Seventy years after the end of World War Two, the voices of revisionism in Japan are growing stronger and moving into the mainstream, particularly on the issue of comfort women, who were women forced to be sex slaves for Japanese soldiers during the war. One of the most eloquent voices of revisionism is Toshio Tamogami. Mr Tamogami is well-educated, knowledgeable and, when I meet him, exquisitely polite. The former chief of staff of Japan's air force believes in a version of Japanese history that is deeply at odds with much of the rest of the world.But it is increasingly popular among young Japanese, tired of being told they must keep apologising to China and Korea. Last year Mr Tamogami ran for governor of Tokyo. He came fourth, with 600,000 votes. Most strikingly, among young voters aged 20 to 30 he got nearly a quarter of the votes cast. "As a defeated nation we only teach the history forced on us by the victors," he says. "To be an independent nation again we must move away from the history imposed on us. We should take back our true history that we can be proud of." In this "true" history of the 20th Century that Mr Tamogami talks of, Japan was not the aggressor, but the liberator. Japanese soldiers fought valiantly to expel the hated white imperialists who had subjugated Asian peoples for 200 years.It is a proud history, where Japan, alone in Asia, was capable of taking on and defeating the European oppressors. It is also a version of history that has no room for the Japanese committing atrocities against fellow Asians. Mr Tamogami believes that Japan did not invade the Korean Peninsula, but rather "invested in Korea and also in Taiwan and Manchuria". I ask him about the invasion of China in 1937 and the massacre of civilians in the capital Nanjing. Surely that was naked aggression?"I can declare that there was no Nanjing Massacre," he says, claiming there were "no eyewitnesses" of Japanese soldiers slaughtering Chinese civilians. It is when I ask him about the issue of Korean comfort women that Mr Tamogami's denials are most indignant.He declares it "another fabrication", saying: "If this is true, how many soldiers had to be mobilised to forcibly drag those women away? And those Korean men were just watching their women taken away by force? Were Korean men all cowards?" Although they may not say it as loudly and as bluntly as Mr Tamogami, this is a version of history that is widely believed by many Japan's nationalists. Earlier this year at a joint session of the US Congress in Washington DC, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe expressed deep sorrow for the suffering caused by Japan during WW2. Mr Abe does not deny there were Korean women serving as comfort women near the frontlines in China and South East Asia. But he has repeatedly said there is no evidence these women were coerced or that the Japanese military was involved in their recruitment and confinement. The implication is the women were prostitutes.This is a very murky area. Girls from poor families have been sold in to prostitution in Japan, Korea and China for centuries, and the practice was certainly still going on in the 1930s and 1940s.But that does not absolve the Japanese military from responsibility.
At least the Japs had the decency to wait 70 years to rewrite history. They should have just bought the history and transferred it to another country.
This might be slightly off topic, but have you ever gone on an escalator that hasn't been working and got a funny feeling in your legs, almost a stumble, as if the brain can't compute that it isn't working, even though you know it isn't working, as it isn't moving? I have, many times, it happened again this morning. Tune in next week for more exciting tales of my life.
God has punished Japan for their transgressions during the second world war. He guided the hand of the Allies when, with god on our side, dropped those holy bombs in 45. Then when they started to think themselves superior again he sent an earthquake to put them in their place again. I wouldn't want to be a kruat judt now because they are next to sample gods wrath.
Thats because you are a dirty Idolitrist fenian and not a god fearing presbyterian. Get you behind me......satan.
Looks like Scan is riding a motorbike in a white helmet style display team. Some **** get a piano photoshopped on there.
