Lifting the lid on one of the most influential, and secretive, political organisations in Japan

ABC News:  2 Deecember 2015

80 percent of Japanese Cabinet ministers belong to “Nippon Kaigi” or “Shinto Association”, a nationalistic right wing party.
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Nippon Kaigi, or 'Japan Conference', has an impressive list of members and aims to reshape Japanese politics and policies, and Lateline gains rare access to this secretive and ultra-conservative organisation.


TONY JONES, PRESENTER: It's been described as one of the most influential political organisations in Japan. Nippon Kaigi, or Japan Conference, has an impressive list of members and advisors, including the Prime Minister and much of his cabinet. But very little is known about this right-wing nationalist lobby group which aims to reshape Japanese politics and policies and even change the Constitution. It operates mostly out of the public eye, but North Asia correspondent Matthew Carney gained rare access to file this exclusive story for Lateline.

MATTHEW CARNEY, REPORTER: A call has gone out and people from all over Japan have responded. To hear a vision from one of Japan's most powerful political organisations, the Nippon Kaigi. And it's back to the future. Nippon Kaigi want to restore the status of the Emperor, keep women in the home to nurture family and rebuild the might of the armed forces.
To do that, they have to scrap the pacifist constitution that was imposed by the Americans. This is the first step, they say, to shake off the shame of the defeat in World War II and restore pride.

YOSHIKO SAKURAI, JOURNALIST (voiceover translation): We need to ask ourselves: will the current constitution of Japan protect Japan and its people? The answer is no. We need a constitution that reflects the true Japanese identity.

MATTHEW CARNEY: The biggest champion to the cause and the group's specialist advisor is Prime Minister Shinzo Abe himself.

SHINZO ABE, JAPANESE PRIME MINISTER (voiceover translation): To create a constitution suitable for the 21st Century, that's where it needs to be spread throughout Japan. I seek your continued support on this. Let's move forward towards changing the Constitution.

MATTHEW CARNEY: The Nippon Kaigi has serious clout. The Deputy Prime Minister is also a member, as well as 80 per cent of the cabinet, as are almost half of all parliamentarians. It's a kind of uber lobby group that uses its 38,000 members to mobilise support.
The Nippon Kaigi has pledged to collect 10 million signatures by next April to change the Constitution. Some say it's a cult-like organisation.

KOICHI NAKANO, SOPHIA UNIVERSITY: I think it is, you know, cultish, in the sense that it's very sectarian. They have a very strong view of us and them. They have a sense of the inner group because they feel victimised, marginalised and they have been subjected to severe injustice, that they need to take back Japan.

MATTHEW CARNEY: But their spokesperson says they are only trying to normalise Japan.

AKIRA MOMOCHI, NIPPON KAIGI, STRATEGIC COMMITTEE (voiceover translation): It is proper for an independent sovereign nation to have an army. There are no sovereign nations without one. Armies are deterrents. They exist to prevent war. We'll keep our pacifist traditions, but we need to respond to the rising threat of China.

MATTHEW CARNEY: The fundamental vision for many in the group is to go back to a time when they say Japan was pure and free from foreign influence, like the Edo Period in the 16th to 18th centuries when outsiders were strictly forbidden and Japanese culture flourished. They believe this beautiful Japan has been lost.

HIDEAKI KASE, NIPPON KAIGI, TOKYO BRANCH: There are two Japan. One is traditional Japan and one is Westernised Japan. And we wish to revert to the traditional Japan.

KOICHI NAKANO: They are romantic, they are irrational, they live in their own world. So they lack strategic thinking in terms of what they are going for and for what reason and how does that serve national interest in realistic terms?

MATTHEW CARNEY: The darker side to the organisation is to deny any wrongdoing in Japan's war-time past. They assert World War II was one of defence, not aggression. They say comfort women were not sex slaves, but well-paid prostitutes and the rape and pillage of Nanjing in China that historians say killed up to 200,000 was a fiction.

HIDEAKI KASE: There was no massacre at all. That is an utterly false accusation.

KOICHI NAKANO: They try to rewrite history in order - and they think that this is fundamental to what they see as Japan's need to restore pride. They think that because the kids and the - you know, the adults of Japan are being brainwashed by self-blame and a sense of shame in their history.

MATTHEW CARNEY: Many in Japan think Nippon Kaigi's ideas are dangerous and have to be countered. Professor Setsu Kobayashi is one of the country's top constitutional experts.

SETSU KOBAYASHI, CONSTITUTIONAL EXPERT (voiceover translation): They're thinking about Asia before the war when Japan was the leader of Asia. They want to repeat that. They openly say that.

MATTHEW CARNEY: On his Friday lunchtime radio spot, he warns against reform of the Constitution, arguing it could lead Japan down the warpath. So far, Prime Minister Abe and Nippon Kaigi have succeeded in passing security bills that let the armed forces fight overseas again. Kobayashi says the move is unconstitutional.

SETSU KOBAYASHI (voiceover translation): The majority of people are not convinced. We have to fight and not give up, otherwise we'll live under a dictatorship. Freedom and democracy will not exist.

MATTHEW CARNEY: Professor Kobayashi was once a member of Nippon Kaigi, but is now one of its biggest critics. He tried to change them from the inside, but couldn't. As a self-described commoner, he says the organisation is one of elites, out of touch with the people. Polls consistently show that the majority of Japanese don't want the country's pacifist constitution to change.

SETSU KOBAYASHI (voiceover translation): They want to achieve the dream that Japan pursued pre-war to be one of the top five military powers in the world. To enable this, our country will go around the world fighting wars alongside the Americans. Mr Abe went to the United Nations and said that Japan will seek aggressive peace; militarism is another name.

MATTHEW CARNEY: Professor Kobayashi now devotes much of his time fighting the Nippon Kaigi and the reform of the Constitution. He believes it's a battle for the very hearts and minds of the Japanese and the outcome will decide the country's future. The Nippon Kaigi say their ambition is to simply protect Japan and its identity.

AKIRA MOMOCHI (voiceover translation): It is a difference of opinion. We want to retain the Japanese traditions, to make Japan as it should be. We have the power to do it.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-12-02/nippon-kaigi-and-the-rise-of-nationalism-in-japan/6994560

Religious agency conducts signature drive misleading public into supporting abolition of pacifist Article 9

Japan Press Weekly: 10 January 2016

It has come to light that a religious corporation, the Tokyo Shrine Agency, during the New Year’s holiday period collected signatures from shrine visitors in support of constitutional revision while concealing its true aim of abolishing the war-renouncing Article 9 of the Constitution.

Seeking to defeat the pacifist, democratic Constitution, a signature-collection campaign has been carried out by a major constitutional revisionists’ group, many of whose members belong to the rightist Japan Conference (Nippon Kaigi), with the aim of gathering 10 million signatures. The group in its petition provided its goal in detail: recognizing the Japanese Self-Defense Forces in Article 9, inserting an emergency provision into the Constitution, and relaxing requirements for constitutional revision under Article 96.

The shrine agency, which has close ties with the Nippon Kaigi, in its signatures drive used its own petition which only calls for revising “contents of the Constitution”. The agency supposedly tried to mislead shrine visitors into supporting constitutional revision in general terms by hiding the truth that it shares the same goal as the revisionists’ group of undermining of Article 9.

In response to an Akahata inquiry, a public relations official of the agency took a so-what attitude and said that the agency only cooperated with the national association of shrines.

http://www.japan-press.co.jp/modules/news/index.php?id=8858

Don’t weaken civilian control of SDF

The Japan Times: 26 February 2016
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This is a matter of concern because I observe some ex uniformed SDF officers are demagogues like Donald Trump.  (Please refer to the related post of the same day :  Tamogami's World: Japan's Top Soldier Reignites Conflict Over the Past )
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It has been reported that the Self-Defense Forces’ Joint Staff Office is demanding that civilian officials in the Defense Ministry’s internal bureaus delegate to it a significant portion of their power over deciding the SDF’s highest-level operation plan. If this were to take place, uniformed SDF officers’ power could become lopsidedly big, undermining a key layer of civilian control of the SDF’s operations.

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The Abe administration cannot be too careful in handling the demand by the Joint Staff Office, which is dominated by uniformed officers. The administration has already amended a Defense Ministry law to abolish the organizational supremacy of civilian defense officials over uniformed officers. The call by the Joint Staff Office, if accepted, carries the risk of significantly weakening the check of SDF officers by civilians, giving the former the upper hand in making decisions on the SDF’s operations.
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What’s at stake is the basic plan for SDF operations — which is classified under the state secrets law. The plan covers the coming five years, and undergoes a major revision in its third year but is also fine-tuned annually. The daily missions of the three branches of the SDF are carried out based on the basic plan. The Joint Staff Office takes into consideration the latest security situation surrounding Japan in operating the units of the SDF’s three branches.
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The next basic plan will have added significance because it will reflect the new guidelines on Japan-U.S. defense cooperation, which were updated by Tokyo and Washington last April, as well as the Abe administration’s security legislation enacted last year. The guidelines have removed the effective geographical boundaries of Japan’s logistic support for the U.S. military imposed under the 1997 guidelines, potentially expanding the scope of the SDF’s joint operations with American forces on a global scale. Under the security legislation, Japan can now take part in joint military actions with its allies in contingencies outside its territory and operate as called for by the guidelines, among other things. Given the nature of the SDF’s new basic plan, it should be worked out with the input of a wide range of views and opinions, and civilian officials in the internal bureaus should play an important role. To significantly reduce their power will risk adopting a plan from a narrow viewpoint that excludes relevant nonmilitary considerations.
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The revision of the law for the establishment of the Defense Ministry last June abolished the long-standing rule that required high-ranking civilian officials to assist the defense minister from a position superior to uniformed SDF officers, and the internal bureaus to which these civilian officials belonged, the Joint Staff Office and the staff office of each branch of the SDF have come to assist the defense minister as equals. As part of the change, the Bureau of Operational Policy, which was part of the internal bureaus and drafted basic policy, was abolished and its task was divided between the Joint Staff Office and the Defense Policy Bureau
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As a result, the Joint Staff Office, in place of civilian officials, came to have the sole power to devise operational plans of the maritime, air and ground branches of the SDF, and command and carry out the operations. But civilian officials still keep part of the power to develop the basic plan because they work out the defense minister’s instructions — on the basis of which the operational plans of the SDF’s three branches are crafted — and to ask the minister for approval for the operational plans. The Joint Staff Office is reportedly demanding that these powers still retained by civilian officials be delegated to it.
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Civilian officials in the Defense Ministry are said to be resisting the demand on the grounds that planning the SDF’s operations and commanding its day-to-day operations are different in nature and that the internal bureaus, which are dominated by civilian officials, legally have the function of general coordination in matters related to the SDF. They point out that the Defense Ministry law stipulates that the internal bureaus take charge of basic matters and coordination related to defense and surveillance as well as of the basic administrative matters concerning SDF actions.
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Chief of Staff Adm. Katsutoshi Kawano has this explanation: The Joint Staff Office is just seeking to sort out office work-related problems and not demanding delegation of power from civilian officials.
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While the prime minister, who is the chief commander of the SDF, and the Diet, which approves his defense-related major decisions, constitute the highest layers of civilian control of the SDF, the defense minister, directly involved in overseeing the operations of the SDF, is responsible for day-to-day control of the SDF. Since the defense minister alone cannot effectively control the SDF, civilian officials in the ministry play an important role in civilian control of the SDF. Uniformed officers may be experts on military affairs but may fail to take a wider perspective by concentrating on maximizing the effectiveness of military operations. Civilian officials have an important duty of correcting the views of uniformed officers if they turn out to be overly narrow.
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Japan’s modern history in the lead up to its World War II defeat in 1945 shows that the absence of civilian control of the military by politicians and government officials led the Imperial armed forces to make gravely erroneous decisions and to even effectively control the government, thereby playing havoc with the fate of the nation. The Abe administration should realize that accepting this demand by SDF officers could create a situation in which the defense minister and the prime minister are swayed by the opinions of uniformed officers, meaning they would effectively play a greater role than elected officials in making key decisions on defense.
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Most people in the West lack even a basic knowledge of current Japanese politics and the prominent role and influence the parliamentary league Nippon Kaigi (a nationalistic, historical revisionism, cult to the 1931-45 Empire of Japan) wields... 'Activists demand that Japan stop apologising for its war crimes. Politicians give speeches on why the status of the Emperor, reduced to a symbol after the war, must “be restored”. An adjacent museum says that far from brutalising much of Asia, Japan’s army was on a noble mission to liberate it from Western colonialism. Such views are deeply at odds with those outside Japan, but they hold sway among a large number of Japan’s politicians. About a third of the Diet [parliament] and over half the 19-member cabinet of Shinzo Abe, the Prime Minister, support them. All are members of the parliamentary league of Nippon Kaigi, Japan’s most powerful nationalist lobby. Mr Abe is its “special adviser”...“They have trouble accepting the reality that Japan lost the war,” says Setsu Kobayashi, a leading constitutional scholar and former member of the group. Mr Kobayashi says Nippon Kaigi is run by people who want to bring back much of Japan’s pre-war constitution, before it was rewritten during the American occupation of 1945-52. Nippon Kaigi’s supporters say the liberal constitution has emasculated Japan. Many despise the pacifist clause that neutered Japan’s armed forces.'

Tamogami's World: Japan's Top Soldier Reignites Conflict Over the Past

Asia Pacific Journal - Japan Focus : 1 November 2008

In 2008, an ex uniformed Self Defence Force officer, General Tamogami Toshio was dismissed from his post in the Defense Ministry, by publishing an essay expressed his opinion as historical revisionist which share the similar value with "Japan Conference".  Even after retirement, he kept expressing the problematic opinions and demagogues with false stories  (but supported by some nationalists), and challenged to become a politician (though failed).  A few days ago, he was investigated for graft scandal at the time of election campaign. In 2008, civilian control still existed so could dismiss Tamogami from his post. However, as I reported earlier, the government tend to weaken civilian control, yet Tamogami's like minded personnel exists in uniformed SDF bureaucrats.
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On October 31, 2008, General Tamogami Toshio, Japan’s Air Self-Defense Force [ASDF] Chief of Staff was abruptly dismissed from his post in the Defense Ministry, but allowed to retire with his full pension rather than be summarily fired. At a press conference several months earlier, Tamogami, who had also been the superintendent of the SDF Joint Staff College, publicly expressed contempt for a ruling by the Nagoya High Court that the Japanese military mission in Iraq was unconstitutional.

On this occasion, the outspoken General, widely known among his peers for provocatively hawkish views, crossed several more lines. He entered and won the top prize of 3 million yen ($30,000) in an 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.  As far as is known, superiors in the Defense Ministry's chain of command did not carefully scrutinize Tamogami’s essay or any of the 94 essays submitted by ASDF soldiers. 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.’”

The views the General expressed did more than simply contravene the official positions of his civilian supervisors. By arguing that Japanese colonial rule was humane and legal, and that Japan was not an aggressor in World War II, Tamogami contradicted the constitution and the official government stance of apology to the nation’s that Japan had invaded before and during World War II. At the same time, he placed himself at odds with the political sense of most educated Japanese people. 

The governments of China and South Korea immediately condemned Tamogami’s views, as did Japan’s leading parliamentary opposition parties, who hoped to use the affair to topple the country’s new LDP Prime Minister, Aso Taro. Aso’s own controversial nationalist ideas on history and the constitution are similar to Tamogami’s, but as prime minister he fired the general and refrained from discussing his ideas. An unrepentant Tamogami, however, held his ground and reiterated that the Japanese “people had been misled by erroneous education” into thinking that their country once had a dark past. In his desire to free the Japanese military from constitutional restraints, Tamogami might have encouraged many senior and junior active-duty ASDF officers to join him in entering essays (of unknown content) in the same competition: the number varies from over 50 to as many as 95. The impression conveyed is that these ASDF officers are heir to the “young officers” of an earlier era who exploited ideas of a “Showa restoration” in an effort to accelerate Japanese rearmament and expansion in the 1930s. The difference is that the uniformed officers of today are supposed to be under “civilian (bureaucratic and parliamentary) control,” not in spiritual rebellion against the nation’s peace constitution. It is notable, however, that the civilian bureaucrats in the Defense Ministry, six of whom have also had their knuckles lightly rapped, initially hesitated to discipline Tamogami and his followers.

Writing on the theme, “Was Japan an Aggressor Nation?”, Tamogami argued the following: * Japanese colonial and semi-colonial rule, based on legal treaties, was “very moderate” in nature and beneficial to Koreans, Taiwanese, and Chinese alike. To defend these legally-recognized positions Japan waged justifiable wars.

* It was the Comintern, according to Soviet intelligence sources, and not the Kwantung Army that might have engineered the assassination of the Chinese warlord Zhang Zuolin in 1928, which set the stage for Japan to take over all of Manchuria.

 *Japan never waged an illegal war of aggression in China starting in 1931, or elsewhere in the European and American colonies in Southeast Asia and the Pacific a decade later. * Manchukuo, unlike the Western colonies where racism was the basis of rule, really was a bastion of racial tolerance; so too was imperial Japan.

 * The Comintern and the Chinese Communist Party played an evil role in the Japan-China War, manipulating Chiang Kai-shek to attack Japan.

 * President Franklin D. Roosevelt “very carefully” entrapped Japan into attacking Pearl Harbor after Comintern spies, such as Harry Dexter White in the Treasury Department, wrote the “Hull Note” that helped “manipulate President Roosevelt and draw [Japan] into a war with the United States.”

* “Had Japan “not fought the Greater East Asia War at that time,” it could not “have experienced the world of racial equality that we have today.” Indeed, without the War of Greater East Asia, Japan might have become “a white nation’s colony.”

In sum, Tamogami concluded, “what this country has done is wonderful.” Toward the end of his essay, citing many limitations on Japan’s Self-Defense Forces, he stresses that it should be allowed to exercise the right of collective self-defense—the implication being that it could then assist allies under attack, something that would obviously necessitate constitutional revision.

 

Clearly, true and false are not issues for Tamogami; belief in a “normal” (war-waging) state and more voice for the professional officer class are. The General tampers with facts; he uses evidence selectively; he cherry-picks international law when it suits his purpose; and he omits any mention of figures on Asian or Japanese civilian and military deaths from the wars of the 1930s and early ‘40s. His aim is to forge a body of activist officers who will participate in political combat, promoting the “true” perspective on history, even if it is not factually true for the particular historical period he cares about.

 

But none of his assertions are in any way new. For more than half a century, high ranking civilian and military officials have repeatedly made statements that provoked domestic and international controversy--either for speaking with a forked tongue on issues of war responsibility, or for reiterating, often unconsciously, crudely nationalistic sentiments of the type that Tamogami expressed. Such incidents reflect badly on the intellectual quality of the officials involved. They touch off storms of political debate within Japan and breed distrust of Japan in China, Korea, and other nations that experienced Japanese occupation. But they also serve to heighten popular vigilance against the danger of domestic militarism. Regrettably, comparable effects are seldom produced by policies initiated by Japan’s security alliance partner, the United States, whose endless war crusades and entrenched militarism have distorted national life and undermined international order. 

 

What then are we to make of Tamogami’s views? Put aside his ignorance of history, international law, the September 8 1951 San Francisco Peace Treaty, and his misinterpretation of sources and documents such as Sec. of State Cordell Hull’s memorandum of November 26, 1941. Is Tamogami motivated by a sense of wounded self-esteem and wrong inflicted by the US and its allies on Japan after its military and ideological defeat in 1945? Is this the reason why he is unable to recognize the many unjust acts and countless crimes committed by Japan in the course of its colonialism and invasion of neighboring states? Consider, for a moment, questions of hypocrisy and double standards in assessing the actions of Japan, the United States, and other nations that went to war throughout the twentieth century.

 

In 1945, the US and the Soviet Union took the lead in establishing the legal nomenclature of war crimes and the principles for adjudicating them and punishing offenders. At the International Military Tribunal (IMT) at Tokyo (1946-8), a small number of Japanese leaders were prosecuted and punished for the crime of aggression and for war crimes in the narrow sense. But the problem of European, American, and Japanese colonialism was ignored. And the war crimes of the Allies, which culminated in the American terrorist bombing of sixty-four Japanese cities and the nuclear destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, were also never adjudicated. During the IMT, attempts by American and Japanese defense attorneys to raise these issues were rejected out of hand.

Moreover, the United States helped Britain, France, and The Netherlands to restore their respective colonial empires by waging war to destroy the national independence movements of their former colonial subjects. While these colonial powers were professing to be defenders of civilization, sitting in judgment of Japan for pursuing policies of aggression, they themselves were continuing to commit comparable offenses.

 

Some Japanese conservatives can neither forgive nor forget this Western hypocrisy. For them, all distorted (i.e. “official” or “victor propaganda”) versions of Japan’s modern past trace back to the Tokyo trial. They also believe the Japanese defendants at Tokyo were denied a fair hearing. When the occupation ended in 1952 and Japan regained its formal independence, a tiny minority rejected the Tokyo trial because they could see only its negative, not its many positive sides. They  began to commemorate and idealize one of the three dissenting judges on the tribunal, Radhabinod Pal. The Indian nationalist judge had been a partisan sympathizer of the Japanese military. He rejected the charge of aggression against Japan’s wartime leaders and sought their acquittal on all counts. For Pal, the real enemy in Asia was the Western White Man. Ever since that time the castigation of the Tokyo IMT’s findings has been a fixed element in Japanese right-wing thought. This is not to deny that in prosecuting Japanese war criminals the victor nations erred in key respects. One was the issue of colonialism; another was the failure to indict Emperor Hirohito, who, alone among Japan’s leaders, was at the center of events during the whole war-period. Yet Hirohito was never even questioned or made to bear moral responsibility for the war, though several of his most loyal subjects were executed or imprisoned on his account.  

 

Tamogami is not alone in defending Japanese colonial rule and holding other far-right views of early 20^th century Japanese history. But for such ideas to dominate, they must be taught in the nation’s schools and universities, widely disseminated among a majority of voters by Japanese journalists, writers, and other opinion-makers, and overcome a political-culture supportive of the peace constitution. In today’s Japan none of these conditions yet obtain. Editorial comment in the wake of Tamogami’s dismissal from office suggests that truthful views of Japan’s wars of aggression from 1931 to ’45 are widely recognized. Mainstream Japanese political culture rejects the fringe ideas associated with Yasukuni Shrine and its history Museum, and articulated here by the General.

 

Nevertheless, the voting public remains divided on issues of war remembrance. Many politicians in the ruling Liberal-Democratic Party, including Prime Minister Aso, share Tamogami’s shallow nationalistic sentiments, as do writers for Fuji Sankei and its affiliated media outlets. Most of these people, however, refrain from publicly expressing their sentiments on highly contentious issues such as implicitly rejecting the verdicts of the Tokyo trial or calling for Japan to exercise the right to collective self-defense in violation of its Constitution.

 

Suppose, however, in the coming decade, powerfully situated individuals with historical consciousness similar to Tamogami’s came to prevail among Japan’s governing elites and their advisers. Could Japan experience the reign of extremist foreign policy ideas comparable to those of the American neo-conservatives and neo-liberals whose ideas developed over a span of three decades before reaching their extreme expression in the policies of the George W. Bush and Barack Obama presidencies? Could something similar happen in Japan?

 

Tamogami says he is uninterested in weakening Japan’s commitment to the US-Japan Security Treaty [AMPO], or Japan’s ties to other Asian countries. He draws an analogy between America, the militaristic superpower that he calls the “parent,” and Japan, its “child.” Japanese staff officers who conform to his way of thinking imagine they can put this “parent-child” relationship on a more equitable basis by jettisoning civilian control, eliminating the Defense Ministry’s “Operational Policy Bureau,” staffed by civilian bureaucrats, and allowing “mostly uniformed officers” to “manage SDF units under the defense minister.”

 

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. As long as this relic of World War II and the Cold War remains, Japan will have difficulty remaining a peace state, dealing with the criminality of its lost war, and developing an omni-directional rather than US-centered foreign policy. To defend Article 9 of the peace constitution without, at the same time, confronting AMPO is to do the work of Tamogami and people who think like him.

 

One final consideration: it is most unlikely that Pentagon officials would really welcome a Japan that undid constitutional restraints on the growth of its militarism, and acquired offensive weapons systems in order to become a “normal” (war-waging) state.  Conversely, it isn’t clear what Japan’s leaders would do if, in the near term, the “parent” escalated its failed colonial-wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and pressured Japan to involve itself more deeply in them. Social Democratic Party leader Fukushima Mizuho understood the problem correctly, however, when she linked the SDF’s expanding role in support of America’s wars to the spread of beliefs “within the Defense Ministry that Japan’s wartime acts did not constitute aggression.”

 

http://apjjf.org/-Herbert-P.-Bix/2945/article.html

 

 

Block the way to Abe version of Hitler’s Enabling Act

Block the way to Abe version of Hitler’s Enabling Act

Japan Press Weekly: 26 January 2016

 

On January 30, 1933, Germany marked a turning point which would lead the country to a horrible tragedy. On that day, Nazi leader Adolf Hitler became the German Chancellor. Following that, he enacted the Enabling Act by “majority” vote. By using the notorious law, half a year later, Hitler banned all the other political parties and established the Nazis’ one-party regime.
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The Enabling Act, which... Hitler obtained by using every trick and resorting to violence, gave his government legislative power and enabled it to enact laws without parliamentary deliberations. Thus, the Hitler administration acquired the ability to make laws against the Weimar Constitution.
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In this way, Hitler “legally” destroyed both the parliament and the Constitution. Of course, this is a past event and an act of this kind won’t work so easily in present-day Japan. However, the Abe government’s high-handed political tactics are arousing public concern.
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“The purpose of the provision is to secure the nation’s safety in case of an emergency such as a massive disaster.” With the aim of strengthening the powers of the prime minister and limiting people’s rights in an emergency caused by major disasters or acts of terrorism, PM Abe is attempting to add an “emergency provision” to the Japanese Constitution. With this breakthrough, he wants to revise the pacifist Constitution. In fact, Hitler’s Enabling Act was officially called the “Law to Remedy the Distress of the People and the Reich”.

PM Abe is eagerly stirring up a sense of impending crisis among the general public by referring to dangers of possible disasters. We have to remember that Abe’s favorite phrase “there is not a moment to lose” is a hackneyed expression used by politicians to instill fear.
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http://www.japan-press.co.jp/modules/news/index.php?id=8930

Abe’s constitutional revision aiming the restoration of pre-war status hopes ride on July election

Abe’s constitutional revision aiming the restoration of pre-war status hopes ride on July election

Wikipedia: /The Japan Times etc.

 

Japan expects to have upper house election in this July. The ruling Party (LDP and Komeito coalition) led by Abe, will try to capture more than two-thirds of the 242-seat chamber in the election, and thus have the seats required to initiate a national referendum to revise the Constitution. The revised plan is similar to pre-war constitution, and Japan Conference (Ultra right political lobby of Shinto extremism) is campaigning very hard to achieve this goal. Their aim is not only to abandon pacifism in current constitution, but also to restore totalitarian state as pre-war status. Constitutionalism is to protect each citizens from the power abuse by authority. Therefore, civil servants, diet members, and royal families are the ones who have legal obligation to keep these laws. However, the revised drafts demand too many obligations to citizens for the sake of state's interest. .

 

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 The below is the provisions regarding the people's rights modified and/or added in the LDP draft. 

(Source: Wikipedia "Constitution of Japan"/I compared and verified the contents with  Japanese Source.)
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Individualism: The LDP draft replaces the word "individuals" with "persons" (Article 13). This change reflects the draft authors' view that "excessive individualism" is an ethically unacceptable thought.
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Human rights and the supremacy of the constitution: The current constitution has Article 97 at the beginning of the "Supreme Law" chapter, which stipulates that the constitution guarantees the basic human rights to the people. The current, prevalent interpretation of Article 97 is that this article describes the essential reason why this constitution is the supreme law, which is the fact that the constitution's spirit is to guarantee human rights. In the LDP draft, this article is deleted and the booklet does not explain any reason for the deletion.
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Freedom of assembly, association, speech and all other forms of expression: The LDP draft adds a new paragraph on Article 21, which enables the State to prohibit the people from performing expressions "for the purpose of interfering public interest and public order". The LDP explain that this change makes it easy for the State to take countermeasures against criminal organizations like Aum Shinrikyo.
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Right to property: The LDP draft adds a new paragraph stating that the State shall define intellectual property rights "for the sake of promotion of the people's intellectual creativity" (Article 29).
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Workers' rights: Workers have the right to participate in a labor union, but currently there is a dispute on whether public officials should be entitled to this right. The LDP draft add a new paragraph to make it clear that public officials shall not enjoy this right or part thereof (Article 28).
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Freedom from torture and cruel punishments: Under the current constitution, torture and cruel punishments are "absolutely forbidden", but the LDP draft deletes the word "absolutely" (Article 36). The reason for this change is not presented in the booklet.
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"New human rights": The LDP draft adds four provisions regarding the concept collectively called "new human rights": protection of privacy (Article 19-2), accountability of the State (Article 21-2), environmental protection (Article 25-2), and rights of crime victims (Article 25-4). However, the draft only requires the State to make a good faith effort to meet the stated goals and does not entitle the people these "rights", as the booklet points out.
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Obligations of the people: The LDP draft can be characterized by its obligation clauses imposed on the people. The current constitution lists three obligations: to work (Article 27), to pay taxes as provided for by law (Article 30), and to have all boys and girls under their protection receive ordinary education as provided for by law (Article 26). The LDP draft adds six more: (1) The people must respect the national anthem and flag (Article 3). (2) The people must be conscious of the fact that there are responsibilities and obligations in compensation for freedom and rights (Article 12). (3) The people must comply with the public interest and public order (Article 12). (4) The people must help one another among the members of a household (Article 24). (5) The people must obey commands from the State or the subordinate offices thereof in a state of emergency (Article 99). (6)The people must uphold the constitution (Article 102).
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Additionally, although defense of the national territory (Article 9-3) and environmental protection (Article 25-2) are literally listed under the LDP draft as obligations of the State, these provisions let the State call for the "cooperation with the people" to meet the goals provided, effectively functioning as obligation clauses on the people's side.Equality: The current constitution guarantees equality to citizens, prohibiting any discrimination based on "race, creed, sex, social status or family origin". The LDP draft adds "handicaps" (Articles 14 and 44) between "sex" and "social status", improving the equality under the law. On the other hand, the sentence "No privilege shall accompany any award of honor, decoration or any distinction" in the current paragraph (2) of Article 14 is deleted in the LDP draft, which means that the State shall be allowed to grant "privilege" as part of national awards. The reason for this change is not presented in the booklet.
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National security: The LDP draft deletes the current provision declaring that armed forces and other war potential shall never be maintained, and adds new Articles 9-2 and 9-3 stating that the "National Defense Force" shall be set up and the Prime Minister shall be its commander-in-chief. According to the paragraph (3) of the new Article 9-2, the National Defense Force not only can defend the territory from a foreign attack and can participate in international peacekeeping operations, but also can operate in order to either maintain domestic public order or to protect individual rights. State of emergency: The LDP draft grants the Prime Minister the authority to declare a "state of emergency" in a national emergency including foreign invasions, domestic rebellions and natural disasters (Article 98). When in a state of emergency, the Cabinet can enact orders that have the effect equivalent to that of the laws passed by the National Diet (Article 99).
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Relaxation of separation of religion and the State: The LDP draft deletes the current clause that prohibits the State from granting "political authority" to a religious organization, and enables the State to perform religious acts itself within the scope of "social protocol or ethno-cultural practices" (Article 20).
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Political control over the courts: Unlike the current constitution, which guarantees that the Supreme Court judges shall not be dismissed unless the "review" procedure stipulated by the constitution, the LDP draft enables the Diet to define this review procedure through a Diet-enacted law, not the constitution (Article 79). The draft also states that salary of a judge —　of both the Supreme Court and inferior courts　— could be decreased in the same manner as any other kinds of public officials (Articles 79 and 80) by the subordinate offices of the State (namely, the National Personnel Authority).
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Further amendments: The LDP draft states that a simple majority in the two Houses shall be adequate for a motion for constitutional amendment (Article 96). An actual amendment shall still require a national referendum, but a simple majority in "the number of valid votes actually cast", as opposed to "the number of a qualified voter" or "the number of votes", shall enact the amendment (Article 96).
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The Emperor Status on the Constitution Revision Plan by LDP

The Emperor Status on the Constitution Revision Plan by LDP
Wikipedia/The Imperial Household Agency

Another notable feature of the revised constitution drafts is the position of the emperor. As per the current constitution, the emperor is merely the symbol of the nation and his ruling authority is deprived. The revised plan, however, promotes his position as "the head of the State". Ironically, the emperor and his family are the ones who are very cautious o...n the right leaning attitude of the Abe government and keep on reminding the citizens the value of pacifism.

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 The status of the emperor as per revised drafts: (Source: Wikipedia/ I checked and verified the contents with Japanese source)
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Preamble: In the LDP draft, the Preamble declares that Japan is reigned by the Emperor and adopts the popular sovereignty and trias political principles. The current Preamble refers to the government as a trust of the people (implying the "natural rights codified into the constitution by the social contract" model) and ensures people "the right to live in peace, free from fear and want", but both mentions are deleted in the LDP draft.
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Emperor: Overall, the LDP draft adopts a wording that sounds as though the Emperor has greater power than under the current Constitution. The draft defines him as "the head of the State" (Article 1). Compared to the current Constitution, he is exempted from "the obligation to respect and uphold this Constitution" (Article 102). The draft defines Nisshōki and Kimigayo as the national flag and national anthem, respectively (Article 3).
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Under current constitution:
Under the constitution, the Emperor is "the symbol of the State and of the unity of the people". The Emperor carries out most of the functions of a head of state, formally appointing the Prime Minister and Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, convoking the National Diet and dissolving the House of Representatives, under the advice of the Cabinet, and also promulgating statutes and treaties and exercising other enumerated functions.
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However, in contrast with the Meiji Constitution, his role is almost entirely ceremonial, and he does not have any powers related to government. Unlike other constitutional monarchies, he is not even the nominal chief executive or even the nominal commander-in-chief of the Japan Self-Defense Forces. The constitution explicitly limits the Emperor's role to matters of state delineated in the constitution. The constitution also states that these duties can be delegated by the Emperor as provided for by law.
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Succession to the Chrysanthemum Throne is regulated by the Imperial Household Law and is managed by a ten-member body called the Imperial Household Council. The budget for the maintenance of the Imperial House is managed by resolution of the Diet.

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Article below: The opportunities, which the emperor expresses his opnion and reference about war and peace, have dramatically increased for these years.

His Majesty's Answers to the Questions by the Press on the Occasion of His 82nd Birthday 2015, and the Activities of the Emperor over the Past Year

 

Question:
In the past year, although there were many sad incidents in Japan including several natural disasters, we also had some cheerful news as well, such as the awarding of the Nobel Prize to two Japanese scholars. This year was a milestone year, marking the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II, and in Your New Year’s Thoughts, Your Majesty said that “it is most important for us to take this opportunity to study and learn from the history of this war, starting with the Manchurian Incident of 1931, as we consider the future direction of our country.” Your Majesty, together with Her Majesty, made many trips this year both at home and abroad to pay Your respects to those who lost their lives in the war.

In Your address at the Memorial Ceremony for the War Dead, Your Majesty used the words “feelings of deep remorse over the last war,” words which were not used before.  This year, the original recording of the speech by Emperor Showa announcing the end of the war was released, as well as images of the Obunko Fuzokuko, the air-raid shelter of the Imperial Palace, and other materials pertaining to the war.

We also understand that Your Majesties are scheduled to make an official visit to the Philippines early next year.  Would You tell us Your thoughts and impressions of the last twelve months, touching upon Your thoughts on war and peace? Also, looking back on the last twelve months, please share with us Your thoughts on the coming year.

 

Answer:

With regard to natural disasters that occurred this year in Japan, the first thing that comes to mind is Mount Shin-dake on the island Kuchinoerabu-jima in Kagoshima Prefecture, which erupted in May, producing a pyroclastic flow that reached the shoreline, forcing all the residents to evacuate from the island. Having witnessed pyroclastic flow when we visited Unzen after the Unzen-dake eruption there in 1991, we can well imagine how truly frightening pyroclastic flow reaching the shoreline must have been. Fortunately, all the residents were safe, but it pains me that the people still continue to live away from their own homes.

 

 In September, heavy rainfall caused Kinu-gawa and other rivers to flood, resulting in a huge disaster which claimed eight lives. When I think of the many people who were trapped inside their own homes due to the floods, I can only imagine the anxiety and uncertainty they must have felt. Thanks to the rescue operations by helicopters and other means carried out by the Self-Defense Forces and others, it was truly fortunate that those people were taken to safety. I am deeply grateful to those people who risked themselves and engaged in the rescue operations. The task of recovering and repairing the flooded houses and fields require much work, and I am glad that many people are volunteering to offer their help. It is most reassuring to see that there is a growing spirit in the hearts of the Japanese people to help others in difficulty. The Empress and I later visited the affected areas in the city of Joso, Ibaraki Prefecture, and we saw the extensive areas of rice paddies and cultivated fields still covered in muddy water. Our hearts went out to the people whose crops were damaged, the crops they must have worked so hard to grow.

On the subject of this year’s happy news, I must cite the news of the two Japanese scientists who were awarded the Nobel Prize. The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was awarded to Dr. Satoshi Omura for his achievements, including the development from soil bacteria a drug that treats onchocerciasis, or river blindness, a disease especially prevalent in Africa and South America, that can cause blindness when humans are infected. I had seen heartbreaking images of people who had lost their vision to the disease walking in procession, so I was truly pleased to learn that medicine to cure this illness had been found. At the same time, the Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded to Dr. Takaaki Kajita for his neutrino research at Super-Kamiokande, an observatory located under the Kamioka mine, where he discovered that neutrinos have mass. It reminded me of our visit 11 years ago to Super-Kamiokande. I have nothing but sincere admiration for the many years of untiring dedication to their research made by the two scientists.

Another happy news was the completion and test flight of a Japan-made passenger jet. It brought back fond memories of watching the test flight at Haneda Airport of the YS-11, the first propeller-driven passenger aircraft made in Japan after World War II, together with those involved in its development. More than fifty years have gone by since then.
This year was a milestone year, marking the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II. The war claimed a great many lives, nonmilitary as well as military. Had peace prevailed, these people could have led meaningful lives in various areas of society, and it pains me deeply to think of the many who lost their lives.

As an example of nonmilitary people who sacrificed their lives in the war, the sailors who served on civilian vessels come to mind. These people, who may have dreamed of one day becoming sailors on international routes, went to work as crews of civilian ships which had been requisitioned to transport soldiers and military goods, and lost their lives in enemy attacks. Japan, a country surrounded by sea, had developed as a maritime power. As a young child, I used to enjoy looking at postcards of ships. But I later learned that almost all of those vessels had been sunk in the war, except for the Hikawa Maru, which remained in service as a hospital ship. In those days, Japan lacked command of the air and no battleships were available to escort the transport vessels. It gives me great pain to think of the feelings of the sailors who had to engage in transport operations under such conditions. In June this year, the 45th memorial service for the civilian sailors who died while serving the country during the war and also after the war was held at the monument dedicated to them in Kanagawa Prefecture. I thought of the fallen sailors as the Empress and I attended the service and offered flowers.

In this milestone year, together with the Empress, I visited the Republic of Palau, which had once been under a Japanese mandate, and dedicated flowers at the Monument of the War Dead in the Western Pacific, erected by the Japanese government after the war, and at the US Army 81st Infantry Division Memorial, both on Peleliu Island. I am deeply grateful to the Presidents and First Ladies of the Republic of Palau, the Republic of the Marshall Islands, and the Federated States of Micronesia for joining us on this visit. Beyond the Monument of the War Dead is Angaur Island, where many people also lost their lives in fierce battle.

 

Today, Angaur is a verdant island lush with trees, and it is difficult to imagine that fierce combat took place there. Seen from the air, the Republic of Palau is made up of beautiful islands surrounded by coral reefs. In these seas, however, lie countless unexploded bombs still submerged, and today, former Maritime Self-Defense Force disposal experts are engaged in clearing them. It is a dangerous task, and I learned that it will take a very long time for the seas of Palau to be safe again. That the last war has imposed a heavy burden on the people living on those islands must never be forgotten.

After our trip to Palau, we visited, in the summer, the districts of Kitaharao in Miyagi Prefecture, Chifuri in Tochigi Prefecture, and Ohinata in Nagano Prefecture, places which were settled and developed by returnees from foreign lands after the war. I could well imagine the toils of the people who, after having put immense effort into reclaiming land overseas, experienced the hardship of leaving that land and returning to Japan, where they again had to struggle and cultivate mostly barren soil, raise livestock, and rebuild their lives. Kitaharao, meaning “Palau of the north,” was settled by those who returned from Palau.

Looking back over the past year, I feel that it was a year in which I spent much time thinking about the war in various ways. With each passing year, we will have more and more Japanese who have never experienced war, but I believe having thorough knowledge about the last war and deepening our thoughts about the war is most important for the future of Japan.
I shall turn 82 on this birthday. I am beginning to feel my age, and there were times when I made some mistakes at events. It is my intention to minimize such incidents by continuing to do the best I can when carrying out each and every event.  As the year draws to a close, it is my hope that the next year will be an even better year for all the people.

 

Abe’s constitutional revision hopes ride on July election, right-leaning opposition cooperation

Abe’s constitutional revision hopes ride on July election, right-leaning opposition cooperation
The Japan Times: 11 January 2016

Japan’s postwar pacifism will face a critical challenge this year that could drastically change the course of this country forever: the July Upper House election.

Right-leaning parties, most notably the ruling Liberal Democratic Party led by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, will try to capture more than two-thirds of the 242-seat chamber in the election, and thus have the seats required to initiate a national referendum to revise the war-renouncing Constitution.
But which parties currently advocate constitutional revision? And how many seats are those parties likely to win in the election?

The following are questions and answers on the numbers in the election and the prospects for the political battle over the Constitution.

Why is the Upper House election regarded as critical to the fate of the Constitution?

Article 96 of the Constitution states that it can only be amended through a national referendum that is to be initiated by the Diet with support of two-thirds or more of all members of both the Lower and Upper houses.

Abe’s ruling coalition of the Liberal Democratic Party and Komeito now holds more than two-thirds of the 475-seat Lower House but doesn’t boast the same majority in the 242-seat Upper House.
Abe, who is still personally popular with voters thanks to his economic policies, is the first-ever prime minister to openly express a willingness to revise the war-renouncing Article 9 of the Constitution.

Believing now is a golden opportunity, right-leaning politicians and activists have been campaigning to help the LDP win as many seats as possible in the Upper House election to gain the political momentum for constitutional change.

What chance does the ruling coalition have to win more than two-thirds of the 242-seat Upper House outright?

Many observers believe the chances are slim now based on the current support rate for Abe’s Cabinet and the LDP in media polls. But together with other opposition forces that support revising Article 9, the coalition might altogether win more than two-thirds of the chamber, they said.

Every three years, half of the 242 Upper House seats are contested in a summer election. Currently, the LDP holds 115 seats and Komeito 20, which adds up to 135 seats, including that of Upper House President and LDP member Masaaki Yamazaki. Of those, 76 LDP and Komeito members are not facing re-election in the summer poll.

This means the LDP-Komeito coalition needs to win 86 seats to occupy more than two-thirds — or 162 seats or more — of the chamber.

This hurdle seems to be rather high when compared with the results of the 2013 Upper House poll. Back then, the LDP-Komeito coalition enjoyed a victory by winning 76 seats in total. At that time, the support rate for Abe’s Cabinet stood at 57 percent and that of the LDP was 42.4 percent, according to a poll conducted by NHK shortly before the election.

The latest NHK poll in December showed the support rate for Abe’s Cabinet stood at 46 percent in December, and that for the LDP was 37.5 percent. This may be why Abe is desperately trying to focus on economic issues to keep voters happy ahead of the election, while maintaining a low-profile on other contentious issues that could dent his popularity.

Will any opposition parties cooperate with the LDP on the Constitution revision?

How those parties fare in the July poll may be key to whether they can help Abe accomplish his referendum goal. In the Upper House there are three minor parties willing to revise some articles of the Constitution, possibly including Article 9.

They are Osaka Ishin no Kai, which now has seven Upper House members; Nippon wo Genki ni Suru Kai (The Assembly to Energize Japan ) with six and Nihon no Kokoro wo Taisetsu ni suru To (Party for Japanese Kokoro) with four, making up 17 seats altogether.

“If you add those parties (to the ruling bloc), (the pro-revision) forces could occupy more than two-thirds in total, which would open the way for constitutional revision,” said Koji Nakakita, professor of politics at Hitotsubashi University in Tokyo.

Will revising Article 9 be a focal issue in the July poll campaigns?

This remains to be seen, as the situation is a complex one.
To revise the Constitution, it is necessary to gain a majority of all votes cast for the national referendum, but various polls have suggested most voters oppose changing the charter.
A poll by the Yomiuri Shimbun taken in March suggested 60 percent of respondents want Article 9 left as is, while only 35 percent said it should be revised. This ratio has not changed significantly in the past decade.

Pro-revision lawmakers say they will first advocate revising other articles in a bid to remove the psychological barrier for amending the 69-year-old Constitution, which has remained intact since its promulgation in November 1946. When it comes to revising the Constitution, rather than trying to revise Article 9, LDP lawmakers have suggested the party first propose creating a new article to give the prime minister extraordinary powers in emergencies.

Komeito is likely to agree to that revision, although the party is reluctant to support the LDP’s drive to rewrite Article 9. The Democratic Party of Japan and other opposition parties, however, would oppose any revision of the Constitution, believing it could be a Trojan horse to open the way for revising Article 9.

Abe, reforms sputtering, faces tough test to seal legacy

Abe, reforms sputtering, faces tough test to seal legacy
The Japan Times: 26 December 2015

Japanese voting rates for recent election are around 50 percent only. In addition, the current election system in Japan is advantageous for bigger parties. At 2012 election, the number of citizens voted for the leading party was less than that of the ones who voted for the opposites, yet the leading party won. The article says, "Abe’s popularity is hovering around 50 percent", but recent statistic shows that among these 50 percent, 80 percent is not eager to support, saying "no other alternative". “There is no better alternative” and/or "nothing will change even if I vote"... these have been the voices of majority.
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It was an irresistible promise: Elect me, I’ll bring back Japan’s once-soaring economy and restore its battered national pride. Three years later, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is facing the enormity of his grand ambitions, and the clock is ticking. Abe, 60, swept to power in December 2012 with a novel recipe for success, energizing a one-time global powerhouse that languished in a decades-long slump, overshadowed by regional rival China.
The take-charge politician trotted around the globe, inking deals for Japanese firms and selling his eponymous “Abenomics” deflation-busting policy.

“I am back and so is Japan,” the two-time nationalist leader declared to an American audience.
Abe’s call to action — including big government spending and massive central bank monetary easing — had some early successes, after the Bank of Japan weakened the yen sharply from record highs against the dollar. The drop was good news for exporters as corporate profits soared and the benchmark Nikkei 225 stock index doubled to the 20,000 level. A fledgling economic recovery appeared to be taking hold.
But as he marks three years in office on Saturday, the scale of Abe’s self-appointed task may be coming back to haunt him.

Growth has stumbled, the war on years of deflation is not yet won, and a promised overhaul of the highly regulated economy is far from complete. “Compared to the magnitude of Abenomics’ stimulus, the economy’s performance has been feeble,” said Ryutaro Kono, an economist at BNP Paribas. Abe’s burst of enthusiasm — after a forgettable one-year first term in office that abruptly ended in 2007 — has not been matched by the results, some say. “The first half of (Abe’s) tenure showed progress,” said Satoshi Osanai, economist at Daiwa Institute of Research. “The second half has not been so bright.”

Abe took power after a rough few years for Japan as it went through a half dozen leaders and saw China overtake it as the world’s second-largest economy and assume an increasingly assertive role in Asia. It also suffered the unprecedented triple shock of the March 2011 earthquake, tsunami and nuclear disasters, which dealt another blow to the economy. Facing an Upper House election this summer, Abe’s popularity is hovering around 50 percent, relatively strong, considering some of his deeply unpopular policies.

His bid to raise Japan’s defense posture by altering the government’s traditional interpretation of the pacifist Constitution — clearing a way for Japanese troops go into battle for the first time since World War II — angered former foes China and the Koreas and was so bitterly opposed at home it sparked rare street protests and drew tens of thousands of demonstrators to the Diet. An unpopular push to switch on nuclear reactors shuttered by the Fukushima disaster has also done little to boost his appeal.

“Abe’s great advantage is that voters think there is no better alternative,” said Robert Dujarric, director of contemporary Asian studies at Temple University’s Tokyo campus.
A key reason, observers say, is that a weak and fragmented opposition has been unable to mount a serious challenge. As a result, Abe is tipped to cement his grip on power in next year’s Upper House election. Meanwhile, Japan’s traditional jobs-for-life culture, a cornerstone of its post-war economic boom, has given way to more part-time and unstable contract work.

The country also has one of the world’s biggest national debts, a problem aggravated by a demographic decline that will see a shrinking labor force made to cover the soaring social security costs of the quickly graying nation. The International Monetary Fund has trimmed its growth projections and credit agencies have cut their ratings amid growing doubts that Abe’s economic plan will work.

Even Abe’s key constituency — Japan Inc. — is not playing ball. The prime minister is struggling to get firms whose bottom lines benefited from his policies to share the spoils with employees.
Wage hikes, he says, are key to winning the war on deflation, which helped hold back growth for years as consumers delayed spending in the hopes of getting goods cheaper down the road. That hurt firms’ expansion and hiring plans.

Abe recently pledged to re-focus his efforts on fixing the world’s third-largest economy and beef up social programs, as he tries to lure more women and the elderly into a shrinking workforce.
But his legacy hangs on whether he can get tough on overhauling Japan’s rigid labor market and tame the spiraling costs of the national pension system, observers said.

Japan has no time to lose as a brief growth jolt from Tokyo’s hosting of the 2020 Olympics could give way to another long-term economic slide, warned Hideo Kumano, chief economist at Dai-ichi Life Research Institute. “After the (summer) election, it would be a great opportunity to carry out painful reforms . . . they need to happen now.”


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Japan’s ruling party under fire over links to far-right extremists

Calls for LDP politicians to distance themselves from extremists come amid campaign of terror targeting academics
The Guardian: 13 October 2014

In this August, voting for 「Hate Speech Restriction Bill」,proposed by the opposite parties, was postponed in Japan. The Economist article described, "In Tokyo’s Shin-Okubo neighbourhood, home to one of the largest concentrations of Koreans in Japan, many people say the level of anti-foreigner vitriol—on the streets and on the internet—is without modern precedent." 　 I observe hate speech has drama...tically increased in Japan for these years.
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In fact, racists and arrogant nationalists are everywhere in the world (and its counter activists too). However, the problems lie in Japan are, the cabinet is not active to protect victims, and some cabinet members are befriending with the notorious racist organization.
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Japan’s ruling party is under pressure to distance itself from the far right, after senior politicians were linked to groups that promote Nazi ideology and hate crimes towards the country’s ethnic Korean community.

The calls for three members of prime minister Shinzo Abe’s government to distance themselves from extremists come amid a campaign of death threats and intimidation targeting liberal academics, which observers say is a symptom of Japan’s sharp turn to the right.

Eriko Yamatani, who as chairman of the national public safety commission is Japan’s most senior police official, is the third senior Liberal Democratic party (LDP) politician to have been linked to ultra-rightwing groups, after a photograph surfaced of her with Shigeo Masuki, a senior member of the Zaitokukai group.

Yamatani, however, has refused to condemn Zaitokukai, whose members have labelled ethnic Korean residents of Japan “cockroaches” and called for them to be killed.

The 2009 photograph, which Yamatani claims she does not recall being taken, became public soon after two of her LDP colleagues acknowledged that they had been snapped with Kazunari Yamada, the leader of a Japanese neo-Nazi party, in 2011.

Sanae Takaichi, the internal affairs minister, and the LDP’s policy head, Tomomi Inada, claimed they were unaware of Yamada’s extremist views at the time.

When challenged to condemn Zaitokukai, Yamatani said it was not appropriate to comment on the policies of individual groups, “Japan has a long history of placing great value on the idea of harmony and respecting the rights of everyone,” she said. Masuki, who has left Zaitokukai, told Reuters he had known Yamatani for more than a decade through their shared interest in education.

Zaitokukai calls for the end to welfare and other “privileges” afforded to about half a million non-naturalised members of Japan’s ethnic Korean community, many of whom are the descendants of labourers brought over from the Korean peninsula to work in mines and factories before and during the second world war.

Rightwing activists have been emboldened by the Asahi Shimbun’s recent admission that articles it ran in the 1980s and 90s on Japan’s wartime use of sex slaves – so-called comfort women –were false. The liberal newspaper’s articles were based on now-discredited testimony of Seiji Yoshida, a former soldier who claimed he had witnessed the abduction of women from the South Korean island of Jeju.

The Asahi’s erroneous reporting prompted Abe and other senior politicians to accuse it of damaging Japan’s international image, claiming that the foreign media had taken the inaccurate sex slave articles as the cue for their own coverage.

Former Asahi journalists who work in academia have become the target of a campaign of bomb and death threats by the far right designed to hound them out of their jobs.

Activists have posted online the names and photographs of the children of one former Asahi journalist, Takashi Uemura, denouncing them as the offspring of a “traitor” and urging them to kill themselves. Uemura had written articles on the sex slave issue for the Asahi 20 years ago.

“[The government’s] lukewarm attitude towards hate crimes by the revisionist right is in itself a reason why we need to criticise the government’s handling of this [intimidation] issue, even if it isn’t directly orchestrating what is happening,” said Koichi Nakano, a politics professor at Sophia University in Tokyo.

Hokusei Gakuen University in Sapporo, which employs Uemura as a part-time lecturer, has postponed a decision on whether to rehire him for the 2015 academic year. Another former Asahi reporter declined a position at a university in western Japan after receiving threatening letters.

“Abe and other leaders’ outlook is encouraging the rightwing to conduct even harsher attacks on those who are critical of the history of the Japanese empire,” said Jiro Yamaguchi, a professor at Hosei University in Tokyo.

Abe’s recent cabinet reshuffle has raised fears that Japan is veering sharply to the right amid rising tensions over history and territorial claims with China and South Korea.

Yamatani, Takaichi and Inada are close allies of Abe and share his revisionist views of Japan’s wartime history. They have questioned the consensus that Japan forced tens of thousands of mainly Korean and Chinese women to work in frontline brothels between the late 1920s and Japan’s defeat in 1945.

Fifteen of the 19 members of Abe’s cabinet belong to Nippon Kaigi, a group launched in 1997 to promote patriotic education and end Japan’s “masochistic” view of its wartime campaigns on mainland Asia.

Abe played a prominent role in pressuring the education ministry to remove references to the comfort women from school textbooks.

Yamaguchi said the rightwing campaign had echoes of the 1930s, when militarists carried out purges of liberal academics. “If Hokusei [University] gives in to this pressure [to sack Uemura], that would mean academic freedom and freedom of speech is undermined, even under a democratic constitution,” he said. “This is a watershed moment for Japanese society.”

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/oct/13/japan-ruling-party-far-right-extremists-liberal-democratic