Quick viewing(Text Mode)

Japan's Pan-Asianism and the Legitimacy of Imperial World Order, 1931-1945

Japan's Pan-Asianism and the Legitimacy of Imperial World Order, 1931-1945

Volume 6 | Issue 3 | Article ID 2695 | Mar 03, 2008 The -Pacific Journal | Focus

Japan's Pan-Asianism and the Legitimacy of Imperial World Order, 1931-1945

Cemil Aydin

Japan’s Pan-Asianism and the Legitimacy policy up to the 1930s, and aware of the lack of of Imperial World Order, 1931–1945 political clout of Asianist circles during the 1920s, Japan’s apparent endorsement of pan- Cemil Aydin Asianism in its official “return to Asia” after 1933 raises a question. How can we One of the most striking aspects of the understand the predominance of pan-Asianist international history of the 1930s is the revival discourses in Japanese intellectuals circles in and official endorsement of a pan-Asian vision the 1930s? Why would Japan’s political elite, of regional world order in Japan. The pan-Asian with its proven record of cooperation with discourse of East-West civilizational difference Western powers based on a realistic and comparison was influential in various assessment of the trends of the time, choose to intellectual circles in Asia. But during the endorse an anti-Western discourse of Asianism 1920s, as a political project of Asian solidarity, as its official policy during the late 1930s? it was irrelevant for Japan’s foreign policy, and it did not have any international momentum or Explaining Japan’s Official “Return to movement. The period after the Manchurian Asia” Incident in 1931, however, witnessed a process by which pan-Asianist ideas and projects In the literature, the process of transition from became part of Japan’s official foreign policy a policy of pro-Western capitalist rhetoric. [1] After 1933 Japan’s pan-Asian internationalism in the 1920s to a very different internationalism began to overshadow liberal policy aiming to create a regional order in East internationalism, gradually becoming the Asia has been attributed to a complex set of mainstream vision of an alternative world interrelated factors, both contingent and order. This process culminated in thestructural. For the sake of clarity, I categorize declaration of the Greater East Asiathe explanations of the previous historiography Coprosperity Sphere in 1940, a project that into two groups, which are distinct but not relied heavily on the rhetoric of pan-Asian necessarily in conflict: those that emphasize internationalism. In 1943, seventeen years domestic political causes of the change and after the ineffectual 1926 Nagasaki pan-Asiatic those that stress changes in the international conference that was ridiculed by official and environment. liberal circles in Japan, the Japanese government itself hosted a Greater According to domestic policy–driven Conference to which it invited the leaders of explanations, Asianism was the foreign policy the Philippines, Burma, the provincialideology espoused by the expansionist, government of , the Nanking government militarist, and conservative segments of of , , and . Japanese society. Frederick Dickinson has traced back to the period of (WWI) Given that pan-Asianist activists had regularly the origins of two distinct agendas for Japan’s expressed strong opposition to Japan’s foreign diplomacy and national mission, one liberal and

1 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF pro-British and the other characterized by pro- noting that anti-Western and antiliberal trends German, anti-liberal, and Asianist tendencies. in Japan had high-ranking supporters and The Asianist and conservative group, mostly strong organizational solidarity during the clustered around Yamagata Aritomo, could not 1920s and thus were able to exert implement its policy visions during the 1910s disproportionate influence as a result of their because the liberal group prevailed in domestic popularity among the bureaucratic and military . By identifying two distinct visions of elite.[4] In his research on the , Japan’s national identity and two corresponding Genzo Yamamoto further demonstrated the international policies in response to theappeal and predominance of what he described opportunities presented by WWI, Dickinson’s as an “illiberal” agenda among Japan’s top study successfully demonstrates that foreign political elite from the 1920s to the late 1930s, policy decisions should not be regarded as leading to their final triumph in domestic automatic responses to international trends politics paralleling the adoption of an and immediate external challenges but rather aggressive China policy.[5] be seen as results of the balance of power in domestic politics among groups that have This focus on the domestic political components competing visions of their national identity and of the transition to the pan-Asianist policies of mission. According to Dickinson, pan-Asianism the 1930s has obvious merit. Asianism, was one such grand vision, which aimed to however, could not always be uniquely establish Japan’s leadership in Asia byidentified as the expansionist ideology of excluding Western powers from the region in conservative antiliberals, as Japan’s liberals the name of racial solidarity and civilizational also envisioned a special role for Japan in Asia, harmony.[2] whether as the disseminator of a higher to backward areas or as the leading Other studies on the 1920s have argued that force in economic development and political members of the conservative antiliberalcooperation in the region. Moreover, an political camp, often identified with pan- aggressive policy in was not the Asianist inclinations, continued to agitate for an monopoly of Japanese Asianists. As expansionist policy at a time when their voices demonstrated by Louise Young, there existed were overshadowed by the of the within Japanese society an overwhelming Taishô democracy and the capitalistconsensus concerning policy in Manchuria, internationalism of Shidehara diplomacy. which cut across the lines dividing liberals and According to Richard Storry’s early work, conservatives.[6] The majority of Japan’s which offers a history of Japanesepolitical and intellectual elite, including the ultranationalism based on the materials of the pro-Western internationalists, supported the War Crimes Tribunal, the persistence new orientation in foreign policy symbolized by and violence displayed by right-wing groups the withdrawal from the League of . For was able to weaken and eventually to overturn example, Nitobe Inazô, reputed for his liberal the prevailing atmosphere of Taishô democracy internationalism, was willing to defend Japan’s and liberal diplomacy. For Storry, for example, policy in China that led to the Manchurian pan-Asianist thinker Ôkawa Shûmei was one of Incident, even to the point of accepting Japan’s the Asianist “double patriots” who influenced withdrawal in 1932 from the League of young military officers and played a great role Nations, in which he had served for so many in the transition to the expansionist 1930s.[3] years.[7] Another liberal internationalist, Christopher Szpilman strengthened thisZumoto Motosada, went on lecture tours in argument in his study of Kokuhonsha, the main 1931 to Europe and the United States in an conservative organization of interwar Japan, attempt to explain Japan’s position on the

2 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF

Manchurian Incident. During his speeches, vocabulary, which would then have different Motosada often referred to the idea of a Japan- political connotations depending on the led regional order in East Asia separate from intellectual climate. For example, those the European-based league system. Just five promoting U.S.-Japan friendship would frame years before the Manchurian Incident, Zumoto their efforts as a dialogue of harmony among had affirmed Japan’s pro-Leaguethe different of East and West, thus internationalism in his critique of the Nagasaki confirming a vision of the world as divided into pan-Asiatic conference of 1926. Japan’s liberal different race and civilization groups beyond internationalists apparently turned to pan- the nations. In that sense, many leading Asianism when they saw a tension between Japanese intellectuals who had no ties to the Japanese national interests and the decisions of conservative radical nationalist groups ended the .[8] up contributing to the legitimacy of the pan- Asianist program in some way, either through their theories on overcoming modernity and Eurocentrism or through their search for an alternative modernity in the Japanese and Asian cultural traditions.[10]

The second major approach to the question of Japan’s adoption of Asianist rhetoric in foreign policy emphasizes that the structural transformations in the international system in East Asia complemented changes in the domestic power configurations to create a situation that led to the triumph of antiliberal Nitobe Inazô at the League of Nations and Asianist projects. Akira Iriye and James Crowley have argued that Japanese policies The Asianist discourse of Japan’s transnational during the 1930s were largely a response to identity had many different versions, ranging changes in the trends of the times as perceived from a doctrine of regional solidarity to anti- by the Japanese elite. A perceived sense of an Western visions of civilizational revival, and it international legitimacy crisis and Japan’s was not limited to conservative circles. For isolation after the Manchurian Incident was example, during the 1930s, many Japanese accelerated by the impact of changed world intellectuals who had no previous connection conditions. Regionalism became the trend of with conservative radical nationalist groups, the time, making the creation of a regional such as the members of the School of order in East Asia a more feasible policy, in Philosophy or the semiofficial think tank Shôwa harmony with the flow of world opinion. As Kenkyûkai, also utilized anti-Western rhetoric Iriye noted, “by 1931 all indications seem to and advocated the revival of Japan’s Asian suggest that the neo-mercantilist world-view of identity.[9] This indicates an area of overlap in Matsuoka was more realistic than Shidehara’s the worldviews of liberals and antiliberals with rational, laissez-faire image, which had respect to Japan’s Asian identity and its apparently failed to produce tangible international mission in Asia, as well as their results.”[11] The capitalist internationalism of shared diagnosis of the international system the 1920s was not only denied altogether by during the 1920s. It also shows that the Fascist and Socialist Russia but also theories of the clash of civilizations and Japan’s half-abandoned in the concept of the pan- mission in Asia were part of a common American trade bloc and economic

3 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF of the United States and the idea of the sterling presented to Japan by the new global trade bloc in England.[12] In short, Japan’s developments should thus be regarded as more policy shift from to significant than the impact of antiliberal right- Asian regionalism could be considered a wing movements associated with pan-Asianism. function just as much of other powers’ policies A similar approach attributes Japan’s turn to in the changing international system of the late anti-Westernism not to the influence of pan- 1930s as of Japan’s own domestic politics. Asianist groups in particular but rather to the general characteristics of Japanese nationalism. The end of the party cabinet system in 1932 Hayashi Fusao’s controversial assertion that and the increasing power of the military in the “ was one phase of an Asian political decisions created a discontinuity in the Hundred Years’ War to drive out the Occidental ’s domestic political order in invader” presents a generalized formulation terms of democratic participation and popular that portrays Asianist ideas as a permanent expression. Japan continued to be apart of mainstream Japanese nationalism.[15] constitutional state, however, with normally This emphasis on the anti-Western historical functioning domestic politics in accordance memory of Japanese nationalism depicts with the intricacies of the MeijiAsianism as a widely held conception about Constitution.[13] In his study on the 1930s, Japan’s transnational identity rather than an Crowley refutes the idea of a conservative or exclusively radical ideology monopolized by right-wing takeover of the Japanese leadership ultranationalists or conservatives. Mark Peattie by focusing on continuity in the “official mind” and James Crowley concur with Hayashi’s and the “decision-making process.” Crowley assessment of the importance of anti-Western shows that all the policy decisions of the historical memory embedded in Japanese Japanese government during the 1930s were nationalism as an ideological factor, although made by responsible political and military they do not share his revisionist agenda.[16] leaders in the interest of national defense and national policy.[14] Since we know, however, that mainstream nationalism in Japan had changing perceptions The historiography that focuses on Japan’s of the West, it would be inaccurate to response to changes in the international characterize anti-Westernism as a single environment attributes an important role to constant position in the history of Japanese ideology and culture in shaping Japanese nationalism from the Opium War to the Greater perceptions of world events, without limiting East Asia War. Moreover, the Japanese focus to right-wing or militarist groups. It is in intellectual elite remained closely linked to this context that an Asianist worldview about trends and ideas in Europe and the United world cultures and international order becomes States. During the 1930s, there was no new relevant for determining the perceptions and expansion of the West in Asia to which the decisions of Japanese leaders. Iriye hassurge in Japanese nationalism might be discussed the role of key notions such as attributed; on the contrary, the West was isolation and self-sufficiency in the psychology perceived to be in a phase of global decline and of Japanese decision makers, showing how the retreat.[17] Thus the very assumption that perception that Japan stood uneasily between there was a constant association between East and West influenced the policy-making Japanese nationalism and resistance to Western mood. expansion reflects the influence of the official pan-Asianist discourse of wartime Japan rather In this view, the notions that the elite held than accurately characterizing how images of concerning the threats and opportunities the West and civilizational identity interacted

4 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF with Japanese foreign policy. Wakabayashi witnessed the decision of Japanese diplomats to withdraw from the Withdrawal from the League of Nations as league upon its refusal to recognize a Turning Point Manchukuo. It was only during his trip back to Japan, Wakabayashi notes, that he recognized a There had been pan-Asianists in Japan since the change of attitude toward his group’s Asianist turn of the twentieth century, and some ideas on the part of Japanese military officers. continued to work for the cause they believed In the long trip from Europe to Japan, he in especially from 1905 to the 1930s, especially explained to Isogai Rensuke, a lieutenant under the umbrella of patriotic Asianistcolonel in the Japanese army the benefits that organizations such as Kokuryûkai andattention to the Muslim world could bring to Genyosha. These patriotic AsianistsJapan’s East Asian policy. Isogai later contacted represented a minority, if not a marginal Wakabayashi and introduced him to Army opinion, in shaping Japanese foreign policy. Minister Araki Sadao.[22] Wakabayashi’s story They often complained about the neglect to of what followed is a narrative of triumph, as which they had been subjected by the Japanese the Japanese army began to implement a pan- elite. In the aftermath of the Manchurian Asianist Islam policy in China and supported Incident of 1931 and Japan’s withdrawal from the activities of the Kokuryûkai. It is clear from the League of Nations the following year, his story that Japan’s withdrawal from the however, traditional Asianists found a very League of Nations was a turning point in the receptive audience for their ideas among Japanese government’s attitude to the pan- Japanese bureaucrats and army officers. Asianist ideas of Japan’s cooperation with Muslim nationalities against the Western The story told by Wakabayashi Han, acolonial presence. Autobiographical anecdotes Kokuryûkai Asianist who specialized in the of other pan-Asianist activists exhibit a similar Islamic world, is very telling in this regard. pattern. The most influential pan-Asianist, Wakabayashi became interested in the Muslim Ôkawa Shûmei, had the similar experience of world after a visit to India with the Burmese finding a surprising shift in Japanese official Buddhist monk and anticolonial nationalist U. policy and intellectual life toward positions Ottama in 1912.[18] His discovery of Indian more to his liking in the mid-1930s, more than Muslims led him to undertake further research two decades after his initial commitment of the about Islam in Asia.[19] For twenty years, he cause of Asianism. worked closely with a small circle of Islam experts within Kokuryûkai led by Tanaka Ippei, Ôkawa Shûmei’s biography during the 1930s arguing that if Japan could develop closer ties took an ironic turn, as he was put on trial and with the colonized Muslims of Asia, its efforts imprisoned for his involvement in a failed to become the leader of an awakening and military coup to change Japan’s domestic independent Asia could benefit from Muslim politics at the very time his Asianist projects support.[20] According to Wakabayashi,were receiving the support of the Japanese however, his small group neither achieved any government. As head of the East Asia Economic result nor received any support from the Research Bureau of the Manchurian Railway government, and he became pessimistic about Company after 1929, Ôkawa naturally was its future success.[21] Then in 1932 Tôyama familiar with Japanese interests in Manchuria. Mitsuru and Uchida Ryôhei sent Wakabayashi Frequently visiting Manchuria and China, he to observe the meeting of the League of came to know the leading military figures of Nations in Geneva that addressed the question the personally. From 1929 of recognizing the state of Manchukuo. There, onward, Ôkawa argued that a solution to the

5 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF

Manchurian problem was essential for both the tribunal’s thesis about the long-term Asian revival and the reconstruction of Japan. Japanese conspiracy to invade Asia.[26] In 1928 Ôkawa met with the Manchurian warlord Chang Hsüeh-liang in an effort to convince him to form a stronger political union with Japan based on “Confucian political values.”[23] Both a respected scholar of colonial studies and a radical nationalist, Ôkawa once gave a lecture on the necessity of creating an independent Manchuria- to an audience that included top military officers of the 1930s, most notably, Itagaki Seishirô, Nagata Tetsuzan, and Tôjô Hideki.[24] He went on a lecture tour in Japan before and after the Manchurian Incident, expressing his conviction that Manchuria was not only a legitimate economic and security Okawa Shumei (left) and Ishihara Kanji sphere for Japan but actually represented the lifeline of Japan’s national policy. It is impossible to attribute the Manchurian Incident or post–Manchurian Incident Japanese Like so many other Japanese intellectuals and policies specifically to the ideology of the pan- leaders, Ôkawa was outspoken about the Asianists. The fact that pan-Asianist Ôkawa importance of protecting Japanese interests in Shûmei had lectured on the issue of Manchuria Manchuria, and he favored radical action to and had known some of the military leaders did secure these interests against the claims of not necessarily make him an ideologue of the . For Ôkawa, Japan’s Manchurian Incident, since there were many “sacrifice” in the Sino-Japanese and Russo- others, including those identified as liberals at Japanese wars created the historical legitimacy the time, who advocated a similarly radical for its treaty privileges in Manchuria.policy in Manchuria.[27] It is helpful to Criticizing the anti-Japanese movement in compare Ôkawa’s arguments on Manchuria China, Ôkawa argued that if Japan did not act with the writings of Rôyama Masamichi to protect its in Manchuria, it would (1895–1980), a liberal intellectual of the time endanger its position in and as who was well respected internationally and well. He condemned the Japanese leaders of influential in Japanese policy circles. Rôyama, the late 1920s for not being able to show the who presented his analysis of Japan’s relations courage and determination necessary to find a with Manchuria to an international audience long-term solution to the Manchurian problem affiliated with the Institute of Pacific Relations because of their submissive commitment to two years before the Manchurian Incident, held international cooperation with the Western that Japan’s established interests in Manchuria powers. His arguments can clearly bedeserved international approval.[28] In a later construed as offering encouragement for the policy report on Manchuria, Rôyama placed radical actions orchestrated by the Kwantung blame for the Manchurian Incident on the Army.[25] Citing these facts, the prosecution at existing international peace structures and the the Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal argued that refusal to acknowledge the special relations there was a link between Ôkawa’s pan-Asianist between China and Japan, not on the actions of ideas and the Manchurian Incident, a key step the Kwantung Army. Ôkawa’s writings about in constructing the ideological background of the need to defend Japanese rights in

6 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF

Manchuria against Chinese nationalistRôyama Masamichi’s justification of the demands did not differ substantially from Manchurian Incident as a practical response to Rôyama’s insistence on the protection of the changing conditions of the region. Ôkawa Japan’s vital interests.[29] wrote:

Our victory over Russia inspired hope and courage in the countries exploited under the of the Caucasian colonialists. But, before long, Japan gave in to the Franco- Japanese Agreement and the revised Anglo-Japanese Alliance, actions that shattered the hopes of noble Vietnamese and Indian patriots who sought for their countries. . . . However, the mistakes in Japanese policy were later rectified decisively by the foundation of Manchukuo. Japan abandoned cooperation with the Anglo-Americans, the chief instigators suppressing the . The foundation of Manchukuo was the first step in achieving a great “renascent Asia.”[31]

Ôkawa similarly applauded Japan’s withdrawal from the League of Nations.[32] As shown in Royama Masamichi the previous chapter, Ôkawa had always regarded the league as an instrument of The nature of the pan-Asianist approach to the Western colonial powers and often urged the Manchurian Incident became apparent only Japanese government to create a League of after the incident, when intellectuals like Asian Nations as an alternative.[33]After Ôkawa formulated laudatory characterizations Japan’s withdrawal from the league in 1933, of the establishment of Manchukuo both as a Ôkawa’s ideas seemed in harmony with the victory against the corruption of business policies of the Japanese government for the conglomerates () and political parties first time in the history of his Asianist activism, at home, and as a brave defense of Japan’s dating back to 1913. continental policy against American, British, and Soviet opposition.[30] Ôkawa retroactively offered a moral justification for the Manchurian Incident within the framework of a pan-Asianist critique of Japan’s foreign policy between 1905 and 1931. His interpretation of the incident as a correction of the misguided course of pro- Western diplomacy, especially since the Russo- Japanese War, differed significantly from

7 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF

League of Nations Assembly, 1932

As the foreign policy Ôkawa had envisioned began to be implemented, he was put on trial for his involvement in the May 15, 1932, assassination of Prime Minister .[34] After his arrest on June 15, 1932, the court found Ôkawa guilty of providing guns and money to conspirators during the planning stage of the assassination. In February 1934, Inukai Tsuyoshi he received a fifteen-year prison sentence, however, between appeals and paroles he spent Although his image had been tarnished by his less than two years in prison, between June involvement in the May 15 assassination, 1936 and October 1937.[35] Between 1931 to shortly after his release from prison, Ôkawa 1935, the dominant visions of Japanese foreign was appointed to head the continental campus policy and domestic politics changed soof Hôsei University. In May 1938, he was dramatically that, by early 1935, Ôkawa no reinstated to his position as director of the East longer needed to work through secretive Asia Economic Research Bureau in Tokyo. Back radical organizations to achieve his ideological in his position of managing one of the largest goals. In February 1935, he marked the end of research institutes in Japan, he actively his career as an activist promoting the Shôwa promoted a pan-Asianist agenda with the Restoration in domestic politics and pan- journal he edited, entitled Shin Ajia (New Asia). Asianism in foreign policy by disbanding the His position as editor allowed him to observe, last organization he established, Jinmukai.[36] comment on, and influence Japan’s Asia policy Japan itself was approaching the state of in the period following the official declaration military mobilization while endorsing anof the “New Order in East Asia” in November Asianist foreign policy agenda, making radical 1938.[37] In his first editorial, published just a activism for the same purpose pointless. month before the German , Ôkawa predicted that the outbreak of war in Europe would usher in a new era in which nationalist movements in Asia would find their chance to achieve independence. He also urged the Japanese government to support these anticolonial movements with the goal of

8 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF accelerating their process of national liberation The Ôkawa Juku represented a practical and simultaneously creating future allies for implementation of Ôkawa Shûmei’s long-held Japan. Pointing out that Japan’s mission in Asia pan-Asianist vision of merging a colonial was gaining greater urgency, Ôkawa expressed cultural policy with anticolonial ideology. He his hope that the Japanese public, which was aimed to educate a body of Japanese not knowledgeable even about the recent bureaucrats who could understand the culture developments in China, would become better and language of Asian peoples and take a informed about the conditions and peoples of position of leadership among them. According Asia in general.[38] to his students, Ôkawa often noted the apparent unreadiness of the Japanese Empire As the Japanese government began to use the for a great pan-Asian cause, underlining the slogan “New Order in East Asia” to describe its urgency he perceived in his teaching mission. foreign policy, Ôkawa became concerned about He encouraged students to form personal the Japanese public’s lack of preparedness, in friendship with Asian peoples and establish terms of their knowledge about Asian societies bonds of solidarity that would last even if Japan and cultures, for a serious pan-Asian policy. In lost the war.[39] order to educate young Japanese about the culture and politics of Asia and prepare them A retrospective assessment of Japan’s wartime cultural policies in newly occupied Southeast for positions in the service of Japan, Ôkawa Asia shows that, with a few exceptions, cultural received government funds to establish a policies were in fact developed ad hoc by special school offering instruction in Asian administrators faced with the reality of ruling a studies. The two-year professional school, the large population they knew little about.[40] most concrete product of Ôkawa’s Asianist Ôkawa Juku complemented the other Asianist vision, was established in May 1938 as a program that brought students from Southeast teaching institute affiliated with the East Asian Asia to Japan for training. Most of the Economic Research Bureau in Tokyo, with graduating students of Ôkawa Juku did find funds from the Manchurian Railway Company, employment in the military administration of the army, and the Foreign Ministry. All the Southeast Asian region during the era of expenses of the admitted students were paid by the Greater East Asia Coprosperity Sphere.[41] the school, which was widely known as the Ôkawa Juku (Ôkawa School), although it was The content of pan-Asianist education at Ôkawa named the Shôwa Gogaku Kenkyûjo (Shôwa Juku reflected a synthesis between the Language Research Institute). In return for scholarly-idealistic vision of Asian liberation receiving tuition and a stipend for two years, and pragmatic goals of Japan’s wartime the students were obligated to work for the military expansion. Ôkawa himself taught Japanese government in overseas regions such classes on colonial history, the “Japanese as for approximately ten years. spirit,” Islam, and Oriental history. His lecture Each year, the school recruited twenty students notes for the classes entitled “History of around the age of seventeen. In their first year, Modern European ” and students had to learn either English or French “Introduction to Islam” later became the basis as their primary foreign language, along with for books with these titles. Students praised an additional language to be selected from Ôkawa as a dedicated educator, citing his among Hindu, , Thai, and Malay. After the informative and clear lectures, his hard work, second year of the school, Arabic, Persian, and and his close relationship with students.[42] Turkish were added to the elective language From time to time, high-ranking army generals course offerings. such as Doihara Kenji, Itagaki Seishirô, Matsui

9 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF

Iwane, Tôjô Hideki, and Okamura Seiji would war in Europe, with all the implications that visit the Ôkawa Juku and lecture students on such a war carried for the colonized areas in Japan’s Asia policy.[43] Indian nationalist Rash Asia, they found renewed faith in Asia’s Behari and Muslim immigrant from Russia ultimate rise to independence; destiny seemed Qurban Ali were among the part-time language to have presented Japan with an ideal and history instructors of the school, giving opportunity to lead the liberation of Asia from students a firsthand encounter with theWestern colonialism. For pan-Asianists, a anticolonial nationalist thinking of Asian exiles southern advance was as much a practical in Japan. It was during this time that Ôkawa opportunity as it was a moral imperative, since pioneered Japan’s rapidly growing field of neither the British nor the Dutch were in a Islamic studies not only through his own position to resist Japanese military pressure, writings but also by supporting young scholars particularly if Japan could act in cooperation and purchasing library collections on Islamic with native nationalist movements in Southeast studies from Europe in his capacity as director Asia. It is in this spirit that Ôkawa Shûmei of the East Asia Economic Researchproposed the creation of a Southeast [Asian] Institute.[44] Common Cooperative Region (Tônan Kyôdôken) to secure the political and economic unity of liberated Southeast Asia with Japan. With this historical opportunity, there could emerge a new world order based on three regional blocs, Euro-Africa, America, and East-Southeast Asia.[45] Meanwhile, realizing the danger that cooperation between Europe and America could present to Japan, Ôkawa Shûmei advocated a policy of keeping the United States neutral.[46] He refrained from making anti- American statements in his editorials and urged the improvement of economic ties, especially with joint projects in Manchuria and Qurban Ali (standing, second left) with China, in a bid to secure U.S. neutrality in the Inukai Tsuyoshi (seated, second left) and event of a future British-Japanese conflict. Toyama Mitsuru (seated, second right). Thus, from 1938 up until the Pearl Harbor It would be mistaken to assume that, before attack, Ôkawa Shûmei was involved in a project Pearl Harbor, Japan’s Asianists advocated war of developing trade ties between Japan and the with the United States based on their vision of United States. There had been an economic East-West conflict. From the time of the diplomacy toward the United States that aimed Manchurian Incident in July 1937 to the Pearl at cooperation in the industrialization of Harbor attack in December 1941, for example, Manchuria between 1937 and 1940.[47] Ôkawa Shûmei cautioned against entering into Endorsing Ishiwara Kanji’s vision of the conflict with the United States whilecreation of a self-sufficient military industry in advocating a southern advance by Japan that Manchukuo, but recognizing the insufficiency would target the colonies of Britain, France, of the machine tool industry in the region, and the Netherlands in Southeast Asia. With military and industrial leaders in Manchuria this goal in mind, he urged a quick resolution aimed to attract a higher level of U.S. to the Sino-Japanese conflict. Particularly as investment and technology. In fact, Manchuria pan-Asianists became aware of an approaching became more heavily dependent on American

10 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF capital and technology than it was on European immediately took on the task of offering a investments. Beyond the goal of industrializing historical justification for the war as Japan’s Manchuria, Ayukawa Yoshisuke, the president response to a century of Anglo-American of the Manchurian Industrial Development aggression in East Asia. He preferred the term Corporation and the founder of the Nissan “Anglo-American aggression” to “Western conglomerate, also hoped to avoid war between aggression,” a contemporary expression that the United States and Japan by fostering allowed pan-Asianist thinkers to exclude mutual economic ties. Germany from their anti-Western rhetoric. Even so, when Ôkawa discussed the historical Ôkawa Shûmei’s personal commitment to the and philosophical basis of the Greater East Asia improvement of economic relations with the War, he again spoke about the confrontation of United States stemmed more from his interest East and West as if China did not belong to the in U.S. neutrality than from considerations of East or Germany to the West. It was during his economic rationality. He believed it was radio lectures on this topic delivered between possible for Japan to avoid U.S. intervention in December 14 and December 25 of 1941, that its confrontation with the Chinese Nationalist Ôkawa credited himself for the prophecy he government and the European colonial powers. had made back in 1924 in his book “Asia, It was Ôkawa’s expectation that the strong Europe and Japan” of an inevitable war trade relationships and joint investments they between Eastern and Western civilizations, shared with Japan in Manchuria would lead the represented by Japan and the United States. He Americans to withdraw their support from the described the books purposes as follows: Nationalist government of China. In making these policy suggestions, Ôkawa relied on his assumptions about the American national first, to let the pacifists reconsider character as being concerned primarily with their wrong attitude by clarifying business interests rather than principled the historical significance of war; foreign policies. He also considered that the second, to show that world history, United States had less to lose by giving up its in its true sense of the word, is support for the government of Chiang Kai-shek nothing but a chronicle of than Britain did.[48] With these assessments antagonism, struggle and and goals, Ôkawa became personally involved unification between the Orient and in an effort by the Pan-Pacific Trading and the Occident; third, to reveal the Navigation Company to barter mineral ores cultural characteristics of the East from China for gasoline from the United States. and the West which had been His project failed as a result of difficulties with blended into the history of the the intricacies of U.S. trade regulations. world; fourth, to give a logical Nevertheless, Ôkawa’s desire to insulate the foundation to Pan-Asianism; last, U.S from Japan’s war in China, in addition to but not least, to point out that a his willingness to make use of U.S. trade in the war is inevitable between the East development of Manchuria, should be noted as and the Anglo-American powers for an indication that he was not, at least where the establishment of a new world. practical policy matters were concerned, a Moreover, I tried to clarify the consistent advocate of an inevitable war sublime mission of Japan in the between the United States and Japan.[49] coming world war. I concluded the book as follows: “Now, East and Once the fighting between the United States West have respectively attained and Japan began, however, Ôkawa Shûmei their ultimate goals. . . . As history

11 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF

fully proves, in creating a new the military, and business circles increased. world, a life-and-death struggle There was a significant gap, however, between between the champion of the East the discourse of civilization reducing all global and that of the West is inevitable. conflicts to a question of clashes between This logic proved true when distinct races or major civilizations and the America challenged Japan.” My reality of the state of international affairs. prediction proved correct after the Around the time of the Russo-Japanese War, a passage of 16 years.[50] vision of racial solidarity and civilizational alliance seemed to be an appealing international strategy for the political projects Such self-promoting references to hisof the rising nationalist movements, which prediction of Japan’s war with the United perceived a united policy in the West of States led to Ôkawa’s indictment at the Tokyo imperialism toward their Asian colonies. During War Crimes Tribunal.[51] During the trial, he the late 1930s, however, the Western world no pointed out that his writings in 1924 did not longer seemed such a unified front as a result necessarily constitute a plan for a Japanese of sharp political and ideological divisions in attack, as he was merely commenting on the Europe. And Japan’s challenge to the inevitability of war between civilizations based international order was not based on racial on the ideas of the Russian philosopher divisions, either. Within East Asia, the major Soloviev.[52] In fact, he offered a moreconflict was not between East and West but historical reinterpretation of his 1924 clash of between Japanese imperialism, on the one civilization thesis while under U.S.hand, and Chinese and , on interrogation. Albeit for opportunistic reasons, the other. pan-Asianists opposed war with the United States before 1941. Moreover, in the aftermath From 1933 onward, there was a dramatic of the Immigration Act of 1924, theories of a increase in the number of Asianist clash between the USA and Japan was a organizations, publications, and events. They popular topic beyond Asianist circles. Yet the aimed not only at demonstrating the sincerity easy transition by the pan-Asianists to clash of of Japan’s “return to Asia” but also at guarding civilization theories to justify the war with the against a perceived state of international United States in the immediate aftermath of isolation for Japan after its withdrawal from the the Pearl Harbor attack also signifies the League of Nations. Asianist publications and flexible utilization of the ideas of Eastern and events also aimed at convincing both the Western civilization, and the historical memory Japanese public and Asian nationalists that of Western colonialism, for the ends of Japan’s civilizational and racial distinctions were in fact own imperial expansion. to be regarded as the primary consideration in Asianist Journals and Organizations international relations. But the empty repetition of slogans about the conflict between From the Manchurian Incident in 1931 to the civilizations and races did not succeed in end of WWII, Ôkawa Shûmei was only one of creating any substantial ideology able to the many intellectual voices trying to clarify the account for the complex global politics of the content and goals of the ambivalent notion of 1930s. Instead, Asianism became less and less Asian solidarity and Japan’s Asian mission. credible in the face of Japan’s full-scale war Especially after Japan’s withdrawal from the against Chinese nationalism. Realizing this, League of Nations, activities related to the Asianists pursued ideological credibility by ideals and discourse of pan-Asianism gained attempting to revive and reinvent the legacy of momentum as support from the government, the early Asian internationalism dating back to

12 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF the period from 1905 to 1914. At the same nothing to improve Indo-Japanese relations for time, liberal and socialist converts to Asianism about two decades, expressing skepticism over during the late 1930s infused new content and the motivations behind Japan’s attempt to vigor into the nearly exhausted concept of “return to Asia” after such a long period of Asian community and solidarity. indifference to nationalist movements.[58]

The reinvention of pan-Asianist ideologyThe New Asia included international news from following the Manchurian Incident can best be the perspective of the East-West conflict and seen in the sudden increase in the number of domestic news on the activities of various Asianist journals and organizations supported Asianist associations in Japan, such as the visits by military, political, and business authorities. to Tokyo of Asian or African American figures In 1933, the same year Japan left the League of of repute, or the awarding of scholarships to Nations, and Qurban Ali, two students from Asia.[59] The journal refrained Asianist exiles who had lived in Japan during from publishing any news or articles critical of the 1920s, began to receive funding for the the creation of Manchukuo and maintained purpose of publishing journals addressed to silence on the subject of Chinese nationalism. India and the Muslim World. Rash Behari Bose After discussing the Sino-Japanese conflict in a published The New Asia–Shin Ajia, a monthly tone of regret, Rash Behari Bose suggested periodical in a dual English- and Japanese- that India should mediate between the two language format.[53] The nations to reach a peaceful settlement.[60] banned the entry and sale of The New Asia With regard to the clash of civilizations and within the territories it controlled.[54] The races, articles in The New Asia emphasized journal seemed to have supporters in Southeast that what Asians wanted was national Asia, as evidenced by the contact between liberation, with the possibility of a racial Indonesian nationalist leader Muhammed Hatta conflict thus depending entirely on the attitude and Rash Behari Bose.[55] that the Western powers chose to assume toward the independence movements:[61] Almost half the journal was devoted to coverage of news about the IndianThe non-white peoples are now conscious of the independence movement, taking a tonedistressing fact that they have hitherto been sympathetic to the radical wing led by Subhas mercilessly exploited and inhumanly Chandra Bose.[56] Neither Japanese pan- humiliated. The intensity of this consciousness Asianism nor The New Asia, however, received is the measure of their challenge to the white support from such prominent leaders of the man. One thing is certain, and that is that the Indian national movement as Gandhi, Nehru, East and the West cannot coalesce, unless the Tagore, and , all of whom West fully realizes its immeasurable folly of were very critical of Japanese aggression in race-superiority consciousness, completely China. Despite the absence of interest in a abandons its mischievous policy of exploitation, Japan-centered pan-Asianist vision among and immediately makes ample amends for the Indian nationalists, the journal referred to the untold wrongs it has inflicted on the non-white pro-Japanese statement by Tagore back in peoples of the earth.[62] 1916, even though Tagore had radically changed his views of Japan by the 1930s.[57] In The New Asia’s editorials on Japanese Even Taraknath Das, the one Indian nationalist foreign policy, Rash Behari Bose urged the who bestowed great hopes on Japan’sJapanese government to cooperate with the leadership of Asian nationalism during WWI, United States, China, and the Soviet Union in a wrote to The New Asia that Japan had done move to eliminate British colonial control in

13 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF

Asia. For him, Britain was the root of all Abdül Kerim Efendi (1904–1935) was invited to problems in the region, including Japan’s Japan, presumably to consider his potential isolation in the international community. As contribution to Japan’s policy toward the early as 1934, Behari Bose warned that Japan Muslims of in case of a conflict needed to maintain good relations with the with the Soviet Union. Although the plan was United States, as only Britain would benefit soon abandoned, it exemplified the reckless from a conflict between that country and Japan: and unrealistic projects that Asianists were “Britain is not able to fight Japan singly and willing to consider at the expense of therefore waiting for her opportunity, when jeopardizing Japan’s diplomatic relations with Japan may be involved in a war with America. . the Turkish Republic.[65] In the same year, . . An American-Japanese War will weaken AbdurreÅŸid Ä°brahim, the famous pan- these two great powers who are serious rivals Islamist whose travel memoirs more than two of Great Britain. Those Americans and Japanese decades earlier had popularized a pro-Japanese who are real patriots should do their best to image in the Muslim world, currently leading promote American-Japanese friendship.”[63] an isolated and uneventful life in Turkey, While Rash Behari Bose edited a journal received an invitation to visit Tokyo. Ä°brahim addressing primarily India, Qurban Ali was collaborated with the Asianist projects reaching publishing Yani Yapon Muhbiri (New Japan out to the Muslim world until his death in 1944 journal), which aimed its message at the in Tokyo.[66] Muslim world.[64] Although the journal was in Turkish, the cover page of the magazine It was also in 1933 that several high-level included a Japanese subtitle, describing it as military and civilian leaders established the “the only journal that introduces Japan to the Greater Asia Association (Dai Ajia Kyôkai).[67] Muslim world.” Several Japanese companies The Greater Asia Association not only promoted provided support to the small Muslimregional unity in East Asia but also advocated community in Tokyo for their efforts in the solidarity among West and Southeast Asian publication of Yani Yapon Muhbiri, which was societies. Konoe Fumimaro, General Matsui seen as an effective means for the creation of Iwane, and General Ishiwara Kanji were among an information network linking Japan and the its prominent members.[68] The Greater Asia Muslim world. In spite of the journal’s limited Association published a monthly journal titled circulation, the very fact that Tokyo was Dai Ajia Shugi (Greater Asianism), which hosting a magazine published by Muslims was became the most important pan-Asianist expected to have propaganda value in journal during that period, offering a wide cultivating pro-Japanese sentiments within a range of news and opinion articles covering all Muslim audience. of Asia, including Muslim West Asia, Southeast Asia, and Central Asia. Ôkawa Shûmei, Around the same time that Yani Yapon Muhbiri began publication in 1933, several other Nakatani Takeyo,[69] Rash Behari Bose and attempts at networking with the Muslim world many Asianist figures in the military frequently were promoted with the support of thewrote for this journal. The content and Japanese army in Manchuria. These new discourse of Dai Ajia Shugi became an attempts benefited from the contactsinfluential source in shaping the official Kokuryûkai had established in the Muslim language of pan-Asianism during the late world and the Turkish Tatar diaspora network 1930s, influencing the “New Order in East in East Asia. In a daring experiment in 1933, a Asia” proclamation of the Konoe Fumimaro prince from the abolished Ottoman dynasty, cabinet in 1938.[70]

14 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF

perspective, the journal always consulted the same small group of exiled nationalists in Japan.[74] This artificial perspective tended to give the journal a self-congratulatory tone, which became typical of Japanese pan-Asianism during the late 1930s; Japanese readers received the impression that Asian nationalists eagerly looked to Japan for leadership. In reality, expectation of Japanese leadership against Western colonialism was much weaker among the nationalist movements of the 1930s compared to the period in the aftermath of 1905. Still, the journal tried to convince the Toyama Mitsuru honors Rash Behari Bose Japanese public that pan-Asianism could be a plausible and positive alternative to the The discourse of Asian identity represented in declining Eurocentric world order in Asia.[75] Dai Ajia Shugi was perfectly in harmony with the broader Asia view of Ôkawa Shûmei’s In addition to the boom of journals and ideology, as it seemed to regard India and the organizations, an increasing degree of Muslim world as just as important as East and networking with different Asian countries took Southeast Asia. Taking this continental Asia place, primarily involving students and perspective, Dai Ajia Kyôkai made an important intellectuals. When one of ’s most contribution to Asianist thought with itsprominent nationalist leaders, Muhammad introduction of news and information about the Hatta, visited Japan in 1933, he was showered political, economic, and social trends of the with media attention and received an entire Asian world, from China and India to enthusiastic welcome from the Greater Asia and Turkey.[71] In foreign policy, Dai Ajia Association as the “Gandhi of the Netherlands Shugi was highly anti-British and, strikingly, East Indies.” Hatta had previously expressed not anti-American. Discussions of the conflict criticism of Japanese imperialism in China and clash of interests between England and following the Manchurian Incident; however, Japan started as early as 1933,[72] andafter his trip, he moderated his position on the gradually the journal’s call for a new world Japanese “return to Asia” and advocated order turned to a more radical rejection of Indonesian cooperation with the liberal, European hegemony in Asia. The journal, progressive, and idealistic segments of however, did not carry any vision of conflict Japanese society, suggesting that Indonesian with the United States that could havenationalists should challenge the Japanese to indicated the path to war. Beginning in 1938, it be sincere in their pan-Asianist rhetoric. During actively promoted the concept of “New Asia,” his visit to Japan in the fall of 1935, Ahmad offering enthusiastic intellectual support for Subardjo, another Indonesian nationalist the government’s declaration of the “New leader, expressed his belief that Japan’s Order in East Asia.”[73] withdrawal from the League of Nations and the revival of the pan-Asianist discourse Despite the journal’s endorsement ofrepresented a very positive turning point in cooperation among Asian nations, there was no Asian history. It is important to note that, genuine dialogue with Asian intellectuals and despite their cautious approach to Japan’s nationalist movements in the pages of Dai Ajia official Asianism, neither Hatta nor Subardjo Shugi. When it claimed to present an Asian had anything positive to say about the League

15 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF of Nations.[76] Meanwhile, various Asianist with his perception of a genuine Japanese organizations tried to increase the number of public interest in the struggle of Africans and Indonesian students attending JapaneseAfrican Americans, convinced him of the universities, with most of these students sincerity behind Japan’s claim for leadership of becoming members of pan-Asianistthe colored races. Du Bois continued to write organizations during their stays in Japan. about the legitimacy of Japan’s actions in Asia in the framework of the importance of race in In 1934 the Japanese government established a international affairs, even in the face of semiofficial agency, Kokusai Bunka Shinkôkai Japanese atrocities in China. Predictably, pro- (Society for International Cultural Relations), Japanese comments by Du Bois received great with the purpose of introducing Japanese coverage in Japanese papers in a self-righteous culture to other parts of the world andaffirmation of Japanese policies.[81] improving cultural ties with European, American, and Asian societies.[77] Although the initial focus of the organization emphasized Europe and the United States, Kokusai Bunka Shinkôkai gradually expanded the funding it devoted to cultural interactions with Asian societies.[78]

As the number of cultural and political associations, journals, and books focusing on Asia grew dramatically after 1933, the Japanese public’s interpretation of international events began to be shaped more by their consciousness of racial difference and Asian identity. The best example of the power that an internationalist race identity held over Du Bois in Japan the Japanese imagination was the popular reaction to the Italian invasion of Ethiopia, Overall, the small group of Japan’s Asian when strong pro-Ethiopian sentiments caused collaborators, together with the Asian and problems for Japan’s diplomatic relations with African American intellectuals who expressed Italy. The mainstream Japanese media was full support for Japan’s Asianist projects, were very of anti-Italian and pro-Ethiopian commentaries, important in allowing Japanese intellectuals to with references to the conflict as another convince themselves that their ideas of the instance of the struggle between the white race New Order in East Asia and the Greater East and colored races.[79] Such overwhelming Asia Coprosperity Sphere were different from sympathy for the Ethiopian resistance caused Western imperialism. As Naoki Sakai has diplomatic tension between Japan and Italy, pointed out, the ideologues of Japan’s official despite the Japanese Foreign Ministry’s policy pan-Asianism manifested a kind of “narcissism” of keeping good relations with Italy.[80] that impelled them repeatedly to quote those Meanwhile, the highly pro-Ethiopian public individuals who praised the Japanese or who response to the Ethiopian crisis attracted the hoped to receive support from Japan against attention of African American intellectuals, Western colonial rule.[82] Through prompting a visit to Japan by W. E. B. Du Bois. magnification of these manifestations of pro- The warm reception Du Bois met during his Japanese expressions, many of which dated 1936 visit to Manchuria and Japan, combined back to the decade after the Russo-Japanese

16 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF

War, Japanese leaders depicted the Japanese The charter of Dai Ajia Kyôkai, promulgated in Empire as a Coprosperity Sphere that1933 after Japan’s withdrawal from the League purported to represent the will of all its of Nations, was a far cry from the cautious colonial subjects. language of the early Asian Monroe Doctrine developed during the 1910s: When Japan first began the process of colonizing Taiwan and Korea and received In culture, politics, economics, rights in Manchuria, its policies could be geography, and race, Asia is a body justified in international law through of common destiny. The true references to the ideals of progress and peace, prosperity, and development favored by other colonial powers. development of Asian peoples are In the starkly different international climate of feasible only on the basis of their the 1930s, the vocabulary of benevolent consciousness of Asia as one entity colonialism had to be replaced by the discourse and an organic union thereof. . . . of pan-Asian solidarity to justify Japanese The heavy responsibility for reconstruction and ordering of imperialism. By 1940 there were many Asia rests upon the shoulders of Japanese, especially in the young generation, Imperial Japan. . . . now is the time who believed in their Asian identity and the for Japan to concentrate all its discourses of Asian liberation propagated by cultural, political, economic, and multiple sources within Japan.[83] organizational power to take one step toward the reconstruction and Asianist Ideology of the 1930s union in Asia. . . . The formulation of the Greater Asia is Pan-Asianism did not have a defined ideology the historical mission facing the or a systematic doctrine. Formulating an today.[84] ideology that was both realistic and intellectually appealing proved to be the In the early stages after Japan’s withdrawal greatest challenge faced by official Asianism in from the League of Nations, scholars of the 1930s. Early pan-Asianism derived its international relations such as Kamikawa appeal from its opposition to the intellectual Hikomatsu and Rôyama Masamichi criticized foundations of the Eurocentric international the idea of Great Asianism advocated by Dai order while claiming to be in harmony with Ajia Kyôkai, calling it both unrealistic and Japan’s national interest through the idea of anachronistic. They suggested that instead of regional leadership in the project of an Asian pursuing an anti-Western vision of Asian Monroe Doctrine. In the 1930s, when pan- solidarity, Japan should create a Far Eastern Asianist ideology took on a more assertive League using the League of Nations as its challenge to the Eurocentric world order, a model. This plan was based on a liberal new generation of intellectuals struggled to internationalist agenda without any emphasis inject a degree of international legitimacy and on the primacy of race and civilization.[85] At realism into the idea of Asianism by modifying that stage, scholars like Rôyama Masamichi the content of the racial conflict thesis with were maintaining their resistance to an reference to regionalism and . increasingly pervasive Asianist tendency to Moreover, a strong tide of intellectual critiques analyze and reorder Japan’s relations with the of Western modernity during the 1930s ended rest of the world in terms of racial and up strengthening the anti-Western discourse of civilizational blocs and conflicts among them. pan-Asianism. Rôyama noted that he deliberately decided “not

17 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF to give a leading position to the question of icon of pan-Asian thought. All of Okakura’s race and culture” in his writings and policy works, including a previously unpublished suggestions.[86] In the end, however, Rôyama manuscript from his 1901 trip to India called capitulated to this convention, offeringAwakening of the East, were published in both realpolitik substance to the slogans of official English and Japanese editions between 1938 pan-Asianism. He incorporated the idea of a and 1945.[90] In the same quest to reinvent distinct East Asian culture in his elaborate early Asian internationalism, books by Ôkawa support of the New Order in East Asia, Shûmei, Paul Richard, and Taraknath Das from although it is true that the core of histhe period of WWI were reprinted after more arguments relied more on the concepts of than twenty years.[91] regionalism.[87] Japan’s liberal intellectuals could redefine the idea of East Asian community (kyôdôtai) as a form of regionalism that would bring about a rationalization of economic and social interaction in the region.[88]

Because of harsh critiques from leading Asian nationalists, such as Gandhi and Nehru, of Japanese policies in China during the 1930s, official Asianism was based on highly repetitive references to the events and ideas of the Asian internationalism of the 1905–1914 period, when there was an interest in Japanese leadership in different parts of Asia. One of the best examples of this attempt to overcome the emptiness of an imposed notion of Asian unity through references to early Asianism can be seen in the response Ôkawa Shûmei offered to the condemnation of Japanese Asianism by leaders of the . Even at the time when Japan was sponsoring the ’s fight against British rule, both Gandhi and Nehru denounced Japanese colonialism. In an open letter to them, Ôkawa recounted his experiences during WWI in joining Indian nationalists to campaign for the liberation of India, regardless of Japan’s pro-Western policy at the time of the Anglo- Okakura Tenshin Japanese Alliance. For Ôkawa, this historical background of Indian-Japanese collaboration It was the presence of new converts from the showed that the ideals of official pan-Asianism socialist and liberal intellectual traditions, during the Greater East Asia War had altruistic however, that injected new energy and vitality historical roots, reflecting a genuine interest in to Asianism. In the writings of Miki Kiyoshi, a aiding the of Asia.[89] It was leading member of the Shôwa Kenkyûkai, we during such a search for the historical roots of can see the Asianist discourse of civilization in Asianism that Okakura Tenshin was made an its most sophisticated formulation, polished

18 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF with the German tradition of the philosophy of West. It was their belief that the fusion history.[92] According to Miki, the over- between the West, “reorganized by the Westernization of world cultures and the proletariat,” and the East, “awakened through Eurocentric character of the social sciences the influence of Pan-Asianism,” would create a posed a global political problem. Borrowing the new world order that would finally establish self-critique of European thought during the world peace and unity.[95] Their retreat from interwar period, Miki expressed the conviction Comintern socialism was accompanied by a that Western civilization was in the process of shift in allegiance to Asian internationalism. self-destruction and could no longer dominate the fate of Asia. From this observation, he What united the ideology of such diverse proceeded to the conclusion that Japan should groups and figures as the Greater Asia uphold its civilizational mission to facilitate Association, Ôkawa Shûmei, and the new Asian unity and cooperation and eliminate converts to Asianism such as Miki Kiyoshi, was Western colonialism. For Miki, Asianthe discourse of civilization central to all their cooperation under Japanese leadership would arguments. Victor Koschmann have accounted serve the interests of peace and harmony, as for the differences among these pan-Asianist well as liberation and racial equality.[93] visions by making a distinction between esoteric and exoteric versions of Asianism. According to Koschmann, popular organizations such as the Greater Asia Association presented the exoteric Asianism that had the power to appeal to Japanese public opinion, while Shôwa Research Institute intellectuals such as Miki Kiyoshi produced an esoteric version of Asianism that was more relevant to rational policy making and legitimization in the eyes of the presumed world public opinion. East-West civilization Miki Kiyoshi (second left) at a meeting of discourse, however, united both the more the Shôwa Kenkyûkai sophisticated scholarly elaborations of Asianism and those that appealed to the Miki’s arguments drew on reflections on broader domestic public opinion. This explains modernity and Eurocentrism in the writings of the striking similarities between the pan- the interwar era in both Europe and Japan. Asianist ideas of Ôkawa Shûmei and Miki Ultimately, however, they resembled the ideas Kiyoshi, despite their dramatically different of Okakura Tenshin and Ôkawa Shûmei in their intellectual and political backgrounds. Very basic tenet, namely, belief in the collapse of the much like Ôkawa Shûmei, Miki Kiyoshi based Eurocentric world order and the corresponding his argument on the conviction that necessity to offer an alternative order based on Eurocentrism or Western civilization had to be and political solidarity. Other overcome, while the civilizational legacy of Asia converts to Asianism, such as the famous could become the basis for an alternative. socialists Sano Manabu, Nabeyama Sadachika, Gradually, these ideas turned into well-known and Akamatsu Katsumaro, offered their own slogans, frequently repeated if not always interpretations of the content of pan-Asianist clearly defined. The following ambiguous thought.[94] These former socialists described formulation by the Greater Asia Association their perception of the world in terms of a summed up the slogans that were common to division into a proletarian East and a bourgeois all versions of Asianism: “It goes without saying

19 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF that the cultures of Europe are incapable of Throughout the Pacific War, pan-Asianists like rescuing themselves any more, much less the Ôkawa Shûmei devoted all their energies to the world at large. The new potential power lies service of the Japanese state and the project of with the third civilization. It makes both the Greater East Asia Coprosperity Sphere. In Eastern and Western civilizations come alive addition to publishing books and journals through ‘musubi’ or harmonious combination. advocating the ideals of Asianism, Ôkawa This is what can produce a new order in China, continued to head the administration of the and Japan may rightfully serve as a catalyst for East Asian Economic Research Institute and to this combination.”[96] run his professional school.[98] Among these efforts, he saw it as particularly important to The central tension in world politics, according clarify Japan’s war aims and explain the origins to this Asianist discourse of civilization, was and goals of the Greater East Asia War. The between East and West, and thus Asianism main Asianist project Ôkawa closely followed helped serve to reduce all world conflicts to during the war was the establishment of the this reductionist framework. Once the war Indian National Army, an event that gave a between Japan and the United States started, sense of final achievement to Ôkawa after three such rhetoric served a very useful political decades of advocating Japanese support for purpose by placing the focus on the conflict Indian independence. The creation of the Indian National Army (INA) with the Western powers and covering up the in 1942, with its ranks composed of Indian sense of guilt some Japanese may otherwise soldiers from the surrendered British troops in have felt about their country’s aggression in , became the most memorable project China. Thus a great number of Japanese to embody pan-Asianist slogans. The INA was intellectuals may have felt relieved after the intended to fight alongside the Japanese army outbreak of war with the USA. They could against the British forces at the Burmese- mobilize their ideas for the glorification and Indian border. It is now clear that the initial justification of the Pacific War in the name of success of the Japanese plans for the creation overcoming modernity and East-West of an can be attributed more to the confrontation. For example, the participants in contributions of idealistic Japanese figures on the famous wartime conference “Overcoming the ground than to any planning in Tokyo.[99] Modernity” utilized a wide array ofMajor Fujiwara Iwaichi (1908–1986) gained the philosophies and theories to link Japan’s trust of Indian officers mainly through his own military conflict with the intellectual attempts sincere commitment to the project of Indian to overcome the problems of Eurocentric independence. In fact, upon Fujiwara’s modernity.[97] It was thus the intellectual departure, INA commander soon legacy of early Asianism in the form of a clashed with the new liaison officer and discourse of Asian civilization that created attempted to disband the 40,000-man army he similarities between the ideology of old-time had created.[100] The objection of Mohan Asianists such as Ôkawa Shûmei and that of the Singh and other Indian officers to the new converts to Asianism during the 1930s, appointment of Rash Behari Bose to the top whose disparate beliefs converged in their position in the newly created army marked obsessive and constant blaming of the imagined another point of crisis, one that shows the West for the problems of the international agency of Indian collaborators in the whole order. project.[101]

Wartime Asian Internationalism and Its Subhas Chandra Bose’s willingness to Postwar Legacy cooperate with Japan, followed by his secret

20 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF submarine trip from Germany to Japan in 1942, for the cause of Indian .” [103] saved the Indian National Army project, when it According to Bose, the Greater East Asia faced a crisis provoked by disagreement Conference organized by the Japanese between the Japanese and Indian sides.government as an alternative to the League of Chandra Bose was a well-respected leader of Nations was receptive to nationalist voices in the Indian nationalist movement who could Asia in a way none of the European-centered both gain the loyalty of the Indian officers and international organizations had ever been. assert authority over the Japanese liaison Meanwhile, he gave several radio speeches and officers. For a long time, he had advocated lectured to the Japanese public, helping to cooperation with anti-British powers in order to enhance the popular Japanese confidence in the win independence for India, in contrast to the liberation mission of the Pacific War. policy of passive resistance advocated by Gandhi. He saw a great opportunity in German and Japanese support for the liberation of India and willingly collaborated with both powers. Soon after his arrival in Singapore, Chandra Bose took over the leadership of the INA and formed the of Free India. Although the actual engagement between the Indian National Army and their British enemies at resulted in defeat for the Indian side, the mere existence of a provisional government and an army had a positive psychological impact on the Indian nationalist movement as a whole.[102] Subhas Chandra Bose in a Tokyo speech in From his arrival at Singapore until his death in 1945 a plane crash at the end of the Pacific War, Subhas Chandra Bose visited Tokyo several What pan-Asianists like Ôkawa Shûmei never times during the war. The speech he made as realized was that, for nationalist leaders like the leader of the Provisional Government of Subhas Chandra Bose, pan-Asianism was Free India at the Greater East Asia Conference merely one of the means to reach national in 1943 to the heads of state of six nations of independence, not a goal in itself.[104] In one the Coprosperity Sphere (Japan, China,of his conversations with Ôkawa Shûmei about Manchuria, the Philippines, Burma, andthe future of the Indian national movement, Thailand, all recognized as independent by Subhas Chandra Bose talked about the Japan) demonstrated the links between the possibility of receiving Soviet support against failure of the League of Nations system and the the British Empire if Germany was defeated on New Order in East Asia that Japan had the European front. Ôkawa was surprised that declared its intention to establish in the context Bose could think of cooperating with the of its war aims. Bose began his speech by Soviets and asked him why he would recalling his frustration with the League of collaborate with the Soviet Union if he was Nations: ”My thoughts also went back to the against . In response, Bose pointed Assembly of the League of Nations, that League out that he was prepared “to shake hands even of Nations along whose corridors and lobbies I with Satan himself to drive out the British from spent many a day, knocking at one door after India.”[105] It did not occur to Ôkawa that another, in the vain attempt to obtain a hearing Japan might well be one Satan with whom

21 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF

Chandra Bose had to cooperate. In fact, looked like a modification of the Atlantic Chandra Bose saw Japan as a different ally Charter, with slight alterations affording from Russia or Germany because of the Asian sensitivity to the cultural traditions of non- identity common to both India and Japan. In the Western societies. For example, the principles end, however, Bose’s nationalist agenda was declared on November 7, 1943, in Tokyo the main motive for collaboration, rather than a affirmed the national self-determination of vision of Asian regionalism under Japanese Asian societies, with the only major difference leadership. In a sense, the legitimacy of from the Atlantic Charter being a call for the wartime pan-Asianism intimately depended on “abolition of racial discrimination” and the the idea of national self-determination. cultivation of Asian cultural heritages.[108] During the Greater East Asia War, the fierce For Ôkawa Shûmei, on the other hand, Asian competition between the Allied Powers and decolonization was unthinkable in the absence Japan in propaganda battles and psychological of Japan’s unique mission to lead the free Asia. warfare had accelerated the pace of He refrained, however, from stating specifically decolonization. Not only did Japan feel the need what kind Asian federation would replace the to respond to the Atlantic Charter, but the old order. Unsurprisingly, Ôkawa’s vision of the Allied Powers also had to respond to the pan- future Asia was ambiguous, and his wartime Asianist challenge to the interwar colonial writings focused more on the history and order. For instance, U.S. Office of Strategic ideology of Asianism. The JapaneseServices (OSS) reports on psychological government, on the other hand, had to clarify warfare in Southeast Asia held that Japan’s its war aims and postwar visions much more Asianist propaganda was generally very clearly than Ôkawa did, especially in response successful. In response, the OSS suggested that to the appeal of the Atlantic Charter. Initially, the vision of a organization and Japanese leaders defined the first stage of the a new world order should be emphasized, new world order they envisioned fortaking care not to make any reference to the Asia—namely, the expulsion of Westerncontinuation of the British, French, and Dutch hegemony and the elimination of Western empires.[109] More important, there was a interests—without specifying clearly what growing awareness among U.S. wartime would happen after the Western powers were leaders, including President Roosevelt, that gone. They assumed that, once Western they had to counter the widespread pan-Asian exploitation was over and trade between Asian notions of solidarity spread by Japan by nations was established, Asia would develop offering a new vision of a postwar order that at very fast. They also hoped that the new Asia least recognized the national demands of India would cooperate with a German-dominated and China. There was also a second concern Europe to create a world order based on beyond the competition with Japan: how to regional economic blocs.[106] As Japanese assure the support of China and later India in leaders soughtthe further cooperation of local the postwar international order. These nationalist movements during the later stages concerns led to recognition that the pre-WWII of the war, they eventually clarified their own colonial discourses of racial inferiority and the war aims as an alternative to the Atlantic reality of the colonial subjugation of India and Charter.[107] China should not continue, even if Japan were punished by a national-racial isolation.[110] It As the declarations of the 1926 Nagasaki pan- is against the background of this concern with Asiatic conference had looked similar to the pan-Asianism that Roosevelt recommended that principles of the League of Nations, so the Churchill give India more self-government in Greater East Asia Conference declaration also order to improve the war efforts against

22 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF

Japan.[111] was diagnosed with brain syphilis in the early stages of the tribunal. While the majority of As a matter of fact, after the end of the Greater judges found the accused Japanese leaders East Asia War, the prewar imperial order would guilty of the charges, Judge Radhabinod Pal not be reestablished. When Ôkawa Shûmei wrote a long dissenting opinion asserting that listened to the ’s radio announcement Japanese decision making leading up to the of Japan’s surrender, on August 15, 1945, he Pacific War did not constitute a crime in thought that four decades of his work “toward international law. It is a testimony to the revival of Asia [had] disappeared like a soap Radhabinod Pal’s expertise in international law bubble.”[112] Yet, although it was true that and his sharp political and legal acumen that Japanese pan-Asianism as a political movement his long dissenting opinion is now as well would disappear, the decolonization of Asia remembered as the Tokyo Tribunal itself. The would be completed by the 1950s. More substance of Pal’s dissenting judgment derived important, the Asianist discourse of an East- from his ideas of international law and his West civilizational conflict would likewise commitment to a just trial untainted by the survive the post-WWII period. politics of “victor’s justice.” It is also evident that Pal’s background in colonial and The period immediately after WWII witnessed his sympathies for the Indian National Army nationalist revolutions from Indonesia to under the leadership of Subhas Chandra Bose fighting against the returning Dutch had an impact on the content of his dissenting and French colonialism. Even in India, despite judgment. This background may have also Chandra Bose’s death in a plane crash and the influenced his failure to speak out against the dissolution of his army at the end of WWII, the use of his dissenting judgment by Japanese Indian national movement rushed to the moral right-wing revisionists. and legal defense of the officers of the Japanese-sponsored Indian National Army, who were indicted for treason against the British Empire. As Tilak Raj Sareen wrote, the trial of the INA officers revitalized the nationalist movement in India, actually creating a new turning point in the Indian national movement, demoralized after WWII.[113] Meanwhile, at the Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal, the legacy of the prewar Asian discourse of civilization would be played out in full in the conflict of opinion between the Indian Radhabinod Pal and the other judges.

Ôkawa Shûmei was indicted as a Class A war criminal by the Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal based on his role as an ideologue of right-wing pan-Asianism. Both the prosecution and the final verdict used Ôkawa’s writings extensively in the construction of their case charging the accused Japanese leaders with conspiracy to commit aggression, even though charges against Ôkawa himself were dropped when he

23 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF

ways the legacies of the pan-Asianist discourse of civilization and race survived in the postwar period, shaping the perception of both the and decolonization in contemporary history.

Conclusion

Japanese pan-Asianism gained unprecedented official support among the elites of the Japanese Empire in the aftermath of the Manchurian Incident and Japan’s decision to withdraw from the League of Nations. The Japanese government declared its “return to Asia” by appropriating an already existing pan- Asianist alternative to the Eurocentric world order only when its empire was challenged internally by nationalist movements and externally by the other great powers. The very fact that Japan’s elites saw something practical and useful in the pan-Asian slogans and networks to help justify the multiethnic Asian indicates both the continuing Monument to Radhabinod Pal in Japan intellectual vitality of Asianist critiques of the interwar-era world order and the potential Richard Minear and John Dower have agreed appeal of the Asianist slogans of East-West with many of Pal’s legal arguments in their relations and racial identity to broader discussion of the neocolonial context of the Japanese public opinion. Pan-Asianism allowed Tokyo Tribunal and their critique of the the Japanese Empire to implement more negative impact of the Tokyo trial on both rigorous and inclusive assimilation policies and international justice and Japan’s acceptance of exhibit a high level of international confidence responsibility for the Pacific War.[114] As and self-righteousness in an era when Timothy Brook has demonstrated, however, imperialism was globally delegitimized. Yet it Justice Pal’s anticolonial sensibilities led him to was partly a nostalgic and narcissistic ideology, refrain from making any meaningful judgment making frequent references to the post-1905 on Japan’s responsibility for the Nanking Asian nationalist admiration of Japan without Massacre.[115] Pal’s anticolonial stance led recognizing the fact that both the nature of him to withhold comment on Japan’s war nationalism and the image of Japan had crimes against Chinese civilians in Nanking and changed dramatically from 1905 to the late elsewhere. The majority of the judges, on the 1930s. other hand, condemned Japanese imperialism in the name of international justice at the same Japanese pan-Asianists saw a great opportunity time that Western powers were trying to in the unexpected patronage of their ideas by reestablish their colonial hegemony.[116] Thus, the Japanese government and military in a sense, the color lines that pan-Asianism authorities after 1933. Throughout the 1930s, emphasized were acted out on the benches of the radical anti-Western tradition within the Tokyo Tribunal, indicating one of the many Asianism was focused on the end of European

24 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF empires in Asia, especially on the weakness of the Era of the Greater East Asia War British Empire, without advocating or(1937-1945)," in Renee Worringer, ed., recommending any Japanese challenge to the Princeton Papers: Interdisciplinary Journal of United States. Pearl Harbor was thus an Middle Eastern Studies, Volume XIV: The undesirable development for pan-Asianists in Islamic and Japan: Perceptions, Japan, even though they rushed to glorify and Aspirations, and the Birth of Intra-Asian justify it via a discourse of East-WestModernity, January 2007. civilizational or yellow-white racial conflicts. Meanwhile, new converts to Asianism from Notes different segments of Japanese intellectual life added practical and policy-oriented content to [1]. The Manchurian Incident of 1931 initiated the ambivalent slogans of Asian solidarity via a process that led to the establishment of a social science theories of regional cooperation Japanese-controlled puppet government in and multiethnic communities. Despite its Manchuria and Japan’s withdrawal from the internal paradoxes and its tensions with the League of Nations. Japan’s Kwantung army logic of Japanese imperialism, pan-Asianism guarding the South Manchurian Railways nevertheless allowed Japan to conduct a bombed parts of the railway in Mukden to relatively successful propaganda campaign create a pretext to occupy Manchuria with the against Western imperialism in Southeast Asia ostensible purpose of providing security while motivating numerous idealist Japanese against Chinese nationalists in September activists and their collaborators. Pan-Asianist 1931. Instead of withdrawing from the propaganda, accompanied by Japan’s own occupied territories, the Japanese government imperial expansion during WWII, did contribute created the puppet state Manchukuo in to the end of Western empires, partly by February 1932. Nonrecognition of this state by forcing the Allied powers to formulate and the League of Nations became the reason for promise a more inclusive and nonimperialistic Japanese withdrawal from the league in 1933. world order at the end of WWII, and partly by [2]. Frederick Dickinson, War and National stimulating anti-colonial thought andReinvention: Japan in the Great War, confidence in the possibility of defeating 1914–1919 (Cambridge: Harvard University European colonizers among colonized Asian Press, 2001). nations. [3]. Richard Storry, The Double Patriots: A Study of Japanese Nationalism (Boston: This article is developed from Cemil Aydin, The Houghton Mifflin, 1957). Politics of Anti-Westernism in Asia: Visions of [4]. Christopher Szpilman, “ and World Order in Pan-Islamic and Pan-Asian Its Enemies in Prewar Japan: The Case of Thought (New York: Columbia University Press Hiranuma Kiichirô and the Kokuhonsha,” 2007) pp: 161-189. For more information about Hitotsubashi Journal of Social Studies 30, no. 2 the book, please see. Posted at Japan Focus on (December 1998): 101–133. March 12, 2008. [5]. Genzo Yamamoto, “Defending Japan’s Civilization and Civilizing Mission in Asia: The Resilience and Triumph of Illiberalism in the Cemil Aydin is assistant professor of history, House of Peers, 1919–1934” (Ph.D. diss., of North Carolina, Charlotte and a University, 1999). See also Arima Tatsuo, The post-doctoral Fellow at Princeton University, Failure of Freedom: A Portrait of Modern Near Eastern Studies Department in 2007-08. Japanese Intellectuals (Cambridge: Harvard Recent publications include "BeyondUniversity Press, 1969). For a previous work on Eurocentrism? Japan's Islamic Studies during this topic that focuses more on the failure of

25 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF the liberals to fight the antiliberals, see Toru (New York: Pantheon, 1986), 227. Takemoto, The Failure of Liberalism in Japan: [10]. Harry Harootunian, Overcome by Shidehara Kijuro’s Encounter with Anti-Modernity: History, Culture, and Community in Liberals (Washington, D.C.: University Press of Interwar Japan (Princeton: Princeton University America, 1978). Press, 2000); Stefan Tanaka, Japan’s Orient: [6]. Louise Young, Japan’s Total Empire: Rendering Pasts into History (Berkeley: Manchuria and the Culture of Wartime Empire University of California Press, 1993); Kevin (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998). Doak, Dreams of Difference: The Japan [7] For Nitobe Inazô’s arguments justifying Romantic School and the Crisis of Modernity Japan’s Manchuria policy, see Thomas W. (Berkeley, University of California Press, 1994). Burkman, “The Geneva Spirit,” in John F. There is an ongoing debate about the Howes, ed., Nitobe Inazô: Japan’s Bridge relationship of the pro-war nature of the Kyoto Across the Pacific (Boulder, Colo.: Westview, School philosophy and its vision of overcoming 1995), 204–209. See also George Oshiro, “The modernity. See Ueda Shizuteru, “Nishida, End: 1929–1933,” in Howes, Nitobe Inazô, Nationalism, and the War in Question,” in 255–258. James Heisig and John Moraldo, eds., Rude [8]. For Zumoto’s defense of the Manchurian Awakenings: Zen, the , and the Incident before international audiences in the Question of Nationalism (Honolulu: University United States and Europe, see Zumotoof Hawai’i Press, 1995), 77–106; Yusa Michiko, Motosada, The Origin and History of the Anti- “Nishida and Totalitarianism: A Philosopher’s Japanese Movement in China (Tokyo: Herald, Resistance,” in Heisig and Moraldo, Rude 1932); and idem, Japan in Manchuria and Awakenings, 107–131; and Andrew Feenberg, Mongolia (Tokyo: Herald, 1931). For Nitobe “The Problem of Modernity in the Philosophy of Inazô’s opinion on the Manchurian Incident, Nishida,” in Heisig and Moraldo, Rude see Nitobe Inazô, “Japan and the League of Awakenings, 151–173. Nations,” in The Works of Nitobe Inazô (Tokyo: [11]. Akira Iriye, “The Failure of Economic Press, 1972), 4:234–239; Expansionism: 1918–1931,” in Bernard S. and idem, “The Manchurian Question and Sino- Silberman and H. D. Harootunian, eds., Japan American Relations,” in The Works of Nitobe in Crises: Essays on Taishô Democracy Inazô, 4:221–233. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1974), [9]. For a discussion of Shôwa Kenkyûkai, see J. 265. Victor Koschmann, “Asianism’s Ambivalent [12]. James B. Crowley, “A New Asian Order: Legacy,” in Peter J. Katzenstein and Takashi Some Notes on Prewar Japanese Nationalism,” Shiraishi, eds., Network Power: Japan and Asia in Silberman and Harootunian, Japan in Crises, (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1997), 90–94. 273. Shôwa Kenkyûkai (1933–1940) was labeled in [13]. This continuity in change was theorized the popular press as Konoe Fumimaro’s brain by Andrew Gordon as the transition from trust. Especially during Konoe’s tenure as imperial democracy to imperial fascism. See prime minister (1937–1939, 1940–1941), Shôwa Andrew Gordon, Labor and Imperial Kenkyûkai was preoccupied with formulating Democracy in Prewar Japan (Berkeley: the East Asian Cooperative Body and the New University of California Press, 1991). Order Movement. The membership of the [14]. “Confronted by a formidable cluster of association included scholars and journalists diplomatic, economic, and military problems, from different ideological backgrounds. For the the Imperial government [of Japan] resorted to anti-Western ideas of the Kyoto Schoola series of potential solutions: Manchukuo, a philosophers, see John Dower, War Without Japanese Monroe Doctrine, Hirota’s three Mercy: Race and Power in the Pacific War principles, an advance to the South Seas, a

26 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF national defense state, and the rejuvenation of and the Japanese Islam: Hatano Uhô. From China” (James B. Crowley, “Intellectuals as Espionage to Pan-Islamist Activity,” Annals of Visionaries of the New Asian Order,” in James the Japan Association for Middle East Studies, W. Morley, ed., Dilemmas of Growth in Prewar no. 12 (1997): 89–112. Japan (Princeton: Princeton University Press, [20]. Tanaka Ippei was a scholar of China and 1971), 395). Similarly, Ben-Ami Shillony has . He converted to Islam and demonstrated that, even at the peak of the performed pilgrimages to Mecca in 1925 and Pacific War, Japan did not deviate from the 1933. Wakabayashi describes Tanaka Ippei as a normal functioning of the Constitution. fighter for “Sonnô Yûkoku,” meaning “Revere See Ben-Ami Shillony, Politics and Culture in the Emperor, and be a Patriot,” despite the fact Wartime Japan (New York: Oxford University that Tanaka became a Muslim and adopted the Press, 1981). name Haji Nur Muhammad in 1918. [15]. Hayashi Fusao, Daitôa Sensô Kôteiron, 2 [21]. His brother, Wakabayashi Kyûman, vols. (Tokyo: Banchô Shobô, 1964–1965), cited worked for the same cause, operating in Crowley, “A New Asian Order,” 297–298. undercover as a merchant among Chinese [16] For example, Mark Peattie has argued that Muslims until he died in Changsha in 1924. For Ishiwara Kanji’s views “were part of this Wakabayashi’s reflections on the history of the surging anti-Western nationalism during the Kokuryûkai circle of Islam policy advocates, see interwar period, and his concept of a Final War Wakabayashi Han, Kaikyô Sekai to Nihon must be seen as a reinvigoration of a(Tokyo: Wakabayashi Han, 1937), 1–3. persistent, if long-muted, theme of challenge to [22]. Wakabayashi, Kaikyô Sekai to Nihon, 3–7. the West throughout Japan’s modern history to Araki Sadao (1877–1966) was a leader in the 1945” (Mark R. Peattie, Ishiwara Kanji and Imperial Way faction of the army. Japan’s Confrontation with the West [Princeton: [23]. Ôkawa Shûmei, “Cho Gakuryo Shi o Princeton University Press, 1975], 368). Tazuneru no Ki” (November 1928), in Ôkawa [17]. For a good example of the perception of Shûmei Zenshû, 4:591. Western retreat from Asia, see No-Yong Park, [24]. Christopher Szpilman, “The Dream of One Retreat of the West: The White Man’sAsia: Ôkawa Shûmei and Japanese Pan- Adventure in Eastern Asia (Boston: Hale, Asianism,” in H. Fuess, ed., The Japanese Cushman, and Flint, 1937). Empire in East Asia and Its Postwar Legacy [18]. U. Ottama (1879–1939) was an influential (Munich: German Institute of Japanese Studies, figure in Burmese nationalism. Influenced by 1998), 51. both the Indian National Congress and the [25]. Ôkawa Shûmei, “Manmô Mondai no Japanese model, Ottama denounced British Kôsatsu,” Gekkan Nihon, no. 75 (June 1931), colonial rule. He was imprisoned by the British reprinted in Ôkawa Shûmei Zenshû, 2:649–683. authorities for a very long time, ultimately [26]. See Awaya Kentaro and Yoshida Yutada, dying in prison. For Ôkawa’s praise of Ottama, eds., International Prosecution Section (IPS) see Ôkawa Shûmei, “Ottama Hôshi o Omou,” in (Tokyo: Tokyo Daigaku Shuppankai, 1980), Ôkawa Shûmei Zenshû, 7 vols., ed. Ôkawa 23:396–398. During the interrogation, Ôkawa Shûmei Zenshû Kankôkai (Tokyo: Ôkawa conceded that he knew something would Shûmei Zenshû Kankôkai, 1961–1974),happen but noted that many others at that time 2:913–915. had the same knowledge and it was not a [19] Selçuk Esenbel, “Japanese Interest in the secret. Ottoman Empire,” in Bert Edstrom, ed., The [27]. For instance, as the biography of Ishiwara Japanese and Europe: Images and Perceptions Kanji, the military brain of the Manchurian (Richmond, Surrey, U.K.: Curzon, 2000), Incident, confirms, ideas about a final war and 112–120; El-Mostafa Rezrazi, “Pan-Asianism East-West confrontation, which were very

27 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF important in Ôkawa Shûmei’s pan-Asianism, found guilty, of providing material assistance to were commonly shared by other European, this group. It is ironic that he ended up American, and Japanese thinkers, and Ôkawa contributing to Inukai Tsuyoshi’s assasination, was not the main inspiration for Ishiwara’s as pan-Asianists usually viewed Inukai plans. See Peattie, Ishiwara Kanji, 27–86. positively, and the 1926 Nagasaki pan-Asiatic [28]. William Miles Fletcher, The Search for a conference honored him as one of the Asian New Order: Intellectuals and Fascism in politicians who aided the cause of Asian Prewar Japan (Chapel Hill: University of North people’s awakening. Carolina Press, 1982), 29–30. For the detailed [35]. The fifteen-year prison sentence Ôkawa arguments of Rôyama on the issue ofreceived on February 3, 1934, was reduced to Manchuria policy, see also Rôyama Masamichi, five years on October 24, 1935. Because of Japan’s Position in Manchuria (Tokyo: Institute health problems, he was allowed to postpone of Pacific Relations–Japan Council, 1929). his prison term until June 16, 1936. He was [29]. Even in June 1931, shortly before the finally paroled on October 13, 1937. See Manchurian Incident, when Ôkawa warned that Ôtsuka Takehiro, Ôkawa Shûmei to Kindai a war could break out between China and Japan Nihon (Tokyo: Mokutakusha, 1990), 220. at a slight provocation and suggested the [36]. In the aftermath of the Manchurian necessity of a radical change in policy in Incident, Ôkawa established Jinmukai (Society Manchuria, his ideas still were not exceptional of Jinmu) as a new nationalist organization in enough to single him out as an instigator of the aftermath of the Manchurian Incident, with Kwantung Army officers. See Ôkawa, “Manmô hopes of reaching a larger audience and Mondai no Kôsatsu,” 679–682. creating a broader popular base for his radical [30]. Ôkawa Shûmei, “Nijyû no Nankyoku ni tai nationalist and Asianist movement. Ôkawa suru Kakugo,” Gekkan Nihon, May 1932, Shûmei’s trial and imprisonment must have reprinted in Ôkawa Shûmei Zenshû, 4:629–631; played a role in his decision to disband the and idem, “Manshu Shin Kokka no Kensetsu,” group. Moreover, after the coup of February Gekkan Nihon, July 1932, in Ôkawa Shûmei 26, 1936, an event that led to the execution of Kankei Monjo, ed. Ôkawa Shûmei Kankei Kita Ikki as the civilian ideologue of the military Monjo Kankôkai (Tokyo: Fuyô Shohô Shuppan, conspirators, the authorities began to show less 1998), 244–248. tolerance for radical nationalist organizations. [31]. Ôkawa Shûmei, “Daitô Kyôeiken no [37]. The journal was published by Mantetsu Rekishiteki Konkyo,” in Dai Nippon Genron Tôa Keizai Chôsakyoku in Tokyo from August Hôkokukai, ed., Kokka to Bunka (Tokyo: Dômei 1939 to February 1944. Tsûshinsha, 1943), 29–43. [38]. Ôkawa Shûmei, editorial, Shin Ajia 1, no. [32]. For Ôkawa Shûmei’s main article on the 1 (August 1939): 2–3. withdrawal from the League of Nations, see [39]. Tazawa Takuya, Musurimu Nippon “Kokusai Renmei to Nihon,” Tôyô, May 1932, (Tokyo: Sho Gakkan, 1998), 145–146. reprinted in Ôkawa Shûmei Kankei Monjo, 232. [40]. See Grant K. Goodman, ed., Japanese [33]. For Ôkawa’s advocacy of the withdrawal Cultural Policies in Southeast Asia During from the league before the ManchurianWorld War 2 (New York: St. Martin’s, 1991), Incident, see Ôkawa Shûmei, “Nihon no 2–5. Kokusai Chii O Kokoromiru,” Daitô Bunka, May [41]. Gotô Ken’ichi, “ ‘Bright Legacy’ or 1929, reprinted in Ôkawa Shûmei Kankei ‘Abortive Flower’: Indonesian Students in Japan Monjo, 234–243. During World War 2,” in Goodman, Japanese [34]. Inukai was assassinated by a group of Cultural Policies in Southeast Asia During radical nationalist army cadets and naval World War 2, 7–35. See also Grant K. Goodman, officers. Ôkawa Shûmei was indicted, and An Experiment in Wartime Inter-Cultural

28 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF

Relations: Philippine Students in Japan,[53]. The New Asia, edited by Rash Behari Bose 1943–1945 (Ithaca: Cornell Universityin Tokyo from 1933 to 1937). Southeast Asia Program, 1962). [54]. The content of The New Asia included [42]. Students of Ôkawa were the leading many of the arguments expounded by Ôkawa figures in Ôkawa Shûmei Kenshôkai and Shûmei, unsurprisingly, given the close ties organized the publication of his collected works that had existed between Ôkawa and Bose and other related materials. See Harada since 1915. For example, the content in The Kôkichi, Ôkawa Shûmei Hakushi no shôgai New Asia, nos. 5–6 (September–October 1933): (Yamagata-ken Sakata-shi: Ôkawa Shûmei 1, is very similar to the writings of Ôkawa in Kenshôkai, 1982). Fukkô Ajia no Shomondai and Ajia, Yoroppa, [43]. For a personal account of the Ôkawa Juku Nihon. from the memoirs of students, see Tazawa, [55]. For news about Muhammad Hatta, see Musurimu Nippon, 129–142. The New Asia, nos. 13–14 (May–June 1934): 4. [44]. For the evaluation of Ôkawa’s Islamic [56]. The New Asia, nos. 17–18 studies, see Takeuchi Yoshimi, “Ôkawa Shûmei (September–October 1934), contains extensive no Ajia Kenkyû,” in Hashikawa Bunsô, ed., coverage of Chandra Bose’s ideas. Ôkawa Shûmei Shû; (Tokyo: Chikuma Shobô, [57]. The New Asia, nos. 5–6 1975), 391–394. (September–October 1933): 3. For Tagore’s [45]. See Ôkawa Shûmei, “Taisen no Zento to critique of Japan during the late 1930s, see Ajia no Shorai o Kataru Zadankai,” Shin Ajia 2, Zeljko Cipris, “Seduced by Nationalism: Yone no. 3 (August 1940): 126. See also Ôkawa Noguchi’s ‘Terrible Mistake’. Debating the Shûmei, “Nanhô Mondai,” in YoshiokaChina-Japan War With Tagore” Japan Focus. Nagayoshi, ed., Sekai no Dôkô to Tôa Mondai [58]. The New Asia, nos. 7–8 (Tokyo: Zenrin Kyôkai, 1941), 384–385. (November–December 1933): 3. [46]. Ôkawa, editorial, Shin Ajia 1, no. 1 [59]. News about the visit to Japan of the (August 1939): 3. African American poet Langston Hughes was [47]. Haruo Iguchi, Unfinished Business: accompanied by information about the issue of Ayukawa Yoshisuke and U.S.-Japan Relations, white discrimination against blacks in the 1937–1953 (Cambridge: Harvard East Asia United States; see Shin Ajia, no. 4 (August Monographs, 2001). 1933): 2. In another instance, the Pan-Asiatic [48]. See Ôtsuka Takehiro, Ôkawa Shûmei: Aru Cultural Association declared its goal to invite Fukkô Kakushin Shugisha no Shisô (Tokyo:, students from Turkey, Afghanistan, Persia, Chûô Kôronsha, 1995), 160–170; Kusunoki India, and East Asian and Southeast Asian Seiichirô, “Ôkawa Shûmei no tai-Bei Seisaku,” regions to Japan. See Shin Ajia, nos. 7–8 Nihon Rekishi, no. 474 (November 1987): (November–December 1933): 4. 54–70. [60]. Shin Ajia, nos. 5–6 (September–October [49]. See Ôtsuka Takehiro, “Shôwa Jyunendai 1933): 2. no Ôkawa Shûmei,” in Ôkawa Shûmei to Kindai [61]. For a lengthy commentary on the rise of Nihon, 227–252. the colored and decline of the white races, see [50]. Ôkawa Shûmei, A History of Anglo- Shin Ajia, no. 17–18 (September-October 1934): American Aggression in East Asia, trans. Yoshio 1. Ogawa and P. B. Clarke (Tokyo: Daitôa[62]. The New Asia, nos. 7–8 Shuppan Kabushiki Kaisha, 1944), 1–3. (November–December 1933): 2. Indicating his [51] For the way the prosecution used this color-blind loyalty to universal principles, Bose reference, see Awaya and Yoshida,wrote about his admiration for Abraham International Prosecution Section (IPS), 23:319. Lincoln, describing him as the leader who [52]. Ibid., 23:303–306. taught the world the meaning of liberation. See

29 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF

The New Asia, nos. 23–24 (March–April 1935): Ishiwara Kanji and Japan’s Confrontation with 2. the West, 281–282. [63]. The New Asia, nos. 13–14 (May–June [69]. Nakatani Takeyô became a prolific writer 1934): 3. See also nos. 17–18in Asianist publications of the 1930s. Nakatani (September–October 1934): 4. was influenced by Ôkawa Shûmei during his [64]. Yani Yapon Muhbiri was edited by Qurban student years at Tokyo University and later Ali in Tokyo from 1933 to 1938. The journal became a member of several organizations led often contained didactic articles about the by Ôkawa. He took a leading position in both history, economy, and , as well Dai Ajia Kyôkai and its journals. For his as carrying news about the Tatar Turkish memoirs, see Nakatani Takeyô, Shôwa Dôranki diaspora living within the boundaries of the no Kaisô—Nakatani Takeyô Kaikoroku, 2 vols. Japanese Empire. Since there was a large Tatar (Tokyo: Tairyûsha, 1989). Muslim community in Manchuria, the journal [70]. Koschmann, “Asianism’s Ambivalent included news about Manchukuo, the Manchu Legacy,” 89–90. dynasty, and developments in China as well. [71]. For example see, Okubô Kôji, “Shinkô [65]. For the background of Abdül Kerim Efendi Toruko No Kokumin Shugi Hyôshiki,” Dai Ajia incident and other Muslim activists who visited Shugi 5, no. 5 (May 1937): 5–10. By late 1934, Japan after 1933, see Selçuk Esenbel, “Japan’s the news section was divided into five parts, Global Claim to Asia and the World of Islam: devoted to Manchuria, China, India, Southeast Transnational Nationalism and World Power, Asia, and West Asia. 1900–1945,” American Historical Review 109, [72]. See “Nichi Ei Shôtotsu no Hitsuyôsei,” Dai no. 4 (October 2004): 1159–1162. Ajia Shugi 1, no. 12 (December 1933): 33–38. [66]. AbdurreÅŸid Ä°brahim looked to Japanese [73]. See “Shin Ajia Kensetsu No Shin expansion in the north against the Soviet Union ShinNen,” Dai Ajia Shugi 6, no. 1 (January with the hope that this would allow the Muslim 1938): 2–19. Both Ôkawa and Rash Behari Bose regions of Central Asia to achieveused the same “New Asia” as titles of their independence. Initially, this idea had many journals. supporters within the Japanese army as well. [74]. In a roundtable discussion on nationalist However, clashes between Japanese and Soviet movements in Asia, four Indians (including forces in Nomonhan, Mongolia, during the Behari Bose), two Annamese, two Indonesians, summer of 1939 convinced the militaryand one Manchurian nationalist offered authorities of Japan that Soviet military power contributions. Naitô Chishû, Mitsukawa could not be easily challenged, strengthening Kametarô, and Nakatani Takeyô, all three close the southern advance theory. For theto Ôkawa Shûmei, were among the ten relationship between Kokuryûkai andparticipants representing the Japanese side of AbdurreÅŸid Ä°brahim, see Selçuk Esenbel, the organization. See “Ajia Minzoku Undo: “Japanese Interest in the Ottoman Empire,” in Zadankai,” Dai Ajia Shugi 3, no. 3 (March Edstrom, The Japanese and Europe, 95–124; 1935): 51–62. see also Selçuk Esenbel, Nadir Ozbek, Ä°smail [75]. It was only during the Pacific War that the TürkoÄŸlu, François Georgeon, and Ahmet same circle of Japanese Asianists began to Ucar, “Ozel Dosya: Abdurresid Ibrahim (2),” publish an English-language magazine in Toplumsal Tarih 4, no. 20 (August 1995): 6–23. Shanghai, Asiatic Asia, in order to reach a [67]. See Storry, The Double Patriots, 149. larger non-Japanese readership with more [68]. In fact, General Ishiwara Kanji’s Tôa participation from non-Japanese Asian Renmei Kyôkai (East Asia League Association), intellectuals. Publication began in January 1941 founded in 1939, was based on ideas also and continued for at least five monthly issues. advocated by Dai Ajia Kyôkai. See Peattie, [76]. Gotô Ken’ichi, “The Indonesian

30 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF

Perspective,” in Akira Iriye, ed., Pearl Harbor [83]. For a good example of a Japanese who and the Coming of the Pacific War (Boston: combined the liberation vision of pan-Asian Bedford and St. Martin’s, 1999), 207–219. identity, sometimes with highly critical views [77]. Akira Iriye, Cultural Internationalism and on the policies of the Japanese state, see World Order (Baltimore: Johns HopkinsMariko Asano Tamanoi, “Pan-Asianism in the University Press, 1997), 119–122; Robert S. Diary of Morisaku Minato (1924–1945) and the Schwantes, “Japan’s Cultural Foreign Policies,” Suicide of Mishima Yukio (1925–1970),” in in James Morley, ed., Japan’s Foreign Policy, Mariko Asano Tamanoi, ed., Crossed Histories: 1868–1941: A Research Guide (New York: Manchuria in the Age of Empire (Honolulu: Columbia University Press, 1974), 179–180. University of Hawai’i Press, 2005), 184–206. [78]. Shibasaki Atsushi, Kindai Nihon no [84]. Quoted in Thomas W. Burkman, “Nitobe Kokusai Bunka Kôryû: Kokusai BunkaInazô: From World Order to Regional Order,” in Shinkôkai no Sôsetsu to Tenkai, 1934–1945 J. Thomas Rimer, ed., Culture and Identity: (Tokyo: Yûshindô Kôbunsha, 1999). ForJapanese Intellectuals During the Interwar example, it was through the support of Kokusai Years (Princeton: Princeton University Press, Bunka Shinkôkai that two Muslim intellectuals, 1990), 211. Amir Lahiri and Mian Abdul Aziz, were able to [85]. Ibid., 212–213. Burkman discusses an visit Japan to prepare books advocating Asian article by Kamikawa Hikomatsu, “Asia Rengô solidarity: Mian Abdul Aziz (former president of ka Kyokutô Renmei ka?” Kokka Gakkai Zasshi the All-India Moslem League), The Crescent in 47, no. 7 (July 1933): 90–100. the Land of the Rising Sun (London: Blades, [86]. Rôyama Masamichi, Tô-A to Sekai (Tokyo: 1941); and Amar Lahiri, Japanese Modernism Kaizôsha, 1941), 141–142, quoted in Miwa (Tokyo: Hokuseido, 1939); idem, Mikado’s Kimitada, “Japanese Policies and Concepts for a Mission (Tokyo: Japan Times, 1940). Regional Order in Asia, 1938–1940,” in J. [79]. For example, the journal Dai Ajia Shugi White, M. Umegaki, and T. Havens, eds., The printed articles on the Italian-Ethiopian conflict Ambivalence of Nationalism: Modern Japan with a pro-Ethiopian character, including those Between East and West (New York: University sent by Japanese correspondents from Addis Press of America, 1990), 149. Ababa, in each of the twelve months of 1935. [87]. Rôyama Masamichi, Foreign Policy of There was also regular news on Ethiopia in the Japan, 1914–1939 (Tokyo: Institute of Pacific section devoted to West Asia. For example, see Relations–Japanese Council, 1941). the five articles on Ethiopia in Dai Ajia Shugi 3, [88]. For an argument that shows the proto- no. 8 (August 1935): 32–53. Asianist views of Japanese liberals during the [80]. J. Calvitt Clarke III, “Japan and Italy 1920s, see Han Jung-Sun, “Rationalizing the Squabble Over Ethiopia: The Sugimura Affair of Orient: The ‘East Asia Cooperative Community’ July 1935,” in Selected Annual Proceedings of in Prewar Japan,” Monumenta Nipponica 60, the Florida Conference of Historians 6no. 4 (Winter 2005), 481–514. (December 1999): 9–20. [89]. Ôkawa Shûmei, “Gandhi wo Tô Shite [81]. Takemoto Yuko, “W. E. B. Dubois to Indojin ni Atau” and “Nehru o Tô Shite Indojin Nihon,” Shien 54, no. 2 (March 1994): 79–96. ni Atau” (1942), in Shin Ajia Shôron (Tokyo: Also see Marc Gallicchio, BlackNihon Hyôronsha, 1944), reprinted in Ôkawa Internationalism in Asia, 1895–1945: The Shûmei Zenshû, 2:925–938. African American Encounter with Japan and [90]. For some examples of the flood of China (Chapel Hill: University of Northpublications on Okakura, see Kiyomi Rokurô, Carolina Press, 2000), 74–75. Okakura Tenshin den, (Tokyo: Keizôsha, 1938); [82]. Naoki Sakai, “Tôyô no Jiritsu to daitô-A Okakura Kakuzô, Okakura Tenshin Zenshû kyôeiken,” Jokyo, no. 48 (December 1994): 13. (Tokyo: Rikugeisha, 1939); and Kiyomi Rokurô,

31 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF

Senkakusha Okakura Tenshin (Tokyo:Suzuki: Patterns of Asian Liberation,” in Atoriesha, 1942). See also Okakura Kakuzô, William H. Newell, ed., Japan in Asia Japan’s Innate Virility: Selections from Okakura (Singapore: Singapore University Press, 1981), and Nitobe (Tokyo: Hokuseido, 1943). 83–103. [91]. For examples of the publication and [100]. A similar idealist Asianism can be seen in republication of the books of Das, Paul Richard, the Japanese cooperation with the nationalist and Ôkawa after the post-1937 Japan-China leadership of Burma. As Louis Allen has shown, war, see Taraknath Das, Indo Dokuritsu Ron a conflict emerged among Japanese officers (Tokyo: Hakubunkan, 1944); and [Paul]involved in the Burmese government when Risharu, Tsugu Nihon Koku, trans. Ôkawa Officer Suzuki Keiji from Minami Kikan took Shûmei (Tokyo: Seinen Shobô, 1941). the side of Burmese nationalism and asked for [92]. For a recent assessment of Miki Kiyoshi’s immediate independence, while General Ishii Asianist ideas, see Harootunian, Overcome by objected to this on the grounds of military Modernity, 394–399. See also Koschmann, interest. See Allen, “Fujiwara and Suzuki.” “Asianism’s Ambivalent Legacy,” 90–94. [101]. Objection to the leadership of Rash [93]. Crowley, ““A New Asian Order,” 278–279. Behari Bose is another indication of the [94]. Germaine Hoston’s study of the writings ineffectiveness of Japanese pan-Asianists’ of post-tenko Sano Manabu shows thepolitical networks. Although Japan’s Asianist importance of her interest in Easterncircles had always presented Behari Bose as spirituality and intellectual tradition, as well as the representative voice of , her belief in Japanese exceptionalism, in it became apparent that he did not have a leading her to search for a Japanese context for reputation sufficient to play a role in the adopting certain core ideals of Marxism. See project of the Indian National Army. See Tilak Germaine A. Hoston, “Ikkoku Shakai-Shugi: Raj Sareen, Japan and the Indian National Sano Manabu and the Limits of Marxism as Army (New : Mounto, 1996), 35–82. See Cultural Criticism,” in Rimer, Culture and also Fujiwara Iwaichi, Japanese Army Identity, 168–190. Intelligence Operations in South East Asia [95]. George Beckmann, “The Radical Left and During World War II (Singapore: Select, 1983). the Failure of Communism,” in Morley,[102]. Sareen, Japan and the Indian National Dilemmas of Growth in Prewar Japan, 170. Army, 228–236. [96]. From Miwa, “Japanese Policies and [103]. Quoted in , “Bose’s Influence Concepts for a Regional Order in Asia,” 142. on the Formulation of Japanese Policy toward [97]. Minamoto Ryôen, “Symposium onIndia and the INA,” in International Netaji ‘Overcoming Modernity,’ ” in Heisig and Seminar (Calcutta: Netaji Research Bureau, Moraldo, Rude Awakenings, 197–229. 1975), 361. [98]. All the books Ôkawa published during the [104]. Ôkawa Shûmei, “Bosu-shi no Raichô,” wartime years attempted to define the ideology Shin Ajia 5, no. 7 (1943): 1. of the Greater East Asia Coprosperity Sphere [105]. Quoted in Lebra, “Bose’s Influence on and Japan’s war aims. See Ôkawa Shûmei, Dai the Formulation of Japanese Policy,” 368. Tôa Chitsujyo Kensetsu (Tokyo: Dai Ichi Shobô, [106]. Akira Iriye, “Wartime Japanese Planning 1943); idem, Shin Ajia Shôron; and idem, Shin for Postwar Asia,” in Ian Nish, ed., Anglo- Tôyô Seishin (Tokyo: Shinkyô ShuppanJapanese Alienation, 1919–1952 (Cambridge: Kabushiki Kaisha, 1945). Cambridge University Press, 1982): 77–91. [99]. For a description of the ideas of Asian [107]. The best description of Japanese war solidarity as they functioned in Japanese aims remains Akira Iriye, Power and Culture: collaboration with Indian and BurmeseThe Japanese American War, 1941–1945 nationalists, see Louis M. Allen, “Fujiwara and (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1981).

32 6 | 3 | 0 APJ | JF

[108]. The Greater East Asia conference did not 1945, Ôkawa Shûmei Nikki (Tokyo: Iwasaki allow for any representation from not-yet- Gakujitsu Shuppansha, 1986), 391. independent regions under Japanese[113]. Sareen, Japan and the Indian National occupation, such as Indonesia and Vietnam. Army, 234–236. Similar contradictions existed in the Atlantic [114]. Richard Minear, Victor’s Justice: The Charter Alliance, which likewise had not been Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal (Princeton: prepared to envision a fully decolonized Asia. Princeton University Press, 1971); John Dower, In fact, immediately after the end of the war, Embracing Defeat (New York: Norton, 1999), the French, British, and Dutch governments 443–484. rushed to reclaim their colonial possessions in [115]. Timothy Brook, “The Tokyo Judgment Asia. and the Rape of Nanking,” Journal of Asian [109]. One report made the followingStudies 60, no. 3 (August 2001): 693. suggestion as a means to win support for the [116]. Radhabinod Pal became the hero of the Allied cause: “Play up American and United revisionist right in Japan in the postwar period. Nations war aims; play down our association He himself revealed his long-lasting sympathies with Great Britain in the East. . . . Do not refer to Japan during his celebrated visit to Japan in to since many inhabitants of 1966 upon the invitation of Japanese right-wing Malaya will not wish to see Malaya revert to its revisionist groups. Justice Pal declared how he old status under British control” (Office of had admired Japan since his youth because Strategic Services, Research and Analysis Japan had “consistently stood up against the Branch, “Japanese Attempts at Indoctrination West” with “the spirit of independence that can of Youth in Occupied Areas,” March 23, 1943, say ‘no.’ ” Then, he urged the Japanese people microfilm, 10). once again to resist the “flood of [110]. Christopher Thorne, Allies of a Kind: The Westernization” with inspiration from Eastern United States, Britain and the War Against civilization. For Pal’s speeches during his 1966 Japan, 1941–1945 (New York: Oxfordvisit to Japan, see Radhabinod Pal, Ai Rabu University Press, 1978), 157–159. Japan: Paru Hakase Genkôroku, ed. Paru [111]. Ibid., 242–243. Hakase Kangei Jimukyoju (Tokyo: Tôkyô Saiban [112]. Ôkawa Shûmei, entry for August 15, Kankôkai, 1966)

33

Top View