“Planet” connects everyone

The biggest thing keeping me from being an avid fan of history, sports, Roman mythology, Pokemon, or what have you has always been the countless names you have to remember. It’s never enough just to know who Ichiro is or that he steals bases because that doesn’t come close to answering why his team hasn’t been to the world series in years. Who else is on the team? How do they train? Why are tickets so expensive? Why is it so stupid to root for the Yankees when you know they’re going to win? These are questions with no answers, yet they inspire some to spend their entire lives following statistics and analyzing the significance of every trade, every injury, every management change… but even a relatively contained and uncomplicated system such as American Major League Baseball is impossible to completely understand. That’s why you so often see people relying on superstitions (some of my friends swear by their rally caps) and curses to make sure their team wins. But curses, too, are occasionally broken. Where will it stop?! When can my mind finally take a break?!

Thus, it has become clear to me that the daunting task of trying to comprehend the world on a macro level takes up valuable time that could be better spent blogging. As you may have noticed, I prefer to take comfort in the agenda-driven generalizations, half-understood slogans, and other baseless name-calling that make for great blog posts. However, when a cool article such as this one comes out, even I must sit up and take notice (OK, I sat on it for 2 months but who’s counting?). Enjoy my translation:

By Nishida Mutsumi (March 21), editor, Nikkei Shimbun

Few have heard of him today, but once there was a strange man named Hisahara Fusanosuke. After founding Hitachi and Japan Energy he went into politics, eventually to become the leader of the prewar Seiyukai. The man lived a roller-coaster life, eventually being brought before the Marunouchi Military Police Headquarters (the charges were later dropped).

“The Planet Revolves” by Furukawa Kaoru (published by Nikkei BP), from Yamaguchi Prefecture (same as Hisahara), is the story of Hirahara’s life. “Planet” was a common nickname for politicians at the time, meaning “surprisingly able but somewhat reckless.”

Hisahara married the younger sister of Aikawa Yoshisuke after being introduced by Inoue Kaoru, but previous to that he was dating a different woman and produced a daughter named Hisako. A young Ishii Koutarou (former House of Peers President) married this Hisako.

Shimomura Nankai, Ishii’s professor at Kobe Business School who later became his boss at the Internal Affairs Ministry, suggested the marriage. “At first Ishii was against it, saying, ‘If I marry a famous person’s daughter, people will think all my achievements are because of him.’ But Shimomura was a skilled persuader, reassuring him, ‘That is up to your attitude. I don’t think you’re the type to break under pressure like that.'” (From “Reflecting on 88 Years” by Ishii Koutarou, published by Culture Publishing). That is what Ishii had to say in his memoirs.

“Besides my older sister, there were several female members including Ishii Yoshiko, but in terms of age, Morimura Atsushi (who went blind at the Imperial Horse Show immediately after the War) was the youngest, and then next was me, then next was Umasugi Kikuko (Later Inoue Kikuko), a master equestrian rider (馬場馬術 — bababajutsu, possibly the coolest word in the Japanese language) who went on to perform in the Olympics after the War.” (From “The Distant Showa Period” by Ogata Shijurou (Asahi Shimbun Publishing)).

The “me” in the previous paragraph is Ogata Shijurou, former Bank of Japan board member who took the job of Vice Chairman of the Japan Development Bank. Here Ogata tells of a prewar youth who enjoyed riding horses at the Tokyo Equestrian Institute.

Ishii Yoshiko, who would later become a chamson singer, was the daughter of Ishii Koujirou and his wife Kumiko. Shijurou’s father was politician Ogata Taketora, and The Distant Showa Period’s subtitle is, “My father Ogata Taketora and Me.”

Back when Shijurou the boy and Ishii Yoshiko were riding horses, Ishii Koujirou and Ogata Taketora were working at Asahi Shimbun together. Both Ishii and Ogata went on to become powerful politicians after the War.

Shijurou’s wife is former UN High Counselor for Refugees Ogata Sadako. If you climb up Sadako’s family tree, you will find that her father was Nakamura Toyoichi, former minister extraordinary and plenipotentiary of Finland, her grandfather was Yoshizawa Kenkichi, a former Foreign Minister, and her great grandfather was the famous former Prime Minister Inukai Tsuyoshi, whose assassination signaled the end of Taisho democracy. In Yomiuri Shimbun’s “Witnesses of an Era”, Sadako writes, “If you put the families of my husband and me together, the hidden areas of Showa history may come uncovered.”

How interesting to look at recent and modern history while tracing the connections between people!

Two interviews discuss Japan’s war apologies

The Asahi, one of Japan’s three major daily newspapers, has two contrasting Q&A format opinion pieces regarding Japan’s recent problems with China and Korea that some people may find interesting. The first is with a German freelance journalist Gebhard Hielscher, who was formerly Far East correspondent for the daily Sueddeutsche Zeitung.

Q: What was your reaction to the recent outrage against Japan in China and South Korea?

A: My impression is that all along, Japan has been deliberately not trying to face the past, and hoping that these issues would go away. Japan has been more concerned about its relationship with the United States.

Running away from the issue of compensation to the two countries that were the main victims of Japan’s aggression, the Japanese have had it (protest) coming for all these years.

Our (Germany’s) main victims, aside from the Holocaust, were the Soviet Union and Poland, and we have done a lot for them. I always leave out the Israel issue because it is not part of the comparison: Japan did not commit a Holocaust. But what we did in Poland, which is colonize it, can be compared to what Japan did in the Korean Peninsula.

Germany didn’t pay direct reparations to Poland, or the Soviet Union, but the Allied Forces took a lot of industrial property out of Germany as a form of reparation. Also, Germany gave up 24 percent of its traditional territory to these two countries, the two biggest victims. We saw that as one way to pay our moral debt.

The intreview given as a response to Herr Hielscher, which disagrees from what I would consider a rather moderate position, and not the extreme nationalist stance that has been irritating everyone, is by Keio University professor Tomoyuki Kojima an expert on Chinese and East Asian affairs.

Q: Do you think Japan has compensated enough for wartime aggression, compared with Germany?

A: In terms of state-to-state compensation, I would say Japan has done more through the process of normalizing relations with many of its neighbors.

While there are countries that did not demand compensation, for those countries that did, we have paid compensation.

In the case of China, both Taiwan, with whom Japan normalized relations first, and mainland China, declared they would forfeit claims for reparations.

Taking the example of forced labor, a court has ruled that the former employer of forced laborers from China and Korea pay damages. But the same court did not rule on whether the state was liable, as that issue has been settled through bilateral negotiations.

In the case of South Korea, for example, Japan agreed in 1965 to provide grants and loans to the country. There is a problem that it was not clearly referred to as “compensation,” but in reality both sides agree that is what it was.

There are individual issues pertaining to the war that remain unresolved, and that is undeniable. Definitely Japan must do something.

But my view is that it is not worthwhile to simply consider Germany a model and criticize Japan for lack of atonement for the past.

Japan not yet totally cut off from East Asia

The Mainichi’s English language Waiwai feature reports that not all of Japan’s international relations have been damaged beyond repair by recent diplomatic gaffes.

One intrepid reporter braved the frontlines of China to find out.

“Welcome, I’m Nana!” one of the older-looking hostesses in a black dress greeted him in Japanese. “Is this your first visit?”

“Are you participating in a boycott of Japanese goods?” the reporter then asks her.

“What you say? Me no understand?” she replies.

“Never mind. Tell me, what do you think of the recent controversy over Japanese history textbooks?”

“You know, your eyes have got a horny glimmer,” she counters. “It means you wanna do ‘rabu-rabu’ with me, right?”

“Um, okay, let’s move on to a different subject. How do you feel about the prime minister’s making visits to worship at the Yasukuni Shrine?”

“Hey, listen, if you no take me out, I’m really pitiful,” she nags. “I don’t make money hanging around this bar. You Japanese men are all lechers, but I’m good at doing ‘etchi.’ How about I give you nice blow job and then ride you on top?”

And another conducted similar field research in Korea.

There he is introduced to a hostess named Ruby, who croons a currently popular Korean tune, a stirring melody entitled “Tok-do belongs to us.”

“This song used to be banned, but these days you often hear customers in Korea singing it,” she explains.

“Should I take that to mean you intend to declare war on me?” the reporter asks.

“Shhhhhs,” Ruby whispers. “Our ‘mama’ told us to avoid discussing political problems here at the club.”

“You know actually,” the reporter thinks out loud, “I’d like to make that generous cleavage between your breasts my territory for a little while. What do you say?”

Christopher Hitchens, full of dogshit

The new installment of Christopher Hitchens’ column in Slate describes North Korea in the typical Hitchens fashion: a dose of humor, erudite writing, high-brow cultural references, but in the typical pundit tradition has no real insights and at least two extraordinarily glaring mis-observations.

He claims that he “tries to avoid cliché” and yet still tells us that “North Korea is rather worse than Orwell’s dystopia.” Is there anything more cliché than comparisons with 1984? I would be a fool to disagree with his assertion here, but it is one that is horrifyingly obvious to anyone who has read even a single article about the situation in contemporary North Korea, and one which takes absolutely no imagination to make.

He also mentions that he has even been to North Korea, although his claim that “North Korea is almost as hard to visit as it is to leave” is quite false. While it is rather difficult for Americans to get tourist visas for the DPRK, urban-dwelling Chinese can enter quite easily, albeit restricted to certain tourist friendly zones. Actually it is quite easy for civilians (with the possible exception of US citizens) to book a North Korea tour through agencies such as Koryo Tours, based out of Beijing. This one company, and there are others, has one special tour listed per month, and advertises that they can arrange special ones for groups. The only caveat is that the government apparently bans journalists. Their website tells us:

On meeting with us at Koryo Tours’ office in Beijing we will require you to sign a form stating that you are not a journalist and that you will not publish anything about your trip. We are sorry to have to insist upon this but at the present time Journalists are not permitted to enter the DPRK, if you are a journalist and are interested in travelling to the DPRK then please let us know and we will be sure to let you know of any future opportunities.

Just because Christopher Hitchens can’t easily get a visa doesn’t mean that everybody else is so restricted.

But I save the best for last.

I was reduced to eating a dog, and I was a privileged “guest.”

So he’s been to North Korea, good for him. But has he ever been to South Korea? If he had, he would know that dog is not a meat of last resort in Korea, but traditionally eaten as a source of virility and considered a delicacy by many. How is somebody who knows so little about Korean culture writing about the region?

Sometimes in April

Last Thursday evening I attended a small, private screening of the HBO original film, “Sometimes in April.” The film is a fictionalized account of the 1994 Rwandan genocide as experienced by two Hutu brothers. One, Augustine, is a Hutu military officer married to a Tusti woman, who is also the mother of his three children. The other, Honore, is a disc jockey/journalist for Radio Télévision Libre de Mille Collines (RTLM), or “hate radio,” as it would come to be known because of its incessant spew of anti-Tutsi propaganda.

As the film opens in April 2004, Augustine has just received a letter from his estranged brother, presently being tried as a war criminal at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) in Tanzania. The letter implores Augustine to visit his brother, who wishes to come clean. The remainder of the film consists of two interwoven story lines taking place a decade apart, one in which Augustine attempts to face the past, and one in which he lives it.

The Rwandan genocide took place 11 years ago last month. If you don’t know what happened by now, I see no need to belabor the point by describing the hellish atrocities here. Nor do I intend to make any moral condemnations and sanctimoniously declare, “never again.” If you are looking for any of these things, then I suggest you watch the film or read one of the number of excellent books that have since been written about the subject.

But I would like to share a few of my thoughts after having had a few days to digest what I saw.

Several adjectives spring to mind whenever genocide is mentioned. Terrible. Most certainly. Hellish. Without a doubt. Tragic. Yes. Evil. You bet. Preventable. Perhaps. Anarchic. No.

To describe the state of affairs that unfolded following the downing of Rwandan President Habyarimana’s plane by Hutu militants on April 6, 1994 as anarchic would be a mistake. These killings were carefully planned well in advance. And, at least in the early days, they were carried out with frightening efficiency.

Hutu militias had been trained. Guns, grenades, machetes (by one account, enough to arm every third adult Hutu male with a machete), and other weapons had been imported, distributed, and stockpiled in caches across the country. Lists, containing the names of Tutsi and moderate Hutu who were to be executed, had been prepared and circulated by the military prior to the slaughter. Later, names of those missed in the initial sweep of the capital city of Kigali were broadcast over the radio by the station RTLM.

This was far from anarchic. And more than anything else, this was what most terrified me after seeing the film.

As a resident of the United States, like residents of most other developed nations, I can think of a number of material comforts that I more or less take for granted. Central heating and air. Public transportation or private ownership of automobiles. Indoor plumbing. And indeed all of these things do contribute to a high standard of living with few inconveniences. Yet it isn’t difficult to imagine life without most of these things.

But try to imagine waking up one morning to discover that everything you thought you knew about your world, every rule and societal norm you had come to accept as permanent, all of this, gone in an instant.

I’m talking about the certainty that you can walk down the street in broad daylight without having your head caved in by a gang of drunken goons – gone. The certainty that your house won’t be set on fire with you and your family inside – gone. The certainty that you won’t be stopped at a roadside checkpoint, be violently pulled from your vehicle and then summarily shot, chopped, or beaten dead on the spot – gone.

One moment it’s there, the next – gone.

It’s not as though these things happened in Rwanda overnight. Again, much of this had been planned in advance. But for some 800,000 Tutsis and their Hutu defenders, the moment that that plane went down, all of that certainty just simply vanished.

One of the noteworthy books I referred to earlier is former journalist Samantha Power’s A Problem From Hell: America and the Age of Genocide. Although the book does contain a chapter on Rwanda, it is meant to be a survey of major genocides of the twentieth century and a detailed examination of American responses. As I said before, I don’t intend to pass moral judgment here. And I don’t think that was Power’s intent in writing the book either. So don’t please don’t cringe at the mention of “American responses,” because I’m almost to the point.

One of her conclusions is this:

Despite graphic media coverage, American policy makers, journalists, and citizens are extremely slow to muster the imagination needed to reckon with evil. Ahead of the killings, they assume rational actors will not inflict seemingly gratuitous violence. They trust in good-faith negotiations and traditional diplomacy. Once the killings start, they assume that civilians who keep their heads down will be left alone. They urge ceasefires and donate humanitarian aid.

But this isn’t just a problem for Americans. Time and again, Power writes of the difficulty of not only outside observers to wrap their minds around the horror, but also that of would-be victims to do the same. On Cambodia she writes:

…[T]hose with the most at stake are in fact often the least prone to recognize their peril. The Cambodian people were frightened by the reports of atrocities in the [Khmer Rouge]-occupied countryside, but they retained resilient hope… [I]n the mental duel that was fought in each and every Cambodian’s mind, it was the concrete features of a horrifying, immediate war that won out over the more abstract fear of the unknown.

It is precisely this difficulty to “wrap one’s head around” the horrors of genocide that I speak of when I describe that total absence of certainty and security that has been characteristic of all past genocides. Say what one may about democritization, economic development, free trade, etc… They are all important means in themselves, no doubt. And I by no means intend to suggest otherwise. But before suffrage, before the ability to produce semiconductors, and before hvaing a selection of imported French wine on my supermarket shelf, I’ll take those basic certainties and securities as an end any day of the week.

Paradox of public opinion – SDF and Article 9

Judging from the total lack of response to my last two postings, I trust no one will be terribly troubled if I go back on my word to make my next post about the implications of RMB revaluation, and write instead on Japanese constitutional reform.

This morning’s Asahi print edition carried the results of the newspaper’s latest nationwide poll, which, in addition to the normal questions about support of political parties, contained a large number of questions about possible constitutional revision. (I had originally intended to translate the entire results and post them, but there are too many questions and too little time.)

One thing the poll data reveals is an interesting paradox in public opinion with regard to the relationship between the SDF and Article 9. Although close three quarters of respondents indicated that the Constitution should be revised to either recognize the SDF’s existence (58%) or make it into a regular army (12%), when asked directly, a majority opposed revision to Article 9 (51%), with only slightly over a third favoring revision (36%).

At the risk of oversimplifying things, it appears that although the Japanese like the SDF, and are increasingly in favor of revising their constitution, they remain wary of touching Article 9, which arguably prohibits the SDF’s existence. The Asahi argues that this paradox is rooted in the Japanese public’s acceptance of both Article 9 and the SDF.

With regard to the SDF, only 7% of respondents said its existence was unconstitutional and should therefore be abolished in the future. Additionally, over half of the respondents said Japan should recognize the SDF’s ability to participate in UN peacekeeping operations, while one-third said they would do the same for SDF support for reconstruction in a country with an ongoing war.

Concerning Article 9 on the other hand, 32% of all respondents said that out of the entire contents of the constitution, they were most concerned with Article 9, and just over three-quarters said they believed that Article 9 had played a role in [creating and maintaining?] peace and stability in Japan.

This belief was even stronger (84%) among the 51% who opposed revision of Article 9. And even among those 58% of total respondents who believed that the constitution should recognize the SDF and that Article 9 had played a role in Japan’s peace and stability, nearly half of this group opposed revision of Article 9.

That’s a lot of numbers to think about, and of course there are the usual caveats about the reliability of poll data, but there are a few other things worth considering here.

First, one wonders if public support would remain high for UNPKOs and especially for reconstruction assistance in a war-torn country if a few Japanese peacekeepers met with the same fate as Belgian UN peacekeepers in Kigali in 1994.

One might also wonder if Japanese politicians would be willing to risk political capital to put SDF forces in harm’s way. My guess is that given the lack of a past failure (i.e. no dead Japanese soldiers), and given that the ruling coalition was able to get away with the mission to Iraq, whatever public or opposition party resistance might exist would easily be overcome the first time around.

Review: Into the Sun (SPOILER ALERT)

Thanks Amazon

This is a review (with spoilers) of Steven Seagal’s latest crapfest, Into the Sun, but first some background:

Steven Seagal was 17 when he first made his way to Japan. By the time he left at age 32, he was the head of a major Aikido dojo in Osaka and spoke fluent Japanese. He then returned to his native California to become personal trainer to the stars.

Eventually he met Hollywood mogul Michael Ovitz and the rest was history: crappy action movie after crappy action movie. Yet something always puzzled me about Seagal’s career: he rarely if ever brings up Japan and hasn’t really attempted to become a gaijin tarento despite his fluence in Japanese and obvious desire for stardom.

There are a few possible explanations for such reluctance. In interviews, Seagal comes off as extremely humble (even though he could beat your ass just by thinking about it), a trait he likely learned in Japan. When asked why he left Japan, Seagal betrays his tough exterior and claims to be shy of the spotlight:

When I was in Japan, people tried to deify me, and the reason I left there was that deification is truly a death trap. That is a reason why I kept my spiritual practice to myself in America. I don’t think deification has been one of my biggest problems in life because I am lucky enough to have understood a long time ago what adoration and power really are about. I think the great obstacle was just a lack of understanding of the way.

My translation: “There’s no money to be made in Japanese showbusiness.” (See this good article for more on the Japanese entertainment industry)

Anyway, Seagal’s first wife was Japanese, and depending on how bad their divorce was I would understand if he didn’t feel like immersing himself in Japanese stuff for a while.

The actor seems to be coming out of his shell, finally, with his new movie Into the Sun. Let me start out by saying some nice things about the film. It was well-shot, there are lots of good-looking actresses dressed impeccably, and Japan is filmed very realistically and without the usual stereotypes. Seagal wrote the screenplay and obviously wanted to make sure his beloved Japan got treated well. The plot is ripped from the headlines as well, dealing with such up to the minute subjects as Japan’s ultra-conservative, anti-foreigner governor Ishihara Shintaro and the Chinese mafia’s expansion into Japanese territory.

The plot: Seagal stars as a retired US government agent (CIA? Special Forces? We are never told) who grew up in Japan and has decided to live out his golden years as a part time sword salesman and a full time badass. However the yakuza/triad-related murder of the anti-foreigner governor of Tokyo forces the CIA to bring him out of retirement in hopes that they can crack the case. Why is the CIA investigating the murder of a Japanese politician? “They could be terrorists.” Welcome to post-9/11 America, where non-sequiturs like that are the major themes of presidential addresses.

However, what the CIA (and the producers for that matter) didn’t bet on when they put Seagal on the case is that he is a complete fuck-up. Continue reading Review: Into the Sun (SPOILER ALERT)

Teikoku Oil seeks rights to test-drill in disputed seas

From The Japan Times:

A Japanese oil company on Thursday requested test-drilling rights in the East China Sea, in disputed waters just a few kilometers from where China is preparing full-scale drilling.

Teikoku Oil Co. submitted an application to the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry to drill for oil and natural gas in three areas totaling 400 sq. km. Two of the areas lie flush against the Chun Xiao and Duan Qiao gas fields, where China’s drilling rigs are set up along the border of the exclusive economic zone claimed by Japan.

If Japan is going to piss off China by prospecting in contested waters, the least they could do is give the license to a company with a less offensive than than IMPERIAL OIL! If you look at any random Japanese article on this topic then you’ll see that ‘Teikoku Oil’ is written as ‘帝国石油’ – and that Teikoku(帝国) is the Japanese/Chinese word for Empire. It’s like they’re writing their China’s anti-Japan propaganda for them.