Friday, January 24, 2014


Abe’s dream of reincarnating "Statism" as in the Meiji revolution


Shinzo Abe

I don't think it is yet the last chance for Japan, to survive a nuclear Armageddon accident or to avoid war in North East Asia because of a few islets lost in the China seas but situation is presented as tense from Tokyo while Peking seems to live more like Hong-Kong did for a century and especially after 1949. Chinese seem to be more preoccupied with constructing their nation, exploiting ressources and energies, and making smart and sometimes terrifying use of their iron hand, while most of them (remember over 1 billion and 300 000 000+) are making money for the time being and don't care what Japan does or says beyond its smart industry. Chinese leaders will look at twice prior to push the button. It's just a matter of how power works. Rhetorical propaganda from many competitors accurately point out at risks to anger a newly empowered China. But time and actions do not seem to work as in the west or Japan, here the access to power to gain China top jobs require an extraordinary power struggle that very few in the rest of Asia or other distant nations, know or want to admit. After all, this is where Confucianism has been ruling for centuries, and Chinese emperors and generals have been making use of violence on their people. This is also where the battle to get the top seat occupied since 1949 by Messieurs Mao, Deng, Jiang or Hu and now Xi is maybe the most terrible intellectual challenge to gain power and to reach the top. Now, regarding current Japan prime minister Abe, sitting on top of Japanese corporations huge unspent cash, there are some witted watchers in Tokyo who see a pattern appearing with what could be the secret Shinzo Abe's dream of reincarnating "Statism" as it emerged at the Meiji revolution. And very pinpointing are the Pekinese on this. I am therefore not surprised at all to see that China plays history symbol (after all Japanese nationalist politicians seem to play history card well too) and just opened in Harbin a memorial hall commemorating anti-Japanese activist Ahn Jung-geun. Ahn assassinated Ito Hirobumi, the resident general of Korea. Ahn is seen as a hero in South Korea. Japan chief communicator Suga played it down and just mildly protested to China about this memorial because in Japan Ito Hirobumi is seen here as one of the founding fathers of the "Meiji renovation" or one of the proponent of "modern statism" and a very talented architect of modern Japan. Talking about correct historical awareness, it is a long way in North East Asia to share the same views, albeit they share lots of common values, customs, mindset.


Ito Hirobumi achievements, the comparison with Abe is just an author "clin d'oeil"...



Update: The other night at a party in town launched by the Yomiuri for the New Year 2014, I had a fascinating chat with defence minister Onodera about what prime minister Shinzo Abe is trying to achieve in Japan and while I mentioned the perception about Abe’s dream of “modern Statism” I also mentioned the Harbin memorial for Ahn Jung-Geun, Defence Minister Itsunori Onodera, from Kesennuma, Miyagi pref. then told me about Ahn honoured in Japan at Dairin-ji, not far from Kurihara... I found this blog about it: “... The significance for visiting Dairin-ji is because of Ahn Jung-Geun’s second memorial, in which many of his literary works are kept by one of the nieces of the prison guard who oversaw Ahn Jung-Geun during his incarceration...”