Gold-Eating Monsters

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Danny Orbach
Keyword(s):  
Future Development ◽  
Armed Forces ◽  
Pacific War ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
Japanese Military ◽  
The Future ◽  
Imperial Japanese Army

This chapter focuses on the supreme prerogative system (tōsui-ken) and how it secured the independence of the Japanese armed forces from any civilian institution apart from the imperial throne. In the postwar years, the “prerogative of supreme command” became a bogeyman to be blamed for all disasters from early Meiji to the end of the Pacific War. The novelist Shiba Ryōtarō claimed that the Imperial Japanese Army, entrenched within their own “supreme prerogative country,” became as wild and murderous as the Pixiu, a gold-eating monster from Chinese mythology. The chapter first considers the Japanese military reforms of 1878 and the motives behind them before discussing the flaws of the supreme prerogative system, arguing that it created a rich background for the future development of military insubordination.

Curse on This Country

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Danny Orbach
Keyword(s):  
Armed Forces ◽  
Political Crisis ◽  
Pacific War ◽  
Military Operations ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
Modern Japanese History ◽  
The Government ◽  
Imperial Japanese Army ◽  
Blind Obedience ◽  
The Military

Imperial Japanese soldiers were notorious for blindly following orders, and their enemies in the Pacific War derided them as “cattle to the slaughter.” But, in fact, the Imperial Japanese Army had a long history as one of the most disobedient armies in the world. Officers repeatedly staged coups d'états, violent insurrections, and political assassinations; their associates defied orders given by both the government and the general staff, launched independent military operations against other countries, and in two notorious cases conspired to assassinate foreign leaders despite direct orders to the contrary. This book explains the culture of rebellion in the Japanese armed forces. The consequences were dire, as the armed forces dragged the government into more and more of China across the 1930s—a culture of rebellion that made the Pacific War possible. This book argues that brazen defiance, rather than blind obedience, was the motive force of modern Japanese history. The book follows a series of dramatic events: assassinations in the dark corners of Tokyo, the famous rebellion of Saigō Takamori, the “accidental” invasion of Taiwan, the Japanese ambassador's plot to murder the queen of Korea, and the military–political crisis in which the Japanese prime minister “changed colors.” Finally, through the sinister plots of the clandestine Cherry Blossom Society, we follow the deterioration of Japan into chaos, fascism, and world war.

scholarly journals Mobility and Ideological Perspective of Asano Akira in Java During Period of Japan Occupation

2020 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 108
Author(s):  
Syahrur Marta Dwisusilo ◽  
Lucitra A. Yuniar
Keyword(s):  
Military Service ◽  
Critical Time ◽  
New Historicism ◽  
Pacific War ◽  
Colonial Era ◽  
Japanese Occupation ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
Japanese Military ◽  
Japanese Colonial

The period of Japanese occupation for 3 years in Indonesia is sort when compared to the Dutch colonial period. However, at that time it was a critical time for the formation of various ideological thoughts. One of the ideologies that emerged in the Japanese colonial era was the ideology of "Greater Asia", which is known as the ideology of unification of Asia. During the Pacific War, Japanese writers who underwent military service in Indonesia published many of his writings for the purposes of Japanese military propaganda, especially those related to prapaganda of Greater Asia ideology. One of the most active writers in spreading this ideology was Asano Akira. This research clarifies the role of Asano Akira in spreading the ideology of Greater Asia through its activities and mobility in Java with the approach of new historicism and orientalism.

Fujita, Tsuguharu (藤田嗣治) (1886–1968)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Szostak
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Landscape ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Pacific War ◽  
The West ◽  
White Pigment ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
Japanese Military ◽  
Post War ◽  
Contemporary Painting ◽  
French Citizen

Fujita Tsuguharu was a Japanese oil painter who spent most of his career in France. He is known in the West for female nudes and portraits painted in the 1920s with a distinctive pearl-white pigment, executed in a style that melds French modernism with the linear aesthetics of traditional Japanese prints. These paintings, which frequently featured cats, won him both critical and popular acclaim, earned him membership in the Salon d’Automne, and made him a mainstay of the Montparnasse artist community. He is the sole Japanese painter associated with the École de Paris. Fujita returned to Japan in 1933, where he exerted substantial influence on contemporary painting as a member of the Second Section Society (Nikakai). During the Pacific War, Fujita created many large-scale works for the Japanese military as an official war artist, activities that continue to affect his reputation in Japan today. Difficulties adjusting to the post-war cultural landscape of Japan led Fujita to return to France in 1950, where he revitalized his career. He became a French citizen in 1955, and was awarded the Legion of Honour in 1957.

The Japanese Military and Indonesian Independence

1996 ◽  
Vol 27 (1) ◽  
pp. 19-36
Author(s):  
László Sluimers
Keyword(s):  
Raw Materials ◽  
Pacific War ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
Japanese Military

The article deals with the question of whether during the Pacific War there was a community of interest between the Japanese military and Indonesian nationalists. This point is mainly denied. Nationalists did want to use the Japanese to oust Dutch rule, but as soon as this was effected relations soured. The Japanese military wanted to use Indonesia as a source of the raw materials essential for war, and as a reservoir of labour. The Indonesians wished to settle their own affairs without any outside interference. These objectives were incompatible.

scholarly journals An Image of Korean Women during the Japanese Occupation of the Peninsula, as It Emerges from Literary Masterpieces

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 73-88
Author(s):  
Elena Buja
Keyword(s):  
Young Women ◽  
Colonial Rule ◽  
Korean Women ◽  
Comfort Women ◽  
Pacific War ◽  
Japanese Occupation ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
Japanese Military ◽  
History Of ◽  
Japanese Colonial

Abstract This paper1 aims to offer a picture of the darkest period in the history of the Korean women, namely that of the Japanese colonial rule (1910–1945). The only advantage Korean women enjoyed as a result of their country’s annexation to Japan was access to institutional education, even if this was done in Japanese and from Japanese course books. But this came with a price: many of the Korean teenaged females were turned into comfort women (sex-slaves) for the Japanese soldiers before and during the Pacific War. Not only did these girls lose their youth, but they also lost their national and personal identity, as they were forced to change their Korean names into Japanese ones and to speak Japanese. To build the image of the fate of the Korean women during this bleak period, the research method I have used is a simplified version of content analysis, “an analysis of the content of communication” (Baker 1994, 267). I have explored the content of fragments from a couple of novels authored by Korean or American-Korean authors, which cover the historical events in the peninsula leading to the end of WWII (Keller’s Comfort Woman (2019) and Bracht’s White Chrysanthemum (2018), to mention just a few) and which are focused on the topic of comfort women,2 i.e. young women that were sexually exploited by the Japanese military. The results of the analysis indicate that many of the surviving victims became “unpersons” and led a life of solitude and misery until their death.

Introduction

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Danny Orbach
Keyword(s):  
Armed Forces ◽  
Modern History ◽  
Military Life ◽  
Japanese Military ◽  
History Of ◽  
Imperial Japanese Army

This book examines the culture of rebellion and resistance in the Imperial Japanese Army. Drawing on fifteen archives in four different countries, along with other sources such as letter collections, testimonies, police transcripts, court documents, diplomatic cables, historical newspapers, memoirs, and interviews, the book refutes the notion that Imperial Japanese soldiers were blindly and unconditionally obedient to authority. It presents evidence showing that the Imperial Japanese Army was arguably one of the most disobedient armed forces in modern history. Indeed, it was normal for Imperial Japanese soldiers to rebel, resist, assassinate, and conspire. The book traces Japan's history of military insubordination to bolster its argument that rebelliousness was an integral part of Japanese military life from the 1860s to the 1930s.

Displaced peoples and the continued legacy of the Pacific War: Korean repatriation and the danger element

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-19
Author(s):  
Mark E. Caprio
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Military Personnel ◽  
The United States ◽  
United States Military ◽  
Pacific War ◽  
Asian Continent ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
Japanese Military ◽  
Daily Record ◽  
Periodic Report

Abstract The battles of the Pacific War formally ended between mid-August and early September, 1945. However, the declarations of peace and surrender ceremonies that occurred during this time did not end informal battles across the Asian continent. Renegade Japanese military personnel refused to lay down their arms and repatriate quietly to their country. Some combed the waters between Japan and Korea in search of returnees attempting to repatriate with financial and material means in excess of that which the United States military governments allowed. Others sought to disrupt the occupation process by patrolling the streets of Korean cities and engaging in illegal and often violent activities. Koreans also caused problems by joining the Japanese in their postwar adventures or by harassing Japanese preparing to return to Japan and the Korean sympathizers who attempted to help them. Reportage of such actions appeared in the G-2 Periodic Report, which kept a daily record of such actions. These documents today open windows into the chaotic situation that the postwar era brought to Japanese and Koreans. Primarily through these reports, this paper sees the postwar belligerence that continued beyond official declarations of cease fire and peace in 1945 as kindling that sparked the broader conflicts of the late 1940s, and evolved to all-out war from the summer of 1950.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document