A wrong turn in Tokyo/エコノミスト

徳富蘇峰−「終戦後日記」
・・・「更に我等は、我が皇軍は、至る処秋毫も犯さず、強気を挫き弱きを憐れむ皇軍の面目を、徹底的に発揮していたものと信じていた。ところが蓋を開けてみたら、言語道断である。これも当初は、敵軍が事実を捏造して、我が皇軍を讒したものと思うていた。しかるにその事が、追々我が同胞の口より洩るるに至っては、最速やこれを否定すべき余地は無い。これは遡って支那事変にも、同様の証拠が、沢山挙がっている。・・・（中略）・・・しかるに今や、財物は必ず掠め、婦女は必ず犯し、あらゆる乱暴狼藉を事とした事になっては、大東亜聖戦なるものは、仮令目的は聖戦であっても、切取強盗の山賊戦にも劣る程のものであって、大東亜聖戦の名に対して、全く以て申し訳がない。しかるにその事を、今日に至る迄、全く隠蔽し・・・」・・・
　徳富蘇峰氏は右翼であり、国家主義者であり、愛国者である。国士舘大学の創設者であり、国民新聞を主催し、明治から日本言論界をひっぱってきた大人物である。徳富蘇峰氏のような卓越した器量を持ち合わせた人物、つまり、己の非や恥を受け止めて反省できる人物が、今の日本の指導者層にはいない。自分が、厚顔無恥の日本人と同じ日本人、しかもその厚顔無恥の日本人は自称保守、この事実を以て、日本人である事さえ恥ずかしく思う。

　欧州アカデミズムを敵に回した、一重に愚民脳の賜物である。無能学力主義、暗記教育によるパブロフの犬育成システムのおかげである。日露戦争時の外交官は、江戸時代方式の教育であり、入省試験は老子、荘子、孟子、孔子・・・等の教養主義である。小泉前首相のように「罪を憎んで、人を憎まず」は論語だと考えるような愚者は居なかった。

　南京の真実という映画の失敗も確定であろう。無教養、不道徳、倫理溶解した組織、共同体、社会、国家は内部から崩壊し、他者に責任を転嫁するであろう。

A wrong turn in Tokyo
Mar 21st 2007
From Economist.com

Military brothels tarnish Japanese diplomacy

A MERE six months into his term as Japanese prime minister, Shinzo Abe has shredded his international reputation by charging into a thicket of wartime history. The trouble began when Mr Abe was asked to respond to the views of a group of revisionist members of his ruling Liberal Democratic Party, and agreed with them in asserting there was no evidence that the Imperial Japanese Army had abducted up to 200,000 women (mainly Korean and Chinese, but also Taiwanese, Burmese and Dutch) and forced them to work in a system of military brothels that operated during the second world war.

This assertion was news to the many elderly women who had testified across Asia and before America’s Congress about the horrors of their servitude as what the Japanese euphemistically call “comfort women”, when they were victims of serial- and gang-rape.

It also goes against evidence unearthed in military archives that eventually obliged the Japanese government to admit in 1993 that coercion had taken place, and to offer remorse of sorts. As outrage over Mr Abe’s comments grew, the prime minister affirmed that his government still stood behind the 1993 admission and apology—but on March 16th his office issued a report that supported his initial statements.

At a stroke, then, Mr Abe has managed not only to set back much of the progress Japan made recently in improving ties with neighbours. He has also antagonised America, an ally. His remarks have given added momentum to a resolution now being debated in Congress, which seeks a full apology from Japan in the matter of wartime sex slaves. Last week the American ambassador to Tokyo, Thomas Schieffer, said that, “the Japanese need to be aware that there is really no constituency for forced prostitution.”

Yet the real measure of Mr Abe’s ineptitude is that he has allowed the issue of the comfort women to give the moral upper hand to one of the world’s most repugnant regimes, that of Kim Jong Il’s North Korea. It is quite a feat.

It helps to recall at this point that North Korea specialised for decades in its own brand of cruel, random and often weird abduction. From the 1950s North Korean spooks began to snatch opponents of Mr Kim’s father, Kim Il Sung, from Soviet-block countries. Then they turned to kidnapping South Koreans, of whom perhaps 500 have been seized and have never returned. In the 1970s and 1980s individual Japanese began disappearing mysteriously, usually from places near or on the west coast of Japan’s main island, Honshu.

We're sorry, and it didn't happenFor years, successive Japanese governments played down the possibility that North Korea might have kidnapped the missing people. They dismissed the notion of North Korean frogmen landing from submarines on Japanese beaches as the stuff of B-movie fantasy. But five years ago, when Mr Abe’s predecessor, Junichiro Koizumi, was visiting Pyongyang, Mr Kim unexpectedly admitted to abductions. Mr Abe, then a little-known politician, was with Mr Koizumi. He swiftly took a tough line on the issue, grabbing a political break that led last year to his appointment as prime minister.

Five abductees are now back in Japan. In late 2002 Mr Abe fought for Japan to renege on its commitment to Mr Kim to have them return to North Korea after being allowed to visit their families. Japan says that North Korea must properly account for at least another 12 missing. North Korea says that they are either dead already, or they were never kidnapped.

More than anything, Mr Abe’s shaky domestic standing rests on the abduction issue. It is, he says, his “top priority”. In turn, anger over the abductions helps cynical nationalist politicians and right-wing groups to push their agenda of “patriotic” education in schools and a revision of Japan’s pacifist constitution. It is a national taboo for the press or mainstream politicians to point out the links between the abduction movement and these sometimes violent groups.
The abduction issue is not formally part of the six-nation talks designed to get North Korea to dismantle its nuclear-weapons programmes, but thanks to Mr Abe’s insistence on its inclusion, it is adding complications there. Two weeks ago in Hanoi bilateral discussions between North Korea and Japan broke down over the abduction row. A new round of collective talks takes place in Beijing this week. North Korea is demanding gleefully that Japan stop talking about abductions, and has called for Japan to apologise and pay for its own historical wrongdoings.

The chief American negotiator at the six-party talks, Christopher Hill, insists that North Korea will not be able to “drive any wedges” between America and Japan. All the same, patience may fray over Mr Abe’s stance on the comfort women. As it is, Japan may already be getting sidelined in the negotiations. Its denial of the comfort women will only compound that. Whatever Mr Abe hoped to achieve by his new assertiveness, it was surely not this.