their students are dominating the educational system and the publishing business. The ideas of odd communism have never gone from Japanese society to my disappointment.
The Imperial system was reformed by the lawmakers apart from the will of the Emperor Meiji (Meiji Tenno, Mutsuhito) after the Meiji Restoration in 1868. All the tributary relationships based on neo-Confucianism were introduced to the Japanese Imperial System, and the Meiji Imperial system was actually born after the Meiji Restoration.
For example, before the Meiji Restoration, there had been no rule that only the male eldest son of Tenno had the right to inherit the throne of the Emperor in Japanese Tenno System. “Sei” means “system” in Japanese. Anyway, by calling the Imperial System, “Tenno-Sei,” the extreme left-wing activists tried to provoke the feeling of anti-Tenno System among the public.
This anti-Tenno campaign was triggered by the order of Stalin in Soviet Russia. Stalin wanted to export Communist Revolution to other counties including the democratic nations, and the extreme lef-wing activists worldwide were attracted to his message. In the later chapter, I will discuss more in detail regarding the definition of Tenno in the present Constitution of Japan.
I would like to introduce one fact, which resulted in the presence of the Chapter of the present Imperial System in the Japanese Constitution. When the Emperor Showa visited Douglas MacArthur soon after the surrender to the Allied Nations, Showa Tenno’s intention was very clear.
The Emperor Showa, Hirohito, wanted Douglas MacArthur to keep Japan as peaceful as possible at the cost of his own life. Seeing Tennno’s honesty and gentle nature with his courage and determination, Douglas MacArthur decided to make use of him to recover peace in Japan. This meaningful talk led to drafting the constitution with a clear definition of the role of the Emperor. In other words, Tenno has become the symbol of peace of Japan.
Defining the Emperor in Article 2 of the new Constitution of Japan was the decision of Douglas MacArthur and the GHQ, not the Emperor’s decision. In my opinion, this decision should not be subject to Douglas MacArthur’s personal humiliation or personal preference. It was the thoughtful decision made by MacArthur, which took control of the post-war process in Japan. However, Japanese media and political analysts were critical of the existence of the Imperial Family in spite of possessing the knowledge of the background stories of the present imperial system.
At the same time, since media insisted that the Emperor was responsible for all the acts of the Pacific War, a lot of people who experienced the War still believe that the Emperor was the very person who was responsible for the Attack on Pearl Harbor and the rest of the atrocities. Clarifying the accountability as to who was responsible for causing the disasters has been more than crucial even in current Japanese society.
There are a lot of questions regarding the motives of the major Japanese media for writing articles which seem to defy the abundant documented facts about the causes of the Pacific War. At the same time, I wonder why the major Japanese media has had to make up stories to justify themselves.
It is because it is not just about the Emperor. Later in the chapter, I will discuss the summary of the conversation between Douglas MacArthur and the Emperor Showa. The Emperor did not even mention that the ordinary citizens had accountability for causing Attack on the Pearl Harbor and the Pacific War, which was the headline of the major Japanese media, who was primarily responsible for the war, have created and insisted.
The definition of the Emperor under the present Japanese Constitution was changed by MacArthur. Even though there was a major amendment in the Constitution of Japan, the major legal system under the Constitution was left untouched. The present Imperial System was introduced on January 10th, 1947 and came into effect on January 16th in the same year.
When people are asked the role of the Emperor, people are often unaware of his roles in the society. The Emperor is in the highest ranking position among Shinto priests. Therefore, there are rituals held by the Imperial Family, which are related to Shinto.
Before and after the amendment of the Constitution, the role of the Emperor, as a Shinto Priest, has never been changed. The ceremonies and rituals were untouched by GHQ. I will analyze the structure of the enthronement ceremony of the Emperor in the later chapter.
The sad fact is that the background stories of the reason why Tenno is defined as such in the current Constitution is never taught properly. At the same time, major Japanese media carried out an anti-Tenno System and an anti-U.S. Military campaign and some news media even supported communist ideology after the Pacific War. Those media changed their policies but they have been on the far left side and have never discussed relevant topics fairly in the news or newspapers.
In my opinion, if Douglas MacArthur had not been in Japan to resolve the disastrous situation after the War, the whole society would have been thrown into chaos like Iraq and Afghanistan. At the same time, MacArthur considered that ordinary citizens were the victims of the War. Douglas MacArthur also understood the circumstance that the Emperor faced. He clearly wrote this in his memoir.
Despite these facts, the efforts made by GHQ under MacArthur were reported as if MacArthur had been a dictator because Japanese researchers and journalists described him that he took advantage of the surrender of Japan to the United States. I consider this as an inappropriate interpretation. This was a strained understanding of the post-war history made up by them. Douglas MacArthur wanted to change the Meiji Constitution into a more idealistic one according to the standard of true democracy, which has come to be the current Constitution of Japan. The important point is that his intention was not ruling Japan, but making Japan an idealistic democratic country.
A lot of issues Japan faces have been created by major Japanese media, such as the Asahi Newspaper (Asahi Shinbun). Furthermore, the fabricated stories that they made up have been fictionalized in order to justify anti-American ideology. This attitude is almost epidemic, which has led to all the major issues between Japan and the neighboring countries, such as Korea and China.
Going back to the topic of Douglas MacArthur, the primary efforts of Douglas MacArthur were to preserve Japanese culture and to free people from slavery condition under Tojo’s Regime, which dominated the Japanese Empire during the Pacific War. MacArthur acknowledged “the slavery condition of Japanese people,” which was created during the war to a large extent. The introduction of the democratic part of the present Constitution is the result of his efforts. This has been ignored or veiled by Japanese media. The sad fact is that stories of the War itself have been mirrored by the influence of the major Japanese media and a lot of victims of the war have been made to believe the fabricated stories as if they were fact.
Making all the people in the Japanese Empire slaves of the Emperor was not the intention of the Meiji Restoration. The intention of the Meiji Regime was to modernize Japan and to establish Japan as an independent nation as promptly as possible. To reach their goal, the Regime based on neo-Confucianism looked ideal because the head of the regime could control Japan from head to tail. However, in other words, those who believed in the imperialism based on neo-Confucianism in an erratic way made believe that neo-Confucian Imperialism was the real core of the Japanese history. This part was taken away by MacArthur’s policy. The reason for this is that modern bureaucracy is built based on democracy. However, some of the bureaucrats tend to worship and try to make people believe that neo-Confucianism is a good policy and try to justify their misconducts.
This is a shameful fact and at the same time, considering the situation, I can hardly believe that there are still people who make the conspiracy theory. Douglas MacArthur was well aware of the structure of Shinto after Meiji Restoration and he strongly determined to dissolve the moral codes called “Kokka-Shinto (Shinto which was taught as a part of education and was general moral codes among people)” for the purpose of freeing people from one belief that lead to tragedy like the Pacific War.
The true meaning of Shinto, which is the main core of the national identity and a part of Japanese people’s lives, is lost in Japan not because of GHQ measure but because of the major Japanese media and the current educational