Exposing sinister rhetoric behind Japan's right-wing attempts to rewrite history

Recent remarks by Toshio Tamogami, former chief of staff of Japan's Air Self-Defense Force and a polarizing far-right figure, alleging that the United States had "framed" Japan for the Pearl Harbor attack have gained significant online traction.

Such assertions are not isolated incidents but reflect persistent efforts by Japan's right wing to systematically distort and whitewash its history of wartime aggression.

The various narratives attempting to overturn the historical verdict on the Pearl Harbor attack reveal this faction's enduring reluctance to acknowledge war responsibility and persisting resentment over Japan's defeat.

Japan's surprise attack on the Pearl Harbor and the subsequent Pacific War remain uncontested historical facts. In 1941, while dispatching so-called "special envoys" to Washington under the pretense of goodwill negotiations, Japan launched an undeclared military assault on the Pearl Harbor. This surprise attack destroyed multiple U.S. capital ships and inflicted heavy casualties on American forces.

Then U.S. Secretary of State Cordell Hull condemned Japan for resorting to every form of deception, openly distorting facts, and never daring to assume responsibility for its actions. In a fireside chat, then U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt stated bluntly, "And no honest person, today or a thousand years hence, will be able to suppress a sense of indignation and horror at the treachery committed by the military dictators of Japan, under the very shadow of the flag of peace borne by their special envoys in our midst."

Following World War II, instead of engaging in sincere reflection, Japan's right-wing factions sought to whitewash war crimes, shape a collective memory favorable to its own narrative, and undermine the postwar international order.

One common tactic is the reversal of cause and effect. After the attack on the Pearl Harbor, Japan issued an imperial rescript declaring war on the United States and the UK, fabricating a false logic that Japan had been forced to "rise up" solely for "self-preservation and self-defense" in response to mounting economic and military pressure from these nations.

Even after Japan's surrender, Japanese war criminals clung stubbornly to this "self-defense" argument. On Dec. 26, 1947, The New York Times reported that Hideki Tojo indignantly told a tribunal composed of judges from 11 countries that Western countries had carefully plotted to force Japan to fire the first shot in order to "ensure national survival."

Over the decades since the war ended, this militarist falsehood has not been eradicated; instead, it has quietly taken root and spread. The Yushukan, a Japanese military and war museum located within Yasukuni Shrine, has long promoted such narratives, claiming that America, Britain, China and the Netherlands formed an "ABCD encirclement" against Japan, leaving it no choice but to take a desperate gamble. Conspiracy theories such as "the Pearl Harbor attack was a trap laid by the United States to drag Japan into war" continue to resonate within Japan's right-wing circles.

A second tactic is the glorification of atrocities. Even during the war, Japanese militarists concocted justifications to legitimize aggression against the United States, portraying the conflict not only as a struggle for Japan's "self-preservation and self-defense" but also as a so-called "war of liberation" between Asian peoples and Western colonial powers.

"I believe I did nothing wrong. I believe what I did was right and true," Tojo declared in his final statement during interrogation in 1948. More than 80 years after Japan's defeat, Japanese right wing has never ceased embellishing the war.

To this day, they remain deeply immersed in the militarist illusion of "glory." At Yasukuni Shrine, binoculars once used by Isoroku Yamamoto, commander-in-chief of the Imperial Japanese Navy Combined Fleet during the Pearl Harbor attack, along with his letters, are still prominently displayed and venerated by worshippers day after day.

A third tactic is equivocation. A thorough reckoning with Japan's militarist war crimes is a necessary requirement for upholding justice. Yet Japan's right wing turns the tables by waving the banner of "reconciliation," attempting to sever ties with the history of aggression and implying that victimized countries should stop dwelling on historical issues.

While preaching "peace" on the one hand, they smear neighboring countries and exaggerate a so-called "survival-threatening situation" on the other, thereby building momentum to break away from Japan's postwar pacifist path.

They have even donned the disguise of a "loyal ally," using cooperation with U.S. forces as a pretext to push for lifting restrictions on collective self-defense and to press ahead with military rearmament.

Beneath this facade lies an extremely dangerous strategic scheme. A right wing that has never accepted defeat and still venerates the architects of the Pearl Harbor attack as heroes can hardly be expected to remain indefinitely subordinate to its so-called allies across the ocean.

Japanese militarism has always been marked by deceit and duplicity. The Japanese right wing's distortion of history is systematic and indiscriminate, and attempts to overturn the verdict on the Pearl Harbor attack are merely one example.

From refusing to acknowledge historical responsibility to pursuing dangerous strategic shifts in the present, these actions all stem from efforts by right-wing forces to rehabilitate and resurrect militarism.

In the face of this, how can the forces of international justice, who paid an enormous price to secure victory in World War II, stand by idly and allow such developments to go unchecked?

Zhong Sheng is a pen name often used by People's Daily to express its views on foreign policy and international affairs.

The views don't necessarily reflect those of Qiushi Journal.