Chapter 15 Chapter 13 The Japanese after the Surrender
Americans have good reason to be proud of the role they have played in running Japan since their victory.The policy of the United States was a joint State Department, War Department, and Navy Department issued by radio on August 29, and was brilliantly implemented by Marshal MacArthur.However, the reasons for pride are often obscured by partisan praise or criticism in American newspapers and radio stations. Few people who have sufficient understanding of Japanese culture can clearly determine whether a given policy is appropriate or not.
A major issue when Japan surrendered was the nature of the occupation.Should the victorious nation use the existing government, even the emperor, or abolish it?Should the administration of each county and city be managed under the command of U.S. military government officials?The occupation of Italy and Germany was done by setting up AMG (Allied Military Government) headquarters in each region as part of the fighting forces, leaving local administration in the hands of Allied administrators.At the time of the victory over Japan, AMG officials in the Pacific region still expected Japan to establish this system of dominance.The Japanese also don't know how much administrative responsibility they can retain.The Potsdam Proclamation simply stated that "points on Japanese territory designated by the Allies must be occupied in order to secure the fundamental object we hereby express" and that "the authority and power".
Directives from the Departments of State, War, and Navy to General MacArthur made major decisions on the above sections, with the full support of General MacArthur's headquarters.The Japanese would be in charge of the administration and reconstruction of their country. "The Supreme Commander will exercise his powers through agencies of the Government of Japan and through agencies, including the Emperor, as far as furthering the satisfaction of the objectives of the United States of America. The Government of Japan will, at the direction of the Supreme Commander (General MacArthur), be permitted to Exercising the normal functions of the government in terms of internal affairs.” Therefore, MacArthur’s management of Japan is quite different from the management of Germany or Italy by the Allied Forces.It is purely a high command, using all levels of Japanese bureaucracy from the top down.High Command circulars are issued to the Imperial Government of Japan, not to Japanese nationals, or residents of certain prefectures.Its mission is to define the working objectives of the Japanese government.A Japanese cabinet minister can resign if he thinks it is impossible to implement, but can also revise the order if his advice is correct.
This style of management is a bold measure.But from the perspective of the United States, the benefits of this policy are very clear.As General Hilldring said at the time: "The benefits of using this form of occupation by the Japanese government are enormous. If there is no Japanese government to draw on, we must have direct operations to manage a seventy million All the complex institutions necessary for a populous country. Their language, customs, attitudes are different from ours. By purifying and utilizing the Japanese government, we save time, manpower and material resources. In other words, we ask the Japanese to put their own country in order , and we are only providing specific guidance."
When this directive was drawn up in Washington, many Americans were still concerned that the Japanese might adopt a haughty and hostile attitude, a people that glared and waited for revenge and would passively resist all peace plans.Those fears later proved unfounded.The reason for this lies mainly in the special culture of Japan, not in the general truth about the politics and economy of the defeated nation and country.Perhaps no nation can accept this policy of faith so smoothly as Japan.In the eyes of the Japanese, this kind of policy is a symbol of removing humiliation from the harsh reality of defeat, prompting them to implement new national policies, and they can accept it precisely because of the specific character formed by their specific culture.
In the United States, we have been debating the lenient terms of peace, but the real issue is not lenient, but just enough lenient to destroy traditional, dangerous patterns of aggression and establish new goals.As for which method to choose, it should be determined according to the character of the country's nationals and the traditional social order.Prussian authoritarianism was so ingrained not only in family life but in the daily life of the citizens that it required some kind of peace terms with Germany.Sensible peace terms would be different for Japan than for Germany.Unlike the Japanese, the Germans do not consider themselves indebted to society and history, and they work hard not to repay an infinite debt or debt, but to avoid being a victim.The father was an authority figure, like any other person who occupied a high position, who, as the Germans said, "forced respect for him" and felt uncomfortable without it.In German life, every generation of sons who in their youth rebelled against their authoritative fathers eventually succumbed to a life of humdrum and passionless life, just like their parents.The highest peak in one's life is the hurricane age of youth rebellion.
The problem in Japanese culture is not extreme authoritarianism.Almost all Western observers agree that Japanese fathers' care and love for their children seems to be difficult to see in the West.The Japanese child takes for granted some real affection with his father, and flaunts his father openly, so that a slight change in the tone of his voice will cause the child to do as he wishes.However, fathers are by no means strict teachers of young children, and youth is by no means a time of rebellion against parental authority.On the contrary, the child enters adolescence as a docile representative of family responsibilities before the judgment of the world.The Japanese say that they respect their fathers "for practice," "for training," that is to say, the father, as an object of respect, is a superpersonal symbol of hierarchy and the right way to behave.
This attitude, which children learn early in their contact with their fathers, becomes a pattern throughout Japanese society.The most revered man at the top of the hierarchy does not himself wield arbitrary power.Officials at the head of the hierarchy do not exercise real power.From the emperor down to the bottom, there are consultants and hidden forces operating behind the scenes.This aspect of Japanese society is best illustrated in a conversation by a leader of the Black Dragon Society-style supranational group in the early 1930s to a reporter from an English-language newspaper in Tokyo.He said: "Society (of course Japan) is a triangle with one corner fixed by a pin." In other words, the triangle is on the table and is visible to everyone.Pins are invisible.The triangle is sometimes tilted to the right, sometimes to the left, but it is always oscillating about a hidden axis.To borrow a saying commonly used by Westerners, everything must be reflected in a "mirror".Efforts should be made not to show autocratic power on the surface, and all actions show a gesture of loyalty to a symbolic position, which often does not exercise real power.Once the Japanese discovered the source of unmasked power, they regarded it as exploitation, as out of proportion to their system, as they regarded the usurer and the upstart.
Because the Japanese viewed their society in this way, they were able to resist exploitation and injustice without becoming revolutionaries.They do not intend to destroy their social fabric.They can bring about the most radical change, as in the Meiji era, without criticizing the system itself.They call this change "retro", that is, going back to the past.They are not revolutionaries.Among Western writers, some hoped that Japan would launch a mass movement in terms of ideology; won the subsequent elections, but they both grossly miscalculated the situation.The following speech, delivered by the conservative Prime Minister Baron Kibara when he formed a cabinet in October 1945, best expresses the Japanese thinking.
The new Japanese government has a democratic form that respects the will of all citizens... Since ancient times in our country, the emperor has made the will of the people his own.This is the spirit of Emperor Meiji's Constitution.The democratic politics I talk about can be regarded as the true embodiment of this spirit.
Such an explanation of democracy is simply meaningless to American readers.However, on the basis of this old-fashioned explanation, it will undoubtedly be easier for Japan to expand the scope of national freedom and improve the welfare of its citizens than based on Western ideology.
Of course, Japan will experiment with Western democratic political systems.But Western institutions, as in the United States, are not reliable instruments for improving the world.General suffrage and an elected legislature can solve many problems, but it can also create many difficulties.When these difficulties persist, the Japanese will modify the means by which we have achieved democracy.At that point, the Americans will angrily declare that the war has been lost.We believe our approach is the best.But, at best, universal suffrage played a secondary role in Japan's rebuilding of a peaceful nation.Japan has not changed fundamentally since the first elections were tried out in the 1890s.The traditional difficulties described by Lafcadio Hearn at the time will be repeated in the future.
In a bitter election battle that cost so many lives, there really was no personal animosity.Violence in parliamentary debate, and the use of violence, often astonishes outsiders, is seldom a confrontation between individuals.Political struggle is not really a struggle between individuals, but a struggle of interests between feudal lords and parties.Moreover, the ardent followers of every feudal lord or party understood the new politics only as a new war—a struggle loyal to the interests of the leader.
In the more recent elections of the 1920s, rural people always said before they voted: "Wash your head and prepare for beheading."To this day, Japanese elections carry different meanings than those in the United States, whether or not Japan pursues a dangerous policy of aggression.
Japan's real strength in rebuilding a peaceful nation lies in the Japanese's willingness to admit that their past course of action had "failed" and thus turn their energies in another direction.Japan has a fickle ethic.They had tried, and failed, to win it its "proper place" in the world by war.So they can abandon this approach.Because of the training they have received in the past, they can change direction.Peoples with a more absolute ethic always believe they are fighting for principles, and when they surrender to the victor they say: "We have failed, and there is no justice." Justice" wins next time.Or, they admit that they have sinned and confess.Not so with the Japanese.On the fifth day after the surrender, when no U.S. soldiers landed, the Mainichi Shimbun, a major newspaper in Tokyo, wrote an article commenting on the defeat and the political changes it brought about.It said: "However, this is of great benefit to the ultimate rescue of Japan." The editorial emphasized that everyone should never forget that Japan has completely failed.Since the attempt to build Japan by force alone has completely failed, the path of a peaceful nation must be taken in the future.Another major Tokyo newspaper, the Asahi Shimbun, also published an article in the same week, arguing that Japan's "excessive confidence in military power" in recent years was a "major mistake" in Japan's domestic and foreign policies, saying that "the attitude of the past has caused us to gain almost nothing and suffer heavy losses." , we must abandon it and adopt a new attitude rooted in international coordination and peace-loving".
Westerners view this shift as a shift of principle, and are suspicious of it.But it is an integral part of Japanese conduct, both in human relations and in international relations.The Japanese were considered to have made a "mistake" when they took a course of action and failed to achieve its goal.If it fails, they discard it as a failed policy, because there is no need for them to stick to a failed policy.The Japanese often say: "It's useless to bite your own belly button." In the 1930s, they generally believed that militarism was a means to win the respect of the world, and it was a kind of worship that was hunted by force.They endured all the sacrifices that this program demanded. On August 14, 1945, the Emperor, Japan's holiest speaker, announced to them that Japan had failed.They accepted all that defeat entailed.This meant that the U.S. military was going to occupy Japan, so they welcomed the U.S. military; it meant the failure of the Imperial Kingdom's invasion attempt, so they took the initiative to consider a constitution that abolished war.On the tenth day after Japan's surrender, "Yomiuri Hochi" published an editorial titled "The Beginning of New Art and New Culture", which wrote: "We must firmly believe that the failure of the military is closely related to the cultural value of a nation. Two things, military defeat should be used as a driving force...Because only the tragic sacrifice of this kind of national defeat can make the Japanese people improve their thinking, look at the world, and observe things objectively and truthfully. All the past distorted Japanese thinking All irrational factors should be eliminated through frank analysis....We need to have the courage to face up to the cold reality of defeat. But we must have confidence in the future of Japanese culture.” That is to say, they tried a Having failed with this course of action, they will now try a peaceful art of life.The editorials of various Japanese newspapers have repeatedly emphasized: "Japan must be respected among the countries of the world." The responsibility of Japanese citizens is to win the respect of others on a new basis.
The editorials of these newspapers were not only the voice of the intellectual minority.Ordinary people on the streets of Tokyo and remote villages are also undergoing major changes.The U.S. occupation forces could hardly believe that such friendly citizens were the same people who had sworn to fight to the end with bamboo spears.The Japanese ethic contained many things that Americans rejected, but the experience of the American occupation of Japan eloquently demonstrated that a heterogeneous ethic also contained many commendable aspects.
The American administration of Japan, headed by General MacArthur, recognized the Japanese ability to change course.It did not use humiliating means to hinder the process.According to Western ethics, it may be culturally acceptable to impose humiliating means on Japan.Because according to Western ethical beliefs, insults and punishments are effective social means to make people who have done bad things realize their sins.This self-confession is the first step in being a new man.As mentioned earlier, the Japanese see it differently.According to their ethics, a person must be responsible for all the consequences of his actions, and the natural consequences of his mistakes will make him confirm that he will never do it again.These natural consequences may also include the defeat of the total war.The Japanese, however, do not detest these situations as humiliating.According to the Japanese, when someone or a certain country insults another or another country, they use methods such as slander, ridicule, contempt, insult, and exposure of their infamy.If the Japanese feel insulted, then revenge is a kind of morality.However strongly Western ethics condemned this creed in Japan, the effectiveness of the American occupation depended on self-restraint on this point.Because the Japanese hate ridicule very much, and think that this is completely different from the inevitable consequences of surrender, including disarmament and harsh compensation obligations.
Japan once defeated a great power.Japan, the victor, was careful not to humiliate the defeated enemy when the enemy finally surrendered and Japan believed that it had not laughed at Japan. When the Russian army surrendered at Lushunkou in 1905, there was a famous photo known to all Japanese women and children.In the photo, the only difference between the victor and the defeated is the military uniform. The Russian soldiers did not disarm and still wore sabers.According to a famous story circulated by the Japanese, when the commander of the Russian army, General Steele, agreed to the surrender conditions proposed by the Japanese side, a Japanese captain and an interpreter came to the Russian army headquarters with food.At that time, "except for General Steele's mount, all the army horses had been slaughtered and eaten. Therefore, the fifty chickens and one hundred raw eggs brought by the Japanese were heartily welcomed."The next day, General Steele and General Nogi met as scheduled. "The two generals shook hands, and General Steele praised the bravery of the Japanese army... General Nogi praised the long and strong defense of the Russian army. General Steele expressed sympathy for General Nogi who lost two sons in this war. … …General Steele presented his beloved white Arabian stallion to General Nogi. General Nogi said that although he desperately wanted to get the horse from His Excellency, he must first dedicate it to His Majesty the Emperor. He believed that the horse would be born Give it to him. He promises that if that happens, he will love it as much as his own horse.” The Japanese know that General Nogi built a stable for General Steele’s horse in the front yard of his house. .According to descriptions, it is even more elegant than General Nogi's own house. After the general died, it became part of the Nogi Shrine.
Some say that the Japanese have completely changed in character since the last Russian surrender, for example, their wanton destruction and brutality during their occupation of the Philippines is well known to the world.However, for a nation like Japan, which can easily change its moral standards according to the situation, the above conclusion may not be inevitable.First of all, the enemy did not surrender after the Battle of Bataan, only some areas surrendered.Later, although the Japanese army in the Philippines surrendered, Japan continued to fight.Second, the Japanese never thought that the Russians had "insulted" them at the beginning of this century.On the contrary, in the 1920s and 1930s, almost all Japanese believed that the US policy was to "contempt Japan" or, as they put it, "to look down on Japan at all."That's how they reacted to anti-Japanese immigration laws, to America's role in the Portsmouth Peace Treaty and the Second Disarmament Treaty.The expansion of American influence in the Far Eastern economy and our racist attitudes towards people of color in the world prompted the same response from the Japanese.Thus, the Japanese victory over Russia and the Japanese victory over the United States in the Philippines reveal the apparently opposite duality of Japanese behavior: one side when insulted, and the other side otherwise.
The final victory of the United States changed the circumstances of the Japanese once again.As was the custom in Japanese life, their final failure caused them to abandon the course they had taken before.This unique ethical outlook of the Japanese enables them to cleanse themselves of dirt.American policy and General MacArthur's administration of Japan added no new humiliation to wash away.They insisted on only those things that the Japanese regarded as simply accepting defeat as the "natural consequence" of the war, and it certainly worked.
Retaining the emperor is of great significance.It's been handled very well.The Emperor visited General MacArthur first, but General MacArthur did not visit the Emperor first. This incident taught the Japanese a vivid lesson, and its significance is difficult for Westerners to estimate.It is said that when he suggested that the emperor deny the godhood, the emperor raised an objection, saying that he was embarrassed to let him abandon what he did not have.He said sincerely that the Japanese did not see him as a god in the Western sense.But MacArthur's command persuaded him that the Western idea that the emperor still insisted on divinity would affect Japan's international reputation.So the emperor endured this embarrassment and agreed to issue a statement denying the godhood.The Emperor issued a statement on New Year's Day and requested that all comments from all countries on the matter be translated for him.After reading these comments, the Emperor sent a letter to MacArthur's headquarters to express his satisfaction.Foreigners apparently did not understand before this, and the Emperor was pleased with the announcement.
American policy also allowed the Japanese to get some kind of satisfaction.The joint directive of the State Council, the Ministry of the Army, and the Ministry of the Navy clearly stated: "The development of labor, industrial, and agricultural groups organized on a democratic basis should be encouraged and facilitated." Japanese workers organized in many industries up.There was also a resurgence of the peasant associations that were active in the 1920s and 1930s.For many Japanese, their ability to actively work to improve their living conditions is a testament to Japan's reaping of the aftermath of the war.An American correspondent told me that a striker in Tokyo stared at American soldiers beamingly and said, "Japan has 'victory'! Is it?" Today's strikes in Japan are very similar to the peasant uprisings in pre-war Japan, when peasants Petitions often hinder normal production due to excessive annual tribute and taxes.They are not class struggles in the Western sense, attempts to change the system itself.Today, strikes across Japan have not slowed production.The strikers' favorite method is for the workers to "occupy the factory, keep working, increase production, and embarrass the operator. In a coal mine of Mitsui Systems, the 'strike' workers drove all the managers out of the mine and reduced the daily output from 250 tons to 100 tons. to 620 tons. Workers at the Ashio copper mine also increased production during the 'strike' and tripled their wages".
Of course, no matter how well-intentioned the administrative policies, the administration of a defeated country is always difficult.In Japan, issues such as food, housing, and national re-education are bound to be acute.The problem would have been equally acute if officials of the Japanese government had not been used.The demobilization of troops was a major concern of the American authorities until the end of the war. The retention of Japanese officials made this problem obviously less threatening, but it was not easy to solve.The Japanese are well aware of this difficulty.Last fall, Japanese newspapers spoke sympathetically of how bitter the cup of defeat must have been for the Japanese soldiers who had suffered so much to defeat them.The newspaper begged them not to cloud their "judgment."In general, the repatriated soldiers showed fairly good 'judgment', but unemployment and defeat also led some of them into old-fashioned secret societies in pursuit of nationalist goals.They are prone to resentment at their present position.The Japanese no longer accord them the privileged status they once had.In the past, disabled soldiers wore white clothes, and pedestrians on the street would salute when they met them.When entering the army, there will be a farewell party in the village, and a welcome party will be held in the village after leaving the army. Food and wine will be provided, accompanied by beautiful girls singing and dancing, and the soldiers will sit at the head.Today's demobilized soldiers don't get that kind of preferential treatment at all.Only the family put them in, that's all.In many cities and villages, they were met with cold shoulder.Knowing how painful this sudden change has been for the Japanese, it is not difficult to imagine how much these soldiers liked to gather with their old friends and reminisce about the days when Japan's honor was placed on the soldiers.Moreover, he may have been told by some of his comrades that some lucky Japanese soldiers had already fought the Allies in Java, Shanxi, and Manchuria.They will say: why despair?He will fight again!Nationalist secret societies have long existed in Japan.These groups want to "wash Japan's stigma."Those who feel "the world is out of balance" because of unfulfilled vengeance are most likely to join such secret societies.The violence used by such groups, such as the Black Dragon Society and Xuanyangsha, is "giri to name" in Japanese morality, and it is allowed to be used.In order to eliminate this kind of violence, in the next few years, the Japanese government must continue the long-term efforts in the past, that is, to emphasize "obligation" and depreciate the "giri" of status.
Therefore, it is not enough to just resort to "judgment". The Japanese economy must also be rebuilt so that people in their 20s and 30s can have a way of life and "get what they want."The condition of farmers must be improved.Whenever the economy suffers, the Japanese return to their rural hometowns.However, in many places, the land is small and the debts are heavy, making it difficult to feed a large population.Industry must also start to develop.Because the sentiment against equal inheritance is very strong, only the eldest son can inherit the inheritance, and the other youngest sons can only go to the city to find opportunities.
The Japanese will undoubtedly have a long and difficult road ahead.But if the state budget does not include the cost of rearmament, they have the opportunity to improve the living standards of the people.For about a decade before Pearl Harbor, half of Japan's annual revenue was spent on armaments and maintaining the army.It is possible for such a country to lay the foundations of a sound economy by stopping such expenditures and gradually reducing the taxation from the peasants.As mentioned earlier, the distribution of Japanese agricultural products is 60% to the cultivator, and the remaining 40% is used to pay taxes and rent.This is quite different from Myanmar and Siam, which are also rice-growing countries. The traditional distribution method in those countries is to leave 90% to the cultivators.The huge taxes paid by Japanese cultivators were ultimately used to pay for the military.
Over the next decade, any country in Europe or Asia that does not build up armaments will have a potential advantage over those that do, because such countries can use their wealth to build sound, prosperous economies.In the United States, we have paid little attention to this situation in our Asian policy and European policy.Because we know that our country will not be impoverished by the great expense of defense programs, that our country has not suffered the scourge of war.We are not a predominantly agricultural country, and our major problem is industrial overproduction.Our mass production and machinery are so perfected that without large scale armaments, luxury goods production, welfare and research facilities, our people would be out of a job.The demand for profitable investment is also very urgent.The situation is quite different in other countries, even in Western Europe.Although Germany has to bear huge compensation, but because it cannot rearm, in the next ten years or so, if France pursues a policy of expanding armaments, then Germany may build a sound and prosperous economic foundation that France cannot do.Japan will also take advantage of the same advantage over China.China's current goal is militarization, and its ambitions are supported by the United States.If Japan's national budget does not include militarization goals, it will lay the foundations of prosperity in the not-too-distant future and become a protagonist in Eastern trade.Its economy will be based on peaceful interests and will raise the standard of living of its citizens.A peaceful Japan will gain a prestigious position among the nations of the world, and it will be of great help to Japan if the United States can use its influence to support this plan.
If it wants to create a free and democratic Japan by command, neither the United States nor any foreign country can do it.This approach has never been successful in any governed country.No foreign country can compel a people with different habits and ideas to live according to foreign patterns.The law cannot make the Japanese recognize the authority of the elected people, and ignore the "each in his place" of his hierarchy.Nor can the law give them the free and easy intercourse, the urge for self-independence, the zeal for choosing a spouse, occupation, home, and obligations of every kind to which we Americans are accustomed.But the Japanese have clearly seen the need for a change in this direction.After Japan surrendered, their rulers said Japan must encourage its men and women to take control of their lives and respect their consciences.Although they did not say so, every Japanese understands in their hearts that they are already doubting the role of "shame" in Japanese society, and hope to develop a new freedom among their compatriots, that is, starting from condemning and investigating "society". Freed from fear.
It's also because, no matter how willingly, Japanese social pressures are too demanding on individuals.Social pressure requires him to conceal his personal feelings, abandon his personal desires, and face society as a representative of a family, group or nation.The Japanese have proven that they can endure all the self-discipline this way of life demands.However, the burden is too heavy, and they must restrain themselves to a high degree in order to get good treatment.They dare not ask for a life with less psychological pressure, and the result is that they are led by the militarists on a long and endless road of sacrifices.After paying such a high price, they became self-righteous, and despised a people whose moral values were more lenient.
The first big step the Japanese took towards social change was to admit that the war of aggression was a "mistake" and a failure.They very much hope to regain respected status in the peaceful country.This must bring about world peace.In the next few years, if Russia and the United States are committed to arming and preparing to attack, Japan will use its military knowledge to participate in that war.But acknowledging this does not cast doubt on the inherent possibility of Japan becoming a peaceful nation.Japan's motives for behavior are adaptable, and Japan will seek its place in a peaceful world if circumstances permit.Otherwise, they would also be part of the armed camp.
Now the Japanese realize that militarism has failed.They will also watch to see whether militarism is also failing in other countries around the world.If not defeated, Japan will rekindle its belligerence and show how it can contribute to the war effort.If militarism fails elsewhere, Japan will demonstrate how it has learned a lesson that imperialist hegemony is never the path to glory.
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