Who was responsible? : from Marco Polo Bridge to Pearl Harbor

406 Pages·2006·21.963 MB·English

by  Yomiuri Shimbun

From Marco Polo Bridge
to Pearl Harbor
WHO WAS
RESPONSIBLE?
Foreword by Editor-In-Chief TSENEO WATANABE
Utedby J VV1KSH. AlHR
w
THE YQMIIKI SHIMBIJN
Japan
From Marco Polo Bridge to Pearl Harbor: Who was responsible?
Translation from original Japanese Kensho Senso Sekinin, Yomiuri Shimbun War Responsibility
Reexamination Committee, Tokyo: Chuokoron-Shinsha, 2006
Translation: The Daily Yomiuri
Copyright © 2006 by The Yomiuri Shimbun
All rights reserved.
First Edition
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http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/info/book/
ISBN-13: 978-4-643-06012-6
ISBN-10:4-643-06012-3
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data available
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For
Our Neighbors
FOREWORD
From Marco Polo Bridge to Pearl Harbor—The Marco Polo Bridge
(Lugouqiao) Incident, which was preceded by the Manchurian
Incident of 1931, ultimately erupted into the 1937-45 Sino-Japanese War.
A series of conflicting approaches to the war in China by Japan and the
Western Powers emerged as one of the causes of the 1941-45 Pacific War,
which began with Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor.
The Yomiuri Shimbun has published a pair of Japanese-language books
and this English-language book featuring the findings of a 14-month study
on the wars Japan fought for nearly 14 years. The research was undertaken
by an in-house team, the Yomiuri Shimbun War Responsibility
Reexamination Committee. (See page 9 for a list of members.)
The books are based on a yearlong series of articles heralding the com­
mittee's findings that appeared in the Yomiuri newspaper through August
15,2006, the 61st anniversary of the end of World War II. Considering the
Yomiuri Shimbun's daily circulation of 10 million copies across Japan, I
am sure the series was tremendously enlightening to many people.
People with no experience of wartime now account for a majority of the
Japanese population. As such, I believe it is the Yomiuri Shimbun's oblig­
ation as the nation's largest newspaper to tell the Japanese populace,
"Who was responsible for starting the Sino-Japanese War and the Pacific
War, why they did so and why the nation kept fighting until many of its
cities had been almost completely reduced to ashes."
I, myself, was drafted as one of the Imperial Japanese Army's last group
of privates, the lowest rank in the military. Before being conscripted, I
studied liberalism as a university student amidst the suppression by mili­
tary police and thought police. I am now 80 years old and serve as Editor-
in-Chief of the Yomiuri Shimbun. For some time, I had been thinking that
we, the Japanese people, should delve into the circumstances surrounding
those wars and clarify on our own just who should be held responsible.
This is one reason why the Yomiuri Shimbun embarked on the task of
looking into war responsibility.
Following the end of World War II, the International Military Tribunal
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for the Far East, also known as the Tokyo Tribunal, tried a group of
Japanese government and military leaders who had been charged as Class-
A war criminals. Subsequently, seven of these leaders were executed by
hanging, while 16 others were sentenced to life and two were given lesser
prison terms.
The proceedings and verdicts handed down by the military tribunal
were not without flaws. Unjustifiably heavy penalties were meted out to
some defendants, while not a few people who should have been held
accountable for appalling war crimes escaped prosecution.
As a part of the 1951 San Francisco Peace Treaty, Japan accepted the ver­
dicts handed down at the Tokyo Tribunal and promised to carry out the
sentences. This settled the matter under international law at that time.
However, Japan signed the peace treaty in order to regain its independence
as quickly as possible; therefore, no efforts were made in the name of
Japan or its people to look into where responsibility for the war rested.
The Yushukan (war memorial museum), within the grounds of
Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo, declares the vindication of the Class-A war
criminals on the basis of its private management's conviction that the
wars were fought for self-preservation, self-defense and for the liberation
of Asia from Western colonial rule. The particular problem with the shrine
is its enshrinement of Class-A war criminals together with the souls of
those many soldiers who sacrificed themselves in battle.
Many Japanese continue to worship at Yasukuni Shrine. If things are
left as they are, a skewed perception of history—without knowledge of the
horrors of the war—will be handed down to future generations.
Where does responsibility for the wars lie? The answer often has been
ambiguous and blurred because of the particular nature of Japan's past
political system, which led to the wars.
In the military, field officers such as colonels often became more influ­
ential than even Emperor Showa, prime ministers, cabinet ministers, Army
generals and Navy admirals in making decisions to go to and to escalate
conflicts; they were responsible for many atrocities. In some cases they ini­
tiated major troop deployments without the consent of the Emperor, the
Supreme Commander.
A handful of generals and staff officers devised special suicide tactics
(called "kamikaze" attacks in other countries) and "gyokusai" operations in
which every soldier or sailor involved sought to die in combat with no
contemplation of surrender. As a result, staggering numbers of young
intelligent people, most of whom had been mobilized straight from
university study, were forced to sacrifice themselves in suicide attacks.
Some military leaders did not treat their subordinates as humans. They
abused their troops and regarded them as nothing but expendable
Foreword / 9
weapons. Such inhuman deeds should have been strictly punished.
It should be noted that the Yomiuri Shimbun's reexamination of where
responsibility for the war sits was launched on its committee's own initia­
tive, and was not due to pressure from China and/or South Korea. The
Yomiuri Shimbun's efforts were based on its belief that there can be no
genuinely honest and friendly dialogue with those countries which
suffered considerable damage and casualties in the wars with Japan, with­
out correctly understanding Japan's past. To that end, we, the Japanese
people, should follow our consciences in explaining on our own how
barbaric the wars were and who should be held responsible.
This approach is indispensable for Japan to forge friendship and peace
with its neighbors in the future. We hope the findings of the Yomiuri
Shimbun committee serve as a cue for others to examine and explore what
kinds of miscalculation or blind belief could trigger wars elsewhere in the
future.
It goes without saying that we would be delighted if our efforts help
facilitate a solution to the Yasukuni Shrine issue, which has jeopardized
Japan's diplomatic relations with China and South Korea, and has sharply
divided public opinion in Japan.
Tsuneo Watanabe
Editor-in-Chief, The Yomiuri Shimbun
The Yomiuri Shimbun War Responsibility Reexamination Committee writers:
Nobuo Asaumi (Chief Writer, Senior Editor & Senior Research Fellow), Tetsuya Ennyu
(Staff Writer, Political News Department), Tatsuya Fukumoto (Staff Writer, Political
News Department), Hiroyuki Fuse (Senior Editor), Masaaki Hamada (Senior Research
Fellow), Masayuki Iida (Editorial Writer), Tetsuro Ito (Senior Research Fellow),
Hidemichi Katsumata (Deputy Editor, Commentary & Analysis Department), Makoto
Kito (Senior Research Fellow), Riichiro Maeki (Deputy Editor, Political News
Department), Futoshi Mori (Staff Writer, City News Department), Shin Nagahara
(Editorial Writer), Satoshi Saeki (Staff Writer, International News Department), Haruki
Sasamori (Deputy Editor, Commentary & Analysis Department), Toshiaki Suzuki (Staff
Writer, City News Department), Takahiko Tennichi (Editorial Writer) and Hideyuki
Tokita (Staff Writer, Culture Department).
Editor's Note
Among some foreign commentators it is fashionable to say that Japan
has not dealt with its past, particularly when compared to Germany
which has apologized for its actions. I have never subscribed to that posi­
tion, first of all, because I believe that numerous Japanese leaders, includ­
ing the current and past emperors and numerous prime ministers, have
done so repeatedly, and second, because I believe Germany's confronting
of history has primarily been to take responsibility and apologize for the
Holocaust rather than for its invasions of other European countries and for
acts of violence committed in those actions.
The Allied Occupation of Japan took responsibility for identifying
Japan's war criminals and the 1951 San Francisco Peace Treaty settled the
legal issue of Japanese responsibility for its actions in foreign countries;
however, it is certainly the prerogative of the Japanese people to study
who was responsible, why Japan got into trouble in China and with the
United States, why Japan failed to surrender by some time in 1944 after it
was strategically defeated and whether the atomic bombings of Hiroshima
and Nagasaki and the Soviet Union's entry into the war could have been
avoided. Indeed, it would seem irresponsible for Japan not to study these
matters carefully in order to incorporate "lessons learned" so that Japan
does not one day repeat the mistakes it made which resulted in such dis­
astrous consequences for itself, its neighbors and for the citizens of Japan
and other countries.
The Yomiuri Shimbun assembled a talented committee of its own
employees who did extensive literature reviews of Japanese and English
language sources and consulted numerous experts in compiling a series of
articles, two Japanese language books and this English language book in
the years 2005-2006 in order to produce a definitive and specific exami­
nation of Japan's "WAR RESPONSIBILITY." Although this committee is
made up of journalists rather than scholars, its members conscientiously
pored over as many sources as they could reasonably access during the
time allotted. Although I do not agree with all of their findings, particu­
larly concerning the United States' rationale for dropping of the atomic
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bombs, I understand this is their (Japanese) study for which I was merely
asked to provide some editing. Also the issue of U.S. rationale for
Hiroshima and Nagasaki is not central to the Yomiuri thesis of which spe­
cific Japanese were responsible for the Sino-Japanese War, the Pacific War,
for the unnecessary and strategically illogical expanding of those wars and
for not terminating them prior to the atomic bombings and to the Soviets'
entry to Manchuria.
I first met Chief Officer Akira Saito of the Yomiuri Research Institute
over 25 years ago when he was a Yomiuri reporter in Washington, D.C. He
has taught me lots about Japan on more occasions than I can ever count
ever since our first meeting. My imperfect efforts as an editor can in no
way compensate for what he has added to my knowledge and under­
standing. I also enjoyed working closely with Yomiuri Research Institute
Senior Research Fellow Makoto Kito who sent me emails multiple times
per day in trying to keep me focused and on schedule, a challenge he
accomplished imperfectly, not because of his failings but owing to mine.
I have never met Yomiuri Editor-in-Chief Tsuneo Watanabe; however, I
have been a secret Yomiuri Giants baseball fan for over 40 years, and I am
deeply impressed with his desire to produce serious Japanese and English
language examinations of Japan's war responsibility for the people of
Japan to learn from and for peoples outside Japan to know of the Japanese
people's sincere desire to acknowledge their responsibility and their deter­
mination to not repeat the mistakes of the past as they continue in the post
Showa Era of the 21st century. I salute his sincerity and determination.
James E. Auer
Director
Center for U.S.-Japan Studies and Cooperation
Institute for Public Policy Studies
Vanderbilt University
Nashville, Tennessee USA
Introductory Notes
This book, From Marco Polo Bridge to Pearl Harbor: Who Was Responsible?
is based on a yearlong series of articles in the Yomiuri Shimbun
heralding the findings by the newspaper's War Responsibility
Reexamination Committee. It appears along with the Japanese-language
book, Kensho Senso Sekinin (WAR RESPONSIBILITY—delving into the past)
Vols. I & II, Tokyo: Chuokoron-Shinsha, 2006.
In this book, Part I contains the English version of the introductory sec­
tion of the series while Parts II and III comprise English translations of the
whole of their respective parts of the Japanese series.
In the Japanese version of this book, reference to the publications such
as books and records that are cited is made as part of each relevant sen­
tence. In this book, meanwhile, similar reference is provided in Notes at
the end of each Chapter. The endnotes also contain noteworthy historical
remarks quoted from literature in English with analysis lines as well as
brief explanatory notes about traditions and customs in Japan.
Japanese names in this book are presented in the given name-family
name order, instead of the traditional Japanese order of family name fol­
lowed by given name. For Chinese persons, the family names precede the
given names in line with Chinese tradition.
The Emperor of the Showa Era, widely known abroad by his given name
Hirohito, is described as Emperor Showa in this book in accordance with
his official name. Each Emperor has a given name only and not a surname
while alive. However, the Japanese people traditionally do not refer to the
monarch by his given name, except during his childhood when people use
the name to show their affection for him. This is true even when people
mention the Emperor in writing. Thus, the current Emperor is called or
described simply as Tenno (the Emperor) or more respectfully as Kinjo
Tenno (the Reigning Emperor) or Tenno Heika (His Majesty the Emperor).
Upon his death, a posthumous name, known as okurina in Japanese, is
bestowed on the late Emperor and is commonly used by the Japanese
public. In the case of Hirohito, the Japanese now call him by his posthu­
mous name of Showa Tenno (Emperor Showa). In this book, we follow the
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Japanese practice and refer to him as Emperor Showa.
In the early part of each Chapter, the year of the Showa Era correspond­
ing to the relevant year of the Christian Era is given on the first reference.
We used italics for some Japanese proper nouns, for example, when we
refer to organizations that are either obscure or would otherwise be
unclear when translated into English.