Published on September 26, 2019.
Based on Masayuki Takayama’s essay in Shukan Shincho, this article discusses Asahi Shimbun’s defense of South Korea, the falsehoods in its editorials concerning Japan’s wartime and prewar rule of Korea, successive Japanese prime ministers’ concessions to South Korea, and the need for a prime minister who can teach South Korea right from wrong.

September 26, 2019.
When it comes to South Korea, Asahi Shimbun’s eyes become moist.
It writhes with affection.
Therefore, if something as insignificant as a Japanese magazine dares to express an opinion about South Korea, Asahi becomes furious and makes an uproar in an editorial, saying, “The media are stirring up antipathy toward South Korea.”
The following is from an essay by Masayuki Takayama published in Shukan Shincho, released today.
This essay too proves that he is the one and only journalist in the postwar world.
A Prime Minister Who Admonishes.
When it comes to South Korea, Asahi Shimbun’s eyes become moist.
It writhes with affection.
Therefore, if something as insignificant as a Japanese magazine dares to express an opinion about South Korea, Asahi becomes furious and makes an uproar in an editorial, saying, “The media are stirring up antipathy toward South Korea.”
The editorial continues that in the last war, “the media followed national policy and planted hostility toward Britain and America and contempt for China and Korea.”
I know the phrase “demonic Britain and America,” but the latter half is something I have never heard before.
Or rather, it is an outright lie.
Koreans were treated equally under naisen ittai, Japan and Korea as one body, and were also given privileges such as exemption from conscription and reduced taxation.
Japan did not commit the inhumanity of using colonial Filipinos as shields for its own soldiers, as the United States did, or Indians as Britain did.
In China, Japan supported Wang Jingwei, and in Shanghai and elsewhere peaceful days continued until the end of the war.
The people enjoyed Li Xianglan’s stage performances, and the people of Langyashan, outside Beijing, were protected by the Japanese army from looting by communist guerrillas.
The editorial also writes that “civilization was transmitted from the peninsula.”
Here too, “culture came from Japan” is correct.
What came from the peninsula was only trouble.
As proof, the chili pepper that came from Tang entered Korea through Japan.
That is why the chairman of Moranbong said that on the peninsula “chili pepper is called Japanese pepper.”
One can tell from the names of rivers too.
The Chinese in the north use “he,” as in the Yellow River, Huang He, and Rehe.
The southern Chinese with whom Japan had dealings use “jiang,” as in the Yangtze Jiang and Huangpu Jiang.
That was transmitted over there through Japan, and they write Nakdonggang and Hangang.
It is fine to love South Korea, but why did editorial chief Nemoto Kiyoki allow such an editorial, with not a fragment of truth, to be written?
This newspaper company calls its editor-in-chief “general editor,” in the manner of a foreign-affiliated company.
If he were a newspaper reporter, such a business card would be too embarrassing to hand out.
That GE’s love for South Korea is no less than that of the editorial department.
He had former Seoul correspondent Kamiya Takeshi interview Moon Chung-in, special adviser to the South Korean president, and this too was terrible.
That so-called adviser is astonishingly unlearned.
Analyzing the current Japan-South Korea dispute, he says, “Both Japan and South Korea have a structure in which, when they attack the other, the administration’s popularity rises.”
That is certainly true of South Korea.
Over there, when the centripetal force of an administration declines, it is the standard pattern to launch an anti-Japanese policy.
Then its popularity recovers.
Japanese people do not think about this very seriously, but they should know that the people of that country are anti-Japanese to the marrow of their bones.
That is why Lee Myung-bak, whose corruption had put him in danger, was forgiven for everything merely by climbing onto Takeshima.
When Kim Young-sam blew up the former Government-General of Korea building, the people were overjoyed.
If it had been Korean-made, it would have collapsed even if the wind blew, but authentic Japanese architecture does not collapse easily.
Thanks to that, the Korean people enjoyed the demolition work for weeks.
By contrast, there is not a single case in Japan in which an administration gained popularity by attacking South Korea.
Even if Japan is too indulgent, something as trivial as South Korea does not become a political crisis.
Take Kishi Nobusuke, for example.
Because of the Syngman Rhee Line that Syngman Rhee drew arbitrarily, 4,000 Japanese fishermen were seized or killed.
Kishi, who had no military means, exchanged a “Memorandum on the Mutual Release of Detainees” in order to free the fishermen, releasing imprisoned Korean resident murderers in Japan and all illegal Korean entrants held in Omura, and even recognizing their residence.
It was excessively lenient, but the Japanese did it in the hope that, through that, they would become decent people.
In 1987, there was the Korean Air bombing terrorism.
A staff member of the Japanese embassy in Bahrain secured the custody of Kim Hyon-hui, but Takeshita Noboru, out of consideration for Roh Tae-woo, handed her over to South Korea.
As a result, the confirmation of the true situation of the abduction victims, including Megumi, by North Korea was greatly delayed.
Roh Tae-woo then pressed his advantage and threatened Kaifu Toshiki as well, making him abolish fingerprinting for Korean residents in Japan and apply that abolition also to South Korean entrants.
Soon after it was put into effect, the Setagaya family murder of four occurred.
There are piles of the criminal’s fingerprints, yet he has still not been caught.
Miyazawa Kiichi made the soccer World Cup a joint hosting with South Korea.
Koizumi Junichiro gave South Korea white-country treatment.
Japan also gave economic aid besides that.
Successive prime ministers believed that such generosity would make that country normal, but they were all mistaken.
Japan needed a prime minister who could teach South Korea right from wrong.
Perhaps, at last, it is becoming that way now.