17. For nearly a year MacArthur had been hoping to get the emperor to call on him. In Manila, he had conveyed his wish to Col. Sidney Mashbir, the head of the Allied Translation and Interpreter Service (ATIS). “I’ll start proceedings along that line as soon as we arrive in Japan,” Mashbir replied. See Sidney F. Mashbir, I Was an American Spy (Vantage Press, Inc., 1953), pp. 308–9. On Fujita’s visit to GHQ, see TN, dai hakkan, p. 152.
18. Takahashi Hiroshi, “Shch tenn no sekkeishatachi,” Shokun (January 1995), pp. 66–68. Several excerpts from Sekiya’s unpublished diary, cited by Takahashi, show how Sekiya, Kawai, and Fellers conferred on making sure that the emperor was not held responsible for the war.
19. FRUS, Diplomatic Papers 1945: The Far East, vol. 6, p. 720.
20. New York Times, Sept. 26, 1945.
21. Ibid., Sept. 23, 1946.
22. Cited in Awaya Kentar, NHK Shuzaihan, Tokyo saiban e no michi (Nihon Hs Shuppan Kykai, 1994), pp. 13–14.
23. Frederick B. Wiener, “Comment: The Years of MacArthur, Vol. III: MacArthur Unjustifiably Accused of Meting Out ‘Victors’ Justice” in War Crimes Cases,” in Military Law Review 113 (Summer 1986), p. 217.
24. Report of Government Section Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers, Political Reorientation of Japan, Sept. 1945 to Sept. 1948 (Washington, D.C.: USGPO, 1949), vol. 2, p. 423.
25. Higashino Shin, Shwa tenn futatsu no “dokuhakuroku” (NHK Shuppan, 1998), pp. 62–68. In his psychological warfare report entitled “Answer to Japan,” drafted in mid–1944, Fellers had written, “It is a profanity for Japanese to doubt the Emperor’s correctness just as it is for Catholics to doubt the chastity of the Virgin Mary.”
26. The final “Blacklist” plan, dated August 8, 1945, assumed an occupation by acquiescence; what developed was an occupation in which Japan’s leaders actively participated in influencing American policy from the very start. See Reports of General MacArthur, MacArthur in Japan: The Occupation: Military Phase, Vol. 1 Supplement. Prepared by His General Staff (Washington, D.C.: USGPO, 1966), pp. 2–12.
27. Toyoshita Narahiko, “Tenn/Makks kaiken no shoken” in Iwanami Shinsho Henshbu, ed., Shwa no shen (Iwanami Shoten 1990), p. 81; Matsuo Takayoshi, “Ksh Shwa tenn, Makks gensui dai ikkai kaiken,” in Kyoto daigaku bungakubu kenky kiy, dai 29 go (Mar. 1990), pp. 46–48. The corrected answer, given afterward by a spokesman, was: “As to the strategic details of the war, such as the disposition of military and naval forces and the time, place, and manner of the attack, the emperor was not generally consulted, these being decided almost exclusively by the high command. At any rate, it was his majesty’s intention to issue a formal declaration of war before the commencement of hostilities.”
28. Hosokawa Morisada, Jh tenn ni tassezu: Hskawa nikki (Isobe Shob, 1953), p. 173; Kinoshita, Sokkin nisshi, pp. 34–35; Sugiyama memo, j, pp. 387–88.
29. Tanaka Nobumasa, Dokyumento Shwa tenn 6, senry (Ryokuf Shuppan 1990), p. 237; ISN, dai nikan, p. 11.
30. Theodore Cohen, Remaking Japan, p. 64.
31. Douglas MacArthur, Reminiscences: General of the Army Douglas MacArthur (McGraw-Hill Book Co., 1964), p. 288; Richard E. Lauterbach, “Secret Japan War Plans: Official Reports Reveal Pearl Harbor Strategy,” Life, Mar. 4, 1946, p. 22; John Gunther, The Riddle of MacArthur: Japan, Korea and the Far East (Harper & Brothers, 1957), p. 116; Kido Kichi nikki, ge, pp. 1237–38; and Toyoshita, “Tenn/Makks kaiken no shoken,” p. 78.
32. Toyoshita, “Tenn/Makks kaiken no shoken,” pp. 83–84.
33. D. Clayton James, The Years of MacArthur, vol. 3, Triumph and Disaster 1945–1964 (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1985), pp. 322–23.
34. Kaneko Shichir, Shinbun Kameraman no shgen (Nihon Shinbun Kykai, 1986) pp. 28–33.
35. New York Times, Sept. 29, 1945; Yui Daizabur, “Democracy From the Ruins: The First Seven Weeks of the Occupation in Japan” (Apr. 30, 1986; unpublished paper).
36. “Kimigayo” (His majesty’s reign) first became the official national anthem during the decade between the Sino-and Russo-Japanese Wars (1895 to 1905).
37. The figures GHQ disclosed on Oct. 30, 1945, were based on early post-surrender monetary standards. Subsequent reevaluation, raised the total value of the imperial property sharply. Nezu, Tenn to Shwashi, ge (San Ichi Shb, 1976, 1983), pp. 265–66.
38. Herbert P. Bix, “The Shwa Emperor’s ‘Monologue’ and the Problem of War Responsibility,” in Journal of Japanese Studies 18, no. 2 (Summer 1992), p. 307.
39. Abdication was a live issue throughout the entire occupation period. For discussion, see ibid., pp. 312–18.
40. Yasuda Tsuneo, “Shch tennsei to minsh ishiki: sono shisteki kanren o chshin ni,” in Rekishigaku kenky 621 (July 1991), p. 36.
41. Yamada, Dai gensui Shwa tenn, p. 306. The last remnants of the army and navy ministries—the First and Second Demobilization Bureaus—were closed down in Oct. 1947.
42. Tanaka, Dokyumento Shwa tenn 6, senry, pp. 167–68. He cites the reaction to the Nov. 8 press report of antiwar activist and writer Watanabe Kiyoshi, who had survived the sinking of the battleship Musashi.
43. Kido Kichi kankei bunsho (Tokyo Daigaku Shuppankai, 1966), pp. 139–40. Kido adds, “However, when the train arrived at Numazu Station, the station [had been] burned down and a temporary hut stood in its place. A crowd was standing by the fence looking at us. Overall the mood was peaceful. Some bowed their heads; others smiled. It was a very natural scene and before I knew it, the six minutes…had passed.”
44. Kinoshita, Sokkin nisshi, p. 64.
45. Tanaka, Dokyumento Shwa tenn, p. 169, referring to the Asahi shinbun of Nov. 24.
46. Takeyama Akiko, “Senryka no hs: ‘Shins wa k d,’” in Minami Hiroshi, Shakai Shinri Kenkyjo, eds., Zoku, Shwa bunka 1945–1989 (Keis Shb 1990), p. 121; Asahi shinbun (ykan), Dec. 8, 1945.
47. John Dunning, Tune in Yesterday: The Ultimate Encyclopedia of Old-Time Radio, 1925–1976 (Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1976), pp. 393–96.
48. Takeyama, “Senryka no hs: ‘Shins wa k d,’” pp. 105–6; see also Mark Gayn, Japan Diary (William Sloane Associates, 1948), p. 6. After watching a rehearsal of the show, Gayn wrote (p. 7):
The only thing that disturbed me in the broadcasts, as well as in the series of twenty [sic] newspaper articles starting tomorrow, was their politics. They described the timid Premier Kijuro Shidehara as a courageous foe of militarism; they concentrated their fire mainly on men of the sword, to the exclusion of such obvious war criminals as the emperor or heads of the super-trusts; they naively interpreted, or even distorted, some of the recent Japanese history.
49. Takeyama, pp. 131–34. CIE-GHQ responded by altering the format and changing the style to accommodate Japanese listeners. The pilot for a new, toned-down version went on the air in late January 1946. Called “Now It Can Be Told—Question Box,” it was later renamed “Truth Box,” and ran from Feb. 17 to Nov. 29, 1946. After further modifications this show too was renamed “Question Box,” a program of questions and answers concerning the Pacific war, labor unions, the new constitution, and school integration. In Jan. 1948 “Question Box” became NHK’s daily “Information Hour.” See Takeyama, p. 140.
50. Asahi shinbun, Aug. 30, 1945, cited in Yoshida, Nihonjin no senskan, pp. 26–27.
51. Mainichi Shimbun, Sept. 5, 1945, quoted in kubo Genji, The Problems of the Emperor System in Postwar Japan (Nihon Taiheiy Mondai Chsakai, 1948), p. 9. Higashikuni’s speech is reproduced in Kokkai Hyakunen-shi Kankkai, ed., Nihon kokkai hyakunen shi, chkan (Kokkai Shiry Hensankai, 1987), pp. 583–93.
52. Yoshida, Nihonjin no senskan, p. 27.
53. For discussion of the Nov. 5, 1945, policy document, see Bix, “The Shwa Emperor’s ‘Monologue’…,” pp. 306–7.
54. Kisaka Junichir, “Ajia-taiheiy sens no rekishiteki seikaku o megutte,” Nenp: Nihon gendaishi, skan, sengo gojnen no rekishiteki kensh (Azuma Shuppan, 1995), p. 9.
55. Akazawa Shir, “Shch tennsei no keisei to sens sekininron,” in Rekishi hyron 313 (July 1
976), p. 47.
56. For the text of the rescript see Senda, Tenn to chokugo to Shwashi, pp. 401–4.
57. For detailed analysis of Meiji’s imperial oath, see John Breen, “The Imperial Oath of April 1868: Ritual, Politics, and Power in the Restoration,” in Monumenta Nipponica: Studies in Japanese Culture 51, no. 4 (Winter 1996), p. 410; for analysis of the “Declaration of Humanity” see Bix, “The Shwa Emperor’s ‘Monologue’…,” pp. 318–21.
58. Akazawa, “Shch tennsei no keisei to sens sekininron,” p. 46.
59. New York Times, Jan. 1, 1946.
60. Chicago Daily Tribune, Jan. 1, 1946.
61. For the full text of Hirohito’s press interview of Aug. 23, 1977, see Takahashi Hiroshi, Heika otazune mshiagemasu (Bungei Shunj, 1989), p. 253.
62. Tanaka Nobumasa, Dokyumento Shwa tenn, dai hakkan: shch (Ryokuf Shuppan, 1993), p. 115.
63. Cited in Sakamoto, Shchtennsei e no pafmansu, p. 96.
64. For contrasting commentary on the New Year’s rescript, see Hata Ikuhiko, Hirohito tenn itsutsu no ketsudan (Kdansha, 1984), p. 221; Tanaka Nobumasa, Dokyumento Shwa tenn: dai hakkan: shch, pp. 115–19.
65. Yoshida, Shwa tenn no shsenshi, p. 78.
66. A typical example of such writing is Ono Noboru, Ningen tenn (Ichiysha, 1947), which went through four editions in its first year.
67. Cited from Yoshida Shigeru, IV, in Ito Satoru, “Yoshida Shigeru: senzen sengo o tsjita shin-Bei-ha” in Yoshida Yutaka, Ara Kei, et al., Haisen zengo: Shwa tenn to gonin no shidsha (Aoki Shoten, 1995), p. 260.
68. Tsuda Skichi, “Kenkoku no jij to bansei ikkei no shis,” in Sekai (Apr. 1946), pp. 53–54.
69. Sakaguchi Ango, “Tenn heika ni sasaguru kotoba,” in Teihon Sakaguchi Ango zensh, dai nana kan (Sanyd Insatsu K. K., 1967), p. 404.
70. “Skan no kotoba,” in Shins (Mar. 1, 1946), p. 3.
71. “Tenn wa hoki de aru,” in Shins, Sept. 1, 1947, inside front cover. The reason offered was because “everywhere the emperor goes, even in deep mine shafts or the corners of the towns through which his entourage passes, the walls of the buildings are cleaned with brooms and instantaneously the towns and villages are beautified.”
72. The Anderton memorandum to “The Commander in Chief” through “Military Secretary” is in the Fellers papers.
73. FRUS, Diplomatic Papers 1946: The Far East, vol. 8, p. 396.
74. The Matsumoto draft merely altered some of the phraseology of the Meiji constitution while retaining the authority and powers of the emperor and the system of separate Imperial House Law. Worse still, it reduced the rights and increased the duties of “subjects,” and, except for subjecting the war-and treaty-making authority of the emperor to the consent of a permanent Diet committee, failed to strengthen substantially the power of the Diet. See Political Reorientation of Japan: September 1945 to September 1948. Report of Government Section, Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers (Washington, D.C.: USGPO, 1949), pp. 98–101.
75. The phrase “In order to accomplish the aim of the preceding paragraph” was added by Ashida Hitoshi in Diet deliberations.
76. Watanabe Osamu, “Sengo kaikaku to h: tennsei kokka wa datsareta ka,” in Hasegawa Masayasu et al., eds., Kza, kakumei to h, dai sankan, shimin kakumei to Nihon-h (Nihon Hyronsha, 1994), pp. 126–29.
77. Watanabe, “Sengo kaikaku to h: tennsei kokka wa datsareta ka,” p. 227.
78. Ibid., p. 226.
79. Kinoshita, Sokkin nisshi, p. 145.
80. Ashida Hitoshi, Ashida Hitoshi nikki, dai ikkan (Iwanami Shoten, 1986), pp. 78–79.
81. Ibid., p. 80.
82. Ibid., p. 82.
83. Kinoshita Michio, Sokkin nisshi, p. 160, diary entry of February 28.
84. New York Times (Mar. 4, 1946), p. 6.
85. Kinoshita, Sokkin nisshi, pp. 163–64.
86. Tanaka Akihito, Nijusseiki no Nihon, dai nikan, Anzen hosh: sengo gojnen no mosaku (Yomiuri Shinbunsha, 1997), p. 33. Yokota later abandoned his initial interpretation of Article 9 and distanced himself from earlier criticism of Hirohito. After the outbreak of the Korean War, both he and Ashida became strong supporters of rearmament. By 1960 Yokota had moved sufficiently to the right to qualify as a justice of the Supreme Court.
87. Takahashi Hiroshi, “Kaisetsu—Shwa tenn to ‘Sokkin nisshi’ no jidai” in Kinoshita, Sokkin nisshi, p. 268.
88. Ashida nikki, dai ikkan, p. 90. The emperor’s resistance has been argued persuasively by Watanabe Osamu in Sengo seiji shi no naka no tennsei (Aoki Shoten, 1990) and “Tenn,” in Nihonshi daijiten, yonkan (Heibonsha, 1994), p. 1246.
89. See Yoshida Shigeru, Kais jnen (Shinchsha, 1957–58).
90. The GHQ account, written by Alfred R. Hussey, states: “On the 22nd, as a last recourse, the Prime Minister, accompanied by Yoshida and Narahashi, consulted the Emperor. Hirohito did not hesitate. He advised Shidehara that he fully supported the most thorough-going revision, even to the point of depriving the Emperor himself of all political authority.” Political Reorientation of Japan, p. 106.
91. Watanabe, Sengo seijishi no naka no tennsei, pp. 119–120, citing Asahi shinbun, Apr. 18, 1977.
92. The following day, Mar. 6, 1946, Kinoshita (p. 165) tried to comfort Hirohito regarding the loss of his sovereign powers by telling him it was better to discard the old constitution:
…and obtain freedom to guide the spirit of politicians and the people. The emperor seems to have the same idea.
Concerning abdication, the emperor said that it would probably be easier for him if he abdicated, for then he wouldn’t have to experience today’s difficulties. But Prince Chichibu is sick; Prince Takamatsu had been pro-war and at the hub of the military at that time, so he was unsuitable to be regent. Prince Mikasa was young and inexperienced. He felt especially disappointed at the rash act of Prince Higashikuni and said that Higashikuni probably never considered these sort of circumstances.
93. Watanabe, “Sengo kaikaku to h: tennsei kokka wa datsareta ka,” pp. 235–38. Watanabe emphasizes (p. 239) the highly limited nature of the constitutional revision process, rebutting the argument that the 1946 revision continued the tradition of constitution making of the 1870s-early 1880s. “The heightening of the movement for postwar reform had barely begun,” he writes, “when the basic framework of the constitution was determined from above.”
94. Shimizu Tru, at seventy-nine, committed suicide in Sept. 1947, leaving behind a last testament expressing anger at the new constitution for having turned Hirohito into a puppet, and sadness at newspaper pictures that showed him being jostled by crowds. See Shimizu Terao, “Meiji kenp ni junshishita kenp gakusha,” in Bungei shunj u 42 (Nov. 1964), pp. 274–81.
95. Minobe Tatsukichi, “Minshushugi to waga gikai seido,” Sekai (Jan. 1946) and “Minshushugi seiji to kenp,” Seikatsu bunka (Feb. 1946).
96. Yamada Akira, “Gendai ni okeru ‘sens sekinin’ mondai: tenn no ‘sens sekinin’ o chshin ni,” in Rekishi hyron 545 (Sept. 1995), pp. 24–25; Yamauchi Toshihiro, “Tenn no sens sekinin,” in Yokota Kichi, Ebashi Takashi, eds., Shch tennsei no kz: kenp gakusha ni yoru kaidoku, (Nihon Hyronsha, 1990), pp. 241–58.
97. See Yokota Kichi, “’Koshitsu tempan’ shich” in Yokota, Ebashi, Shch tennsei no kz: kenp gakusha ni yoru kaidoku, pp. 106–8; for the English text, Political Reorientation of Japan, pp. 846–48.
98. Watanabe Osamu, “Nihon koku kenp unyshi josetsu,” in Higuchi Yichi, ed., Kza, kenpgaku 1, pp. 116–32.
99. Kinoshita Michio, “Seij no goshinky,” in Chory (Mar. 1946), p. 86; Kinoshita, Sokkin nisshi, p. 169; cited in Tanaka, Dokyumento Shwa tenn, dai hakkan, pp. 424–25. This interview appeared after the emperor had read and approved it. Hirohito obviously believed he could remain the moral and spiritual center of the nation.
CHAPTER 15
THE TOKYO TRIAL
1. Under-Secretary of State Sumner Welles made the earliest declaration of this war aim. Kurusu Sabur, ex–ambassador to the United States, cited Welles on Nov. 26, 1942, in an address before
the Imperial Rule Assistance Association, in which he noted that punishment of war criminals was a principal U.S. war aim.
2. Timothy L. H. McCormack, “From Sun Tzu to the Sixth Committee: The Evolution of an International Criminal Law Regime,” in Timothy McCormack and Gerry J. Simpson, The Law of War Crimes: National and International Approaches (Boston: Kluwer Law International, 1997), p. 57.
3. While waiting for GHQ’s reply, the Japanese army prosecuted seven people, in fake trials designed to protect the army by destroying, manipulating, and fabricating evidence. GHQ ordered the Japanese government to stop its prosecution of war criminals on March 9, 1946. See Nagai Hitoshi, “War Crimes Trials by the Japanese Army,” in Kant Gakuin Daigaku Keizai Gakubu Sg Gakujutsu Rons (Jan. 99).
4. Evan J. Wallach, “The Procedural and Evidentiary Rules of the Post–World War II War Crimes Trials: Did They Provide An Outline for International Legal Procedure?” in Columbia Journal of Transnational Law 37, no. 3 (1999), pp. 873–74. Justice Murphy in the Homma case objected to the absence of safeguards concerning the use of coerced evidence; Justice Rutledge in the Yamashita case condemned MacArthur’s charter, which made the Military Commission in Manila “a law unto itself.” For details of the trials in the Philippines and elsewhere in Asia, see Philip R. Piccigallo, The Japanese on Trial: Allied War Crimes Operations in the East, 1945–1951 (University of Texas Press, 1979), esp. pp. 49–68.
5. Piccigallo, The Japanese on Trial, p. 66; citing Douglas MacArthur: Reminiscences: General of the Army Douglas MacArthur (McGraw-Hill, 1964), p. 298.
6. Higashino Shin, Shwa tenn futatsu no “dokuhakuroku” (Nihon Hs Kyoku Shuppankai, 1998), pp. 102–3.
7. Gordon Daniels, ed., “A Guide to the Reports of the United States Strategic Bombing Survey: Europe, The Pacific” (London: Offices of the Royal Historical Society, 1981), pp. xxiii-xxiv; Yoshida Yutaka, Shwa tenn no shsenshi (Iwanami Shinsho, 1992), pp. 179–80.
8. Toyoda Kumao, Sens saiban yoroku (Taiseisha Kabushiki Kaisha, 1986), p. 170.
9. Takada Makiko, “Shinshutsu Shiry kara mita ‘Shwa tenn dokuhakuroku,’” in Seiji keizai shigaku 299 (Mar. 1991), p. 41. The Mizota documents were first published in Toyoda, Sens saiban yoroku, pp. 171–72.
Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan Page 83
