Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba held a press conference at the Prime Minister's official residence on the evening of the 10th and read out his thoughts titled "Written on the 80 Years after the War."
On the basis of his wish to inherit the historical knowledge shown in the post-war talks of the previous cabinet, he expressed his desire to “think with the people ‘why that war was not avoided at the time’”, as follows:
The story is related to the 80 years after the war.
The last war ended 80 years ago.
Over the past 80 years, Japan has always been moving forward as a peaceful nation, focusing on world peace and prosperity.Today’s peace and prosperity is based on the history of precious lives and sufferings of people led by the warriors.
By visiting the island of sulphur in March, visiting the Philippine Monument to the Victims of War in Kalilaia in April, attending the ceremony of commemoration of all victims of war in Okinawa in June and visiting the Peace Memorial Museum, attending the commemoration ceremony of the victims and victims of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombing in August, and attending the national commemoration ceremony of the victims of war on the day of the end of the war, I once again vow to keep the reflection and lessons of the last war in mind.
So far, there have been Cabinet Prime Minister talks in the post-war 50s, 60s, 70s, and I have also inherited the positions of the previous cabinet on the issues of historical cognition.
In the last three talks, there has been little talk about why the war has not been avoided. Even in the 70 years after the war talks, there has been only one mention: “Japan tried to solve diplomatic and economic difficulties by using force. The domestic political system failed to form constraints on it.”
Why has Japan's domestic political system failed to form constraints (on war)?
Under the background of the First World War and the world entering the era of total war, according to the predictions of the "General Warfare Research Institute" established by the cabinet before the war and the so-called "Qiumaru Agency" established by the Army Ministry, defeat was inevitable. Many people of insight also have a premonition of the difficulty of fighting war.
The leadership of the government and the military are aware of this, but why can’t they make a decision to avoid war and eventually go to war, leading to the sacrifices of many innocent lives at home and abroad?
In the 80 years after the war, I want to think with the people.
[Problems in the Constitution of the Empire of Japan]
The first was the institutional problem at that time. Before the war, Japan lacked a mechanism to properly integrate politics and military.
Under the Constitution of the Great Japanese Empire, the authority to command the army — the commander's power — was independent, and in the political and military relations, there was no systemic principle of "civilization of officials", that the politician (i.e. civilian officials) must always be in a superior position.
Under the Constitution of the Empire, all ministers of state, including the Prime Minister of the Cabinet, are in equal relations, and although the Prime Minister of the Cabinet is considered to be the chief position, it is not systemically conferred the command ordering power of the ruling cabinet.
Nevertheless, until the period of the Japanese-Russian War, the seniors still played the role of integrating diplomacy, military, and finance. The seniors who had experienced as samurai from the army, on the basis of a full understanding of the military, can control it. By borrowing the words of the true man, "the media of the supra-constitutional existence of the seniors, ministers and others" played an important role in the unification of the will of the state.
After the gradual disappearance of the senators, and the decline of this informal mechanism, under the Orthodox democracy, political parties attempted to integrate political and military.
At the time of great changes in the world due to the First World War, Japan became one of the main contributors to international coordination and became a permanent member of the International Union. The policies of the government in the 1920s, such as the foreign policy of China (Note: "The foreign policy of China" was promoted by Japan's foreign minister in the 1920s, with the main characteristics of British-American coordination and "no interference in domestic affairs" with China), suppressed the expansion of imperialism.
In the 1920s, public opinion was tough on the military, and political parties advocated a mass disarmament. Military people felt embarrassed about their situation, and the resulting resistance was considered one of the backgrounds of the rise of the Ministry of the Armed Forces during the Showa period.
Traditionally, the command-in-chief power is limited to military orders involving operational command, while military affairs involving budget and institutional preparation are interpreted and operated as auxiliary matters of the Minister of State who is a member of the cabinet. In my opinion, the institutional problem of the lack of civil control was made up for by the elders at first, and then by the political parties, through the so-called "application" means.
[Government problems]
However, the meaning of command-in-chief was gradually expanded, and the independence of command-in-chief began to be used by the military as a means to exclude the government and parliament from participating in and interfering in the overall situation of military policy and budget.
In the era of the political party cabinet, the scandals between the political parties to seize power revealed the war, and the political parties gradually lost the confidence of the people. In 1930, the opposition Constituent Political Friendship shaken the Cabinet of the Constituent Party and joined forces with a portion of the navy around the ratification of the London Naval Disarmament Treaty, claiming its violation of commanding power and violently attacking the government. The government eventually ratify the London Naval Disarmament Treaty.
However, in 1935, the "Emperor's Organ Theory" of Minobe Tatsuyoshi, a constitutionalist and member of the House of Lords (Note: The Emperor's Organ Theory is an interpretation theory put forward by Minobe Tatsuyoshi, a professor at Tokyo Imperial University, in 1912 for the Constitution of the Great * Empire. This theory is based on the theory of state legal person, and advocates that the ruling power belongs to the whole country as a legal person, and the emperor exercises power as the highest organ under the constitutional framework, which is subject to the restriction of parliament. At that time, Okada Keisuke's cabinet tried to keep a political distance from this issue, believing that there was "no other way but to entrust scholars" on the issue of doctrine, but finally succumbed to the demands of the military and twice issued the "Statement of Mingzheng of the State System" denying the previous "Emperor's Organ Theory" as a general position, and Mino's works were also banned from being published.
In this way, the government gradually lost its control over the military.
[Questions from Parliament]
The parliament, which should have performed the duty of controlling the army, has gradually lost its function.
The most prominent example of this was the removal of the members of the House of Representatives from the House of Representatives. On February 2, 1940, the members of the House of Representatives criticized the war during the plenary session of the House of Representatives and severely prosecuted the government for the purposes of the war. The so-called "rebel speech". The army rejected the speech as insulting the army, demanding that the members of the House of Representatives resign, and many of them ended up removing the members of the House of Representatives with a overwhelming majority of 296 votes in favour and 7 against. This is a rare example of attempts to perform parliamentary duties in the House of Representatives, but two-thirds of the conference records have been removed
After 1937, the provisional special accounting system was established, and almost all military expenses between 1942 and 1945 were accounted for in the "special accounting". When examining the contents of the special accounting, the budget did not specify the details, and the House of Representatives and the House of Nobles were essentially examined in secret meetings, and the time for examination was very short and could not be called examination.
In a situation of worsening war conditions and financial difficulties, the Army and Navy were still fighting for the interests and faces of the organization around obtaining the budget.
In addition, we must not forget the assassination of many politicians, including three prime ministers, by nationalists and youth officers, during about 15 years from the late period of Daesh to the early period of Showa, who were assassinated by politicians who attached importance to international coordination and tried to dominate the army through politics.
These incidents, including the May 15 and February 26 incidents, have undoubtedly greatly hindered the environment in which civil servants, including those with parliamentary and government relations, can freely discuss and act on military policies and budgets.
The media issue
Another point not to be overlooked is the media issue.
In the 1920s, the media was critical of Japan’s expansion abroad, and the journalist’s Stone Bridge Tsinghua (Note: Stone Bridge Tsinghua, journalist for Daily News Agency and other newspapers, Japanese Prime Minister from 1956 to 1957) had advocated for abandoning the colonies.
Taking the Great Depression of the United States in 1929 as an opportunity, the economies of Europe and the United States suffered heavy losses. Countries adopted high tariff policies on the grounds of protecting their domestic economies, and Japan's exports suffered a huge blow.
As one of the backgrounds of the severe depression, nationalism rose, and the Nazi Party in Germany and the Fascist Party in Italy rose. Among the major countries, only the Soviet Union seems to be developing, and the ideological circles are also filled with the arguments of liberalism, democracy, the end of the capitalist era, and the end of the American and British era, forming the soil for accepting plenarianism and national socialism.
In this situation, a part of the Guangdong Army initiated the “Manchuria Incident” (Note: 1918 Incident) and occupied several times the territory of Japan in only about a year and a half.
With regard to Japanese diplomacy, although there were some sharp criticisms such as Yoshino's criticism of the military's movements in the Manchuria Incident and Kiyosawa's severe criticism of Matsuoka's withdrawal from the League of Nations, since then, since around the autumn of 1937, with the strengthening of speech control, the criticism of policies has been blocked, and only the argument of actively supporting the war can be conveyed to the people.
[Issues in Information Collection and Analysis]
It is also necessary to re-examine whether the government-led country at the time was able to correctly understand the international situation. For example, in August 1939, in the course of negotiations with Germany on a military alliance against the Soviet Union, the Treaty of Non-Infringement was signed, and the Pyeongchang-Iron Cabinet at the time was able to “completely resign” with “the complex and strange new situation in the sky of Europe” (notation: in addition to the prime minister of the cabinet, also resigned as a minister of state). There were questions as to whether it was able to fully collect information about the international situation, the military situation, whether it was able to correctly analyze the information received, whether it was able to properly share information.
The lesson of today.
After the war, Japan had systemically improved civil servants. The Japanese Constitution stipulates that Cabinet Prime Ministers and other state ministers must be civil servants. In addition, according to the Self-Defense Force Law, the Self-Defense Force was placed under the command of Cabinet Prime Ministers.
The Constitution of Japan clearly stipulates that the Prime Minister is the head of the cabinet, and the cabinet is jointly and severally responsible to the National Assembly, thus ensuring the unity of the cabinet in the system.
In addition, the National Security Conference was established, strengthening the comprehensive coordination of diplomacy and security. The government's system in the collection and analysis of information has also been improved.
Our country has made institutional improvements based on the past painful experience of the lack of appropriate mechanisms to integrate politics and military affairs and the military's arbitrary behavior in the name of "independence of commander-in-chief." However, these are only systems after all, and they will be meaningless if they cannot be used properly and reasonably.
The political party must fully have the ability and knowledge to use the Self-Defense Forces. Continuous efforts are needed to correctly understand and properly apply the current civil service control system. We must have the reserve and sense of responsibility of politicians who do not succumb to irresponsible populism and follow the tide.
We demand that the Self-Defense Force, as an expert group, actively explain and submit opinions to the political party on the international military situation, equipment, and the use of forces in our country.
Politics has the responsibility to overcome the division and integration of organizational blocks. There can be no organizational allocation and opposition, so that the national interests of Japan are lost. It must be drawn from the Army and Navy to prioritize their respective organizational logic and oppose each other, even within each other, the military order and military administration also lack coordination, can not realize the unification of the state will, and ultimately lead to the whole country to the historical lessons of war.
Politics must always consider the interests and well-being of all the people, base itself on a long-term perspective, and strive to make reasonable judgments. When the responsibility is unclear and the situation is deadlocked, even if the possibility of success is low and the risk is high, it is often easy to accept tough voices and bold solutions. Nagano Shino, the former chief of the naval military command department, compared the war to surgery, saying, "Although there are considerable worries, the only way to cure this serious disease is to eliminate the national disaster with great determination." "The government judges that if there is no war, the country will be subjugated, but war may also lead to national subjugation. But when the country dies without fighting, it is a real national subjugation that even loses its soul." It is said that former War Minister Hideki Tojo also forced former Prime Minister Konoe Fumimaro to say, "Sometimes you need to jump from the clear water stage with your eyes closed". We can't repeat the history of attaching importance to spiritual and emotional judgments instead of calm and reasonable judgments, which led the country to go astray.
Parliament and the media play a brake role in preventing the government from making wrong judgments.
Requires that Congress, by exercising the powers conferred on it by the Constitution, play the role of properly overseeing government activities.Politics must not meet the public opinion of the moment, promote policies that harm the national interests, and be drowned in the party and self-preservation.
A sound speech space that includes journalism with a sense of mission is needed. In the last war, the media also incited public opinion and led the people into reckless war. The media cannot fall into excessive commercialism and cannot tolerate narrow nationalism, discrimination and xenophobia.
Including the tragic killing of former Prime Minister Abe, discriminatory words that trample on politics with violence and threaten free speech will never be tolerated.
The foundation for all this is to learn the gestures of history.The courage to face the past and the tolerance to listen sincerely and sincerely to the arguments of others—a truly liberal, sound and enduring democracy that is essential.
As Winston Churchill pointed out, democracy is by no means a perfect political form. Democracy takes cost and time, and sometimes it makes mistakes.
It is for this reason that we must always be humble with history and keep the lessons deeply in mind.
In terms of self-defense and deterrence,ining a strong organization is crucial. I can’t stand in the position of denying the “theory of deterrence.”In the current security environment, this is the reality of implementing a responsible security policy.
At the same time, if a country has unparalleled owners of power – power organizations beyond democratic rule – democracy is a vulnerable thing that can collapse instantly. On the other hand, civil officials and politicians are not going to war without misjudgment. The necessity and importance of civil official rule, proper military and political relations are not too highlighted in any way. Government, parliament, power organizations, the media must always recognize this.
Senator Takao Saito (note: Japanese politicians in Taisho and Showa periods and member of the House of Representatives of the Imperial Parliament) discussed in his anti-military speech that the history of the world is the history of war, and war is not the victory of justice, but the conquest of the weak by the strong; We can't ignore this point, hide under the reputation of jihad and misjudge the country's century-old plan; He advocated the importance of policy based on realism and was eventually removed from the House of Representatives.
The following year, in the House Air Defense Law Committee, the Army Province denied citizens asylum during airstrikes, saying it would lead to the collapse of the will to continue the war.
Although both of these are distant past events, they fully reveal the terrible aspects of parliament's abandonment of its duties, the rampant spiritualism, and the contempt for human life and human rights. Without facing history head-on, we cannot create a bright future. Today, when my country is in the most severe and complex security environment after World War II, we must re-understand the importance of studying history.
It is at this moment when people with war memories decline year after year, and the winding of memory is worrying, that I believe that every Japanese citizen, including the younger generation, will actively think about the past war and peace and use this thinking for the future, which will further strengthen the foundation of Japan as a peace country.
Together with all the people, based on the lessons of the last war, I will do my best to avoid such a tragic disaster again.
Order and 7 Years (2025) October 10
Cabinet Prime Minister
Shi biaomao