Initial Post-Surrender Policy for Japan

 

Part 1: Ultimate Objectives

 

The ultimate objectives of the United States in regard to Japan, to which policies in the initial period must conform, are:

 

(a) To insure that Japan will not again become a menace to the United States or to the peace and security of the world.

 

(b) To bring about the eventual establishment of a peaceful and responsible government which will respect the rights of other states and will support the objectives of the United States as reflected in the ideals and principles of the Charter of the United Nations. The United States desires that this government should conform as closely as may be to principles of democratic self-government but it is not the responsibility of the Allied Powers to impose upon Japan any form of government not supported by the freely expressed will of the people.

 

These objectives will be achieved by the following principal means:

 

(a) Japan's sovereignty will be limited to the islands of Honshu, Hokkaido, Kyushu, Shikoku and such minor outlying islands as may be determined, in accordance with the Cairo Declaration and other agreements to which the United States is or may be a party.

 

(b) Japan will be completely disarmed and demilitarized. The authority of the militarists and the influence of militarism will be totally eliminated from her political, economic, and social life. Institutions expressive of the spirit of militarism and aggression will be vigorously suppressed.

 

(c) The Japanese people shall be encouraged to develop a desire for individual liberties and respect for fundamental human rights, particularly the freedoms of religion, assembly, speech, and the press. They shall also be encouraged to form democratic and representative organizations.

 

(d) The Japanese people shall be afforded opportunity to develop for themselves an economy which will permit the peacetime requirements of the population to be met.

 

So, the above objectives must be rooted in some analysis or set of assumptions about what caused Japan to go to war. In Chapter 2, Kingston has a brief section on "What went wrong?" (pp. 9-10) where various theories are discussed. Of course, this is an enormously huge and complicated question, not something easily reducible to a few words or key phrases.

But "Demilitarization" and "Democratization" were clearly two key aims: strip Japan of its military capacity and remake the land-holding system, the political system, and the educational system in order to root out economic inequities, obstacles to political participation and the diffusion points for right-wing ideologies and emperor worship. To that end, individual liberties and fundamental human rights were to be recognized and supported particularly in the form of the freedoms of religion, assembly, speech, and the press. Behind all this was the assumption that the Japanese people themselves were not at fault, but the political and economic system had failed them and they had easily been misled by bad (military) leaders who had enabled the educational system to indoctrinate youth with misguided ideas about the emperor's divinity, his sacred mission to control East Asia, and the need for absolute loyalty and obedience to the monarch.

By the way, if you are interested in the more recent attempt in Iraq to eliminate an autocratioc dictator and replace him with a functional, operative constitutional monarchy, please see the recent comparisons of the the Occuptation of Japan experience and whether the experience with Japan could actually serve as a model. Iraq.

For better or worse, a decision was made not to charge Emperor Hirohito or hold him responsbile for Japan embarking on a war that ravaged China and part of Asia. This is something we will be discussing later with the article by Herbert Bix but if you are interested, here is an article on the subject.

 

 

Here are some prewar Theories of Democracy and how it might survive within the Imperial System:


1. Yoshino Sakuzô (1878-1933) Tôdai Professor of Politics, Liberal Internationalist, but not a Socialist or Marxist


a. minshu shugi 民主主義　term for "democracy" or "popular soverignty" but irrelevant to Japan since sovereignty resides in the emperor


b. minpon shugi 民本主義 Yoshino' s kind of clever term for democracy--makes people the "basic concern" (fundamental) of government. So if it's not "Governtment OF the People" or "BY the People," it could be "Government FOR the People"


c. urged limitation of non-constitutional entities like Privy Council, Army, etc.

d. supported labor movement and unions; founded The New Person Society (新人会) which became a pretty radical, Marxist tinged student group 

e. he criticized Japan's treatment of Korea which becane a colony in 1910.


2. Minobe Tatsukichi (1873-1948) Tôdai Law


a. tennô kikan setsu or "Organ Theory" 

Minobe Tatsukichi (law professor): author of the "organ theory" regarding emperor. His argument in legal theory calls into qestion the idea of absolute sovereignty, i.e., that the emperor was, in effect, above the law because of his divine origins and his status as a "sacred and inviolable" ruler. But, according to Minobe, if the emperor is mentioned in the constitution and other legal documents then, he is, by definition, a part of the legal discourse and therefore not above it. Rather, his role has been defined and therefore "limited" under the law. This theory was not controversial when it first appeared in 1921 or so but by 1935 popular criticism of Minobe intensified. The right wing castigated him for daring to "insult" the sacred and inviolable nature of the monarch and maneuvered to get him fired from his positions at the Faculty of Law of Tokyo Imperial University and even stripped him of his seat in the House of Peers.


i. sovereignty belongs to the state
ii. emperor is highest organ of state


b. So by 1935 Minobe was attacked for lese majesty, his writings were banned; right wing thugs broke into his home in 1936 and attempted his assassination.

c. No doubt, things turned very bad in the 1930s but for the decades leading up to the 1920s, there were strong currents of popular resistance to all of the curtailments of individual freedoms during the prewar period.

 

3. NO REGRETS

Since we are watching Kurosawa Akira's first postwar film, No Regrets for our Youth (1946), we should note the film's referencing of a real historical incident, the "Kyoto University Incident." In general terms, in 1933, Yukitoki Takigawa, a Professor of Law School in Kyoto Imperial University, was accused of spreading Marxist ideas through his lecture, "Leo Tolstoy's view on criminal law through 'Resurrection'." The Ministry of Education, headed by Ichiro Hatoyama, ordered the University to expel Takigawa. The board of University Professors refused it at first, but the pressure from the military-political machine was so immense that they finally gave in.

Students expressed their opposition and launched protests as well, but to no avail. This was a forerunner of another incident of academic purge as described in #2 above. that occurred two years later, also resulting in expulsion of a Law School professor, this time a Professor at Tokyo Imperial University, Tatsukichi Minobe. 

As noted above, Minobe was famous for his "Organ Theory" of the Meiji Constituion which held that since the monarch, the Emperor, was specifically mentioned in the document, he was like any other legal entity referred to in said document making him just one of several "Organs" of state that are described in and therefore delimited by the Constitution. This view was contrary to the Right Wing's insistence that the Emperor was "Sacred and Inviolable" and a transcendant authority figure, hence above the law.

Oddly enough, Minobe's "Organ Theory" was considered completely the norm and taught in all Japanese law schools until the mid-1930s when more extreme rightwingers and military leaders questioned Minobe's loyalty and patriotism and stripped him of his post and his seat in the Upper House.

Takigawa, who was not a Marxist in any sense, was clearly a scapegoat of political climate at the time. There were factions of extreme right wing thinkers and activists, rallying with military and conservative politicians during thirties. These fanatic activists exploited public fear against Communism to frame whoever they thought "too liberal." The torch bearer of this ultra right wing movement was Muneki Minoda, who initiated the waves of accusations against both Takigawa and Minobe. 


The character of Professor Yagihara (played by Denjirô Okochi) is loosely based on Takigawa, who regained his professorship in 1946 under Allied Forces' direction. Another event of significance is not depicted in the film. Muneki Minoda, the fanatic activist, committed suicide in his birthplace earlier that year. In fact, activists and other political figures who were responsible for Yagihara's expulsion were never visible in the film. The presence of such political machines is only vaguely suggested through the Prosecutor Itokawa (Akitake Kono) and the detective of Tokko (Japanese version of Gestapo), Hebiichigo (Takashi Shimura).


There is also a second real Historical Event in this film which weaves its away into the story. This would be the Sorge Ring Incident, and specifically espionage committed by Hotsumi Ozaki. The character of Noge (Susumu Fujita) is vaguely reminiscent of Ozaki, but the real-life spy had never revealed his activities even to his wife. Ozaki had no connection with Professor Takigawa or his family. In the film, the fictional relationship provides the tense backdrop for the story of Yukie (Setsuko Hara). When Ozaki was imprisoned and charged with espionage, he wrote very poignant letters to his wife which were later published and the book became a best-seller. He comes off as a sincere person who was kind and considerate husband to his wife and deciated father to his family.

So, taken together, these are a few signs that there were significant trends in prewar Japan that are encouraging and positive. You might remember how in the documentary "Reinventing Japan," Milton Esman, when speaking about the creation of the Postwar Constitution, noted that "The Democratic Ideas were not something we brought to Japan. The democratic ideas were there and many paid very heavily for espousing them." These are just a very few examples but we can survey also what the climate of prewar politicd was like. There were definitely limitations on the possibilites for individual rights and freedoms, but it is worthwhile to note that there were people who worked hard to secure and protect such rights.

Here is a sketch of the prewar political atmosphere and its paramaters.

Also, we can modify some of these main views with a more nuanced interpretation:

Consider Harvard Professor of Japanese History Andrew Gordon's notion of "Imperial Democracy," from his 1991 book Labor and Imperial Democracy in Prewar Japan


1. As he sees it, the "Imperial Democratic Movement" has its roots in the PRM--the Popular Rights Movement = jiyu-minken undô. The PRM fell apart under the pressure of intense government suppression, on the one hand, and the split that occurred within the Movement dividing the ex-samurai and landed elite or gentry who founded the movement v. the poor farmers on the other side1 who later joined them in search of a voice and solutions to their problems.

In Gordon's framework, then, "Imperial" modifies Democracy and thereby qualifies it or limits it. But within the limitations given, established by the "Imperial" framework--the Oligarchs, The Constitution, the Imperial Rescript on Education, the limited scope for Political Parties, the harsh press laws, and for basic "Natural" or Human/Civil Rights--- Gordon can argue that quite a bit more took place within this limited "Imperial" framework than many might have us believe.
So, when the Imperial Democratic Movement surfaces in the early 1900s, it contained some of the same forces that drove the PRM in that it called for


--expanded suffrage
--tax reduction
--respect for the electorate as represented in the Diet


But we still have to call this movement "limited" or "Imperial Democratic," however, because it addresses several constricting realities of the late Meiji political order = i.e.,


--the oligarchs; and
--the emperor centered constitutional order they created
-- the bureaucrats, the heads of the Ministries and Agencies
--including lots of "extra-constitutional" historical actors like 

--the imperial household minister, 
--the grand chamberlain, 
--the chief aide de camp, and 
--the Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal
-- along with other leaders of the executive branch,


--and, of course, things like, the Imperial Rescript on Education of 1890, 
--the power of Home Ministry, with their control over Prefectural Governors, the Police, Shinto Shrines, 
--the passage of the Peace Preservation Law 1925
--all the rhetoric about Emperor, the Kokutai and Japan's "uniqueness," etc., etc. 
--In other words, forces not that amenable to an open society and a participatory political system

 

The inauguration of electoral politics in the 1890s, though, did create several new institutions and political behaviors:


--the press--> and a new educated, avid reading public---> mass circulation for papers and magazines
--the political parties
--political rallies--hundreds held in Tokyo
--public speeches
--speaking tours
--later, political Demonstrations
--emerging new bourgeoise, salarymen class
--emerging class of wage laborers;

Yokoyama Gennosuke published his "reportage" on slums and the working and living conditions among the poor in the mid-1890s.

His essays and research got people thinking about and using the term "Social Problems" or shakai-mondai (社会問題)


So, according to Gordon, we need to lengthen out our view of Taishô Period so that we don't limit it to 1912-1926, or to the 1918-23 stretch as historian Henry Smith is prone to do; rather, we should go back to 1905 and extend it all the way up to 1932. That is when the last civilian, political party PM, Inukai Tsuyoshi, was assassinated in office.

So, we need to widen and deepen our gaze. 
If we do this, then we would see the following historical currents

The Diet emerging as a central fixture in political order

The Seiyukai emerging as major party

2nd, anti-Seiyukai force, the Doshikai/Kenseikai/Minseitô emerging as counterweight to the Oligarchs and the Bureaucracy

A vigorous partisan press

Frequent political rallies and demonstrations--sometimes evolving into Riots 

e.g., Hibiya Park1905, 1906, 1908, 1913, 1914, 1918 (Rice Riots) 

which indicates that the popular masses WILL become more involved

people begin to become aware of, and to write and speak about "Social Problems" (shakai mondai) Working and Housing conditions, the emergence of aurban poor, existence of slums, etc. Remember, Taoka Reiun was also seeing this as early as 1895

a sustained effort inside and outside the Diet to expand the Suffrage resulting in the Universal Manhood Suffrage finally achieved in 1925

the appearance of Proletarian political parties thereafter 

the Rise of Industrial Capitalism which produced a growing class of wage laborers and

also, an urban petty-bourgeosie--retail shop owners, small manufacturers

a definite middle-class of salarymen, typists, telephone operators, clerks, etc. 

a strong Feminist tradition emerges as we shall see in Changing Lives

--Hiratsuka Raichô, Seitô (1911), 

--Ichikawa Fusae--organizer and activist--along with Oku Mumeo formed the Shinfujinkai, the New Women's Association (NWA).

Given the limited political options, this "Imperial Democratic" framework, women's suffrage was NOT really an option; so, they lobbied for what they could get:

Concerns for working women, and their desire for economic independence and personal freedoms

Repeal of Article 5 of the Police Safety Regulations that prevented women from joining political parties or giving speeches at political meetings; Succeeded in 1922!

1921 several Progressive/Radical Women formed the Sekirankai--The Red Wave Soceity--and brought a (red!) banner to the first May Day Demo

Hosoi Wakizô publishes his best-selling  Joko aishi or the Sad History of Female Textile Workers in 1925

Ryosai-ken'bo (good wife, wise mother) ideology fails to persuade many women--they want something more! 

Many new journals emerged that were aimed at women and working women like Shufu no Tomo (Housewife's Friend) Fujin Kurabu (Women's Club) and Fujin Kôron

New occupations for women also appeared: telephone operators, department store clerks, office clerks, tram conductresses, cafe waitresses, elevator operators, etc.

Liberal, democratic and socialist thought flourished -- The Communist Manifesto is translated into Japanese

Labor movement emerges as a force for social change as unions and strikes grew so the WORKING CLASS is clearly engaged in this new political order

"Our enemy is is the capitalist" 

"Destroy the Zaibatsu!"--See the tables in McClain on pp. 370 and 372

An underground (illegal) Japan Communist Party formed 1922

Voices on the Left are more ubiquitous like,

Kawakami Hajime whose Bimbô monogatari, or Tales of Poverty (1918), wrestled in simple language with the basics of global economics and the problem of poverty in modern times

Osugi Sakae--philosopher, Marxist, anarchist

Sakai Toshihiko--translator, editor, activist; translates Communist Manifesto into Japanese and helps found the JCP--Japan Communist Party

Nakano Shigeharu--poet, critic, Marxist - see the chapter on Sata Ineko!

So there was this broad-based, profound movement for change occurring during the1905-1932 period, and

This "movement" evolved between 1905-1932 was neither as narrow and shallow, nor as short-lived, as Smith would have us believe.

Another View:

Miriam Silverberg writes in her book, Erotic, Grotesque Nonsense, about "consumer-subjects" who were simultaneously imperial subjects but with agency within the mass culture; 

She therefore looks to

the streets, the cafes, the movie theaters, the working class alleyways, the MoGa and MoBo, the modern playgrounds; 

She employs the film device of "montage" to portray Japanese modern mass culture.

 

Recalling Commentator Ian Buruma's words, it is not surprising that the Oligarchs would try their hardest to limit the freedoms to assemble, write, speak out and participate under the Meiji Consitutional order; but what is surprising is that so many people from so many diffeerent directions challenged this framework. 

 

 

Consider, for example, how a new atmosphere was growing:

 

 


Shinjinkai (New Man Society) established by Professor Yoshino at Tokyo University 

Grew into a significant leftwing oriented organization on campuses throughout Japan

 

Marxism in the 1920s was elevated to part of the Discourse

 

Yamakawa Hitoshi, leads first JCP 1921

+ with Yamakawa Kikue his spouse

an economist, a feminist and social critic in her own right 

both very influential

 And

Kawakami Hajime, Kyoto Professor of Economics 

author, Tales of Poverty (Bimbo monogatari) - serialized in a

Newspaper and very widely read

 

 

  

Watanabe Masanosuke + Tanno Setsu----------------> joined JCP 1922 

Watanabe was born the son of a tatami maker, only graduated elementary school, 

worked in a celluloid factory in Kameido, became leader JCP Central Committee 

married Tanno Setsu 

but had to flee Japan during Mass Arrests of Leftists in March 15, 1928

Fukumoto Kazuo, economist, 

replaced Yamakawa Hitoshi for a while as the leading theorist of JCP 

 

Sekirankai a Socialist Women's Organization (Red Wave Society) May Day 1921

 

Osugi Sakae and feminist leader Ito Noe were brutally murdered by police captain in aftermath of the Great Kanto Earthquake, 1923

 

Universal Manhood Suffrage Passed expanding the Electorate 4-fold

but so too was Peace Preservation Law 1925 which made

criticizing the existing regime/order very difficult

(See Loftus, The Turn Against the Modern, 194)

 

 

What about holding the Emperor accountable for his role and enabling the military expansionism and the war effort?

As Dower and Herbert Bix show, behind these objectives was a subtle plan--code-named "Operation Blacklist"--designed by MacArthur's friend and subordinate, Brigadier General Bonner F. Fellers, a psychological warfare expert. His aim was to "drive a wedge" between the military and the emperor, and utilize the emperor to bring about "a great spiritual transformation of the Japanese people." (Bix, Hirohito, p. 545) With this in mind, it became essential to establish Hirohito's innocence before the machinery of the war crime trials got up and running, for there were many who thought Hirohito should/would be indicted

For example, although the emperor DID in fact know all about the Pearl Harbor attack in advance and "had personally taken great pains to ensure that the attack would be a surprise,"(Bix, p. 546), MacArthur and his staff worked diligently to see that Hirohito was never held accountable. MacArthur cabled Eisenhower in January of 1946 to say that he could uncover no evidence connecting Hirohito with political decisions and that his connection to the affairs of state was largely ministerial and responsive to the advice of his councillors. He cautioned that the US could ill afford to indict this man for it would convulse the nation and cause it to disintegrate, leading to riots and violence in the streets. A million troops might be needed to keep the Japanese people down, he warned, for years to come.

Ironically, the same kind of scare tactics that convinced people that the US needed to drop the Atomic Bomb on Hiroshima--accompanied by equally inflated figures--are now used to preserve the emperor's position on the throne, and to keep the kokutai in tact. Japanese historians refer to the whole prewar political and economic system as the tenno-sei, or the emperor (centered) system rooted, as it was, in the 1889 Meiji Constitutional order which had produced a functional parliamentary system complete with political parties and elections. It operated like this:

The Meiji Constitution was brief and unspoken about many things which the Genrô (The Senior or 'Elder' Statesmen) who were themselves also unmentioned in the Constitution, leveraged to their advantage with personal ties, loyalties, etc.. These kinds of informal exercises of power were very key.  But succession and transfer of power always remained an issue.  The prewar structure did not create "responsible party cabinets" like in the British model where a loss of confidence motion could cause the PM to dissolve parliament and call for new elections. It is not that this never happened in prewar Japan; it was just never regularized, and nowhere mentioned in the Constituion.

Althought the Constituion did not provide for it, civilian and/or political party rule did establish a foothold in prewar Japan, it was a delicate balancing act. The War and Navy Ministers, and the Chiefs of Staff, had direct access to the Emperor, which gave them a distinct advantage over civilian political leaders. Beginning in 1900 it was required that both Army and Navy Ministers be on active duty which gave Yamagata control over the appointment of the War Minister.  Army and Navy Chiefs of Staff could then bypass the Prime Minister by issuing imperial orders in the name of the emperor. In effect, they could paralyze or bring down a cabinet! 

After the so-called "last Genrô" Yamagata's death, the War Minister and the Chief of General Staff became potential political rivals.  

The Meiji Constitution, then, lacked an institutional mechanism to force civil and military leaders to consider integration of all instruments of national power like finance, production, commerce, and diplomacy.  With the passing of the Oligarchs, though, the War and Army-Navy ministers and Chiefs of staff could act without accountability.  In time, this meant that the military could limit civil interference in military affairs but no one limited military interference in civil affairs. Eventually, civilian authority was overwhelmed by the military. Sad Story. But not a simple one.