Japan's Continued War

Behind Japan's political battles, a war over history By Daniel Sneider, lecturer in East Asian Studies in Stanford University, the former co-director of the Divided Memories and Reconciliation project at the Asia-Pacific Research Center, and an APP member. First appeared on Observing Japan, August 5, 2025 Constitutional Democratic Party leader Noda Yoshihiko questions Prime Minister Ishiba Shigeru in a 4 August meeting of the Budget Committee of the House of Representatives. During their exchange, Noda asked about Ishiba’s plans to mark the eightieth anniversary of the end of World War II; Ishiba said he intended to issue a personal statement, though not a formal cabinet statement. Source: CDP The political battles now raging in Japan in the aftermath of the July Upper House election are being waged across many fronts – tax policy, trade, corruption, and at base, a struggle for power. Largely hidden from sight is another, deeper and more long-standing conflict – the war over Japan’s wartime history and its national identity. This dimension of the political battles emerged into the open this past week when the embattled Prime Minister Ishiba Shigeru seemed to back away from his plan to issue a potentially landmark statement to mark the eightieth anniversary of the end of the war on August 15. The Japanese media reported last week that Ishiba had changed his mind when faced with fierce resistance from the rightwing of the Liberal Democratic Party, mostly but not entirely followers of the late Prime Minister Abe Shinzō. For these conservatives, the last words on the meaning of the war were uttered by Abe in his seventieth anniversary statement. Fearing what Ishiba might say, they mounted a growing campaign to demand he back off from his plans. “I believe it is unnecessary and will cause unnecessary confusion,” argued Nishimura Yasutoshi, a former Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry and a former senior member of the Abe faction in the party. They are leading the charge to force Ishiba to step down after the election results led to the loss of the majority in the Upper House for the ruling LDP-Kōmeitō coalition. As the Asahi Shimbun put it: Having been dealt a devastating blow in the Upper House election July 20 and facing calls from within his Liberal Democratic Party to resign, Ishiba has chosen not to rankle conservative elements in the party that would take umbrage at a fresh interpretation of Japan’s role in the war. But in answer to a question from an opposition leader in the Budget Committee of the House of Representatives on Monday, August 4, Ishiba left open the possibility he may still issue some kind of eightieth anniversary statement as a personal message rather than a formal cabinet approved document which carries more weight. "We must not let history fade away,” Ishiba replied. “We need to make active and proactive efforts to prevent this from fading away. Regardless of the formality, it is necessary to issue a statement to ensure that war never happens again." The anniversary statement over time The wars over anniversary statements are not new – they are in fact one of the most significant battlegrounds in the fight over Japan’s past. The baseline for Japan’s official view of the war remains the statement issued in 1995 by Prime Minister Murayama Tomiichi, a Socialist who had joined an unusual coalition government with the LDP. For the first time, a Japanese leader not only marked the end of the war but apologized directly for Japan’s aggression and colonization in Asia. He expressed “deep remorse” and “heartfelt apology” for “tremendous damage and suffering to the peoples of many countries, particularly those of Asian nations” that Japan caused “through its colonial rule and aggression.” From the start this was a target of attack from those in the LDP who embraced revisionist views of the war, regarding it as a justified act of self-defense, of liberation of Asia from Western colonial rule, who focused on Japan’s victimization and condemned apologies as acts of “masochism.” Despite this opposition, which among other things blocked a Diet resolution echoing Murayama’s statement, his clear view remained as the official view. In 2005, when then Prime Minister Koizumi Junichirō issued his sixtieth anniversary statement, he very notably echoed Murayama’s language. When it was Abe’s turn in 2015, he issued a statement that carefully stepped around this challenge to rewrite the Murayama precedent. Under clear pressure from the Obama administration and from within Japan, Abe’s own statement does echo key words – “aggression” and “colonial rule” – while also trying to rewrite the narrative about the war. As I wrote at the time, based on my own expertise on the formation of historical memory about the war, in Nippon.com: Abe’s version of events can be read as a justification for Japan’s own imperialism (which he neglects to mention began in the late 1800s with the seizure of Taiwan) and a denial of historical responsibility. But he goes on to acknowledge Japan’s own decisions that led to war (my italics): ‘With the Manchurian Incident, followed by the withdrawal from the League of Nations, Japan gradually transformed itself into a challenger to the new international order that the international community sought to establish after tremendous sacrifices. Japan took the wrong course and advanced along the road to war.’ This version of history will not satisfy many people, including many historians, but it is a step away from the view held by Japanese revisionists, including Abe himself, that Japan waged a war of self-defense and not of aggression, or even more provocatively, that it was engaged in the noble cause of liberating Asia from colonial rule. Since that time, the backers of the revisionist right in Japanese politics have been eager to both protect the Abe legacy but also to correct even the concessions he made at the time. The most ardent advocates of this view of the past include the leader and members of the newly emergent darlings of the right in Japan – Sanseitō, a new party that made a significant showing in the recent election, now holding fifteen seats in the Upper House. Sanseitō* is now well known as a Japanese echo of Trumpian rhetoric – from its slogan of “Japanese People First” to its anti-immigrant rhetoric. But what is less well understood is its passionate advocacy for an ultra-nationalist view of Japanese history, articulated by its leader Kamiya Sōhei and distributed for many years now on his YouTube Channel, CGS or Channel Grand Strategy. The channel features so-called “history lessons” taught by prominent rightwing historians. “A fundamental reason for Sanseitō's rise, I believe, is rooted in the historical perspective shared by its candidates,” wrote historian Fujioka Nobukatsu in the rightwing daily Sankei Shimbun. “Building on the momentum of these study sessions, Sanseitō, established in 2020, has uniquely emphasized the importance of taking pride in Japanese history. It's an approach no other political party has adopted.” Fujioka is a historian and the vice president of the Japanese Society for History Textbook Reform (Tsukurukai), the driving force for decades behind revision of Japanese middle and high school textbooks and opposition to what it views as a distorted view of Japan’s past. Sanseitō members have been active in promoting use of their alternative textbooks in Japanese schools. What would Ishiba say? If Ishiba were to deliver his own judgement on Japan’s wartime history in an anniversary statement, what would he say? There are some clear clues to this, clear enough to have fueled the fears of the revisionist rightwing in Japan. Ishiba has made numerous remarks that indicate he shares Murayama’s view of Japan’s aggressive and colonial past and saw the eightieth anniversary as a key moment to declare Japan’s intention not to repeat that past, despite his reputation as a defense hawk. Ishiba was among the most forthright of Japanese politicians in advocating close ties to South Korea based on a recognition of the illegality of Japan’s 1910 annexation of Korea. “There’s no need to flatter Korea or to lay out the logic of the past, but we should admit that what was a mistake was a mistake,” he said in a December 2023 interview touting his bid for leadership. “We must redouble our emphasis on the fact that it is vital for this region that Japan and South Korea understand one another and cooperate.” In unscripted remarks to the Global Dialogue organized by the Japan Institute for International Affairs, where this author was present, Ishiba spoke frankly about his desire to mark the eightieth anniversary as a moment for self-reflection about the disaster of the decision to go to war. “It is time for us to revisit and review the war experience,” he said. He called for Japan to understand “how to position itself in the world to create a world with more peace.” The idea that the mistakes that led to Japan’s war and its total defeat should not be repeated is a persistent obsession of Ishiba. As he told the Diet this week: What should we do to ensure that war never breaks out again? It is not simply a matter of expressing our thoughts, but rather of what went wrong. I have strong feelings about what our country will convey to the world this year. Tanzan Ishibashi Perhaps the most intriguing, and least known, clue as to what an unfettered Ishiba would say is his membership, since its beginning in 2023, in a study group dedicated to the life and work of former Prime Minister Ishibashi Tanzan. Ishibashi, also a former editor of the august Japanese weekly Tōyō Keizai, was a long time opponent going back to the prewar era of Japanese militarism and aggressive nationalism. In his brief tenure as PM in the 1950s, he sought to defy the United States and establish diplomatic relations with Communist China. According to Richard Dyck, a longtime resident of Japan and a businessman with a passion for Ishibashi and his work, Ishiba has been a regular attendent at these study sessions. Among the members are also two prominent members of his cabinet and close friends – Foreign Minister Iwaya Takeshi and Defense Minister Nakatani Gen. At the most recent meeting of the group, according to Dyck, Foreign Minister Iwaya gave introductory remarks along the lines of “the message we get from Ishibashi is that relations in Asia need to transcend nationalism, ideology and history.” From all this we can gain a glimpse into the largely hidden – at least to Western eyes – war over history that still is being fought in Japan and that lies behind, in part, the fate of Ishiba and his government. ### *According to Sanseito Senator Gen Yamanaka's [山中泉] X feed, he and Sanseito founder and leader Sohei Kamiya [神谷 宗幣] will be in Washington, DC in mid-August. Their visit will be arranged by their Washington lobbyist Matthew Martin Braynard who is an all-in MAGA loyalist and J6er. Love to hear from anyone who they visit or who knows how to get ahold of Mr. Braynard. [APC Editor]

Rescinding Japan's War Apology

What Will Kishida Say on August 15 at Japan’s National Memorial Ceremony for the War Dead?

Kishida has an opportunity to demonstrate his independence now that Abe is gone. Will he return to the legacy of the Murayama statement?

By Mindy Kotler, Asia Policy Point

The Diplomat, August 13, 2022

What Will Kishida Say on August 15 at Japan's National Memorial Ceremony for the War Dead?

In the immediate aftermath of former Prime Minister Abe Shinzo’s murder, Japan’s current leader Kishida Fumio promised to honor Abe’s legacy by building upon his accomplishments. The reportedly more liberal Kishida, however, came to power expected to do the opposite and dial back some of his predecessor’s more provocative stances. His room to maneuver was limited, however, by the ruling Liberal Democratic Party’s right wing and Abe’s own constant public hectoring on hewing to the course.

With Abe’s untimely death, Kishida has an opportunity to demonstrate his independence. The first indication of a new course may come with his August 15 address at the National Memorial Ceremony for the War Dead.

A crucial objective of Abe’s two terms was the freeing of Japan from “masochistic” history. This odd expression was a call to arms advocating both amending the U.S.-imposed “mind-control” constitution and ending Japan’s war apology diplomacy. Although constitutional amendment was not accomplished, the latter objective has been achieved.

Abe led an aggressive campaign to reconstruct history and monitor its telling at home and aboard. Diplomats asked the governments of the Philippines and Germany to remove statues memorializing the “comfort women” and other victims of sexual violence. Abe ordered the creation of commissions questioning the legitimacy of Japan’s 1995 official war apology, known as the Murayama statement, and the 1993 provisional apology to the comfort women, known as the Kono statement. (Here it should be noted that this particular statement is no longer prominently noted on the Foreign Ministry’s webpage explaining their position regarding the comfort women. Instead, it is buried in another document and only the knowledgeable and persistent can find it.)

Cabinet level officials squired applications for UNESCO World Heritage recognition of culturally dubious and politically fraught sites. One was an island shrine inaccessible to women. Another glorified Japan’s industrialization while disregarding the troubled use and abuse of convicts, the underclasses, children, Koreans, Chinese, and prisoners of war. Government promises to UNESCO to include this missing history have not been kept.

The Foreign Ministry was pressed into defending false history in an amicus brief to the U.S. Supreme Court, scrubbing its website of historical documents containing embarrassing details, and asking the public to report historical narratives contradicting the new official positions. The Abe government used budget allocations to hire public relations firms and amateur historians to cast doubt on widely respected historians. 

In talks with the Park Geun-hye administration in South Korea seeking to resolve the disagreements over the proper means of recognizing the dignity of the comfort women, the Abe government resorted to an unprecedented diplomatic diversion. Despite announcing an “agreement,” the 2015 comfort women talks resulted in two competing unsigned memoranda distributed at a “Joint Press Occasion.” The Japanese memorandum, in particular, contains an impossible demand that “this issue is resolved finally and irreversibly.” The “Press Occasion” document was furthermore not Cabinet approved, unlike every other diplomatic agreement the government of Japan has ever announced.

The crowning moment of Abe’s revisionism was his 2020 August 15th address at the National Memorial Ceremony for the War Dead. His remarks were the culmination of a seven-year effort to completely revise, if not indeed rescind, the 1995 Murayama statement, the cabinet-approved apology for World War II released by Prime Minister Murayama Tomiichi. Until Abe, the Murayama statement was the template for all Japanese apologies. The 2020 statement, however, had many of Murayama’s key phrases removed. The new statement was not an apology to Japan’s victims. Instead, it paid tribute to the Japanese people for their resilience.

As early as 2013, on August 15, Abe stopped expressing his “deep remorse” and “heartfelt apology.” He replaced “colonial rule and aggression” in the Murayama statement with the milder “Japan took the wrong course and advanced along the road to war” causing “immeasurable damage and suffering.” The main focus shifted away from Japan’s victims to turning the war into a positive transformation where “the peace and prosperity that we now enjoy have been built upon the sacrifices of you who gave up your precious lives.” And the four mentions of unfortunate history in the Murayama statement were reduced to just one promising blandly to “face history with humility and engrave deeply into our hearts the lessons that we should learn.” 

Abe tried to codify these changes with a Cabinet-approved statement issued the day before the 2015 August 15th memorial. He explained that his Advisory Panel on the History of the 20th Century and on Japan’s Role and the World Order in the 21st Century had reevaluated Japan’s post-war period. The conclusion was that today’s Japanese are not “predestined to apologize.” Instead, “Japanese, across generations, must squarely face the history of the past” only because the peace enjoyed today “exists only upon such precious sacrifices” that are “the origin of postwar Japan.”

Abe’s last memorial statement was in 2020 for the 75th anniversary of Japan’s surrender ending World War II. It made no reference to history or remorse at all. The pledge to take “the lessons of history deeply into our hearts” vanished. In its place, Abe introduced a new, “forward-looking” phrase – that Japan was ready to make a “proactive contribution to peace.” 

In 2021, Prime Minister Suga Yoshihide substantially repeated Abe’s 2020 reconstruction of Japan’s war apology. History remained now only with the Japanese. Like his predecessor, Suga insisted that the lesson learned from WWII was “We will not forget, even for a moment, that the peace and prosperity we enjoy today was built atop the precious lives and the history of suffering of the war dead. I express my deepest respect and gratitude once more.” 

Come August 15, Kishida has a decision to make. He can choose to accept Abe’s unrepentant, nationalistic war remembrance. This would of course please the Abe faction and revisionist pressure organization Nippon Kaigi, whose legislative wing includes Kishida and most of the members of his new Cabinet. 

Or Kishida, a legislator from Hiroshima, can reassert the centrality of the Murayama statement and the honest, forthright contrition it represents. If he does so, he would send a powerful signal to South Korea and Imperial Japan’s other victims that Japan is willing to confront its dark history.

UPDATE: August 15, 2022

On August 15th, Japan’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida repeated Abe's unrepentant statement remembering, but not apologizing for WWII. With his statement, Kishida completed the undoing of the Murayama Statement of apology and remorse.

Kishida largely focused on the damage Japan suffered on its Home Islands — the U.S. atomic bombings on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the massive fire-bombings across Japan, and the bloody ground battle on Okinawa. He said the peace and prosperity that the country enjoys today is built on the suffering and sacrifices of those who died in the war. The Japanese, he like Abe implied, were the victims. There was no mention of the harm Imperial Japan inflicted upon others. He repeated Abe's pledge for Japan to make "Proactive Contribution to Peace," which implies military involvement in upcoming world conflicts.

Kishida did, however, return to the August 15th statement a mention of history, however stopping short of actually learning from it: "Taking the lessons of history deeply into our hearts."

Japan's Official Statements of Apology are only four

What is an official Japanese government statement? What would make a Japanese apology official? The following paper answers this question by pointing out the three war apologies that have distinction of a Cabinet Decision (kakugi kettei) behind them. This is approval by Cabinet, which is the executive of the Japanese government. No war apology can be said to have been approved by the Diet, which would also be official.

The article below does not mention the fourth Cabinet Decision on a war apology. This was in 2009 to the American former POWs (buried in a February 6, 2009 reply, #171-22 [English, Question III, #3], to a Dietmember). Written answers to questions made in the Diet are kakugi ketteis. This apology by implication and vagueness included ALL POWs of Imperial Japan during WWII. It is the first war apology to a specific group.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in all his war statements has been very careful not to have them Cabinet approved. Neither his address to the joint meeting of the U.S. Congress or at Pearl Harbor were Cabinet approved. This substantially weakens them, and implies that the words are more personal than state sanctioned. There is then room for improvement.

The Prime Minister's Statements on Understanding of History

By Junichiro Shoji, director of NIDS Center for Military History, National Institute for Defense Studies Commentary, 18 February 2013. Provisional translation by Asia Policy Point. [National Institute for Defense Studies is a policy research institute under Japan's Ministry of Defense]

Introduction 

In a speech to a plenary session of the Upper House, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe stated that he "would like to make a future-oriented statement that is appropriate for the 21st century," while, as with his first cabinet, continuing to follow the tenor of the "Murayama Statement," indicating Abe's intention to issue a new "Abe Statement." Abe has referred a number of times to the idea of an "Abe Statement" up to now, but this was the first time he mentioned the possibility in the Diet.

In this article, I will focus on three "Prime Minister's Statements" addressing Japan's historical understanding that received cabinet approval in order to identify their respective particular features and differences among them (these statements being divided between those receiving cabinet approval and those not needing it).

1) Murayama Statement

The "Murayama Statement," officially entitled "On the Occasion of the 50th Anniversary of the War's End," was a statement issued by Socialist Prime Minister Tomiichi Murayama on 15 August 1995, 50 years after the end of the Second World War, regarding Japan's recognition of its wartime history. The following is an extract from the statement.

During a certain period in the not too distant past, Japan, following a mistaken national policy, advanced along the road to war, only to ensnare the Japanese people in a fateful crisis, and through its colonial rule and aggression, caused tremendous damage and suffering to the people of many countries, particularly to those of Asian nations. In the hope that no such mistake be made in the future, I regard, in a spirit of humility, these irrefutable facts of history, and express here once again my feelings of deep remorse and state my heartfelt apology. 

The primary special aspect of this statement is Murayama's expression of "deep remorse" and "heartfelt apology" in regards to the "tremendous damage and suffering" inflicted on Asian and other countries through Japan's "colonial rule and aggression." Moreover, based on this recognition, Murayama expressed his commitment to peace and the renunciation of war to ensure that Japan never repeats this sorrow of history again.

Up to then, official documents, statements, speeches, and so on had often expressed Japan's "remorse," "apology," and "renunciation of war," but [the Murayama Statement] compiled all of these sentiments into one statement, and was given the weighty imprimatur of cabinet approval [kakugi kettei, emphasis added]. For example, in his policy speech to the Diet on 23 August 1993, then Prime Minister Morihiro Hosokawa stated, "I would like to express anew our profound remorse and apologies for the fact that past Japanese actions, including aggression and colonial rule, caused unbearable suffering and sorrow for so many people." Prime Minister Murayama himself in the "Statement by Prime Minister Tomiichi Murayama on the 'Peace, Friendship, and Exchange Initiative,'" issued in August 1994, expressed similar sentiments.

The second aspect is that for the first time a reference to "following a mistaken national policy" was included in the Murayama Statement. Since a clear recognition was made of a "mistaken national policy," an animated debate subsequently ensued about who the main bearers of responsibility were and what the specific target policies and their timing were.

At that time, there were various views in Japan on the matter. For example, since disputes had arisen regarding historical understanding, the Resolution To Renew the Commitment to Peace on the Basis of Lessons Learned From History (War Renouncing Resolution) that was issued by the Lower House in June 1995 adopted the following mediating language: "Solemnly reflecting upon many instances of colonial rule and acts of aggression in the modern history of the world, and recognizing that Japan carried out such acts in the past, inflicting pain and suffering upon the peoples of other countries, especially in Asia, the Member s in this House express a sense of deep remorse."

That is, the words "aggression" and "apology" were replaced by "acts of aggression" and "deep remorse" respectively. A sentence calling for "transcending the differences over historical views of the past war" was also added. Moreover, although Diet resolutions are meant, in principle, to be passed unanimously, since many members from both the ruling and the opposition parties absented themselves during the voting, it was the rare case of a resolution being approved by less than half the total number of Diet members.

Although the Murayama statement was said, for external consumption, to have been led by the prime minister's office, in actuality, the statement was carefully vetted by the Foreign Ministry as part of its long-term processing of post-war policy. Moreover, the target countries for the resolution, particularly China, South Korea, the United States, and Britain, were kept well in mind, and letters from Murayama were sent to those four countries at the same time as the statement was released. (See The Murayama Statement and MOFA, by Ryuji Hattori.)

Accordingly, the Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson lauded the statement, saying, "The Japanese government has expressed deep remorse over their past history of colonial rule and aggression, and they have shown a positive attitude in apologizing to the peoples of Asia."

After that, the Murayama Statement policy was adopted and followed by successive cabinets, including those of the Liberal Democratic Party, and the policy has continued until today.

2) Koizumi Statements

On 15 August 2005, then Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi issued a statement marking the 60th anniversary of the Second World War's end. It basically followed the Murayama Statement, but Koizumi's statement was significant because it was issued by an LDP prime minister. It is certainly true that certain quarters in both China and South Korea were dissatisfied with the Murayama Statement because it was issued under a Socialist Party administration.

Koizumi's statement had the following characteristics. First, the references to the wartime period in the Murayama Statement, particularly those that sparked argument, such as "following a mistaken national policy," "ensnar[ing] the Japanese people in a fateful crisis," and "eliminat[ing] self-righteous nationalism," are gone, and in their place, much more prominence is given to emphasizing Japan's postwar history of peaceful development (achievements as a peace-loving nation). 

Thus, Koizumi's statement points out that postwar Japan adopted a completely pacifist position, and has contributed to peace and prosperity in the world (international contributions) through its Official Development Assistance (ODA), participation in UN peacekeeping operations (PKO), and so on. The statement reads, "Japan's postwar history has indeed been six decades of manifesting its remorse on the war through actions." Koizumi's statement has a "new aspect not found in the Murayama Statement," and as shown by the path taken by Japan after the war, Japan's past remorse is expressed not only in words [but also by international contributions], and "by emphasizing that Japan's actual actions are proof of this, the statement is all the more persuasive" (Takakazu Kuriyama, Wakai [Reconciliation]).

Incidentally, in a BBC opinion survey in 2012, Japan was ranked as the top country for "having a positive influence on the world," and in a survey by an Australian think tank in 2012, Japan ranked 5th in a list of "peaceful countries."

On the other hand, in the history education and media in China and South Korea, compared with the Second World War and Japan's colonial rule, Japan's postwar course has not been taken up very much. The Japan-China History Research Committee (December 2006-December 2009), of which I was a member, addressed not only the wartime period but also ancient and modern history, including the postwar period. In that sense, it had epoch-making significance (although at the request of the Chinese side, the section in the committee's report dealing with postwar history was not publicly released). This committee was established based on an agreement with the Chinese side when Prime Minister Abe visited China in October 2006. The Chinese side "positively appreciated the fact that postwar Japan has consistently followed the path of a peaceful country based on freedom and democracy."

Second, based on postwar Japan's pacifism, Koizumi's statement declared, "I believe it is necessary to work hand in hand with other Asian countries, especially with China and the Republic of Korea, which are Japan's neighboring countries separated only by a strip of water, to maintain peace and pursue the development of the region." While specifically naming China and South Korea, the statement penultimately concluded, "I intend to build a future-oriented cooperative relationship based on mutual understanding and trust with Asian countries."

At the Asian-African Summit (Bandung Conference) held in Jakarta in April 2005, Prime Minister Koizumi gave a similar speech, following the line of the Murayama Statement, but it was the first time a Japanese prime minister had referred to the matter of historical awareness at an international conference and expressed "remorse" and "apologies," making the speech exceptional.

Third, Koizumi's statement begins: "...I affirm my determination that Japan must never again take the path to war, reflecting that the peace and prosperity we enjoy today are founded on the ultimate sacrifices of those who lost their lives for the war against the their will. More than three million compatriots died in the war -- in the battlefield thinking about their homeland and worrying about their families, while others perished amidst the destruction of war, or after the war in remote foreign countries." Referring to the Japanese war dead, the statement expresses a remembrance of the Japanese who died as a result of the war and a desire for peace. This is an expression of Koizumi's logic (thinking) for visiting Yasukuni Shrine.

Prime Minister Koizumi's first visit to Yasukuni after becoming prime minister came in August 2001; because of his consideration of China, Koizumi made the visit on the 13th, ahead of the anniversary on the 15th. On that day, Koizumi issued a statement that began: "...Japan caused tremendous sufferings to many people of the world, including its own people. Following a mistaken national policy during a certain period in the past, Japan imposed, through its colonial rule and aggression, immeasurable ravages and suffering, particularly to the people of the neighboring countries in Asia. This has left a still incurable scar to many people in the region." This statement replaces the Murayama Statement's phrase "tremendous damage and suffering" with "immeasurable ravages and suffering." With the addition of the idea of an "incurable scar" and so on, Koizumi's statement was evaluated as going beyond the Murayama Statement. Although he continued to visit Yasukuni, Koizumi carried on the policy line of the Murayama Statement.

Moreover, when Koizumi visited China on 8 October, two months after his first Yasukuni visit, he went to the Museum of the War of Chinese People's Resistance Against Japanese Aggression (near Lugou Bridge), the first prime minister to do so since Murayama visited the Museum in 1995. "I looked at the various exhibits with a feeling of heartfelt apology and condolences for those Chinese people who were victims of aggression...We must look directly at our past history and must never cause a war again. Based on our remorse, Japan has been able to achieve prosperity as a peaceful country after the war," Koizumi said after he toured the museum. Koizumi expressed remorse and an apology more clearly than the Murayama Statement, which did not specify the other countries. The Chinese side highly appreciated Koizumi's remarks, and Chinese President Jiang Zemin said with surprise, "This is the first Japanese prime minister I can talk with to such an extent." Sources said that the Chinese side held expectations that Koizumi would not visit Yasukuni again (Yomiuri Shimbun, 28 July 2005). Thus, it has been pointed out that in response to Koizumi's subsequent repeated visits to Yasukuni, the main emphasis of China's criticism moved from the issue of historical understanding per se to the damage to the national sentiment of the suffering country.

3) Kan Statement

Prime Minister Naoto Kan issued a statement in August 2010, the 100th anniversary of the annexation of Korea. The statement referred only to South Korea, and it was the first statement issued by the Democratic Party of Japan.

Following the tenor of the Murayama Statement, Kan's statement made specific mention of Japan's colonial rule of Korea, and in reference to the March 1st independence movement [Samil Movement], the statement recognized the coerciveness of Japan's colonial rule: "...the Korean people of that time [were deprived of their country], and their ethnic pride was deeply scarred by the colonial rule, which was imposed against their will...." Expressing consideration for the sentiments of the South Korean people, the statement also said, "Those who render pain tend to forget it, while those who suffered cannot forget it easily."

On the other hand, around half of the statement, particularly the latter half, declares that Japan and South Korea should build future-oriented ties based on the 2,000 years of exchanges and friendship between the two countries, while also recognizing the sorrowful periods in the past. Thus the statement declares: "Japan and the Republic of Korea have become the most important and closest neighboring nations now in the 21st century, sharing such values as democracy, freedom, and a market economy." Referencing the idea of an East Asian community, the statement also stressed the necessity of building a "partnership where we cooperate and exercise leadership for the peace and prosperity of the region and the world."

Conclusion

As far as an Abe Statement, the specific timing and contents will be considered from now. Regarding the timing, it is said that, in accordance with custom, one option is the year 2015, which will mark the 70th year since the war's end. As regards the contents, Abe has stated, "We should issue a statement that is appropriate for one given 70 years after the war and which includes the postwar path taken by Japan and the path that should be taken from now." Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga has said, "We believe that a statement that is focused on a future-oriented outlook is necessary when we consider the stability, peace, and economies of Asia."

In other words, it is believed that the statement will aim for an "orientation towards the future," based on Japan's postwar course and not being solely tied to the past. It will likely reflect the transition, which I have taken up in this article, from the Murayama Statement, which took responsibility for Japan's wartime period, to the statements by Koizumi and Kan, which, while based on the sentiments of the Murayama Statement, also emphasized Japan's postwar path and future-oriented relations.

I had several opportunities to talk with scholars on the Chinese side through the Japan-China Joint History Research Committee, and I found that, in actuality, even the Murayama Statement is not sufficiently known in China. And since the impressions produced by Koizumi's repeated visits to Yasukuni ended up overshadowing the contents of his various statements and remarks, I was at first particularly surprised that members on the Chinese side said they wanted to read the full texts of Koizumi's statements and requested copies of them.

It is said that US President Bill Clinton, after reading an English translation of the Murayama Statement, praised it as being a "very courageous statement." From now, more efforts should be made to disseminate this series of statements by Japan's prime ministers more widely overseas.

References
· Kuriyama, Takakazu, Wakai -- Nihon Gaikou no Mondai (1) (Reconciliation -- Issues for Japanese Diplomacy), Gaiko Forum, January 2006.

· Hattori, Ryuji, Murayama Danwa to Gaimushou -- Shuusen 50 Shuunen no Gaikou (The Murayama Statement and MOFA -- Diplomacy in the 50th Year After the End of the War), in Nihonron: Gurobaruka-suru Nihon, ed., Tanaka Tsutomu, Chuo University Press, 2007.

· Shoji, Junichiro, Rekishi-Ninshiki o Meguru Nihon Gaikou -- Nitchuu Kankei o Chuushin To Shite (Japanese Diplomacy Regarding Historical Understanding -- Focusing on Japan-China Relations), Kokusai Seiji, No. 170, October 2012.

Abe’s WWII statement fails history 101

Dove of Peace at
the Yasukuni Shrine

By Professor Tessa Morris-Suzuki, ARC Laureate Fellow based at the School of Culture, History and Language, at the College of Asia and the Pacific at The Australian National University and APP Member
First appeared in the EastAsiaForum, 18 August 2015

As the clock ticked down to the 70th anniversary of the end of the Asia Pacific War, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe faced a dilemma. His right-wing supporters were pushing him to produce a commemorative statement that would move away from the apologetic approach of his predecessors and ‘restore Japan’s pride’. Moderates, Asian neighbours and (most importantly) the US government were pushing him to uphold the earlier apologies issued by former prime ministers Tomiichi Murayama and Junichiro Koizumi. Most of the media anticipation centred around the wording of the forthcoming Abe statement. Would it, like the Murayama Statement of 1995 and the Koizumi Statement of 2005, include the words ‘apology’ (owabi) and aggression (shinryaku)?

Abe’s response to this dilemma was clever. First, he established a committee of hand-picked ‘experts’ to provide a report locating Japan’s wartime past in the broad sweep of 20th-century history. Then, drawing heavily on their report, he produced a statement that was more than twice the length of those issued by his predecessors. His statement, to the relief of many observers, did use the words ‘apology’ and ‘aggression’. In fact, it is almost overladen with all the right words: ‘we must learn from the lessons of history’; ‘our country inflict immeasurable damage and suffering’; ‘deep repentance’; ‘deep remorse and heartfelt apology’; ‘we will engrave in our hearts the past’.

But, focusing on the vocabulary, some observers failed to notice that Abe had embedded these words in a narrative of Japanese history that was entirely different from the one that underpinned previous prime ministerial statements. That is why his statement is so much longer than theirs. So which past is the Abe statement engraving in the hearts of Japanese citizens?

The story presented in Abe’s statement goes like this. Western colonial expansionism forced Japan to modernise, which it did with remarkable success. Japan’s victory in the Russo–Japanese War gave hope to the colonised peoples of the world. After World War I, there was a move to create a peaceful world order. Japan actively participated, but following the Great Depression, the Western powers created economic blocs based on their colonial empires. This dealt a ‘major blow’ to Japan. Forced into a corner, Japan ‘attempted to overcome its diplomatic and economic deadlock through the use of force’. The result was the 1931 Manchurian Incident, Japan’s withdrawal from the League of Nations, and everything that followed. ‘Japan took the wrong course and advanced along the road to war’.

The narrative of war that Abe presents leads naturally to the lessons that he derives from history. Nations should avoid the use of force to break ‘deadlock’. They should promote free trade so that economic blocs will never again become a cause of war. And they should avoid challenging the international order.

The problem with Abe’s new narrative is that it is historically wrong. This is perhaps not surprising, since the committee of experts on whom he relied included only four historians in its 16 members. And its report, running to some 31 pages, contains less than a page about the causes and events of the Asia Pacific War.

In effect, the Abe narrative of history looks like an exam script where the student has accidentally misread the question. He has answered the question about the reasons for Japan’s invasion of Manchuria with an answer that should go with the question about the reasons for the attack on Pearl Harbor.

There is widespread consensus that the immediate cause for Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor was the stranglehold on Japan created by imperial protectionism and economic blockade by the Western powers. But there is equal consensus that the reasons for the Japanese invasion of Manchuria in 1931, and for the outbreak of full-scale war in China in 1937, were different and much more complex.

Key factors at work in 1931 were the troubled relationship between the Japanese military and the civilian government; Japan’s desire for resources, transport routes and living space; rising nationalism in an economically and socially troubled Japan; and corruption and instability in Northeastern China. By the time Japan launched its full scale invasion of China in 1937, global protectionism was becoming a larger issue. But even then, other issues like Japan’s desire to protect its massive investments in China from the rising forces of Chinese nationalism were paramount.

Economic historians note that the Japanese empire was the first to take serious steps towards imperial protectionism. The slide into global protectionism had barely started at the time of the Manchurian Incident. Britain did not create its imperial preference system until 1932. The economic blockade that strangled the Japanese economy in 1940–41 was the response to Japan’s invasion of China, not its cause.

This is not academic quibbling. These things really matter, and vividly illustrate why historical knowledge is vital to any understanding of contemporary international affairs.

The Abe narrative of history fails to address the causes and nature of Japan’s colonisation of Taiwan (in 1895) and Korea (in 1910), and ignores the large presence of Japanese troops in China long before 1931. It says to China: ‘Sorry we invaded you, but those other guys painted us into a corner’. It offers an untenable explanation for Japan’s actions, and blurs the distinction between aggressive and defensive behaviour. Western media commentators who haven’t studied Japanese history may not pick up these flaws in the narrative, but Chinese and South Korean observers (who have their own, sometimes profoundly problematic, versions of this history) will instantly see them and rightly object.

Engraving a factually flawed story of the past in people’s hearts is not going to solve East Asia’s problems, and risks making them worse. Worse still, the Abe statement is generating deeply divergent responses in the countries where East Asian history is not widely taught (most notably the United States) and those where it is (South Korea, China and Japan itself), thus creating even deeper divisions in our already too divided world.

Abe's apologies: a boneless corpse

click to order

The politics and pitfalls of war memory and apology

BY Jeff Kingston, director of Asian Studies, Temple University Japan

THE JAPAN TIMES, July 11, 2015

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s handling of history issues during this 70th anniversary of Japan’s World War II defeat came under critical scrutiny at the recent Japanese Studies Association of Australia conference hosted by La Trobe University in Melbourne.

Arthur Stockwin, the University of Oxford’s eminent political scientist on Japanese politics, assessed the arc of apology from 1995 to 2015, highlighting the counterproductive backsliding that has occurred during Abe’s tenure.

Although there has been no shortage of Japanese apologies for wartime misdeeds, an unwarranted apology fatigue has taken hold. Unwarranted because, as Stockwin argues, every official apology has been undermined by countervailing comments aimed at repudiating or dismissing the contrition expressed. This undermines any potential goodwill because Japan looks like it is wriggling out of its war responsibility and downplaying the horrors that it inflicted on Asia.

Stockwin also believes that Abe has been duplicitous in his “handling of war apology issues that combines apparent agreement with official apologies made in the past, while at the same time by various means throwing doubt on their veracity.”

Abe’s misgivings about the Murayama statement are well-known so when he says that he accepts it in general he underscores that in certain specifics he doesn’t. Stockwin related that in February 2009 Abe gave an interview in the journal Will, saying, “It is a big mistake to teach the Murayama statement as historical understanding.”

That same month, in the right-wing journal Seiron, Abe commented: “Japan is not bound forever by the personal historical understanding of Mr. Murayama. The Murayama statement was too one-sided, and I should like to come up with something more balanced.”

In April, Abe said there was no point in repeating the Murayama and Koizumi war apologies, saying he inherited them and wants to leave it at that. Shinichi Kitaoka, a well-known academic who is one of Abe’s foremost advisers and apologists, maintains that Abe can inherit past statements without repeating them.

“It is natural that what is said 50 years after the war and what is said 70 years after the war should differ to some extent,” Kitaoka says. Stockwin’s rejoinder is withering: “Kitaoka’s analysis sounds confused, and appears to imply that it is acceptable to repeat earlier war apologies so long as their content is removed. It is surprisingly difficult to see that this could carry serious intellectual conviction.”

Stockwin senses a strategy, saying that Abe pays lip service to war apologies that have stood the test of time and served Japan well while at the same time slagging them. Instead of outright repudiation of the 1993 Kono statement on “comfort women,” Abe has gutted it, something Stockwin refers to as honenuki ni suru (taking the bones out, while leaving the outward shape).

In Stockwin’s view, Abe’s maneuvering on war apology has been counterproductive and worsened relations with China and South Korea, thereby irking the United States.


Akiko Hashimoto, a professor of sociology at the University of Pittsburgh, recently published an excellent book titled, The Long Defeat: Cultural Trauma, Memory, and Identity in Japan, which explores the contentious politics of divisive war memories. She draws our gaze to intertwined narratives of nationalism, pacifism and reconciliation, and the long shadow of defeat that animates the politics of national identity. She calls on Japan to relinquish the “comfort zone of ambiguity in the amorphous middle ground between guilt and innocence in WWII” and to embrace “imaginative concessions and innovative compromise to break the logjam of historical grievances.” Forgetting, denying or downplaying, she says, is no longer an option in a “globalizing culture of memory.”

“Japan’s moral recovery cannot be complete without constructing a new collective self, and a political identity that extends beyond the alliance with the U.S.,” she argues.

Hashimoto points out that apology is “an ennobling act” and Abe can do much to enhance Japan’s dignity and moral stature if he takes the measure of Japan’s wartime history. A forthright apology is a “pathway to transcend stigma,” but Japanese revisionists lack the courage to admit wartime “evildoing” and therefore close off possibilities of rapprochement and achieving a shared sense of justice with its victims. Nationalism in East Asia has turned “war memory into a contest of national interests and identity, and a stew of national resentments” that fuel mistrust and suspicion. It is up to Japan to show the way forward, but Abe’s vision is focused on the past in ways that jeopardize the future.

Hashimoto notes that Abe is unlikely to repeat Murayama’s condemnation of Japanese colonial and wartime aggression as a “mistaken national policy” because it would mean condemning the wartime record of his grandfather Nobusuke Kishi and, thereby, dishonoring his family. Kishi was indicted as a Class-A war criminal by the International Military Tribunal for the Far East due to his role in mobilizing labor in Manchuria and as wartime munitions minister for Prime Minister Hideki Tojo.

Hashimoto also believes Abe’s efforts to expand Japan’s security role are misguided and ignore public sentiments that draw on grass-roots wartime memories. Expecting that the forthcoming Abe statement will shirk the burdens of history, Hashimoto wants to remind Japan’s victims, and the world, that most Japanese don’t support his exonerating and valorizing narrative of Japan’s wartime record.

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Akiko Takenaka, a professor of history at the University of Kentucky, her astute insights on historical controversies in her new book, Yasukuni Shrine: History, Memory, and Japan’s Unending Postwar. She focuses on Yasukuni Shrine’s role in terms of national identity and war memory and the dilemma of how to remember those who died in Japan’s attempt to subjugate Asia.

“(Abe’s) record on historical issues in 2015 has been dismal,” Takenaka says. “I believe he’s managed to reach a new low as far as Japanese prime ministers’ records on the issues.”

In his much-anticipated statement on Aug. 15, she says Abe “should most certainly declare support of the Kono statement, apologize for the violence inflicted on others, and also acknowledge the wrongs of the past.”

She adds that acknowledging past wrongdoings is just the first step in reconciliation.

“But mere acknowledgment won’t change the past. Nor will it speak to the growing number of Japanese who embrace the revisionist myths,” she says.

To address this trend, Takenaka calls for the inclusion of peace education in the school curriculum, but Team Abe is busy white-washing textbooks and promoting patriotic education.

As perpetrator’s fatigue gains momentum among Japanese amid a heightened sense of victimization, she wonders, “Who is going to take action to improve Japan’s strained relations with China and South Korea, which are deeply rooted in the wartime past?”

None of these experts thinks Abe is the man for the job.

Abe's history committee defuses responsbility

Commission impossible for Abe’s foreign policy

By Michael Cucek, Temple University Japan

Originally published in East Asia Forum, 3 March 2015


On 25 February, Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe convened the first meeting of a new special advisory council, the Commission on a Framework for the 21st Century. The rather ambiguously and grandiosely named council is to meet with him over the coming months, presenting the results of their deliberations on five topics. The prime minister will presumably include the gist of the commission’s recommendations in his Prime Minister’s Statement to be delivered on August 15, the 70th anniversary of Japan’s acceptance of the terms of the Potsdam Declaration, the act ending the combat phase of World War II.

The first topic the commission will address is how Japan should view its and the world’s courses through the 20th century, and what lessons may be drawn from them. Second, what path has Japan trod in the 70 years since the end of World War II, and to what extent have Japan’s pacifism, economic development and contributions to the international community have been appreciated? Third, what path has Japan traveled in regards to reconciliation, first with the US, Australia and Europe but especially with China, South Korea and the rest of Asia? Fourth, what should Japan’s vision for relations in the 21st century be? Finally, what specific measures should Japan undertake 70 years into the post-war period.

The membership of the commission is top notch: 16 of the most influential and recognizable senior commentators and reporters on foreign policy, diplomacy and international image management. The council’s president Taizo Nishimuro is the eldest at 79. He is Chairman of Japan Post and former chairman of both Toshiba Corp and the Tokyo Stock Exchange. His presence provides the council with actual personal memory of the war and its end. Rumiko Seya, the director of the Japan Center for Conflict Prevention, is the youngest at 38. Most of the members of the commission are in their late 60s, meaning that while they have no direct experience of the war, their lives span both Japan’s rise to global economic power and its decades of struggle and relative decline since the collapse of the asset price bubble.

Some reports have incorrectly characterized the commission as composed mostly of academics. Though many of the members currently use academic titles, many are not university scholars. Professionally the commission’s membership is quite varied. Mitsubishi Corporation Chairman Yorihiko Kojima stands at the pinnacle of traditional Japan Inc. corporate culture [Company frequently sued for slave and forced labor claims during the war]. Globis Capital Partners president Yoshito Hori represents Japan’s young, entrepreneurial business class. Yukio Okamoto (for whom the author used to work) and Kunihiko Miyake are former career diplomats. Keiko Iizuka and Takao Yamada are senior journalists, hailing from two news organizations one of which is the most supportive (Yomiuri Shimbun) and the other the most critical (Mainichi Shimbun) of the Abe administration.

Politically, the council can be characterized as moderate-right in orientation. Terumasa Nakanishi of Kyoto University is the one hardliner on the commission. His presence is more than balanced though by the presence and authority of Nishimuro, who serves as the president of the New China-Japan Friendship Committee of the 21st Century. Nishimuro is one of the few members of the elite who have close relations with the leaders of China. Most of the membership of the council would be best called conservative, both in the sense of advocating for greater legalization of the SDF’s use of military force in line with international norms and in wanting those changes to be incremental and not disruptive to the peace in East Asia.

Nishimuro will be a formidable chairman. But the power to shape consensus within the commission will have to be shared with his deputy, Shinichi Kitaoka. Kitaoka, the president of the International University of Japan and the former Japan chair of the Japan–China History Research Committee is a long-time close Abe confidant. He served as deputy chairman of the Advisory Panel on Reconstruction of the Legal Basis for Security, the council that gave the Abe administration the intellectual argument for the constitutionality of Japan engaging in limited collective self-defense operations. He will likely play a highly influential role on the commission.

Most of the members — with the exception of Nishimuro, Iizuka and Seya — have long been part of Prime Minister Abe’s network of advisers. Miyake, a fluent speaker of Arabic, Chinese and English, is often treated by the media as the prime minister’s private spokesman on security and international affairs.

That such talent is so close to the prime minister should be a cause for celebration. But it could well be wasted. Abe has managed in the past to consult with wise persons, weigh their advice and then go on to do what he wanted to do as if he had never talked to anyone at all — his 26 December 2013 visit to Yasukuni Shrine being the most glaring example of his stubborn self-direction.

Furthermore, the sheer mass of talent and attention being brought to bear upon the Prime Minister’s Statement on the 70th Anniversary is many orders of magnitude greater than what is necessary. If Abe wanted to please the US government and satisfy the governments of China and South Korea, all he would have to do is reissue the 1995 Statement of Prime Minister Tomiichi Murayama on the 50th anniversary of the end of World War II. That he has inaugurated a commission to supplement his own statement is evidence he does not intend to follow in the path to reconciliation mapped out by the Murayama Statement.

Unfortunately for Abe, the members of the commission and the citizenry of Japan, the Murayama Statement is the minimum standard expected by the governments of the US, China and South Korea. If, after the deployment of all the experience and knowledge of the commission, Abe fails to hit the expected notes and to transcend the Murayama Statement, the letdown felt by those governments, and the damage done to Japan’s international stature, will be all the greater.

The prudent course for Abe would have been to discourage the build-up of expectations for his statement, to work through the normal diplomatic and bureaucratic channels in its production and forget about the text immediately after reading it. As of 25 February, that humble, cautious path is closed.

Michael Cucek is an Adjunct Fellow at the Institute of Contemporary Asian Studies, Temple University, Japan. He was formerly a senior research analyst at Okamoto Associates Inc, a consulting firm led by commission member Yukio Okamoto. He is an APP member 

Will history again trip up Prime Minister Shinzo Abe?

At Chidorigaifuchi

Issues of history have dominated the past few weeks of Japan's international relations. For Japan's leaders, they are defending the nation's honor, for all others Tokyo's inability to squarely confront its past undermines trust and distracts from the economy.

APP Senior Fellow William Brooks, who is an Adjunct professor at Johns Hopkins University, addresses the domestic repercussions of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's focus on "correcting" the misperceptions of history in the essay below that first appeared in the Asahi Asia Japan Watch on May 7, 2013.

Dr. Brooks echoes The Economist's May 18th Cover Story "It's Japan." The editors are unsure if Abe is the economic modernizer, the internationalist, or the radical nationalist. The Prime Minister's emphasis on "backward-facing patriotism as a model for modern strength" and constitutional reform is troubling. Or as The Economist notes:

At best, all this could prove a distraction at a time when some structural-reform initiatives already appear to be running into the sands. At worst, it could endanger all reform by eroding the government’s popularity, at the same time increasing tensions with Japan’s neighbours. Far from having banished the ghosts of his past, as some of his advisers claim, the prime minister is in danger of summoning them up again.

More pointedly, The Economist's editors conclude: 

Mr Abe is right to want to awaken Japan. After the upper-house elections, he will have a real chance to do so. The way to restore Japan is to focus on reinvigorating the economy, not to end up in a needless war with China.

~~~~~~

With the landslide victory of the Liberal Democratic Party in December, its president, Shinzo Abe, returned for the second time as prime minister, aiming to fix Japan’s perpetually ailing economy through dramatic policy measures, dubbed “Abenomics,” which were cheered by the markets and welcomed by the public.

As Abe’s popularity soared in the polls to a 70 percent or higher approval rating, it seemed the momentum would give his ruling party an easy win in the Upper House election in July. Abe also defied trade-protectionist sentiment even in his own party and wowed international opinion by making a bold decision for Japan to join the U.S.-led Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) negotiations that would open the economy to what will become a huge free-trade bloc in the world.

Abe was lauded in Washington, too, by his promise of a strong national security agenda that would enhance Japan’s alliance with the United States. Washington hoped that finally, Japan had a strong leader that it needs to bring the country back on track, return stability to politics and restore Japan’s status as a “tier-one” level member in the global community.

But at the same time, the return of Abe to power has been accompanied by growing controversy due to his nationalistic agenda and revisionist views toward history.

His plan to drastically revise the Constitution, including the war-renouncing Article 9, has set off domestic alarms, even with the LDP’s coalition partner, the New Komeito. He also has upset Asian neighbors by questioning Japan’s wartime legacy and breaking his own taboo by letting Cabinet members visit Yasukuni Shrine, where war criminals are enshrined.

Abe left office in 2007 in a cloud over his handling of the war-guilt issue. Will history ultimately trip up Abe’s second try as prime minister?

Abe's Right-Turn Agenda Detours To Yasukuni
While the Japanese public welcomed the new prime minister, Abe was seen overseas in quite a different light. The Western media were especially critical. The Economist of Britain on Jan. 5, 2013, called Abe an “arch-nationalist” and predicted that his “appointment of a scarily right-wing cabinet bodes ill for the region.” The magazine noted “thirteen [members] support Nippon Kaigi, a nationalist think-tank that advocates a return to ‘traditional values’ and rejects Japan’s ‘apology diplomacy’ for its wartime misdeeds.”

Similar warnings about Abe’s nationalist roots appeared in major U.S. dailies, as well. This sparked a series of rebuttals in op-eds and commentaries from scholars and think-tanks seeing Abe instead as a pragmatic leader who had learned from his unsuccessful first term.

Such concerns seemed borne out when Abe soon began to make comments that were seen in the Western media as “exposing his true nationalist colors.” Abe talked of revising the statements of wartime apologies made by earlier administrations and, in a Diet reply, he questioned the definition of “aggression” to describe Japan’s wartime actions in Asia.

Although he and his Cabinet spokesman sought to assuage irate Korean and Chinese reactions by later assurances that past apologies would always be honored, the damage had been done.

Things did not stop there, however. Abe in his previous turn as prime minister was careful to avoid visiting Yasukuni Shrine, where 14 Class-A war criminals are enshrined. He was painfully aware of the trouble with China and Korea caused by the visits to Yasukuni of his predecessor, Junichiro Koizumi, and he desired above all to repair ties with those countries.

This time, however, Abe broke his old rule by allowing three of his Cabinet members, including Deputy Prime Minister Taro Aso, himself a former prime minister, to pay homage at Yasukuni during its April spring festival. Angry reactions swept across Korea and China, and scheduled high-level meetings were either postponed or canceled. Major Japanese dailies and the Western press slammed Abe. He may have miscalculated Korean and Chinese reactions, for it was clear from the start of his administration that he wanted to repair relations strained by territorial disputes. Although Abe himself did not visit the shrine, only sending a donation of a sacred plant, his allowing his deputy to pay homage at the shrine was to Asian eyes the equivalent of sending a proxy.

The impact of the Yasukuni visits has gone far beyond Asia. Abe was chastised for allegedly revealing his nationalist colors by editorials in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Financial Times, The Christian Science Monitor, and other major Western dailies. The Financial Times stressed, “Yasukuni ... is irredeemably associated with the nationalist cult of emperor worship.” The New York Times charged: “Visits to Yasukuni … are often seen as proof that Japan remains unrepentant for its brutal wartime march across Asia.”

The Japanese government’s position, which under ordinary circumstances would be reasonable and understandable, is that how Japan mourns its war dead is not something that other countries can give orders on.

Such a stance may still resonate among U.S. officials, for it harks back to the Yasukuni visits of Koizumi during his tenure in office (2001-2006). Koizumi was careful always to state that his intention was to pay homage to the war dead, not to war criminals. But his actions, though certainly not personally linked to nationalism, roiled China and South Korea and wrecked relations with those countries.

Those who defend official visits to Yasukuni as no more than paying respect for the war dead are denying the reality that the shrine long ago has become hopelessly politicized as a symbol of Japan’s militarist past. The Showa emperor himself stopped going to the shrine decades ago when he found that war criminals had been enshrined there. Still, most Japanese these days are probably neutral about the shrine, seeing Yasukuni as just a place to go to pray for the war dead, perhaps their own relatives. They do not think they are praying for the war criminals enshrined there.

Neutralizing Yasukuni
There has been much talk over the years of separating the souls of the war criminals from Yasukuni and enshrining them elsewhere. Other suggestions have included establishing a secular war memorial where even a U.S. president could lay a wreath. Such talk has not led to any action, though one could persuasively argue that the 14 Class-A war criminals do not belong at Yasukuni anyway: They were never killed on the battlefield but were executed for sending millions to die in battle.

As Abe’s miscalculation shows, though, Yasukuni remains a potential lightning rod for trouble if officials believe that visiting there is just an act of respect for the war dead.

Yasukuni Adds To U.S. Security Concerns In The Region
When Yasukuni flared up again in April, Washington officials were likely more upset about the timing of the dispute than with the visits to the shrine by Cabinet ministers. Washington has become increasingly concerned about escalating tensions between Japan and China over the Senkakus, islands both countries claim. China’s maritime surveillance ships repeatedly intrude into Japanese waters near the isles, and earlier this year, a Chinese warship, locking its radar on a Japan Coast Guard vessel, was ready to fire.

Conflict could have ensued. Moreover, the isles have taken on an even more strategic significance when Beijing recently announced that the Senkakus were part of China’s “core interests,” ranking them with Tibet and Taiwan.

Adding nationalism to territorial and historical issues makes an extremely volatile mixture, and U.S. officials worry that in the case of China and the Senkakus, a military clash is not out of the question. In that case, the United States might be dragged into an unnecessary war.

America’s pivot to Asia is largely centered on protecting its maritime security interests in the region. In that connection, Washington would like Japan and China to find diplomatic ways to return relations to a more cooperative mode, putting the territorial issue on the back burner and toning down the historical rhetoric.

Japan's rocky relations with South Korea further complicate U.S. regional strategy. Washington expects trilateral cooperation among the United States, Japan and South Korea in dealing with North Korea’s dangerous nuclear and missile programs.

Officials are disappointed, too, that bilateral strategic cooperation between Japan and South Korea, such as planned agreements for intelligence and materiel sharing, have been sidelined by the territorial row in 2012 and made even more remote by the tiff over history.

Moreover, the United States and Japan at this point cannot leverage cooperation from China in pressuring North Korea to reconsider its nuclear ambitions. As Japan becomes more isolated, another casualty is the loss of access to close consultations between Beijing and Seoul over the North Korea problem--a matter of direct national security interest for Tokyo.

Comfort Women Issue Could Roil U.S. Again
The comfort women issue--sex slaves used by the Japanese military in World War II--has the potential to flare up again, not only with Asian countries but also with the United States, if Abe makes good his oft-stated intention to review the 1993 Kono Statement, which admitted military involvement in the recruitment of women, mostly Koreans, to service Japanese soldiers at the war front.

A similar review of the 1995 Murayama Statement of apology for Japan’s wartime acts has also been suggested.

The comfort women issue became a bone of contention between the United States and Japan when Abe was prime minister for the first time. Congress was upset when the Abe government began to deny military involvement in that wartime system, and subsequently passed a resolution critical of Japan’s responses to date.

Americans view the comfort women’s plight as a humanitarian issue and expect Japan to do the right thing. Should the Abe administration, in its review of the Kono Statement, take the tack of again denying coercion and military involvement in this prostitution corps, it will find that the United States has joined the chorus of international criticism, too. Relations that started out so well early in the year could quickly cool. Such a scenario need not happen, though. Abe, who says he has learned from his mistakes in his first time in office, should apply that wisdom by turning over historical issues to historians to discuss and taking politics out of the act.