NEW SOLIDARITY

June 13, 1980

Page 8

WILL JAPAN REPEAT THE 1930s ROAD TO WAR?

From Alliance With Britain To War With America Part II
by Richard Katz

This cannon was used by Japan to bombard Port Arthur in the 1905 RussoJapanese War and again in 1931 when Mitsui's "strike north" army henchmen seized Manchuria.

Mitsui Bank head Sehin Ikeda and "strike north" General Sadao Araki. These men organized the 1930s fascist movement in Japan to try to invade the U.S.S.R. in alliance with Britain. The greeting on Araki's picture is to Captain Malcolm Kennedy, Britain's 1930s military attache in Tokyo.

The origins of Pearl Harbor do not lie in Japan's 1937 invasion of China or even in an event as shortly prior to 1941 as the 1931 takeover of Manchuria. The origins go all the way back to 1902, when Japan formed a military alliance with Britain against Russia. That alliance opened the door to a British cultural subversion operation in Japan which reversed much of the political, though not economic, progress modern Japan had made since its founding in the 1868 Meiji Restoration. By enforcing the "cultural isolation" of Japan, Britain created the environment in which it and its ally in Japan, the Mitsui faction, could spawn ultra-nationalist fascist gangs tied to the British geopolitical aim of invading the U.S.S.R. Even more than the case of the German Nazis, on whom the Japanese scheme was modeled, Japanese fascism turned into a Frankenstein monster. The 1941 war was launched in the "wrong direction," but it was British psychological warfare and British geopolitics that had created the Frankenstein. Today, Prime Minister Ohirawho entered politics in the 1930s as part of the Mitsui factionis carrying out the 1980s version of the British policy of using Japan and China against the Soviet Union. The humanists in Japan, known as the Mitsubishi faction, had created the 1868 Meiji Restoration not simply to industrialize Japan but to transform it into a full-fledged modern humanist republic. To the Meiji humanist leaders like Yukichi Fukuzawa and Shigenobu Okuma, the key to uplifting Japan at home was giving it the international identity of acting as the transmission belt for modernizing all of Asia. This meant taking on the British Empire. The most important case of challenging Britain was the 1898 alliance Mitsubishi faction leader and Prime Minister Shigenobu Okuma made with . Russian Finance Minister Count Sergei Witte to modernize and liberate China. That effort, known as the Hundred Days Reform, was led in China by Mitsubishi faction leader Fukuzawa's Chinese allies. When that effort failed, Mitsubishi's rout inside Japan was swift and sharp. Within six weeks of the defeat, Okuma was deposed and replaced by archmilitarist General Aritomo Yamagata. Yamagata was a leader of the Mitsui faction, which had allied with the British in trying to stop the humanists every step of the way ever since the 1868 Meiji Restoration. The defeat and demoralization of the Mitsubishi faction was so severe that within only four years, by 1902, the Mitsui faction had succeeded in forming a military alliance with Britain. Three years later, armed with British-built ships,

financed by British banks, and trained by British sea captains, Japan launched a successful war against Britain's enemy Russia. Japan's capitulation to allying with Britain set the ground rules for Japanese politics from that time forward. On the most important issues of Japans international role and whether it would become a fully humanist nation, Mitsui remained in the saddle. The previous organizing drive of the Mitsubishi faction to transform Japan was reduced to a mere impulse, such as is seen today in Japan's post World War II economic miracle and in former Japanese Prime Minister Takeo Miki's efforts to depose Carter's ally, Prime Minister Masayoshi Ohira. Because humanism became only an impulse, Britain and its Mitsui allies successfully imposed a "cultural isolation" on Japan. An incredible ideology swept Japan that one could not be both "modern" and "Japanese" at the same time. If the individual took on a modern identity to serve the practical needs of the modern world, including propitiation of the more powerful British, then his identity was reduced to a mere facadeso went the argument. If one wanted to be "Japanese" then one had to revert to a feudal identity. This ideology would later become the breeding ground of fascist cults. Immediately, it meant that Japan turned inward and lost its sense of playing an active, positive role on the world scene. The Mitsubishi faction itself adopted a milder form of this ideology and acquiesced to defining Japan's national role as, at best, developing Japan's economy within the context of the alliance with Britain. Britain's 'China Card' Strategy Once Mitsubishi capitulated to "modern" vs. "Japanese" psychology, Japan could be easily manipulated into adopting a profile propitiatory to Britain but "nationalist" toward the United States where economic interests in China were at stake. By keeping China backward and disunited, and by keeping Japan and the U.S. squabbling over their economic interests in China rather than cooperating in developing it, Britain expected it could maintain its supremacy in Asia. Because the nation-building impulse from the Meiji period survived, Mitsubishi faction leader Okuma continued to fund and support the efforts of Chinese republican leader Sun Yat Sen to unify China. Moreover, the Mitsubishi faction set up industrializing projects like the South Manchurian Railway (SMR) which soon became the most important industrializing force

in all of China. To this day Manchuria is the most industrialized part of China because of the SMR. Okuma knew that "a weak China is a threat to peace." Yet the pro-British Mitsui group was always able to make sure that the Mitsubishi faction's activities never posed an unmanageable threat to the British Empire. When Sun Yat Sen overthrew the British puppet Empress Dowager in 1911 with Mitsubishi faction aid, and formed the Chinese republic. Mitsui directly aided the defeat of the republic by pro-British warlord Yuan Shih Kai. This was the same Yuan Shih Kai who had launched war on Japan in 1895! Mitsui's own economic activities in China were strictly of the British colonial looting type, and increasingly Mitsui predominated in Japan's activities in China. Britain's strategy worked because at the same time that Mitsui took over Japan, the American agents of Britain emerged victorious in this country. They reversed the Lincoln Republicans' support of Japan's Mitsubishi faction and urged a rivalry with Japan over economic interests in China. Wall Street Anglophile leaders J.P. Morgan, E.H. Harriman, Jacob Schiff, and James Stillman set up the Committee on American Interests in China to pressure President McKinley to agree to the so-called Open Door in China. The Open Door doctrine was British Prime Minister Salisbury's proposal for the United States to defend "Anglo-American" interests in China against Japan and Russia. In 1899, McKinley capitulated and allowed Secretary of State John Hay to announce the Open Door. Hay didn't even write the note; it was written by a British customs official in Shanghai named Hippisley. And the man who had been briefing the Wall Street leaders on China policy, complete with blackboard and pointer, was Hippisley's young American assistant! The assistant, Willard Straight, later the founder of the ultra-liberal New Republic magazine, made no secret of his motivations for his anti-Japan policy; he wrote a friend: I find myself hating the Japanese more than anything else in the world. It is due I suppose to the constant strain of having to be polite and seek favors from a yellow people. . . . In China if you're feeling frustrated you can just kick a coolie; the Japanese demand to be treated as equals.

Obviously, Straight and the Wall Street gang never supported Chinese republicanism. Shortly after the 1905 Russo-Japanese War, Teddy Roosevelt put Straight at the State Department in charge of American policy for all of Asia. In 1907 under Roosevelt the U.S. Navy developed Plan Orange for a possible war against Japan. The Opportunity of 1924-27 The 1924-27 period provided the one real opportunity the Mitsubishi faction was granted to take the offensive against the British Empire in Asia and to reverse the British-Mitsui alliance's domination of Japan. During that envelope of time, governments came to power in Japan, America and the Soviet Union that provided the potential for an international entente around liberating China along the lines of the 1898 Japan-Russia support for the Hundred Days Reform. The Mitsubishi faction's Minseito Party had at long last returned to power in Japan under Prime Minister Takaaki Kato, a student of the Meiji Restoration leader Yukichi Fukuzawa. Kato immediately established diplomatic relations and economic cooperation with the young Soviet Republic, ending the previous Mitsui government's military actions there. At the same time the Mitsubishi business venture hooked up with U.S. industrialists opposed to Wall Street's Anglophile posture, men like Henry Ford and George Westinghouse. In China itself, the Mitsubishi government funded and aided Chinese republican leader Sun Yat Sen's new effort to liberate it from Britain. The Northern March launched by Sun and his Kuomintang (KMT) party was sweeping China and defeating Britain's puppet warlords. Just as the Mitsubishi faction aided Sun, so Stalin in the U.S.S.R. ordered the Communist Party of China to enter and support the work of the Kuomintang Party. In the United States, President Coolidge's Secretary of State Frank Kellogg both reduced the anti-Japan posture of his predecessors and sympathized with Chinese republicanism. In fact, in 1928, to Britain's consternation, Kellogg made the U.S. the first country to recognize the KMT government, but by that time it was too late. Unlike 1898, the three governments acted only in parallel and not jointly. They failed to grasp the opportunity. In April of 1927, Chinese traitor Chiang Kai Shek, an ally of Mitsui's Black Dragon Society, met with the British and used his military position to launch

a coup inside the KMT. In the famous Shanghai Massacre, he destroyed the Northern MarchChina's republican movement was finished forever. Because all three governments acted from the point of view of maneuver against Britain rather than frontal assault, Britain succeeded in wrecking the nation-building effort in China and thus reinstituting the rivalry over China among the U.S., Japan and the USSR. Mitsui Creates Fascism in Japan Within weeks of Chiang Kai Shek's Shanghai Massacre, Mitsui pulled off what can only be called a coup inside Japan, the first of many. The immediate effect was to bring down the cabinet of Mitsubishi's Minseito Party and replace it with a cabinet of the Mitsui faction's Seiyukai party. This was not simply another change of government from Mitsubishi back to Mitsui. This takeover ushered in the process that led to fascism in the 1930s. As part of the 1927 coup, Mitsui deliberately provoked a financial crash equivalent to what the U.S. suffered in 1929. The crash bankrupted the entire nexus of business ventures the Mitsubishi faction had set up to aid industrialization projects overseas. The Mitsui faction's Black Dragon Society terrorist apparatus took over the South Manchurian Railway (SMR). They rapidly transformed it from the industrializing force Mitsubishi had created into a machine for drug-growing, economic looting, and funding of fascist gangs. Mitsui and Britain's object was not simply consolidating Mitsui's power, but Nazifying Japan. British Intelligence and Mitsui spawned scores of fascist cults modeled directly on the Nazi movement in Germany, guided by the same anti-modern ideology, promoted by the same British sponsors and banks, and all for the same purpose, to induce Japan to join Germany in invading the Soviet Union. British Intelligence agent Karl Haushofer, who had helped create the Nazis, showed up in Japan to repeat his work there. To translate Nazism into Japanese, Mitsui revived on a mass basis the racialist, Shintoist Sonno-joi cults using the "modern" vs. "Japanese" dichotomy. Back in 1878, in large part instigated by British Ambassador Harry Parkes, the Sonno-joi cult had launched the famous Satsuma Rebellion to overthrow the new Meiji Restoration government. Their ideology was to prevent modernization from destroying "unique Japanese identity and culture," which they defined in feudal terms. The entire Mitsui

faction leadership had come out of that cult. In the 1920s, using the same racialist feudal ideology, Mitsui created fascist cults with names like Blood Pledge Brotherhood and Death-Defying Farmers Band. The cults specifically regarded themselves as repeating the Satsuma Rebellion's attempt to overthrow modern Japan. As in Germany, the fascists were organized to regard communism as the most extreme form of modernism, and they demanded that Japan "strike north" to invade the Soviet Union. Again as in Germany, the elite organizers of the fascists were the most Anglophile Mitsui faction leaders in Japan, those who totally identified with their British masters. Every single fascist band in Japan, whether openly pro-British or ostensibly anti-British, can be traced back to the National Foundation Society. The leadership of the National Foundation Society was the triumvirate of 1) Sehin Ikeda, the leader of Mitsui business group and the self-avowed Hjalmar Schacht (Hitler's Finance Minister) of Japan; 2) General Sadao Araki, the leader of the "strike north" faction in the military; and 3) Kiichiro Hiranuma, the head of Tokyo Imperial University, later Prime Minister of Japan, and the chief ideologue of fascism. Hiranuma's Tokyo University had been founded by Mitsui specifically to counter the humanist ideas of the Meiji Restoration and the Mitsubishi faction back in the 1890s. This triumvirate created Japanese fascism and were dyed-in-the-wool Shintoists, but they were no more sword-waving crazies than Nazi Finance Minister Hjalmar Schacht was a goose-stepper. They were urbane, pro-Western, liberal-accustomed to discussing world affairs with visiting British dignitaries over brandy and cigars. In a book written in 1969 Britain's military attache in Japan from the 1930s wrote about Strike North General Araki and his efforts to form a British-Nazi-Japanese alliance to invade the Soviet Union: He was liable to be carried away in a torrent of words when expounding his views on the philosophy of Kodo, the Imperial Way, (Shintoism); but, being an idealist by nature and a soldier by profession, he always gave one the impression of being honest and upright, a man of simple tastes, and kindly and courteous toward others, no matter how senior or junior they might be. He is describing the Hermann Goering of Japan.

Manchuko and the 1930s The 1930s depression opened the way for British Intelligence and Mitsui to make their move. In the first year of the depression Japan lost half its exports. U.S. and British protectionism dashed whatever hopes Japan had of quick recovery. Since resourceless Japan desperately needed exports to finance the imports which made industrialism possible, China, Korea and Manchuria loomed even more importantnot in a geometry of development, but as sources of cheap raw materials, cheap labor and captive markets in a depression. Large sections of the Mitsubishi group tolerated the "strike north" Mitsui faction's international adventures, such as the Manchurian takeover of 1931, on grounds of economic necessity"and to hell with the Anglo-Americans who are running trade warfare anyway." With that mood pervading Japan, the Mitsui fascists began their series of coups. In November 1930 a Black Dragon Society member shot the Prime Minister, a member of Mitsubishi's Minseito Party which had returned to power a year earlier. In March 1931 the fascists in the military attempted a coup that proved abortive. In September the Mitsui "strike north" elements in the army pulled a coup in Manchuria and seized it. Mitsui's Sehin Ikeda had met with the coup ringleaders prior to the takeover. The real target of the coup in Manchuria (soon to be renamed Manchukuo) was not Manchuria itself, but Japan. The coup plotters boasted: We have succeeded. Therefore, when we return to the homeland we shall carry out a coup d'etat and do away with the political party system of government. Then we shall establish National Socialism with the Emperor as the center. We shall abolish capitalists like Mitsui and Mitsubishi and carry out an even distribution of wealth. This was exactly the ideology of Shinto fascism. The reference to Mitsui as well as Mitsubishi represented Mitsui Bank head Sehin Ikeda's determination to eliminate any elements of the Mitsui group that hesitated at going to war against the Soviet Union. Indeed in 1932 his minions assassinated Ikeda's nominal superior, Baron Tokuma Dan, and Ikeda took complete control over the entire Mitsui group. A few months after the Manchurian takeover, Mitsui's Seiyukai party deposed the Mitsubishi faction Prime Minister and made "strike north" General Araki the new War Minister. The new prime minister was a member

of the fascist-organizing National Foundation Society. After the Mitsui takeover, the foreign ministry mouthpiece Japan Times wrote openly, "Fascism safeguards the fundamental institutions of the country and at the same time puts a curb on capitalism, without eliminating private property." Every leading policymaker at the time knew it was the pro-British Mitsui faction that created fascism, not some jingoist generals. The latter idea was a myth created during the Cold War and denounced as such by General Douglas MacArthur in a 1949 Fortune article. Henry Stimson, U.S. Secretary of State in 1931, recorded in his memoirs that even after the Manchuria coup, as long as the Mitsubishi faction remained in control he hesitated to take strong punitive action that would weaken it inside Japan. But as soon as the Mitsui faction came to power, he strongly advocated a trade embargo against Japan. The British Foreign Office and Morganbacked U.S. President Herbert Hoover blocked Stimson's embargo on the grounds that Mitsui's Manchuria takeover provided a "bulwark against Soviet Communism." Had the Mitsubishi faction taken strong action, even then, they could have stopped the fascists. But they tolerated Mitsui's international adventures though not its domestic coupson grounds of economic necessity in the depression, especially in light of foreign protectionism. The Road to Pearl Harbor Mitsui's "strike north" fascists never succeeded in taking complete control of Japan. After a series of abortive coups aimed at putting General Araki in power, a coalition of Emperor Hirohito, the loyal section of the army and the Mitsubishi group mustered themselves to stop Mitsui. Using the loyal "Control Faction" of the army, Emperor Hirohito and his allies purged Araki and his "strike north" cohorts from the army. Hirohito's army supporters believed that if anyone should be attacked it should be, not the U.S.S.R., but the British Empire. On the eve of another planned purge, Mitsubishi's Minseito Party swept the 1936 elections on the anti-fascist slogan, "Which Way for Japan: For or Against Fascism?" Takeo Miki was first elected to the Diet on the Minseito ticket a year later. Mitsui responded to the elections in February 1936 with their most murderous coup attempt. When that failed, the police investigated Mitsui Bank head Ikeda's funding of the coup. They let him go, not because they didn't have the evidence, but because Hirohito wanted to

placate the United States and he knew how the New York Times would scream if he should dare execute a "moderate businessman, a leader of the liberals." And yet, did Ikeda and Mitsui really lose? If the "strike north" Japanese Hitlers never came to power, the Hjalmar Schachts remained. The Schachtian economics imposed by Mitsui set Japan on the course to war with the U.S.A. Japan "recovered" from the trade collapse of 1930-31 through domestic austerity and fascist levels of looting of Manchuria and Korea. Cheap raw materials and a 20 percent drop in living standards allowed an export recovery and a 30 percent rise in production. Military spending doubled to comprise half the budget. As in Nazi Germany, this was not enough. By 1937 exports were falling and the economy was on the rocks. The "strike north" fascists, making one last bid for power, used their remaining networks in the army to launch the Marco Polo Bridge incident and the invasion of China. Once again the Mitsubishi faction tolerated it, and some sections even supported the move on grounds of economic necessity. Mitsui's Sehin Ikeda was allowed to come back as head of the Bank of Japan. From 1937 until Pearl Harbor, looting of the colonies fueled Japan's economy. Trade with the yen bloc of China, Korea and Manchuria formed 60 percent of Japan's trade. Most of that was handled by Mitsui, with Mitsubishi a distant second. Ikeda kept pushing to resume good relations with Britain and returning to the "strike north" course. For a few months British policymakers debated whether the takeover of China might indeed be the prelude to an attack on the U.S.S.R. By late 1937 Britain decided that Japan had become a Frankenstein monster and that Britain's colonies were the most likely target of a Japanese attack, not the Soviet Union. If Britain's Empire were to be saved, America had to go to war against Japan. For different reasons than Britain's, Franklin Roosevelt had also decided that war between the United States and Japan was inevitable. Every day Japan pushed further and further into China, and threatened southeast Asia. When a State Department group proposed working out an arrangement to guarantee Japan's raw material needs, Roosevelt quashed the deal.

The Japanese general staff knew a war with the U.S.A. was suicide. Staff documents show they repeatedly tried to separate America from Britain, but they never retreated from fascist economics. Japan prepared to take military action when Britain hindered its colonies from selling Japan raw materials. When FDR annulled the U.S.-Japan commercial treaty in 1939, Tojo and his staff knew the United States would go to war if Japan advanced further into Asia. Driven by the necessities of fascist economics and the determination to shore up previous military adventures, Japan decided to try to choose the time of war, defeat the U.S. fleet, and then negotiate. At that point Pearl Harbor was just a matter of time. The Coming Elections War or peace is again the issue in Japan. Prime Minister Ohira, in full support of Washington's China card, is carrying out the "strike north" policy of the 1980s. Ohira had entered public life in the 1930s serving in the Finance Ministry under the patronage of Sehin Ikeda's networks. Takeo Miki, who entered politics as part of the Minseito Party's fight against Mitsui in 1937, knows that the economics and geopolitics of the 1930s produced the war of the 1940s. This time support for a "strike north" policy means the nuclear destruction of Japan in a U.S.-Soviet war. It's about time Miki told the Japanese people what his fight with Ohira is all about.