Japan needs a thread too

[Josquius]

China and even Korea have threads, but not Japan. So here it is.

[Josquius]

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/17/opinion/what-germany-can-teach-japan.html

TOKYO — Imagine a postwar Germany that had never managed to become friends with its neighboring countries. Imagine a Germany that, despite all the remorse it had shown for its belligerence during World War II, had been excluded from the European Union. Imagine, even, that this Germany had been excluded from NATO, because it had forever been denied the right to engage in a defense alliance.

On top of all of this, imagine the following: Your economy is in decline; a mighty, nondemocratic neighbor is increasing military spending while denouncing you as an aggressive, militaristic nation, even as it and other nearby countries are grabbing parts of your territory.

If it's hard to imagine such a scenario, just hop on a plane to Japan.

The comparison with my own country is certainly a compassionate reading of the new, assertive tone that Japan's government has adopted toward its neighbors. It's hard not to sympathize after speaking with the many Japanese officials I've met here, who say they have just one wish: that Japan, almost 70 years after the end of World War II, could become a "normal country" like Germany.

Normal? At first the idea sounds humble, understandable. But "normal" is a tricky concept: No country is truly "normal," even boring old Germany. And this desire comes at a time when being normal — including the right to militarize — may contribute to the spiral of mistrust underway among the major players in East Asia.

My conversations with Japanese officials and observers persuaded me that, for all the differences between the countries, there are instructive parallels between Germany's experience and Japan's current position — above all, that normalcy is not something that is granted; it must be sought out and earned.

Of course, there are good reasons that Germany and Japan followed divergent courses after the war. Japan has obviously had greater problems with coming to terms with its past: A foreign affairs official in Tokyo frankly told me the Japanese public was experiencing "apology fatigue" — something most Germans would never admit to, even if they felt it.

This is partly understandable. China is an undemocratic neighbor that has never seriously been interested in reconciliation; on the contrary, it uses Japan's guilty past — the massacre at Nanjing, the widespread enslavement of "comfort women" — to stir up its own neo-nationalism.

And then there is the simple fact of geography: Japan is an island nation, Germany has land borders with nine countries. You cannot take the train from Tokyo to Seoul as you can from Cologne to Paris.

The lack of strong cultural interaction is a problem, too: There has not been anything like the real-life social network of the Erasmus student exchange program for the Pacific region.

But for those precise reasons, if long-term peace is to be achieved, then someone has to take the lead on regional reconciliation. And there is no one more obliged than Japan to take on that burden.

Here is where the Germany parallel becomes instructive. Nobody expects Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to kneel before the Nanjing Massacre Memorial Hall in atonement, the way Chancellor Willy Brandt of Germany did before the Ghetto Uprising Memorial in Warsaw. But as Germany learned in its coming to terms with the past, the famed "Vergangenheitsbewältigung," strong symbols are sometimes more helpful than facts.

While some Japanese scholars may be correct to say that Chinese propaganda inflates the numbers of victims of Nanjing, the easiest way to unwind its effect would be to make an impressive, lasting statement of guilt. Germany has been accepted as a full and fairly normal member of the international community not least because of the persistence with which it has remembered the Nazi atrocities.

Another lesson from Germany: Withstand the temptation to blame others, even if you see good grounds for it. When I asked a Japanese official why his government didn't react to the proposal of President Park Geun-hye of South Korea to set up a committee for jointly developing history schoolbooks, after the Franco-German model, he said Tokyo had "not received any proposal from the Korean government in relation to this issue." If Germany had waited for a written invitation for reconciliation from France or Poland, my generation would probably still believe that we were surrounded by hereditary enemies.

Reconciliation takes bravery as well as generosity. And you must want it. Without it, a country's path to "normality" — perhaps best defined as earning and enjoying the trust of its neighbors — remains blocked. Reconciliation pays off, and a new normality is the reward.

The opposite, creating boogeymen and playing blame games, happened in Europe in 1914. Does East Asia really want to go sleepwalking down that path a hundred years later? Japan, more than any of its neighbors, has the obligation, with a gesture to its neighbors, to prevent that. Perhaps the best way to prove you are a normal country is to hold your nerve when things get rough.

I read this today and it was great to see a balanced article about Japan for once.
The amount of times I see people online just taking the Chinese/Korean propeganda of an evil neo-militarist Japan at face value really irks me. Its particularly annoying since a big part of the reason this version of things is so widespread is that the Japanese, contrary to being evil masterminds, are really shit/indifferent to spreading their version of things.

[Monoriu]

Imagine a German chancellor visiting a shrine that contains the ashes of Himmler, Goring, Heydrich etc.  He has the freedom to go, of course.  But others also have the freedom to dislike him for that. 

[Admiral Yi]

Can you give me an example or two of this Chinese/Korean propeganda you're referring to?  I'm not sure what that is.

[The Brain]

Imagine a hot bisexual submissive woman.

[Josquius]

Can you give me an example or two of this Chinese/Korean propeganda you're referring to?  I'm not sure what that is.

Imagine a German chancellor visiting a shrine that contains the ashes of Himmler, Goring, Heydrich etc.  He has the freedom to go, of course.  But others also have the freedom to dislike him for that. 

* This is a minor point which has only been an issue since the 80s.
* It doesn't contain the ashes of war criminals, only their names.
* The war criminals are a handful of people amongst 2.5 million.  They don't have any special status amongst the millions- though there is talk of giving them this so as to stop people overreacting every time someone visits the shrine.
* Since the war criminals were added by the shrine the emperor (both of them) has made a point of not visiting the shrine. A far more meaningful stance than politicians visiting.

Its really much much more complicated than "Imagine the German chancellor visiting a monument for worshipping the Nazis"

[Syt]

Imagine a German chancellor visiting a shrine that contains the ashes of Himmler, Goring, Heydrich etc.  He has the freedom to go, of course.  But others also have the freedom to dislike him for that.

It was actually a minor scandal when Reagan visited Germany in the 80s, that he and Helmut Kohl wanted to commemorate the fallen of WW2 and chose to visit a soldier cemetery where not only Wehrmacht soldiers but also members to the Waffen-SS had been buried.

[Grey Fox]

My first reaction was : fuck this Japan doesn't need a thread.

but that was a very interesting article.

[Admiral Yi]

So Squeeze, your example of ant-Japanese propaganda is that the ashes of war criminals are located  in the war dead shrine, and that the shrine only contains war criminals?   

[Valmy]

Imagine a German chancellor visiting a shrine that contains the ashes of Himmler, Goring, Heydrich etc.  He has the freedom to go, of course.  But others also have the freedom to dislike him for that. 

If exercising that freedom a certain way results in an arms race and political instability then I reserve the freedom to think using your freedom in such a way is counter-productive

[The Minsky Moment]

Imagine a German chancellor visiting a shrine that contains the ashes of Himmler, Goring, Heydrich etc.  He has the freedom to go, of course.  But others also have the freedom to dislike him for that.

It was actually a minor scandal when Reagan visited Germany in the 80s, that he and Helmut Kohl wanted to commemorate the fallen of WW2 and chose to visit a soldier cemetery where not only Wehrmacht soldiers but also members to the Waffen-SS had been buried.

Yes it was a scandal.  And so it was not repeated.

The article's implication about Japan's isolation is also not true.  Japan was a founding member of the G5.  It is a major non-NATO ally, which is the highest status for a non-Atlantic/European nation.  It could be a founding member of the TPP, except for the fact that it has raised a thicket of objections to basic trade liberalization measures.  And that gets to another point - West Germany and later Germany made significant concessions and sacrifices to its own national interests to make European integration work.  Other than providing very generous (albeit tied) foreign aid, Japan historically has not been willing to make those kinds of concessions.  That is not so much a criticism - Japan deserves no blame for the peaceful pursuit of its interest - but it is another reason why Germany has made more progress in strengthening ties with others. 

And yes it is true that Japan has had to deal with its "difficult" formerly Communist and now authoritarian neighboring power and former adversary.  Just as Germany has had to deal with USSR/Russia.  But Japan's issues with other nations are not limited to the PRC.

[jimmy olsen]

Imagine a German chancellor visiting a shrine that contains the ashes of Himmler, Goring, Heydrich etc.  He has the freedom to go, of course.  But others also have the freedom to dislike him for that.

It was actually a minor scandal when Reagan visited Germany in the 80s, that he and Helmut Kohl wanted to commemorate the fallen of WW2 and chose to visit a soldier cemetery where not only Wehrmacht soldiers but also members to the Waffen-SS had been buried.

How many cemeteries only have Wehrmacht soldiers and no SS?

[Monoriu]

I'm in fact going to Japan next week.  There are a ton of stuff about Japan that I want to talk about.  Food, anime, sakura flowers, music, films.  Why does it have to be this

[alfred russel]

I'm in fact going to Japan next week.  There are a ton of stuff about Japan that I want to talk about.  Food, anime, sakura flowers, music, films.  Why does it have to be this

The only of those topics that I can bear reading about (in relation to Japan) is food. So it should be this or food.

Although this topic is also dull. Who cares? Japan used to be rather evil and intent on conquering, enslaving, and raping, but these days it is a bunch of old people, and the young people they do have are thoroughly demilitarized. Even if they have nostalgia for the bad old days, they are no threat to anyone.

[celedhring]

And such nostalgia is sublimated into pervy drawings of girls as Japanese warships.