News reports that show mountains of rubble in Ukraine, Gaza or Iran may remind a number of Japanese of what their nation endured during World War II.<\/p>\n
But even at a time when the smell of war is growing stronger, the generation that experienced it is decreasing in number.<\/p>\n
This is why we must reflect once again on what transpired that summer 81 years ago.<\/p>\n
STARTING POINT: THE POSTWAR ERA<\/p>\n
Koichi Kido, the last Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal, noted that on Aug. 15, 1945, he heard repeated banzai cheers from people gathered in front of the Imperial Palace.<\/p>\n
\u201cI felt that was a telling expression of how much the people desired peace after being unable to further tolerate a desperate war,\u201d he wrote in his diary.<\/p>\n
Having been burned out of his Tokyo home, the writer Kafu Nagai (1879-1959) was in Okayama when the war ended. He celebrated by getting drunk with sake.<\/p>\n
In his diary entry for Aug. 20, 1945, he wrote, \u201cThere is nothing better than peace and nothing more fearful than war.\u201d<\/p>\n
The public sentiment about being fed up with war was described by the literary critic Norihiro Kato (1948-2019) as \u201cgrass-roots pacifism.\u201d<\/p>\n
Postwar politics and diplomacy played out on a foundation of that pacifism.<\/p>\n
In fact, although Japan has gradually expanded its defense capabilities, pacifism remains a national credo even today.<\/p>\n
But there is another factor that has contributed to postwar pacifism.<\/p>\n
Eight years before Nagai experienced the fire-bombing of Tokyo in March 1945, the Chinese writer Mao Dun (1896-1981) experienced the Imperial Japanese military bombing of Shanghai.<\/p>\n
In his diary entry for Sept. 8, 1937, Mao wrote that Japanese planes conducted daily, pirate-like attacks on peaceful Chinese cities. He said this helped to instill a resolve in people to protect their homeland with their lives. They came to recognize the madness and barbarity of the invaders.<\/p>\n
Japan began its fighting on the Chinese mainland and later took on the United States and Britain. It was a foolhardy fight, but Japan continued even after the defeat of its allies, Italy and Germany.<\/p>\n
By the time Tokyo accepted the Potsdam Declaration, about 50 nations had become Japan\u2019s enemy.<\/p>\n
Its survival was allowed only after it made the international pledge to renounce war and be reborn as a pacifist nation.<\/p>\n
That is the starting point of postwar Japan that we must never forget.<\/p>\n
UNPRECEDENTED CHALLENGES\u00a0<\/p>\n
Japan says peace is important. But it can be said that Japan has been able to get by in the postwar era without seriously thinking about how to achieve peace.<\/p>\n
The front lines of the Cold War in Northeast Asia were the Korean Peninsula and the Taiwan Strait. Protected by the security treaty with the United States, Japan provided Okinawa to the U.S. military for its bases and was content to have a rearguard position.<\/p>\n
More recently, discussion has tilted. There is increased talk of how to prepare for war, with elevated concerns about a potential Russian invasion–see Ukraine–and about China, with the Chinese military strengthening its naval and air forces to the extent that it could exert instantaneous force in Japan\u2019s vicinity.<\/p>\n
Japan\u2019s ally, the United States, is either out of control or just meandering.<\/p>\n
While trade and investment relations with other nations should contribute to peace, there is increased talk of weaponizing the economy.<\/p>\n
These are the challenges to pacifism. They make it difficult to face up to what needs to be done.<\/p>\n
Akihiro Yamamoto, a professor at Kobe City University of Foreign Studies who has researched postwar pacifism, believes there is a disconnect here. Although people\u2019s daily lives are linked to international relations, they believe that national security is a separate matter.<\/p>\n
For example, residents in communities where many foreigners live might reasonably hope for a peaceful coexistence \u2013 a hope that others might criticize as unrealistic.<\/p>\n
But the arguments of vocal xenophobes tie in directly with calls to strengthen defense capabilities.<\/p>\n
\u201cI believe people should be doubtful about this difference,\u201d Yamamoto said. \u201cIt should be easier for people to hope for peace.\u201d<\/p>\n
IS DIPLOMACY FUNCTIONING?<\/p>\n
A key point in the period surrounding the 1960 revision of the Japan-U.S. Security Treaty was a debate between two young international political scientists, Yoshikazu Sakamoto of the University of Tokyo and Masataka Kosaka of Kyoto University.<\/p>\n
Sakamoto opposed the security treaty. He advocated instead bringing to Japan a U.N. police force of troops from neutral nations, with the Self-Defense Forces under its command.<\/p>\n
Kosaka opposed this because, he argued, the security treaty would surely bring about a power balance in the Far East and prevent war.<\/p>\n
While that debate can be considered a contest between idealism and pragmatism, Sakamoto had moved boldly away from the pacifist ideas of the past.<\/p>\n
Kosaka, for his part, said peace had to be pursued. Pragmatism would not be achieved, he argued, without such thinking.<\/p>\n
Both arguments were deeply thought-out. Today, they still hold an importance that we should heed.<\/p>\n
When circumstances result in calls to beef up defense, it is often because insufficient efforts were made in diplomacy. The defeat in war 81 years ago was the result of diplomacy being unable to restrain the military.<\/p>\n
Today, there are many issues of concern.<\/p>\n
Is it acceptable to have a dysfunctional diplomacy toward China?<\/p>\n
Is it appropriate to have a defense budget with insufficient sources of revenue?<\/p>\n
How rational is the government\u2019s logic in hoping for a positive spiral in national security and economic growth by encouraging the defense industry?<\/p>\n
And would not stronger defense capabilities lead to arms buildups in other nations and heighten regional tensions?<\/p>\n
Discussions must reaffirm the value of peace, but they also must seek a connection between the ideals and reality.<\/p>\n
The issue is not only about not being attacked by foreign nations.<\/p>\n
We also need considerations and actions that lead to other nations not fearing attack.<\/p>\n
That is the peace we should be pursuing.<\/p>\n
–The Asahi Shimbun, Aug. 15<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"News reports that show mountains of rubble in Ukraine, Gaza or Iran may remind a number of Japanese…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":75526,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[172,436,8,173,170],"class_list":["post-75525","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-japan","tag-asahi-shimbun","tag-editorial","tag-japan","tag-news","tag-opinion"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75525","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=75525"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75525\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/75526"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=75525"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=75525"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=75525"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}