Published on September 3, 2019.
Based on an essay by Yamaoka Tetsuhide published in the monthly magazine Hanada, this article examines Australian media coverage of Japan’s export-control measures toward South Korea, discusses anti-Japanese historical narratives in overseas media, Japan’s weak international communication, and the challenges Japan faces in the global information war.

September 3, 2019.
In this essay, he teaches us that even in Australia there exist poor-quality scholars like Alexis Dudden in the United States, and that they are cooperating with anti-Japanese propaganda.
The following is from an essay by Yamaoka Tetsuhide, published in this month’s issue of the monthly magazine Hanada under the title “Why Japan Cannot Win the International Information War.”
As people of insight know, Yamaoka Tetsuhide has encountered the reality of anti-Japanese propaganda in Australia and has been fighting for Japan.
In this essay, he teaches us that even in Australia there exist poor-quality scholars like Alexis Dudden in the United States, and that they are cooperating with anti-Japanese propaganda.
Like me, many Japanese people must be shocked to learn this for the first time.
This is a fact that even students who think of Australia as a favorite travel destination and even consider studying there must engrave firmly in their minds.
In other words, it is the fact that Australia’s academic world, too, has been brainwashed by anti-Japanese propaganda.
If I were your father, I would never allow you to study abroad in such a country.
To begin with, the fact that Australia is a dangerous country for young Japanese women to travel alone has already been made clear by several murder cases in the past.
I had thought that these incidents occurred because Australia was originally a penal colony for British convicts.
But being brainwashed by this kind of anti-Japanese propaganda is probably also one of the reasons behind the unending cases of assault and murder against young Japanese women.
By no means should one commit the folly of studying abroad in Australia merely from the viewpoint of climate, nature, and the like.
To begin with, Australia has a far shallower history than Japan, and its academic history and level are also shallow compared with those of the United States or Britain.
If one is going to study abroad in Australia, one should study in the United States or Britain instead.
Japanese women must know that Australia’s nature is dangerous for them.
The preceding text is omitted.
However, international communication with overseas media in mind is completely missing.
It does not feel persuasive.
Let us look at a concrete example of how this is being reported overseas.
Australia’s national broadcaster, ABC, reported as follows on July 28.
The following is a summary of the article.
“South Korea is extremely dependent on Japan for the procurement of three chemical products.
Those three products are indispensable for manufacturing semiconductors, memory chips, and LCD screens.
South Korean semiconductors are used in everything from smartphones to refrigerators, automobiles, and missiles.
This conflict, which on the surface appears to be a trade war, is in fact not merely a matter of won and yen.
South Korea still bears deep scars from Japan’s colonization during World War II.
In particular, there are the comfort women, which is a euphemism for sex slaves, and the forced labor of Koreans in Japanese munitions factories.
Experts say that the U.S.-China trade war lies behind this Japan-South Korea clash.
Between 70 and 90 percent of the three chemical products are manufactured in Japan.
The new rules do not ban exports of these products, but they make them approval-based, and since approval can take up to 90 days, they will in effect disrupt the supply chain.
Samsung and SK Hynix of South Korea manufacture 61 percent of the world’s semiconductors and supply them to Chinese and American companies such as Huawei and Apple.
If supply is disrupted, semiconductor prices will surge, pushing up retail prices of mobile phones, computers, and servers, and becoming a burden on consumers.”
The extreme-left reporting of overseas media.
“According to Professor Lauren Richardson of the Australian National University, an expert on Japan-South Korea relations, the greatest historical pain for South Korea is the colonization of the peninsula from 1910 to 1945, but the history of resentment goes back to Japan’s invasions in the 1500s.
Koreans who were forced to work in Japan were exploited until they suffered malnutrition or died, and their remains were not returned.
However, Japan claims that the matter was settled by the 1965 treaty and the 2015 comfort women agreement.
Stephen Nagy of International Christian University in Tokyo, who is familiar with policy, points out that North Korea is involved in the present dispute.
The Japanese government is concerned that Japanese products may flow from South Korea into China’s supply chain, then reach North Korea, and be used to support and strengthen the Kim Jong-un regime.
Japan’s present measures can be used not only against South Korea but also for the purpose of putting pressure on China’s Huawei, which is reportedly secretly helping North Korea build its wireless network.
This is part of the Trump administration’s tactics.”
Other reports are more or less the same.
In other words, the tone is that, at the root of this issue, there is the cruel history in which Japan colonized the Korean Peninsula, made women into sex slaves, and worked men to death through forced labor, and that Japan is now also citing security concerns, but only in vague terms, and appears to be acting as part of the Trump administration’s strategy.
The tone is that Japan’s measures will cause product prices to rise and will have an adverse effect on the world economy.
If foreigners without knowledge read this normally, they will, after all, think that Japan is a terrible country.
Of course, overseas media are basically extreme-left and anti-Japanese, a great deal of China money is flowing into them, and there are also many Japanese and Korean reporters who write outrageous articles.
Japanese-origin media such as Asahi and NHK also spew out biased articles in English.
Even so, it is also a fact that Japan’s own communication remains weak, unclear, and lacking in persuasiveness.
The rest is omitted.