It looks like deviating from state-ordained “truths” is a dangerous business even in Japan.
November 1, 2008
Japan Fires General Who Said a U.S. `Trap’ Led to the Pearl Harbor Attack
By NORIMITSU ONISHI
TOKYO — A high-ranking Japanese military official was dismissed
Friday for writing an essay stating that the United States had
ensnared Japan into World War II, denying that Japan had waged wars
of aggression in Asia and justifying Japanese colonialism.
The Defense Ministry fired Gen. Toshio Tamogami, chief of staff of
Japan’s air force, late on Friday night, only hours after his essay
was posted on a private company’s Web site. The quick dismissal
seemed intended to head off criticism from China, South Korea and
other Asian nations that have reacted angrily to previous Japanese
denials of its militarist past.
The defense minister, Yasukazu Hamada, said the essay included
an “inappropriate” assessment of the war, adding, “It was improper
for a person in his capacity as air force chief of staff to publicly
state a view clearly different from the government’s. ”
In the essay, General Tamogami, 60, elaborated a rightist view of
Japan’s wartime history shared by many nationalist politicians. But
it was a rare formulation from inside Japan’s military, which, as
Japan has been shedding its postwar pacifism in recent years, has
gained a more prominent role.
Japan’s military — whose operations are restricted by the nation’s
war-renouncing Constitution — should be allowed to
possess “offensive weaponry” and widen its defense activities with
allies, the general also wrote.
The article was posted on the Web site of a real estate developer
called Apa Group after taking the $30,000 first prize in an essay-
writing contest sponsored by the company.
General Tamogami wrote that Japan attacked Pearl Harbor in 1941 and
thereby drew the United States into World War II after being caught
in “a trap” set by President Roosevelt.
“Roosevelt had become president on his public pledge not to go to
war, so in order to start a war between the United States and Japan,
it had to appear that Japan took the first shot,” he wrote.
He denied that Japan had invaded China and the Korean Peninsula,
arguing that Japanese forces became embroiled in domestic conflicts
on the Asian continent.
“Even now, there are many people who think that our country’s
aggression caused unbearable suffering to the countries of Asia
during the Greater East Asia War,” he wrote, using the term favored
by Japan’s right to refer to World War II. “But we need to realize
that many Asian countries take a positive view of the Greater East
Asia War. It is certainly a false accusation to say that our country
was an aggressor nation.”
Since the mid-1990s, the Japanese government has officially
apologized for its wartime past and acknowledged its aggression in
Asia. But in recent years, nationalist politicians belonging to the
right wing of the long-governing Liberal Democratic Party have waged
a campaign to revise Japan’s wartime history.
Few politicians have spoken as comprehensively as General Tamogami
did. Instead they have telegraphed their sympathies with the
rightist view of history. The current prime minister, Taro Aso, in
the past publicly praised Japanese colonial rule on the Korean
Peninsula. Mr. Aso, whose family’s mining business used forced
laborers during World War II, also said Koreans gladly adopted
Japanese names.
Hours before the general’s dismissal, Mr. Aso said, “Even though he
published it in a private capacity, given his position, it is not
appropriate. ”
Last year, Shinzo Abe, then the prime minister, drew anger in Asia
and the United States by denying the Japanese military’s involvement
in recruiting the wartime sex slaves known euphemistically
as “comfort women.”
His comments led the United States House of Representatives to adopt
a nonbinding resolution calling on Japan to acknowledge and
apologize for its wartime sex slavery. Japan has yet to respond.
http://www.nytimes. com/2008/ 11/01/world/ asia/01tokyo. html?
_r=2&oref=slogin& pagewanted= print
The only thing I find surprising is that someone having this mindset actually managed to hold such a high ranking, offical position. In Germany this is nowadays completely unthinkable. The screening is so thorough, that anyone long before reaching this level is eliminated as a candidate for promotion and, depending on the severity, from the particular organisation. So the Japanese are better off than us in this respect also.
He denied that Japan had invaded China and the Korean Peninsula,
arguing that Japanese forces became embroiled in domestic conflicts
on the Asian continent.
After my government pushed the Japanese out of China, it gave the friggin country to the Soviet Union! Really, what was the point of ‘liberating’ China only to hand it to the communists? Because of Communist control of China 60 million Chinese died in Mao’s Great Leap Forward.
Dunno about this guy. Other than the Roosevelt provocations which were real, he simply concocts half-lies and wild b.s. to make Japan look good. This is distinct from factual revisionism.