Японские исследования (Dec 2020)
War memory as an independent factor in Japan's relations with neighbors: on the 75th anniversary of Japan's surrender
Abstract
The 75th anniversary of the end of World War II provides an opportunity for a new understanding of the global historical significance of Japan's defeat, as well as for evaluating this event from the point of view of present-day relations between Japan and its former adversaries. For many decades, a whole tangle of specific problems of the historical past related to the legacy of WWII has not lost its relevance in these relations. In fact, different countries have developed their own national-oriented discourses around the war with Japan, in which different accents are placed in the interpretation of its essence, character, main actors, and even chronology. In the West, the question of Japan's responsibility was generally considered to be closed by the terms of the post-war settlement determined by the San Francisco Peace Treaty, as well as by the verdicts of the Tokyo and other tribunals that punished Japanese war criminals. Their position during the cold war was determined primarily by the logic of bipolar confrontation, in which Japan was a faithful proponent of Western values in Asia in the global paradigm of the fight against communism. As for the USSR and post-Soviet Russia, it does not have any “historical” (not only legal, but also moral and ethical) claims against Japan related to the results of the war. In turn, in China, as well as the states of the Korean Peninsula, anti-Japanese sentiment prevails, due to the insufficient degree of public expression of remorse for the militaristic past on the part of official Tokyo, in whose policy, in their opinion, the revisionist component is growing. Their painful reaction is caused by statements of Japanese officials, and especially the head of government, which justify the militaristic policy of Japan during the war, by the visits of Cabinet members to the Yasukuni Shrine, by the publication of ‘patriotic’ history textbooks for secondary schools, etc. These countries hear from Japan both voices of admission and denial of guilt, and this complicates the bilateral dialogue at the political level. As a result, the establishment of a relationship of trust between Japan and East Asian countries seems unlikely in the foreseeable future.
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