Bill Schiller
Asia Bureau
TOKYO–Essay contests aren't normally the stuff of controversy.
But if the contest is held in Japan and the subject is the nation's role in World War II – it can stir the embers of emotion, trigger a national discussion and even take down titans in the country's military establishment.
This month, Gen. Toshio Tamogami was sacked from his position as air force chief after he took top prize in a contest in which he suggested Japan should cast off the widely held views of its World War II culpability – and "regain its glorious history."
The general asserted Japan was not an aggressor, Pearl Harbor was an American trap and Japan's brutal occupation of other Asian countries – which by some accounts claimed 20 million lives – wasn't really all that bad.
In fact, he wrote, "many" Asian nations reflect positively on it.
China was stunned by the statement – it had borne much of the brunt of that brutality. What began as a contest – organized, as it turns out, by a nationalistic businessman and ideologue – erupted in fury.
Tamogami was sent packing, an investigation into military officers' training was launched and the dark and persistent forces of Japan's World War II revisionism were once again thrust into the spotlight.
But Tamogami's essay did something else: for Japanese peace activists, it was an ironic "call to arms."
So one recent weekday afternoon, the Housewives' Association of the Construction Workers' Union of Tokyo visited Yushukan – the nation's most hallowed museum of militarism and a memorial to the nation's war dead. The women had never been before.
But after Tamogami's disturbing essay, they felt they had to.
"We need to study what makes these people want to glorify war," said Fumie Fujimoto, who heads the 26,000-member association well-known for its peace activism.
"If we want to pass on our message of peace to the next generation, we have to understand how they think in-depth. That's why we came here today."
Inside the museum, in film and state-of-the-art displays, are many solemn and uncontroversial commemorations in keeping with the museum's function of honouring those who died.
But there are also many of the very same ideas put forward by Tamogami in his controversial paper. And they're viewed by thousands here every day.
One film, We Won't Forget, presents a version of the war that few in the West would recognize. It emphasizes, as many of the displays do, that the Japanese tried every means to avoid war and ended up fighting only reluctantly and defensively, solely for their own survival.
As for the highly politicized Tokyo Trials, a narrator in the film explains, against a background of tasteful orchestral music, that charges against Japanese combatants were "groundless," the trials were based on "distorted history" and the only true hero was dissenting Indian judge Radhabinod Pal.
On the other hand, in wall displays, Japan's massacre of Chinese civilians in Nanjing in 1937 is vaguely touched upon but not explicitly dealt with in detail. One display refers to "confused battles."
Historians say those "confused battles" were actually a rampage that left between 100,000 and 300,000 Chinese civilians dead.
Outside the museum, Takeshi Kimura, a professor of history at the University of Tsukuba, is philosophical, but not unfeeling.
"This really isn't a history museum," he said. "It's a museum next to a shrine."
The shrine he refers to is the Yasukuni Shrine, the memorial to Japan's 2.5 million war dead of which Yushukan museum is a small part.
Yasukuni has been a lightning rod for controversy in recent years, stemming from the fact that among the dead commemorated here are 14 Class A war criminals.
As a consequence, visits to the shrine by Japanese politicians always anger Asian leaders whose people suffered at the hands of the criminals. China and South Korea have been most critical.
"This shouldn't be regarded as a historical representation," Kimura cautions. "It's more like a point of view."
He is, however, sharply critical of Tamogami. "It's just totally wrong,' he said. "Unless you admit that we made some mistakes, there is really no way to learn anything."
The union women have another bone to pick with the general and the way in which he was dismissed by Prime Minister Taro Aso.
They're not happy that Tamogami is able to walk away with his $725,000 pension. "It's not a proper dismissal if he's still going to receive his 60 million yen," said 61-year-old Mari Sagara. "This is taxpayers' money. I can't tolerate it. They should have just let him go."
The general's essay not only caused an international embarrassment, but brazenly contradicted official government policy.
In both 1995 and 2005, Japan formally announced its remorse for its wartime conduct and apologized.
But speaking before Parliament earlier this month, Tamogami was unbowed.
He said he did not "see anything wrong in what I wrote."
"I was fired after saying Japan is a good country," he told Parliament. "It seems a bit strange."
