After the Meiji Restoration, the Sino-Japanese War, and the Russo-Japanese War, Japan found itself occupying a prominent position in the global arena. Komura Jutaro, whom Mutsu Munemitsu had chosen as his successor, served on the Katsu Taro cabinet and set to forging a plan for Japan’s continental development in opposition to Russia, considering the influence of the United States and Britain. Komura accurately judged that Japan had no other option than war with Russia, given his piercing insights into Russia’s intentions, and that recognition enabled the Empire of Japan to stay on the right track. All the other merits and demerits of Komura’s diplomacy are directly connected to the merits and demerits of the steps taken by the Empire of Japan that eventually led to the country’s defeat in World War II. Komura’s diplomacy thus calls into question Japan’s national strategy itself: consistently pursuing independent diplomacy instead of entrusting Japan’s fate to collaboration with the Anglo-American world and, in Asia, expanding Japan’s exclusive sphere of influence beyond the Korean Peninsula deep into the Asian continent.

The founder of judo, Kano Jigoro, is a highly revered figure amongst those who pursue the sport. Little is known, however, about his various other achievements, from how he laid out the foundation for sports in Japanese education to his immense devotion and commitment to bringing the Olympic Games to Japan. Born in 1860, Kano showed his brightness from a young age and studied hard from childhood. After graduating from Tokyo Imperial University, the most prestigious school, he embarked on a teaching career which eventually led him to become the headmaster of the Tokyo Higher Normal School for a total of twenty-three years. This was just one of the many roles he undertook; aside from this he was chairman of the Japan Amateur Sports Association and became the first Asian member on the International Olympic Committee. And all the while he never ceased to develop and promote his creation, judo. For the first time, this comprehensive biography written by a team of Kano experts and researchers sheds light on the many dimensions of the legendary figure. It depicts how he truly lived life to the fullest by living out his own words-seiryoku zen’yo and jita kyoei-the best practical use of one’s energies and putting one’s efforts to good use for the benefit of both oneself and society.

The Kwangtung Army’s invasion of Manchuria in 1931 was a clear demonstration of the military’s independence and the Japanese foreign policy establishment’s impotence and irrelevance. For the next 14 years, diplomats and others who sought to avert war on the Asian mainland and with the Western powers saw their efforts sidelined and undercut. Such is not, however, to imply such toilers-in-the-dark did not exist. They did, and this ambitious history chronicles that difficult time focusing on the lives of Shigemitsu Mamoru and Togo Shigenori. A career diplomat who brokered a ceasefire between the Imperial Japanese Army and the Chinese Kuomintang Army in 1932 and then a settlement of the Russo-Japanese border at Changkufeng Hill in 1938, Shigemitsu was aghast at the 1940 tripartite Pact (among Japan, Germany, and Italy) and its implications for Japan’s relations with the UK and the US. Despite―or perhaps because of―his opposition to the militarists’ policies, he was appointed Foreign Minister midway through the Pacific War, and it was in that capacity that he was caught up in the charade of the International Military Tribunal for the Far East. Much of Shigemitsu’s work was complemented by Togo’s, including efforts to better relations with the Soviet Union. Marginalized though he was, Togo had the distinction of being Foreign Minister both at the outbreak and at the end of the Pacific War, albeit with a long hiatus in the middle, and it was this distinction that brought him to the International Tribunal’s attention. Belying the standard image of a hundred million hearts beating as one, Japan had many distinguished figures who remained true to their principles even as they served the state during the long war years. This is thus both a history of personal turmoil and an insightful window on the Japan of that era.

The Constitution of Japan is often described as a pacifist constitution for its Article 9 renouncing war and foreswearing war potential. Although this is usually attributed to starry-eyed idealists and steely-eyed realists in the occupation, both of which wanted to ensure Japan did not again challenge America’s position, there is also a cast to be made for crediting Shidehara Kijuro (1872-1951). Indeed, the case becomes even stronger if we think of the Constitution not so much as pacifist but more as internationalist―as evidenced in the Preamble’s trusting in the justice and faith of the peace-loving peoples of the world and its belief that no nation is responsible to itself alone. For it was Shidehara who was the ultimate internationalist. Born to a middle-class family four years after the Meiji Restoration, he went to Tokyo Imperial University and from there to the civil service, ending up at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. From there, history took him to a number of foreign capitals and historic international conferences on his way to the foreign ministership and after he became foreign minister. Serving as foreign minister under a succession of prime ministers, he developed and staunchly promoted what came to be called Shidehara diplomacy―a foreign policy stance of not intervening in China, respecting the Anglo-Japanese alliance, and adhering to what were put forward as universal values. Yet despite his steadfast championship, this internationalist stance was weakened by widespread discrimination against Japanese (e.g., in America’s immigration laws) and fatally wounded by the Kwangtung Army’s rogue aggression in China. He resigned as foreign minister in 1931, while retaining his seat in the House of Peers, and was tapped by the occupation to be Japan’s first postwar prime minister, putting him in a position to influence the Constitution’s drafting. Shidehara’s was a principled life engagingly recounted in this informative biography by one of Japan’s foremost diplomat-turned-historians.

Yoshida Shigeru is widely regarded as a pivotal figure in early postwar Japanese history―someone who guided the nation through those difficult years with a clear vision and a firm hand. Yet much of his success, this book argues, was mandated by circumstances, and he was more a practical politician than an ideologue wedded to any particular “ism”. Particularly lauded by Yoshida admirers are his adroit fending off of pressures to remilitarize, including during the Korean War years, and his accompanying focus on economic recovery as the nation struggled to get back on its feet. Yet the decision not to rearm had already been made in the postwar Constitution’s Article 9, and Yoshida was more affirming Occupation policy than breaking new ground. Indeed, his policy pronouncements in this area largely channeled MacArthur’s thinking throughout SCAP’s reign. Pushing that thought one step further, Ambassador Okazaki contends that the acceptance of Article 9 was part of a grand bargain with MacArthur: Japan would forsake rearmament and the International Military Tribunal for the Far East would not put the Emperor in the dock for war crimes. Taking issue with the conventional wisdom, Okazaki further maintains that many Occupation policies (e.g., women’s suffrage and agrarian reform) would have been adopted in the course of building upon prewar democratization initiatives even were there no Occupation. Significantly, these reforms, unlike zaibatsu dissolution and the purge, for example, were not rescinded once Japan regained its independence in 1952. Pulling together testimony from a wide variety of informed sources, this solidly argued treatise roundly rejects the Tokyo Trials, both their conduct and their verdicts, and paints a picture of Japan laboring under a capricious autocracy in the Occupation years. This is an insightful work that demands serious consideration by everyone interested in Japan past, present, and future.