18: the missing historic view shared with others

Post date: Jun 19, 2016 8:49:58 AM

日本語版

19 June 2016

Let me share a documentary about Thai-Burma railway, made by BBC a few years ago. Like the massacare of Nanking and Comfort Women this is a major scar Japan left at the war. I share this now also because an important parliamental election in Japan is coming soon.

Soon Japan’s army will probably come back to a war in the world again after more than 70 years of absence. Although there have been many discussions about this issue in Japan and elsewhere, the most important discussion is still missing, I think. Even 71 yeras after the war there is no clear historical view of Japan about that war, which is supported by the majority of the Japanese people and which Japanese government always respects. Instead there are always many different conflicting views but not a single shared and approved view. Without that how can Japan discuss and make a plan for a new war? 

Ideally this historical view in Japan should be supported by the rest of the world especially the neghboring countries. For example about the holocaust one view is shared by Germany France, the rest of Europe, and the rest of the world. If there comes such a shared view about the war of Japan, Japan and ohter countries can finaaly put an end to the endless dispute about that history. That is why Germany is trusted by the world, and no country worrys about what Germany would do int he future. But in Japan there are always conflicting views. Then the rest of the world cannot stop wondering if they can really trust Japan, and worrying about what Japan would do in the future. At this moment US is the only country which trust Japan and which welcomes the changes Abe made to join their war. Probably Abe discussed with them and received instructions from them behind the doors. That is not the way to peace, but a conspiracy at a back alley.

Abe’s goverments will be remembered in history with the Japan’s come-back to wars. His party and coalitiona partner have 2/3 of the seats in the Diet. If they will win the coming Upper House election and occupy more than the 2/3 of the seats, they will start the process of changing the constitution for this agenda, But before the election they talk only about economy but nothing about the constitution.

When this issue was debated in the Japanese Diet last year, there were huge demonstrations also in front of the parliament. The reasn for the protest was that this policy was against the article 9 of the constitution. But I hardly heard about the war itself and why this constitution was made after that war.

But in August there are many artucles about the war on the Japanese media: A-bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the battle of Okinawa, Kamikazes, lack of food back then, etc. I hardly hear about the suffering of others.

In this context this BBC documentary is very useful. Fairly and equally they laid out interviews of ex-soldiers of both Japan and alled force. Off course Japanese documentaries also cover the outsiders view, but they select only comfortble ones for the maker and showed them as the main voice outside Japan in my view. I strongly hope that based on such fair materials Japanese people will find the missing historical view about that war, which will be respected by their government and the neighboring countries, and that they will start the discussion about peace and war in the future based on that shared view. (It is pity that in the BBC documentary there were no interviews of Dutch and Australian POWs and other Asian romusha's from Thailand, Indonesia, and other Asian countries. If they incorporate these, it would supported and shared by more people in Asia and the world.) 

Japan has a simlar problem elsewhere as well, for example the restart of other nuclear plants after Fukushima disaster. The accident of the Fukushima Dai-ichi plat is not yet settled, not in the coming decades. There is still no official explanation about the accident and its causes, which the majority of the people would approve, and nobody was brought to justice about it. In spite of that the government decided to restart some of other nuclear plants. Then the most of the people in Japan and the world cannot stop worring about it.

After major disasters in history human society sometimes stepped up the moral level to overcome them. That made more important history than the disaters themselves. Japan needs to do that, too. 

Perhaps many other countries, too. Does you country or group has such a clear historic views on wars, colonies, or slavery, which is shared and supported by other countries and group?