Is there a note of
insincerity, audible
only to Koreans
and Chinese, that
renders Japanese
contrition void?
the mid-19th century, perhaps the Jap-
anese would not have had such an easy
ride through the region later on.
Western perspective
Of course, in all of this I was guilty of
a dreadful western-centric solipsism.
China, Korea and Japan didn’t need us
to stoke their mutual hatreds. They’ve
mistrusted, resented, detested and
fought each other for centuries. Some
historians argue that the roots of this lie
in the ancient Confucian hierarchy, with
China as the ‘Middle Kingdom’ called
on to civilise the world, Korea as the
lesser sibling and Japan as the lowest in
the hierarchy. In militar y terms, though,
the conflicts date back at least to the 13th
century, when Mongol fleets carrying
Chinese and Korean troops were twice
repelled by the original kamikaze – liter-
ally ‘divine wind’ – while attempting to
invade Japan’s Kyushu island.
Hostilities between Japan and Korea
were reignited during the Imjin Wars
of the late 16th centur y, when Japan’s
unifying daimyō (feudal lord) Toyotomi
Hideyoshi invaded the peninsula and in-
flicted atrocities upon the Koreans. These
included the killing of tens of thousands
of Koreans and removal of their noses as
trophies, which were interred in hanazuka
(‘nose mounds’) in Kyoto and Bizen.
The Imjin Wars are still keenly
remembered in Korea, yet largely
unknown outside the region. More than
a million Koreans – almost one-third
of the population – are believed to have
died. “Hell cannot be in some other place
apart from this,” wrote a Japanese Bud-
dhist monk who witnessed one massacre.
Japan visited a great deal more
hellishness upon its neighbours during
the first half of the 20th century, before
itself suffering the wrath of the US in- Further suffering was subsequently
inflicted by the dictatorial rulers of Chi-
na, Korea and Taiwan upon their own
people, yet it is the Japanese who remain
the primary focus of resentment in the
region. Before I started my journey, I
believed that I had a reasonable grasp of
the charge sheet against Japan. I didn’t: it
was worse than I thought. But if Europe
and Israel could come to terms with
Germany’s war crimes, and the Philip-
pines, Indonesia and other countries also
occupied by Japan (including, of course,
Taiwan) no longer seem to harbour
much animosity towards the Japanese,
why do the Koreas and China persist
with their ill-feeling?
As well as the various disputed
islands, the Chinese and Korean people
I spoke to most often cited as a factor the
lack of apology on the part of the Japa-
nese. Many mentioned Tokyo’s Yasukuni
Shrine, where war fallen – including
more than 1,000 convicted of war crimes- are commemorated, and where senior
Japanese politicians still worship.
Again, some blame here can be
apportioned to the US. With the Treaty
of Versailles and its harsh consequences
on post-First World War Germany still
fresh in its memory, not to mention
anxiety about Communist China, the
US was notably lenient on Japan’s leaders
post-1945. But numerous Japanese
prime ministers and emperors have since
offered apologies to their former enemies,
expressing ‘remorse’ or ‘deep regret’
almost on an annual basis. Is there a bat
squeak of insincerit y, audible only to Ko-
reans and Chinese, that renders Japanese
contrition void?
Actually, there does seem to be. But
part of the problem might also be that,
compared with the Chinese and even
in some ways the South Koreans, the
Japanese enjoy a high level of freedom of
expression. For a variety of murky rea-
sons, a minority continues to exploit that
freedom to provoke its neighbours.
Yet there is hope. It lies, I think,
in continuing cultural and economic
exchange: it lies with smartphones and
K-Pop, kimchi, anime and manga, tour-
ism and technology, with Pokémon and
computer chips. Here’s hoping.
A relief depicting Japanese
soldiers on the Yasukuni
Shrine in Tokyo. Chinese
and Korean people criticise
senior Japanese politicians
who worship at the shrine
commemorating war
fallen, including more than
1,000 war criminalsALAMY