An armed clash occurred between Japanese and Chinese troops in Shanghai 75 years ago yesterday. Known as the Shanghai Incident, hostilities spread to Nanjing, where Japanese warships delivered their broadside. An American warship in Shanghai was bombed by Japanese warplanes by mistake. The fighting followed the Mukden Incident of 1931, that finally led to the founding of Manchukuo on February 18, right after the hostilities in Shanghai, with Henry Pu Yi as head of the puppet government in Manchuria.
That is not dealt with in a new book published by the Yomiuri Shimbun, Japan's and the world's most widely circulated newspaper. Titled "From Marco Polo Bridge to Pearl Harbor: Who Was Responsible?" the Yomiuri book assesses Japan's responsibility for starting the Sino-Japanese and Pacific Wars.
What is known as the Marco Polo Bridge Incident occurred on July 7, 1937, long after the last of Manchu emperors had ascended the throne in Changchun, north of Mukden. The war, undeclared at first, forced Japan to confront the United States that started its pax Americana. In the end, Tokyo decided to launch a sneak attack on Pearl Harbor to annihilate the U.S. Pacific fleet to ensure victory in initial engagements of the war.
The book is a brainchild of Tsuneo Watanabe, Yomiuri editor-in-chief. A World War II veteran, the journalist wanted to make clear where the responsibility for the war lies. He set up an editorial commission for a 14-month investigation into the causes of Japan's war from 1937 to 1945. His reporters found government leaders, generals, admirals and even field-grade officers were responsible for making decisions to go to and escalate the wars and for many atrocities, including the Rape of Nanking.
It isn't easy for a very proud Japan to face up honestly to the bitter fact of having committed war crimes, genocide, and unjustified aggression on China. So far the Japanese government hasn't done that. The book does comes as close as Japan can probably get to conducting an acceptable public inquiry and offering an adequate apology. As a matter of fact, a majority of Japanese believe they have already apologized enough for all the war crimes, while quite a number of them consider war criminals, including wartime prime minister Hideki Tojo, to be martyrs sentenced to death by a military tribunal in Tokyo. They are honored at the Yasukuni shrine, pilgrimages to which by Japanese prime ministers have been considered a sign of the resurgence of ultranationalistic militarism.
Whether the book has persuaded Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to try to patch up the differences between Japan and China is unknown, but it is safe to say the new premier shares with Watanabe the sense of contrition for the wrongs Japan had done China.
China, on the other hand, is showing signs of growing maturity by refraining from criticizing Japan for elevating its defense agency to ministry status, legislating teaching of patriotism in school, and planning to amend the 1946 constitution that bans war as a means of settling international disputes.
（本文刊載於96.01.29 China Post第4版，本文代表作者個人意見）
