Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
defend Japan but its long-term ally? Thus, even if most people in Japan
wanted to be more independent of the USA, what would the consequences
be? What would happen if the USA were not there to keep old power struc-
tures in place in Asia? China and Japan were experiencing renewed economic
and political frictions with the increasing unwillingness on the part of the
Chinese government to export natural gas to Japan in the wake of its own
surging energy needs. Essentially Japan was 80% dependent on energy
resources from overseas, a large chunk of it from the Middle East. Moreover,
anti-Japanese sentiments in China had risen in response to the prime minis-
ter
s repeated visits to Yasukuni Shrine (cf. Takamine 2002; Terada 2006). In
light of these geo-political tensions, of which most people in Japan were
aware, including the supporters, how were they really to imagine that now
was the time to break the 50-year military cooperation and protection that
Japan had enjoyed and arguably still needed from the USA. While every
single person I spoke to in Soka Gakkai was against any kind of war or vio-
lence, could anyone realistically expect Japan to say
'
'
no
'
to the USA when it
was in such an apparent state of dependency?
Okamoto Mitsuo was another scholar with whom I met in Hiroshima. A pro-
fessor at the department of international politics at Hiroshima Shudo University,
he is a long-term peace activist. Emptying a chair for me to sit on in his o
ce,
where every surface including table and chairs was
lled to capacity with topics,
articles and newspapers, he certainly seemed to be still working hard. I found
to my surprise that in the 1980s Okamoto had sometimes been a speaker at
Soka Gakkai conferences and had published articles in Komeito journals.
Yet Okamoto told me that in relation to Soka Gakkai and Komeito he found
it di
cult to reconcile a
'
Peace-orientated religious group with a political
authoritarian character
'
. Although he agreed with the philosophy held by its
first two presidents of being against the military government and with Soka
Gakkai
s stance on nuclear disarmament, he was less impressed with what he
saw as the organisation
'
,whichremindedhimof
a military organisation where the top can give orders to the lower levels of people.
'
s
'
authoritarian power structure
'
At the time of an election I think it works very well, and is not only
typical of Soka Gakkai but many groups behave in similar ways. Other-
wise, I would gladly become a member [laughs]. But the reality is often
di
erent from the ideal. So I am not a member of anything. The Com-
munist party, for instance, also asked me to head one of their peace
organisations, but I never accepted; also the Socialist party. So in a way
no political party trusts me [laughs].
(conversation with Okamoto, 10/03/2004)
Okamoto was in his sixties, friendly and easy to talk to. Concerning the
changing perceptions of Japan
s possible future military role in the world,
he believed that there was a dangerous and nationalistic
'
Nostalgia among the
leading Japanese politicians for Japan to become a world power again in a
'
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