Yasukuni shrine hit by arson attack
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102 Comments
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-17
JapanGal
People get so hung up about those 14. Who cares.
1
gogogo
So much hate
13
rickyvee
people care because enshrining those class a war criminals is tantamount to deifying them. that's why people care.
1
CVHuan
This issue will continue to haunt Japan. The neighbors' enemies are Japan's heroes.
0
Disillusioned
Why blame a Korean? They should be look at members of the LDPJ first.
-16
edojin
Yasukuni Shrine is where I go every New Year's Day to get my "fighting spirit" for the new year. It is an impressive shrine, and do hope that no nutcase sets fire to it or damages it in any way ...
2
bicultural
LDPJ? It's either the LDP or the DPJ. Make up your mind.
-18
issa1
Yasuni shrine is the most beautiful place in the japan, is simply magic. Is where the real Japanese pay their respects to our ancestors who gave their valuable lives to protect this country. I feel contempt for someone who puts fire in a place so sacred to the Japanese people.
5
NinjaDave
Shame it wasn't a better job and burn the place down.
5
yessir
@Kentaro75, terrorists? really? I think it's just a petty hot head with a bagful of misguided politics. Let's not do the same.
3
Johannes Weber
Arson without any harm to human beings is far from being terrorism. It is a simple sort of crime. Once the motivation (of the arsonist) has been discovered by an independent panel - wait, it's Japan. They'll have a written confession with a signature. Like the old witch trials in Dark Ages of the west... They will get whatever they want.
It's disrespectful. It's destructive. It's criminal. But it's no surprise. Yasukuni offends more people in the world than any other "sacred site". I can very well understand that many people dislike Yasukuni Jinja. Still no justfication to burn it down...
12
GW
issa1 kentaro75
what if it was a Japanese who lit the fire? They are plenty of locals that see yasukuni for what it really is!
Note I do not condone arson, but I have often dreamt that ysukuni was bulldozed & rpelaced by a parking lot.
5
electric2004
Maybe better to go green. Guiding some termites or other wood loving insects to worship the place would do the trick.
-7
presto345
Despicable act.
4
sojherde
I think it is stupid to set fire to a shrine that glorifies war. That will not change war lovers into peace lovers. Yet I would like to learn from Kentaro 75 how he will teach younger generations to apreciate peace. To me it seems impossible worship war criminals and at the same time brand others who use exactly the same methods as terrorists.
5
mountainpear
@issa1 Who were these soldiers protecting Japan from?
0
Elbuda Mexicano
Karma??
0
GW
rangermiffy
Simple, because anyone going to a place like yasukuni to get "reinvigorated" or whatever is not what this world needs, yasukuni is a nasty nasty place, there are numerous places much better than yasukuni, thats why edojins getting the negs, its a post thats doesnt defy why there are + or - that one is straight forward.
4
Patrick Smash
Kentaro75, your English is pretty good, but you need to sit down with Georbe Bush and look up the word "terrorist". Some drunken fool with a lighter is not a terrorist.
-9
kukuchai
i think must be south korean and chinese who did it.
2
Yubaru
It means that someone actually read the post and took the time to state their opinion without actually writing one, (maybe). In the bigger picture of life the "thumbs up" or "thumbs down" means actually nothing, unless one is the type that is affected or overly influenced by anonymous opinions.
5
BurakuminDes
Or maybe - just maybe - it may be the same mob who burnt down Kinkakku-ji or launched urban terrorism in Tokyo. Why do you assume Japanese do not have a possibility for attacking public places for screwed up reasons? They do. Easier to blame foreigners, I guess.
-2
anglootaku
Any wrong doings and damage is a state felony
7
Serrano
"14 of Japan's top World War II criminals"
I bet those 14 caused a lot of suffering.
6
Disillusioned
Wow! A couple of over-zealous posts from the natives. It's a shame they don't really understand what they are attempting to condem. Japan was not a victim of war in the last five hundred years. They were the aggressors, which is why Yasukuni is despised by so many nations that Japan either invaded or attempted to invade in the last five hundred years. Why do you think 'world history' is a secondary subject in japanese schools?
6
Michael Craig
That person should've graffito-tag the place instead!
8
Michael Craig
Metropolitan Governor Ishihara must be blowing steam out of his ears over this!
-4
Ishiwara
"Tokyo’s controversial Yasukuni shrine, often seen as a symbol of Japan’s wartime aggression"
Typical of today's style of reporting, and some gaijin-observations are not helping here. The shrine itself is not controversial, and was made to honor the dead in Japan's civil war (the Boshin war).
I agree that the war criminals are a problem, but there should also be some more understanding that the Japanese have a right to honor their war dead like any other country. The British reacted pretty hysterical last year when a drunken student climbed a war monument in London.
7
oginome
The Yasukuni Shrine has been tainted by the inclusion of those 14 unrepentant murderers. A horrible place.
-5
Ishiwara
@Ayler
Nobody made a problem of this shrine until the war criminals were enshrined there in the 1970's. So no, the shrine itself is not controversial.
-1
Ayler
I agree, the building and environs 'itself' are wonderful. If you find problem or amazement with the news report wording of
then you need to either slap yourself hard or take up a career in japanese politics if indeed you haven't already.
-7
Ishiwara
@Ayler What's so difficult to understand about this? It is this kind of reporting that spreads false information that the whole shrine is somehow a glorification of Japanese war crimes in WWII. It is not.
3
Ayler
2 facts in opposement of each other are still facts. What is so difficult to understand about that? Site of cultural, historical and aesthetic importance vs Site hated by millions. See?
-4
keika1628
The Japanese mind ! when you pay for your sins with your life you are forgiven . Burning a Torii will not change a peoples mind.
-6
NeoJamal
What if Yasukuni shrine became a museum instead like the Smithsonian where the Enola Gay is exhibited or a grave site like Harry S. Truman's own? people can still worship or glorify atrocities and the monsters who perpetrate them in the guise of commemoration HAHAHA
-5
midoritori
I wonder if all the people advocating this vandalism of a sacred temple would feel equally inclined if it was Mao's mausoleum or the tombs of the dynamic duo of N. Korea, Kim Il-sung and his recently deceased progeny Kim Jong-il? Unlike Japan, the governments of these respective leaders treat them as demi-gods in the pantheon of heroes instead of the brutal, deranged mass murderers they are. It seems some of the readers are very selective in their vilification of "evil monster" burial sites.
0
Patrick Hattman
The U.S. should've dismantled the place during the Occupation. There should have been a separate memorial built to honor war dead from the Meiji Restoration onwards, just like there is a place for the unidentified war remains at Chidorgafuchi.
Since Yasukuni Shrine remains-and there more than 1,000 war criminals enshrined years after the Occupation ended- Japan and its neighbors will always have trouble getting along. I see no resolution remotely acceptable to all parties.
-2
Michael Craig
Today, arson.
Tomorow, terrorising the shrine priestesses!
6
Wolfpack
It is absurd to set fire or in any way attempt to damage any part of the Yasukuni Shrine. However, it is easy to understand the reason for someone to do so.
There has always been a strain of nationalism among Japanese present even after the war that I think is quite different from say the Germans or Italians. However, it has mostly been overwhelmed by a sense that the past should be left in the past. I have seen this in that just about every Japanese person that I have gotten to know well. Most have a certain defensiveness about the war but also an inclination to paint Japan as a victim as well. This inward looking attitude infuriates people from other countries that were the recipients of so much brutality from the Japanese.
I did a bit of research and found that it wasn't until decades after the war, in January 1969, the Japanese government and representatives from the shrine established that the 14 Class A war criminals (including Tojo) and more than 1,000 other prisoners convicted of war crimes after the war, would be eligible for inclusion in a registry of persons considered 'on duty' during the war. This listing is a necessary requirement for diefication in the Yasukuni Shrine. In October of 1978, those convicted of Class A war crimes were enshrined. The Japanese government and leaders from the shrine did something very provocative and completely unnecessary; basically sticking their fingers in the eyes of their Asian neighbors and every country they went to war with 30 years earlier.
Unfortunately for Japanese today, they cannot avoid the repercussions of the actions of their nation in the first half of the 20th century. They could do a lot of good by removing the war criminals from the Yasukuni Shrine. Doing so would be an exceptionally humble act and would turn a very negative situation into something actually positive for the nation.
0
yourock
@ midoritori, not really. the story is only about Yasukuni, not Mao or the Kim's. Write about them and you'll receive the same response. IMHO.
3
melonbarmonster
Have any of you actually BEEN TO THE SHRINE??? It's not just a place of honoring vets. It's basically run by rabid neo-imperialist types and the place basically glorifies Japanese war atrocities and imperialism. It's like Germany having a chapel to honor Hitler and Nazis where propaganda from that era is repackaged and glorified.
-7
Walkimio
My Regards from Germany to all those japanese humans are do stay 100% japanese in their mind as solid as a rock. This nighttime- backbiter comes in a weakheart-style, like a dog and piss the shrine. This shows one time more the basic thruths: A lot of enemy means to have a lot of honour. We germans should recieve a lesson from this upright japanese brothers in mind!
4
zichi
The bones of the dead war criminals can't be removed because firstly all the bones are mixed together and also under Shinto rules once interned they can't be removed. The emperor was opposed to the internment of the remains of the war criminals and in fact does not visit the shrine.
-4
catiano
Japanese common sense (majority of their opinions) will go this way:
"Don't stir up the problem, man. Who cares those dead guys? I don't even care for the war crimminals of some generations ago. You are disturbing the harmony ("wa"). You are anti-social, you keep on saying that sh*t. Just leave it. Even if you don't like that shrine, some others like that. Don't disrespect what others respect. Don't think you are always saying a right thing. Everybody has a different perception on that. You should stop being narrow-minded."
What would you say to this?
-1
nigelboy
For the upteenth time, there are no bones or ashes inside Yasukuni.
-4
nigelboy
Good for you except for the fact that 1,000 other convicted war criminals were enshrined in 1959 and nobody including China and Korea who are most vocal never questioned the enshrinement nor opposed PM visiting the shrine for over three decades. Secondly, the inclusion of the 1,000 or so war criminals to the "war dead" was done because of public petition during the late 50's. For such "very provocative" actions, one wonders why there were no protests or outrage from these so-called "Asian neighbors" during that time.
-1
melonbarmonster
1959 Japan didn't have diplomatic relations with their neighbors bc of a small little thing called WWII and Korean War. LOL. Ridiculous bizaro reasoning continues...
-2
nigelboy
???? You mean to tell me that 1965 Treaty with Korea and 1972 Joint Communique "just happened" out of thin air without any diplomatic correspondences before??
0
nigelboy
And another thing.
Since the issuance of Joint Communique up to August of 1985, there have been 32 Yasukuni vists by PM's.
-4
hialeahtom
It makes a good target. Wait until Germany build a shrine for all those Nazi deaths with name Hitler at the top.
-1
LH10
what?! i'd like to set their house on fire!
-2
YuriOtani
zichi, of course their remains are not at the shrine. The ashes were dumped in Tokyo Bay. What they do is protected under our constitution and while it is not my belief, they should be respected.
-3
melonbarmonster
You were talking about 1959 and the 65 Treaty is known as the "Normalization Treaty". They needed it bc Japan didn't have diplomatic relations with its neighbors. LOL. History is funny like that.
Moderator
Back on topic please. Posts that do not refer to the arson attack will be removed.
1
melonbarmonster
It's a travesty to humanity for this thing to exist in the first place. No the japanese emperor isn't a kami. JApanese are not a divine race. ANd no it's not heroic to murder, rape and commit war atrocities against your neighboring countries. And no there's no honor in lying about out of shame."
0
Mirai Hayashi
I see nothing wrong with Japan honoring their fallen soldiers; every country does it. But the 14 war criminals should be put somewhere else IMO.
-1
melonbarmonster
There is nothing wrong with dead soldiers. Yasukuni is not it. It's a shrine for glorifying a fascist imperialism while whitewashing war crimes. And yes there is a difference. See Exhibit A: post WWII Germany.
-4
Mirai Hayashi
@melonbarmonster
The US has thousands of cemeteries and memorials for fallen soldiers, and I am sure that many of them have committed murder and rape. The thing is, we should be crucifying the people who gave their lives to doing what they perceived as being right at the time (no matter how wrong it really was) The real monster were the people who declared the war in the war in the first place, not the people fighting in it.
In other words, the soldiers only did what they thought was right for their country and shouldn't be condemned for it. The real monster was the Emperor, and we continue to honor his legacy and family, which IMO is questionable.
0
melonbarmonster
Which is why I said there's a way to honor dead soldiers and that Yasukuni is not how you do it. Americans honor dead Civil War soldiers WITHOUT glorifying slavery and racist ideologies from that era. Germany honors its role in WWII WITHOUT glorifying Nazism and Hitler. Japan hasn't figured out how to do this.
2
villagehiker
There is no big problem with Japan honoring its war dead—even the war criminals. Even if the war criminals were wrong, they were Japanese humans and should be treated with the respect they may have failed to give others. If Deity wishes to reject them, fine, but that is hardly our job description as humans. Rejecting people as inferior was one of the causes of the Pacific War. Repeating this prideful mistake helps no one.
-2
Michael Craig
Whoever torched that gate...deserves a medal!
2
It"S ME
Not a fan of the Yasukuni Shrine, but Japan does guarantee freedom of "Religion" and "Speech" as well as "Separation of Church & State".
Yasukuni is a privately owned and administered Shrine as are all other Temples, Shrines, Mosques and Churches here.
-1
yosun
Those ghosts live inside came to torch te gate, just for fun?
1
WilliB
Not much of an "arson attack" imho, just a drunk with a lighter.
-1
melonbarmonster
@villagebioker. Yes it is 'inferior' to think that raping, murdering and committing war atrocities is a good way to behave.
0
sf2k
all this presupposes that Japan for some reason can control spirits. Just open up another shrine without homage to class A war criminals then people will no longer think that Japanese worship class A war criminals. This is not difficult.
0
It"S ME
sf2k.
The goverment has NO/zero/zilch/nada control over shrines, etc.
They asked the Yasukuni Shrine many times to remove the names but the Shrine refused. Case closed as far as the goverment has power. Well documented.
0
smithinjapan
"We believe it was arson because our security footage shows somebody spraying liquid on the gate before the fire started,”
Must be quite the security guard(s) they have there -- managed to put out the fire before there was any serious damage, but couldn't lift a finger to stop the person spraying the liquid on the gate (it was seen by someone else, why not the guard?).
Anyway, Yasukuni isn't worth the bother to think about. It's less useful than the small Torii gates placed in places where men liked to urinate in public (so that they would avoid doing so for fear of offending the gods) -- at least those had practical applications; Yasukuni only serves as a symbol of war crimes.
0
GW
Its me,
Separation of church & state................. yeah............but actually no! Whatever govts in power & bunches of the oppposition make regular appearances at this god forsaken plot, some even put on penguin suits. Although most PMs dont go there, except when they aint PM then bunches flock there off & on
While yasukuni isnt part of the state in reality it very much is & thats just another reason for Japans neighbours to get ticked off
1
It"S ME
GW.
Not sure what your point is. But when I look at other countries where churches got lobbying groups trying to control the goverment, etc.
1
Fookleng Liew
Pity it was just a minor burned! Hope one day its was quake down and replaced by toilets!
2
Johannes Weber
@melonbarmonster:
Germany doesn't honour its role in past wars, except a few extremely dumb nationalists. We mourn the dead, yes. There are graves for hundreds of thousands of soldiers whose bodies could not be recovered. We mourn the sacrifices. The cities, which were completely destroyed. The hundreds of thousands of civilians that died. And we put the blame - mostly to ourselves. Of course, You can debate whether the full brutality of war against civilians in cities was necessary - but if You look back at this time, German soldiers were no better in general. The country which suffered most was Russia. They suffered even more (in bare numbers) than the Jews in the Holocaust.
Japan as a society is unwilling to put the blame for the Pacific War to themselves. Even though many wartime atrocities (like the nuclear bombs) were committed by others, the initial, original cause was Japanese aggression. This is a understanding which will still take a few decades of learning until Japan as a society will reach the state of a civilisation capable of self-critical introspection. Yasukuni Jinja stands diametrally opposed to such a change of society.
Even though politics cannot directly tell the priests of Yasukuni Jinja what they have to do, the population could put pressure on them.
-1
GW
its me
OK I will spell it out for you, there is no separation of church & state in Japan, they just pretend there is.
Its the same in a lot of places, like in the US, no presidential hopeful wud have hope in hell(sorry :) ) of getting elected if they werent a church going type & frequented them during elections etc
-3
It"S ME
GW?
Spell it out further as I am hard of hearing and want verifiable proof.
Which religion is the J-government tied to? Shinto, Buddhism, Zen-Buddhism, Christianity?
-1
melonbarmonster
@Weber, tha'ts what I meant. Germany honors its past with deep introspection and reflection with mourning and full admission WITHOUT glorifying Nazism the way Yasukuni celebrates it's war criminal heroes.
-3
Ishiwara
Some clarifications are in order for some mis-informed comments:
In short: the Yasukuni problem is a bit more complex than it looks like at first sight...
2
Patrick Hattman
You can't separate one from the other. The head of the Yushukan is a Yasukuni high priest, is he not? The history as depicted at the Yushukan encompasses the beliefs of those who support and maintain the shrine and the "archive of relics."
It's not for all those who fought in the Boshin War. It was not for those who fought on the side of the Tokugawa against the Emperor. It, therefore, glorifies all who fought for the Emperor, willingly or not, since that time.
Name some specifics, please. If you're talking about the Chinreisha and how it supposedly honors those who fought against the Emperor in the Boshin War, and how it remembers all war dead regardless of nationality, try again.
Not true. There were 1,068 Class B/C war criminals enshrined in 1959, and most people generally overlook them as the focal point of the controversy. Instead, they center their attention on the 14 Class A criminals enshrined in 1978.
5
oginome
Installing the kami of 14 murderers and torturers into the Yasukuni shrine deserves the highest condemnation, Yuri. That shrine is corrupt and foul, a stain on Japan and Shintoism.
1
GW
Ishiwara, looks like Patrick H sunk your battleship!
You cant just select bits & bobs of that awful place you need to look at the whole thing & some of the types who love the place, it very clearly glorifies Japans brutal & savage habits of 1930-45 no question about it, & way too many politicians go there(which means they also have little or no qualms with what Japan did) & then there are the right wing nutjobs......
Also there are many ysukuni enshrined against their wills & they refuse to do anything, how wud you like to be enshrined with hitler, tojo & their ilk...............think about it.
-1
Ishiwara
@Patrick & GW
Interesting points, but do not change the fact that it is not the case that the existence of the shrine as such is controversial. Nobody is calling for its abolition. The main function of the shrine is to console (not "glorify") the spirits of the dead, according to Japanese rituals and sensibilities concerning how to deal with deceased spirits.
The shrine was indeed erected to console the spirits of those who fought against the Tokugawa. But the warriors of Aizu and other domains who fought against the Meiji government also did so in name of the Emperor. (The new Chinreisha was erected to console them as well (not "supposedly"). ) So it honors the all those who died for the country, just as Arlington does in Washington.
Enshrining the class B/C war criminals was not very controversial. Criticism from China and other countries only started after Nakasone's visit in 1985, precisely because of the 14 class A war criminals.
One of Chinreisha's "za" is indeed dedicated to all the war dead regardless of nationality: British, US, Chinese, Korean, South East Asian, and rituals are performed for them. (This has made it controversial for some nationalist priests.)
@ GW. So let's turn it around: you cannot take bits and pieces of the shrine and therefore condemn the place as a whole.
Do you have a solution how Japan can console the dead without controversy?
1
Tyler Vandenberg
A: A war memorial dedicated only to "ordinary" soldiers.
Yasukuni Shrine provides a permanent residence for the spirits of those who have fought on behalf of the Emperor. BUT Emperor Hirohito did not visit Yasukuni from 1978 until his death. His son, Emperor Akihito, has not visited the shrine since becoming emperor.
The "Shrine" also has a monument of Justice Radha Binod Pal (the lone justice on the International Military Tribunal for the Far East's trials of Japanese war crimes to find all the defendants not guilty)............... I mean REALLY!!!! you can't get more blunt then that? Pal's 1,235-page dissent, which Japanese nationalists brandished and began using as the basis of their argument that the Tokyo trials were a sham by selectively choosing passages from his dissent. Even though Pal believed that the Japanese committed atrocities during World War II, his dissenting opinion has been used by Japanese nationalists as evidence that the crimes had never happened
Yasukuni Shrine also operates a museum on the history of Japan- The museum highlights heroic war stories and kamikaze pilots, but does not mention atrocities. The museum depicts Japan as an Asian liberator, provoked into war by European and U.S. officials, who choked the incoming supply of raw materials to the resource-poor nation. Some believe that the museum is unapologetic of Japanese colonialism and nationalism, and is a reminder that Japan has been slow to apologize for wartime atrocities
1
GW
Ishiwara,
As Tyler above & others have pointed out the EMPEROR WONT GO TO yasukuni..................clearly yasukuni is not appropriate for people wanting to go visit their relatives that died from the 1930s onwards.
There is another place Chidorifuji(sorry I think I have butchered the spelling) that seems more appropriate. The sad fact is back early last century yasukuni was hijacked & used to whip the nation into a frenzy, many worshipped there hoping to waltz through Asia & take over by brutal force, millions upon millions died(up to 30mil by some estimates) & many more millions who suffered horribbly at the hands of Japan, yasukuni is simply too tainted to ever fix, it will forever be a symbol of Japans rampage through the far east & Asia, Japan has no say in this, its already established, done, finished.
The more Japan just carries on it will never go away & this is severely affected/ing relations with its neighbours, & Japan just AINT WHAT SHE USED TO BE economically so other nations arent going to give Japan a pass on yasukuni & other issues like it got in the past because business took precedent, we are seeing this happen the last 5yrs or so, it will continue, Japan is going to have to get used to a new reality whether it likes it or not
-2
Blitzpanzer
Pretty sad to see that WW II is still being fought to this day with fire bombing of another's property. Savages and hypocrites.
0
Goals0
Most people commenting here are fairly ignorant of what A Class criminals means.
"Class A" crimes were reserved for those who 'participated in a joint conspiracy to start and wage war' not for those guilty of personally carrying out atrocities - who were the Class B and C criminals.
Here's a newspaper article from 1947 which shows what Joseph Grew (US Ambassador to Japan from 1932-42) thought of three of the above fourteen.
0
BurakuminDes
And who, pray tell, are you referring to as these so called "savages and hypocrites", Blitzpanzer? Do you have some evidence that we don't? Hmm? Or are you just jumping on the convenient blame-a-foreigner bandwagon? You do realise the overwhelming majority of attacks on public institutions in Japan are done by the Japanese, don't you?
-2
nigelboy
Very ambiguous indeed.
The only difference between those buried at Arlington and those enshrined at Yasukuni are that U.S. never had to go through the International Military Tribunal like the ones staged pursuant to London Charters. To say that none of the soldiers buried there are free from crime only goes to show how some people are really clueless on what transpired during these proceedings as well as the war crimes committed in subsequent conflicts.
0
Patrick Hattman
@Ishiwara:
What you're saying makes no sense at all. Those who fought against the Emperor's forces in the Boshin War and supported the Tokugawa by taking up arms for that side were not enshrined in Yasukuni, which is a point of contention to this day. You're using some double-speak to pretend that anyone and everyone supported the Emperor as Japanese, it seems. Go back and review the status of the Emperor during Tokugawa years and you might understand the issue.
As far as the Chinreisha goes, it was not erected til 1965. Strange that it would be 100 years after fact that those who fought on the losing side of the Boshin War would finally get a shrine to remember them. And the "supposedly" in my earlier statement about the facility representing all who've died in war stands. Nobody in foreign lands asked the Japanese to do so and it was not done with complete sincerity, which is why it has had its own security issues and has been closed at times.
If the people enshrined after WWII died simply for the country, then why did Emperor Hirohito refuse to visit after 1975 prior to the installation of the Class A war criminals? And why has his son never made a visit in his official capacity as Emperor?
Arlington was laid out to accomodate the remains of those who died in America's war since the Civil War. It was for THEM, not first and foremost to legitimize a state-sponsored religion and the myth of a divine leader.
Japan did not have diplomatic relations in the 1950s with countries like China and Korea. In the past few decades, many more people in countries that suffered under Japan's aggression in the 20th century to 1945 are aware of the details of who the Class B and C criminals were, what they did, and why they were punished. (If there was little if any controversy about their enshrinement in Yasukuni, why did Japanese leaders wait til after the U.S. Occupation ended?)
The problem is not just the Class A war criminals. It is Yasukuni/Yushukan and what they represent. Your side narrows it down to the Class A war criminals, and looks at the proceedings of the Tokyo Trials, how some aspects were manipulated by Occupation authorities, and a misinterpretation of what Judge Pal of India said in his opinion.
Judge Pal never said Japan was completely innocent in the first few decades of the 20th century-not by a mile. He did not deny Nanking. He did not deny the validity of trials for people in the field, like Class B and C criminals. While he abhorred Western colonialism, he did not support what Japan had done with replacing one colonial master for another, and sometimes with more severe consequences to the people of those places.
And he most certainly did not want the Japanese to free India and remain, just as they tried to do with members of the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. (Strange how Japan was trying to free the Philippines for example, when independence had been promised in 10 years in 1934 by the U.S. I guess Japan had to murder and rape its way through the islands for 4 years and delay all that simply to be a good neighbor.)
After former Prime Minister Koizumi visited Yasukuni as err...a private citizen...on August 15, 2006, I wrote about it for a Japanese newspaper. At the time, the Yasukuni hompage had this in English:
"Japan's dream of building a Greater East Asia was necessitated by history and it was sought after by the countries of Asia."
Millions of your neighbors in Asia disagree.
0
Patrick Hattman
@Ishiwara:
To make it perfectly clear, I support Japan having a place to commemorate its war dead. I believe that the great majority of people who served Japan and made the ultimate sacrifice simply did their duty and should be remembered with honor.
The leaders on the battlefield and the central government who ordered them to do so should not on a case-by-case basis, as with the large number of convicted criminals after the culmination of WWII.
If Yasukuni had been dismantled during the Occupation, as I stated in my first post in this thread, a lot of the problems could've been avoided. It was not and the problems between Japan and its neighbors will not dissipate, let alone disappear, for the foreseeable future.
-3
nigelboy
Patrick.
The question is why?
First and foremost, as Goals0 alluded to, Class A is defined as basically "waging or consipiring to wage an agrressive war". That particular crime in of itself "WAS NOT" interpreted as being the severist of the crime for not a single individual was executed on just being guilty of "Class A" only. Those who were executed also committed Class B.
Secondly, why did it take so long for China to complain until 1985? Since the enshrinement of Class A, a total of four PM's visited Yasukuni 22 times without a single noise.
Thirdly, the 7 Class A that were executed had their remains transferred to 殉国七士廟. Hence, if one was to accuse of anyone of honoring Class A would be a visit there instead of Yasukuni.
Hence, Ishiwara is right in that "Yasukuni problem is a bit more complex than it looks like at first sight" for the recent negative perception is nothing more than a creation by the left wing nuts and China.
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nigelboy
?????
Those who were executed were not considered "war dead" until April of 1952 when the revision of 戦傷病者戦没者遺族等援護法.
1
oginome
These 14 men were torturers and murderers. They conspired, planned and authorised all manner of executions, rapes, murders, tortures, and slave labour that the Japanese Empire was notorious for. Without their approval, the Class B and C war criminals would not have been able to do what they did.To call them anything less than what they are is to insult the memory those who suffered at their hands.
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Patrick Hattman
nigel:
My point about the war criminals is that I see most Japanese overlooking what so many Class B and C criminals did, and why the punishments meted out-including execution-were deemed necessary. Accordingly, continued questions about why they are enshrined in Yasukuni are appropriate.
My complaint over the years that we've discussed these issues is that the Yasukuni "apologists" narrow down the problems that Japan's Asian neighbors have to the inclusion of the Class A gang in 1978. If the Tokyo Trials can be solely interpreted as victor's justice, and admittedly there is some merit for this point as dissenters like Judge Pal pointed out, then it's easier to discount the entire findings of the court, or even view them as a travesty of justice.
And once enshrined, any and all wrong done by those in Yasukuni is absolved. Japan's neighbors that suffered grievously will not let this issue rest.
No diplomatic relations between the two for nearly thirty years after the end of WWII, for starters.
Part of it I would say is the desire of China to stir up anti-Japanese sentiment among the people from time to time to deflect criticism away from the state and onto an easy target, Japan.
China essentially took decades of ODA from Japan starting in the '70s, in lieu of formal war reparations, IIRC. I would say that China did not want to bite one of the hands that fed it during the early years of receiving the money til it became much stronger economically and militarily.
Do you have any other ideas?
I can't agree with this for reasons I've already mentioned, including "once enshrined, any and all wrong done by those in Yasukuni is absolved. Japan's neighbors that suffered grievously will not let this issue rest."
The Emperor Hirohito refused to visit Yasukuni after 1975 due to the inclusion of the Class A criminals in 1978. This was widely reported in some mainstream news sources in Japan several years ago. If he turned his back on Yasukuni for this reason, and his son the current Emperor has followed suit, then what does this ultimately say about what Yasukuni did?
Thanks for clarifying this.
I said I didn't want to get into this issue again when I resumed posting, but I guess I've broken that one.
I'm done and will gladly read any final thoughts from you.
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nigelboy
I don't think they're overlooking this issue at all. They dealt the issue first hand by petitioning the government to revise the aforementioned law as well as passing the 戦争犯罪による受刑者の赦免に関する決議. So what did these B and C criminals who are executed really do from the standpoint that we know very little about their court proceeding or whether or not they received a proper due process. I'll give you an example. Let's say a U.S. soldier was captured by Iraq, Vietnam, or Al Qaida. The soldier was prosecuted for bombing a compound that contained civilian population and espionage and was subsequently executed by the enemy courts despite the fact that the soldier denied those accusations. The body was sent back to U.S. Now, is this fallen soldier a hero? Does he belong in Arlington Cemetary? Poll the Americans and you will get a majority "yes" on both counts. Would the enemy states care how this soldiers is perceived or honored back in U.S.? The answer is NO. That's pretty much is true in all conflicts, IMO. You're a despised criminal to an enemy but a hero to your home country.
Pal is just one example. But when a Class A criminal convict can make a speech at the U.N. General Assemby to a standing ovation, it's basically stating (admitting) that the ex post facto law was a joke to begin with.
One could voice a complaint over to the media, you know. That's how China started hers.
Basically, we're in agreement. The timing of it also has to do with the fact that some left wing Japanese were also vocal about it. If the majority of population was for Yasukuni, China & Korea, would not have the balls to try.
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7solace9
Arson. Interesting approach. Might have been the better by learning from the Emperor Hirohito himself:
2007, The New York Times: "Hirohito quit Yasukuni Shrine visits over concerns about war criminals" http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/26/world/asia/26iht-japan.1.5447598.html
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melonbarmonster
All the specious neo-imperialist reasoning is really unbecoming. Imagine a neo-Nazi museum anywhere in Germany, let alone in the same space as a veteran's memorial... It is not only inconceivable but ILLEGAL. To claim it's not the same legal, financial entity is irrelevant and misses the point. This is really a social disease in Japan. Japan needs to figure out how to honor it's past without denying, whitewashing and even glorifying its historical crimes and atrocities.
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yasukuni
The Yasukuni issue is extremely complex and most people who have an opinion about it don't really know much about it.
My conclusion is that it isn't for foreigners to tell Japanese what to do about it. There are many normal Japanese who have visited Yasukuni to remember the family members or fallen comrades. There reasons they do are many and varied, and also personal.
As to the war criminals, and whether it should make a difference whether A.B or C, and whether those charged as criminals did receive a fair trial is another huge issue.
I don't know enough about Shinto to know how the spirits of the so called War Criminals would be taken out. Be interested to know though in case there's a shinto priest on the boards.
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Ishiwara
@Patrick,
I respect some of your arguments, but it seems you want to have it both ways. You agree the Japanese should have a place to console (which is very different from "worship") their war dead, yet that the Japanese have no right to do that in the way they want.
The US occupation had better demolished Yasukuni? More than one historian has pointed out that while the US occupation was benevolent and successful to a large degree, it was also colonialist. Destroying Yasukuni would it have made even more so. Nevertheless, even McArthur (a colonialist with heavy personal financial stakes in the Phillipines), and who hoped to Christianize Japan, decided not to destroy Yasukuni.
If the Japanese had destroyed it themselves, perhaps that would have been better, but then a way to console the dead would have to be found, including of those B/C criminals,unless they become "onryo" and i am sure some people would have found a problem with that.
Concerning the chinreisha:
It was erected by a priest who sincerely hoped to make Yasukuni into a place symbolic of Japan's postwar commitment to peace. That is my point: Yasukuni is a place of many meanings and potentialities, and you cannot just condemn it as a whole, despite it's state-Shinto origins. It is up to the Japanese to decide where this will be going.
Yasukuni, with its links to the Imperial House, was mostly erected to console the dead. Unlike what many foreigners think, most Japanese think that even while the WWII was largely a mistake, the souls of the dead should still be consoled. The fact that Yasukuni still exists and functions while the Emperor has denounced his divinity is a sign that it is not only "a place to legitimize a myth of a divine leader."
I don't now why you started off about Judge Pal and liberating Asia and so on, since I never mentioned this. you are right that Pal never denied the Japanese committed war crimes, and his legacy is sometimes abused by rightists. Nevertheless, his judgement leaves a large mark on the whole tribunal: the random way in which it was done, the limitation of arguments for the defense (fear for communism was not to be mentioned) the selection of accused, and the fact that all except Pal where representatives of colonial powers makes the trial more than a little ambiguous. One Dutch and one American judge also found the whole thing bizarre. No wonder the Tokyo Tribunal arouses ambiguous feelings in Japan.
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Ishiwara
To add: I certainly don't want to fall into the "they did it too, so we were right to commit crimes" -type of argument, but probably all war cemeteries over the world have many war criminals enshrined.
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Elbuda Mexicano
All wars are evil, killing is evil, so in the end, it don't matter if it is Yasukuni or Arlington Virginia, we humans have to raise our life conditions and move beyond these cycles of hate, violence, war, more hate?? more violence,* more shrines to war heroes??***** Just as many posters commenting here, sure somebody got angry, tries to burn down this shrine, Yasukuni, but it could happen anywhere in the world, why?? In wars, you always have 2 sides, somebody is going to win, somebody is going to loose, somebody is going to go down in history saying, hay look we kicked your sorry asses blah, blah,blah, and the other side will live in shame and with dreams of revenge, and this is why so many Koreans and Chinese want to get revenge against Japan, kind of like the rest of Europe wanting to avenge their humiliations of WW2 against the Nazis, etc..right??
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yasukuni
Elbuda, the Japanese military was brutal beyond description. Yes there are atrocities in all wars, but the suffering caused and directly inflicted by Japan in WW2 against Asians and Westerners was horrendous, and needs to be remembered and learned from - especially by Japanese. Just from memory I could write pages of the war crimes committed in so many different places.
Simply put, yeah the Japanese were worse. They started it, and kept up atrocities right to the end, and even afterwards in the case of some diehards.
From what I understand Christians believe that even a monster should have a decent burial. From what I understand, those who died and are enshrined at Yasukuni are NOW not considered to be criminals.
0
oginome
Not really. Germany enjoys good relations with most countries in Europe. It has atoned and learned from its mistakes and continues to teach and remember the atrocities committed before and during WW2. Unlike Japan.
0
oginome
Not really. Germany enjoys good relations with most countries in Europe. It has atoned and learned from its mistakes and continues to teach and remember the atrocities committed before and during WW2. Unlike Japan.
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