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Saturday, 1 November 2008
Japan’s air force chief faces sack over Second World War comments
The chief of staff of Japan’s air force is to be sacked after he claimed the country had been drawn into the Second World War by the US and denied it had been an aggressor during its occupations of the Asian mainland.
Japan’s air force chief faces sack over Second World War comments
Justin McCurry 31 October 2008
The chief of staff of Japan’s air force is to be sacked after he claimed the country had been drawn into the Second World War by the US and denied it had been an aggressor during its occupations of the Asian mainland.
In an essay entitled “Was Japan an Aggressor Nation?” General Toshio Tamogami claimed that Japan had been provoked by the then US president, Franklin D Roosevelt, and that many of Japan’s wartime victims took “a positive view” of its actions.
The claims, made today in an online essay, drew a swift rebuke from senior politicians.
The defence minister, Yasukazu Hamada, said he would dismiss the general immediately. “I think it is improper of the air force chief of staff to publicly state a view that clearly differs from that of the government,” he told reporters.
“It is inappropriate for him to remain in this position and I will swiftly dismiss him.”
The Prime Minister, Taro Aso, a nationalist who has upset Japan’s neighbours with ill-judged comments about the war, described Tamogami’s views as “inappropriate, even if they were made in a personal capacity”.
In the essay, which is likely to spark outrage in China and South Korea, Tamogami wrote: “Even now there are many people who think that out country’s aggression caused unbearable suffering to the country’s of Asia during the Great East Asia War,” he said.
Japanese nationalists use the term the Great East Asia War to support their view that Japan entered the conflict to free Asian countries from western colonialism.
“But we need to realise that many Asian countries take a positive view of the [war]. It is certainly a false accusation to say that our country was an aggressor.”
Tamogami, who took up the post in March 2007, called for Japan to reclaim its “glorious history”. He said: “A nation that denies its own history is destined to pursue a path of decline.”
He said the Korean peninsula had been “prosperous and safe” under Japan’s 1910-1945 occupation and that Roosevelt had “trapped” Japan into attacking Pearl Harbour in December 1941. He went on to accuse the then US leader of being a puppet of the Comintern, the international communist movement founded in Moscow in 1919.
Tamogami, who did not seek the defence ministry’s permission to submit the essay, also shares the view of many neo-nationalists that the Allied war crimes tribunals - which sent several Japanese leaders to the gallows for war crimes - were a farce.
But it was his description of Japan as victim, rather than aggressor, that made his position untenable.
Japanese leaders, regardless of their personal views, have repeated an official apology to the country’s wartime victims issued by the then prime minister, Tomiichi Murayama, in 1995. Aso, too, has said he will stand by Murayama’s apology.
Though an outspoken critic of China’s military spending, Aso has attempted to continue the thaw in relations between Tokyo and Beijing since taking office in September.
1 comment:
Japan’s air force chief faces sack over Second World War comments
Justin McCurry 31 October 2008
The chief of staff of Japan’s air force is to be sacked after he claimed the country had been drawn into the Second World War by the US and denied it had been an aggressor during its occupations of the Asian mainland.
In an essay entitled “Was Japan an Aggressor Nation?” General Toshio Tamogami claimed that Japan had been provoked by the then US president, Franklin D Roosevelt, and that many of Japan’s wartime victims took “a positive view” of its actions.
The claims, made today in an online essay, drew a swift rebuke from senior politicians.
The defence minister, Yasukazu Hamada, said he would dismiss the general immediately. “I think it is improper of the air force chief of staff to publicly state a view that clearly differs from that of the government,” he told reporters.
“It is inappropriate for him to remain in this position and I will swiftly dismiss him.”
The Prime Minister, Taro Aso, a nationalist who has upset Japan’s neighbours with ill-judged comments about the war, described Tamogami’s views as “inappropriate, even if they were made in a personal capacity”.
In the essay, which is likely to spark outrage in China and South Korea, Tamogami wrote: “Even now there are many people who think that out country’s aggression caused unbearable suffering to the country’s of Asia during the Great East Asia War,” he said.
Japanese nationalists use the term the Great East Asia War to support their view that Japan entered the conflict to free Asian countries from western colonialism.
“But we need to realise that many Asian countries take a positive view of the [war]. It is certainly a false accusation to say that our country was an aggressor.”
Tamogami, who took up the post in March 2007, called for Japan to reclaim its “glorious history”. He said: “A nation that denies its own history is destined to pursue a path of decline.”
He said the Korean peninsula had been “prosperous and safe” under Japan’s 1910-1945 occupation and that Roosevelt had “trapped” Japan into attacking Pearl Harbour in December 1941. He went on to accuse the then US leader of being a puppet of the Comintern, the international communist movement founded in Moscow in 1919.
Tamogami, who did not seek the defence ministry’s permission to submit the essay, also shares the view of many neo-nationalists that the Allied war crimes tribunals - which sent several Japanese leaders to the gallows for war crimes - were a farce.
But it was his description of Japan as victim, rather than aggressor, that made his position untenable.
Japanese leaders, regardless of their personal views, have repeated an official apology to the country’s wartime victims issued by the then prime minister, Tomiichi Murayama, in 1995. Aso, too, has said he will stand by Murayama’s apology.
Though an outspoken critic of China’s military spending, Aso has attempted to continue the thaw in relations between Tokyo and Beijing since taking office in September.
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