ABSTRACT
Since the end of the war and the Occupation, it seems Japan has indeed ‘taken advantage of defeat.’ In the late 1980s Hatanaka Shigeo, former editor of the leading monthly, Chuo koron, who was arrested in 1944 as an alleged communist, spoke of Japan ’s war and defeat:
It really was a miserable erä. I wish such a period had never existed. But because Japan lost, we are able to speak [freely] like this. This, too, is a paradox. If we’d won, we might have been more miserable. Maybe we should thank America, (quoted in Cook and Cook, 1992: 227)
Japan’s quest for international strength began in the late nineteenth century as a response to American demands for treaty relations. When the Tokugawa government proved unequal to the task of leading Japan through this crisis and preserving the country’s national independence, a group of young samurai overthrew their government and established the new Meiji government. The twin goals of ‘Rich Country, Strong Army’ guided these remarkable new leaders as they rebuilt their nation using Western political, economic and military models. Phenomenally successful, within a gener ation Japan had fought and won wars against both China and Russia, and established colonial control over Taiwan and Korea. But rapid change brought social dislocation, and by the early part of the twentieth century governmental leaders grew concerned that this social dislocation would derail Japan’s national progress. Their response was to establish ever-tighter control over the population.
