to, 205–6, 218, 315n10; and local Yasukuni, 89, 214, 217; memorial celebrations held at, 22, 88, 155, 302n2, 305n15, 321n51; monuments associated with,

INDEX351

171–72; nation-protecting shrines under supervision of, 87–88; official visits to, 198, 210, 214, 217, 218, 313n33; political and ideological role of, 217; registers containing names of victims, 88, 155, 214, 215, 220, 255, 256, 316n31; Shinto priests in charge of, 88, 89, 205, 255, 293n15 Yasuoka Masahiro, 118, 298n42 Yi Sun-shin (Korean military hero), 148, 304n25 Yokohama Incident, 44 Yokomitsu Riichi, 41, 283n37 Yokoyama Taikan, 38, 161 Yomiuri shinbun, 135, 140, 154 Yonai Mitsumasa, 44 Yoneyama, Lisa, 233

Yoshida Shigeru, 191, 206, 218, 252, 253, 312n15 Yoshihara Jirō, 39 Yoshihito (Emperor Taishō), 23, 276n20 Yoshikawa Eiji, 38 Yoshino Sakuzō, 287n27 Yoshiwara pleasure district, 10 Young, Louise, 280n73 “Your Bones in My Arms, Comrade” (military song), 97, 295n56 youth schools, 284n52 youth training centers, 46, 284n52, 293n24 Yui Masaomi, 284n52 Zen Buddhism, 50, 219, 220, 285n7 zentaishugi (whole-body doctrine), 31 Zweig, Stefan, 51