The following is a continuation of the previous chapter.
As the Japan–Russia summit was approaching in December 2016, I became alarmed when the Japanese media began floating one trial balloon after another, including “the return of two islands first” and “joint administration.” I warned that the proposal to return two islands first was nothing more than a proposal to abandon the other two islands—Kunashiri and Etorofu (this magazine, December 2016 issue).
My conclusion was that Japan should first recover its proper understanding of history and secure the strength to stand as a nation, and only then enter into full-scale negotiations on the Northern Territories issue.
My view has not changed.
Britain and the United States Planted the Seeds of the Cold War in Asia
Watanabe
As far as the loss of territory is concerned, Germany’s situation was even more tragic than Japan’s.
It lost East Prussia and was stripped of territory as far as the Oder River, which now forms the border with Poland.
Most of the expelled ethnic German residents headed for Berlin, but along the way they were robbed and raped by Soviet soldiers, and by the time they reached Berlin, they had nothing left.
What awaited them there were American GIs with their pockets filled with Allied marks that the occupying powers had issued at their own discretion.
According to a paper in the U.S. National Archives, as many as 500,000 German women were making a living through prostitution in 1946.
Nakanishi
In Europe, the Second World War resulted in territorial changes more cruel than those of any previous war, and these changes became fixed as the postwar European order.
Japan, too, had the hardships endured by those who fled back from the continent, including Manchuria. In the course of these territorial changes, hundreds of thousands—indeed, millions—of ordinary Japanese and German civilians lost their lives after the war.
The former Allied nations have kept this tragic history entirely outside their field of vision to this day.
So, from the German perspective, there is a sense of wondering why the Japanese are preoccupied with the “small issue” of the return of the Northern Territories and why they do not pursue the matter as a question of responsibility for the postwar settlement borne by the Allies as a whole.
Watanabe
Another thing Japanese schools never teach is U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Morgenthau’s plan to destroy Germany’s industrial infrastructure and turn it into an agricultural country—the so-called “Morgenthau Plan.”
Before its defeat, Germany exported industrial goods and used the proceeds to import agricultural products. But as a result of Morgenthau’s “outrageous plan,” its economy was transformed into one dependent on agriculture, and the country was struck directly by famine.
According to Crimes and Mercies by the Canadian historian James Bacque, more than nine million people died of famine: 5.7 million civilians within Germany, 2.5 million ethnic Germans expelled from Eastern Europe who returned to Germany, and 1.1 million prisoners of war.
When Japanese textbooks discuss the reconstruction of postwar Europe, they mention the Marshall Plan but ignore the tragedy brought about by the Morgenthau Plan.
It is important to give a balanced account of the darker side of what the victorious nations brought about, as well as the brighter side.
I do not believe doing so would worsen Japan–U.S. relations.
Nakanishi
The historical outlook and view of the international order held by Japanese people today were formed during the Cold War. Particularly in Asia, the Soviet Union was “evil,” while Britain and the United States were “good.”
The prevailing understanding of history is that, just as in the Second World War, “justice prevailed” in the Cold War, and that it was only natural for the “evil empires” of Imperial Japan and the Soviet Union to collapse.
Since the end of the Cold War, this view of “Britain and America as the embodiment of justice” has grown even stronger and continues to constrain Japanese diplomacy.
But let me say that it is the clearest expression of the “Tokyo Trials view of history” and a profound mistake.
The division of the Korean Peninsula into North and South, which remains a live issue today, can also be traced back to the secret Yalta agreement, under which Britain and the United States encouraged the Soviet Union to enter the war against Japan.
Because Soviet forces that invaded Manchuria stayed there for more than a year, the Chinese Communist Party was able to use the region as a base to fight the Second Chinese Civil War and establish the People’s Republic of China.
Seen in that light, it was Britain and the United States that planted the seeds of the Cold War in Asia, including the division of the Korean Peninsula.
Responsibility for the tragedy of those who fled Manchuria and for China’s fall to communism lies not only with the Soviet Union but also with Britain and the United States. It is fair to say that it was all because of the “secret Yalta agreement.”
Watanabe
After all, all the weapons held by Japan’s Kwantung Army in Manchuria passed into the hands of the Chinese Communist Party.
Nakanishi
At that point, it was obvious that Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalist army, cut off from American support, would be defeated by the Communist forces.
A communist state was thus born on the Chinese mainland. At Yalta, it was also arranged that the Korean Peninsula would be placed under the trusteeship of the Allies, including the Soviet Union.
The Soviet Union, however, occupied the area north of the 38th parallel, brought in Kim Il Sung, and established North Korea—the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.
That is where the tragedy of the division between North and South began, and its principal cause should be sought, rather, in the Anglo-Saxon alliance of Britain and the United States.
At least in the sense that they brought turmoil to Northeast Asia, Britain and the United States should be regarded as equally culpable with the Soviet Union.
Above all, every Japanese person should remember that the Soviet Union entered the war against Japan after unilaterally repudiating the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact.
This was a clear violation of international law, and Britain and the United States, which encouraged Stalin to enter the war against Japan, should properly be held accountable for instigating and aiding a war of aggression against Japan.
Stalin was a naturally cautious man, so it is highly likely that he would have hesitated to enter the war against Japan without the encouragement of Roosevelt and Churchill.
In that sense, Britain and the United States helped the Soviet Union carry out its aggression against Japan.
As a result, the Soviet Union acquired Manchuria, Sakhalin, and the Kuril Islands, which had been under Japanese control, and a storm of conflicts caused by the spread of communism swept across postwar Asia.
In other words, we need to understand the suffering associated with the Cold War in postwar Asia as the responsibility of the Allies as a whole.
Watanabe
Although Britain and the United States won the war, Poland ultimately fell into Stalin’s hands.
The central demand of the Hull Note was that Japan withdraw from China, but China too ultimately became communist.
This was the outcome of the contradiction in the Atlantic Charter: proclaiming the worldwide establishment of democracy while accepting the Soviet Union, a country that was not democratic, as a member of the Allied powers.
It shows how mistaken Roosevelt and Churchill were in their conduct of the war.
Yet many British and American history books avert their eyes from these facts. In other words, they pass over them.
That is because the assessment of Roosevelt and Churchill as “great leaders” would be undermined at its foundations.
Most Japanese history books also turn away from the consequences of the two men’s conduct of the war—the expansion of communism—and instead devote themselves solely to exposing the folly of Japan’s leaders during the same period.
They show no willingness to examine the historical facts and causal relationships of the time from an international perspective. It is extremely regrettable.
To be continued.