Fox' Mike Huckabee to interview Toshio Tamogami

It is way, way too late at night to be up reading this sort of nonsense, so the whole thing could possibly be just a weird dream.

We remember Huckabee as one of the Republican candidates of the last primary season and Tamogami as the fellow who was fired as Japan's Air Force chief of staff for saying what many others---including some of those who had him fired, one suspects---believe: that Japan was not an aggressor during WW2 and that FDR tricked* the apparently naive Japanese government and military of the time into attacking Pearl Harbor.

Tamogami, who will be in New York for a lecture tour, is reportedly going to be interviewed by Huckabee on his TV show at Fox:

Are you just sitting around waiting for the opportunity to hear a lecture and take a booze cruise with a disgraced Japanese general who is notorious for defending Japan's WWII atrocities? Mike Huckabee apparently is...

...The Tamogami scandal and his lecture tour has been extensively covered by the blog Armchair Asia, which points out that while Tamogami's "strident, revisionist views were brushed aside as an aberration in Japan's armed forces ... he remains vocal and a hero to many." From Foreign Policy's The Cable.

Has he written a manga yet? It'd sure help in the US. Bet if ya check some overseas Japan-forums, you'll find some likely candidates for fanhood.

*The FDR trick belief is something not only held by a number of people in Japan. Some in the US hold it too, and there have been a few books written that support that claim. Tamogomi won't have to sell that part to some. Err, I meant Tamogami.

As a board member of The Academy of Outrageous Books, Shunichi Karasawa sees parallels between the controversial essay written by sacked Air Self-Defense Force chief Toshio Tamogami, an apologist for Japan's wartime aggression, and classic "outrageous" conspiracy theories...

Regarding the vocal support for Tamogami's views that is rampant on the Internet, Karasawa pointed to a generation that he claims harbors resentment*....Article at the Japan Times.

I would guess that this resentment will increase rather than decrease. I only hope that those who predict the downfall of the LDP are right, not because Ozawa and the DJP are any great improvement, but because if the DPJ can win and govern well enough to gain support, perhaps it will begin a real 2-party system with choices in the future. But then again, who says that a second party would not turn more rightward and more revisionist and more isolationist than certain factions of the LDP. After all, some DPJ members signed the ad in the Washington Post last year claiming Japanese government innocence in the sex slave business in WW2.

As long as certain extremists keep denying Japan's wrongdoings in the war, criticism will continue. Were they simply to shut up some of the controversies might actually die down. They won't though.

*The younger generation resents criticism of Japan? Damn, what would they do if Japan got half the criticism that the US receives and has received for decades?

(For your mental health, avoid 2ch (2 Channel) and similar places. It can be depressing, alarming, and certainly impacts any impression one has of Japan. Tamogami seems soft compared to some of those folks.)

Keep talkin'

I love it when the loony-birds of the right speak openly and unapologetically of their true beliefs. This will insure that the rest of the world gets the message that some of the kooks who have never accepted that Japan did anything wrong in World War 2 are still around, still in power, and still accepted by many.

Pugnaciously defending his version of Japan's role in a war that killed millions across Asia, Toshio Tamogami, 60, told parliament Tuesday that he does not see "anything wrong with what I wrote." Washington Post.

At least he has the guts to continue to defend what he truly believes, unlike Abe who expressed what he believes then claimed he didn't really say what he meant, or mean what he said, or that what he said didn't mean what it meant. Or whatever he mumbled before he retired because of bowel trouble.

Of course Tamogomi is able to stay in the news and publicize his beliefs and perhaps gain a few new believers or put some doubt about WW2 in the minds of others. Others may have a less kind reaction and take it out on Aso.

Is there something missing here?

Reiji Yoshida and Jun Hongo of the Japan Times take on Gen. Tamogami's view of Japan in Asia during WW2 and interview a few historians to get a more informed, accurate version of what Japan did during the war.

Interestingly, they wrote the following:

Japan's colonial policy, however, was largely aimed to help the economy at home, and Japan later further exploited the colonies' economies to help it continue the fight in China and against the Allies.

In Korea, Japan forced locals to adopt Japanese family names and worship Shinto, while limiting Korean-language education, which all gave rise to strong anti-Japanese sentiment.

Japan in addition inflicted devastating economic damage on China and other parts of Asia in the 1930s and '40s.

Economic damage? Didn't the damage inflicted---especially on China---include a bit more than economic damage? Wasn't there a huge cost in human lives?

Perhaps I'm being too picky by noticing this omission.

General Tamogomi continued

Herbert Bix, the author of Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan (among other things) has posted an article at Japan F0cus concerning the essay that got Tamogomi relieved:

...essay contest sponsored by a large scandal-marred construction and real estate conglomerate, the APA Group, which required contestants to write on “The True Outlook for Modern and Contemporary History.” APA's President is Motoya Toshio, the author of historical works and a key figure in political organizations supporting the Komatsu Air Base in Ishikawa Prefecture (fronting the Sea of Japan). He has strong ties to former Prime Minister Abe Shinzo and other rightist politicians, including Tamogami. [2] As far as is known, superiors in the Defense Ministry's chain of command did not carefully scrutinize Tamogami’s essay. A notorious Nanjing atrocity denier, Professor Watanabe Shoichi, headed the panel of judges that awarded the prize. And the essays were apparently “solicited for the purpose of ‘steering Japan toward a correct understanding of history as an independent nation.’”

Bix then analyzes Tamogami's essay and rightist beliefs (as did Tobias Harris earlier at Observing Japan here here, and here). Bix discusses some of the Western Allies' hypocrisy during the Tokyo Tribunal which gives the right-wing some of their rational for dismissing the war crimes convictions as victor's justice. He also discusses US/Japan alliance and why it may not be so good for Japan's future by its pressuring Japan to rearm (thus playing into the right-wing's hands.):

...But the real problem with the US-Japan security relationship is that it is a poison injected into the arteries of Japan’s political system, continually weakening Japan’s commitment to its constitutional ideals.

A link is provided tin Bix's article for the text of Tamogami's essay in both English and Japanese.

See Japan Focus for the full article.