In my August 13, 2017 article, “The Laughable but Unlaughable Terribleness of the World, in Which the United Nations Human Rights Council Is an Organization Controlled by China,” my criticism was directed toward the United Nations, the United Nations Human Rights Council, China, the Asahi Shimbun, and the entirety of the postwar intellectuals.
Even before that, I had strongly criticized the manner in which people calling themselves United Nations rapporteurs were unjustly severe toward Japan, while offering no essential criticism of China.
Behind this lies the reality that the United Nations and the United Nations Human Rights Council are not neutral and fair international organizations, but organizations heavily influenced by political intentions and national power.
China, one of the world’s greatest human rights violator states, holds enormous influence over the United Nations Human Rights Council.
When one looks at this laughable but unlaughable reality, one understands how dangerous it is to accept the human rights recommendations and criticisms that the United Nations directs at Japan as if they were simply the voice of justice.
Nevertheless, whenever United Nations rapporteurs made critical statements about Japan, media outlets such as the Asahi Shimbun reported them with delight and used them as material to attack Japan and the Japanese government.
I criticized that manner of conduct as something that, in effect, served the national interests of China and South Korea.
After the war, Japan provided China with financial and technological assistance on a scale among the largest in human history.
There is even the possibility that those funds and technologies were used for China’s economic growth, military buildup, and expansion of influence in places such as Africa.
Nevertheless, Japan has continued to have its honor damaged by anti-Japanese propaganda from China.
Indeed, Japan has suffered a double injury: its money was taken, and its honor was stained.
In this context, media outlets such as the Asahi Shimbun, the so-called cultural figures who sympathized with them, human-rights lawyers, opposition parties, and the postwar intellectuals represented by Kenzaburo Oe and Haruki Murakami had already lost their ideological lifeline.
They refused to look at the essence of the state called China, the political nature of the institution called the United Nations, the enormous contribution Japan made after the war, and the unjust treatment Japan has received.
Each time China’s arrogance and tyranny became clear, their foolishness also became clear.
To put it in a way that readers around the world can easily understand, the representatives of this were people such as Kenzaburo Oe and Haruki Murakami.
In August 2017, I saw that these postwar intellectuals had received an ideological death sentence before the reality of the United Nations, China, and the Asahi Shimbun-like discourse space.
November 2016.
I was discussing UNESCO and the Nanjing issue.
The Nanjing issue is not merely a historical dispute.
I had already seen through the fact that it was a problem in which the political nature of international organizations, anti-Japanese propaganda by China, and the Asahi Shimbun-like discourse space inside Japan were connected.
March 2017.
I criticized Haruki Murakami’s reference to 400,000 in Nanjing in Killing Commendatore.
I strongly pointed out the danger of a person treated as a world-famous writer placing such a number inside his work concerning the Nanjing Incident.
It was not a problem that remained within literary expression.
It was a problem of Japan’s honor, Japan’s historical awareness, and international information warfare.
April 2017.
I discussed the error of the theory of peace treaties and eternal apology.
States conclude peace treaties after war.
After that, a state must not repeat apologies.
That is because doing so does not deepen peace, but reproduces hatred.
Postwar cultural figures such as Haruki Murakami and Tatsuya Uchida did not understand this basic principle.
From June to July 2017.
I discussed the history of the Chinese Communist Party, the Nanjing issue, and anti-Japanese propaganda.
The mass killing, Cultural Revolution, people’s trials, torture, forced confessions, illegal detention, and Campaign to Suppress Counterrevolutionaries that the Chinese Communist Party carried out against its own people.
Without knowing that terrifying history, one cannot speak about the Nanjing issue.
Haruki Murakami’s reference to 400,000 in Nanjing was something that had to be viewed precisely within this context of Chinese-side propaganda.
August 2017.
I discussed the structural problems of the United Nations Human Rights Council, China, the Asahi Shimbun, and the postwar intellectuals.
The United Nations and international organizations are not necessarily neutral and fair entities.
China has used such international organizations, and inside Japan, the Asahi Shimbun-like discourse space has responded in concert with it.
The postwar intellectuals represented by Kenzaburo Oe and Haruki Murakami have, within that structure, borne the pseudo-moralism that judges Japan one-sidedly.
Looking at it in this way, my criticism of Haruki Murakami is not mere literary criticism.
It was a criticism of postwar Japan’s pseudo-moralism.
It was a criticism of the political nature of international organizations.
It was a criticism of China’s anti-Japanese propaganda.
It was a criticism of the Asahi Shimbun-like discourse space.
And it was a discussion of the ideological end of the postwar intellectuals represented by Kenzaburo Oe and Haruki Murakami.
In other words, from beginning to end, my criticism of Haruki Murakami was civilizational criticism.