This essay questions who truly incited Japan’s entry into war, arguing that it was the Asahi Shimbun that inflamed public sentiment with slogans like “Down with the U.S. and Britain,” pressuring a hesitant military leadership. It contrasts military rationality with media agitation and highlights the overwhelming power of the United States at the time.

2016-03-19
Do Asahi Shimbun and the so-called cultural figures who sympathize with it today know that it was Asahi Shimbun that shouted “Down with the U.S. and Britain” and “Strike the United States,” and that it was Asahi Shimbun that spurred on a hesitant military leadership?
Just as those who gather at West Point in the United States represent the most outstanding individuals in that country, it was only natural that Japan’s officer academies were also filled with the nation’s finest minds.
This is true in every country throughout the world.
If those tasked with strengthening or defending a nation were incompetent, that nation would perish in an instant.
Even Nazi Germany never seriously considered going to war with the United States.
On the contrary, they must have been thinking about how to keep the United States out of the war.
And yet Japan initiated war against the United States, which at the time was an overwhelmingly wealthy nation, the world’s greatest superpower—far more so than it is today.
To be continued.