JAPANESE REVISION OF HISTORY REJECTED

Edward G. Galian, Department Adjutant

We thank the New York Times (Thursday, August 16, 2001) for reporting the latest Japanese affront to logic and morality.

In April, 2001, the Central Government authorized a history textbook written by the Nationalist Society for Textbook Reform. This Society is made up of historians who proclaim that Japan has become overly self critical with respect to atrocities committed by the Japanese Imperial Army as it advanced southward into other Asian countries, Primarily China and Korea. The textbook glosses over such events as the 1937 Nanjing massacre of thousands of Asian women as sex slaves by Japanese troops and avoids use of the word "invasion" in reference to Japan's occupation of Asian countries.

The textbook even asserts that the advance of the Japanese army gave impetus to Asian countries to obtain independence earlier from European colonial forces.

Fortunately, however, 98% of the education boards in the 542 Japanese public school districts have rejected the textbook accusing it of glossing over the nation's war time atrocities. The Japanese Broadcasting Corporation reported that its own nationwide poll showed that 532 of the 542 public school districts said they would not use the textbook.

However, difficult as it is to imagine, Tokyo's Governor, the nationalist author, Shintaro Ishihara, has publicly supported the textbook. Apparently there will never be true closure of the Japanese atrocity chronicles while that nation persists in its denials and revisionist tactics.

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