ABSTRACT
Despite the fact that one would not usually connect the history of the Nation of Islam with that of Japan, the interrelationship of American religion and Japanese imperial ambitions is especially visible in the history of the Nation. Japan's interest in the Islamic world became especially strong as a consequence of its antagonism toward the Russian Empire, where many Muslims were longing for liberation. This chapter presents a survey of the Islam-oriented policy of Japan from the end of the Russo-Japanese War until the Second World War. It discusses the Nation of Islam and its branches to highlight the existing bonds between the Nation and Japan. The chapter provides the international perspective on the Nation of Islam as well as a description of Japanese war-oriented strategies of cultural counter-insurgency. Black Nationalism in the United States was in most forms a separatist movement, because it aspired to segregation from the existing white-dominated society.
