(OT) Japanese Prime Minister Copies and Pastes Speech for Hiroshima AND Nagasaki Memorial Ceremonies for Atomic Bomb Victims

Somehow quite fitting for Mr. Shinzo Abe, who, along with his Minister of Education and Science, remains staunch supporter of Ms. Haruko Obokata, who copied and pasted and photoshopped her way to a very brief scientific fame (turned infamy) as a "Nature" author on STAP cells.

Unlike Ms. Obokata, who copied and pasted other people's work (among many other misconducts) without citation, Prime Minister Abe claims his is no misconduct, because the speeches he lifted for this year's ceremonies were his own speeches for the same occasions last year.

Tokyo Shinbun (8/8/2014) says the opening few paragraphs of Mr. Abe's speech in Hiroshima on August 6, 2014 were almost identical to his speech in 2013.

2013 speech on the left, 2014 speech on the right. Only the parts highlighted in blue are different:

It apparently got better (I know I should say "worse") in Nagasaki. Mr. Abe's speech on August 9, 2014 was identical except for the number of years since the atomic bomb was dropped in Nagasaki:

The Prime Minister's Office has the temerity to say this after the Hiroshima ceremony, according to Kyodo News (via Nikkan Sports):

首相のあいさつは、犠牲者を悼み、平和に力を尽くす決意を述べたものだ。その姿勢は昨年も本年も全く変わりはない

Prime Minister's speech is to mourn for the victims and to express his determination to do his utmost for peace. This attitude is the same as the last year.

平和への祈りや追悼の気持ちは、政府も被爆者やその遺族、地元の人たちと変わりはない。そういう部分はどうしても同じようになってしまう

Praying for peace and mourning [for the victims] are shared by the government, atomic bomb victims and their families, and local residents. The part [that expresses such feeling] ends up being similar, no matter what.

Similar? How about "identical"?

I was amused by the reaction in Japan on Twitter, where people were rightfully angry and upset that the prime minister didn't bother to change this year's speech from the last year's, and that it was such an insult to the victims, Japanese citizens, and foreign dignitaries who attended the ceremonies. Many of them seem to think a prime minister, or any politician, is supposed to write his/her own speech, and that the more world-class he/she is the better speech he/she writes and gives.

'Tatemae' hurts.

To me, the ultimate insult is that the Japanese government hasn't owned up to its own culpability for the two atomic bombs dropped in Japan in August 1945, as 2011 NHK Special revealed, and that most Japanese refuse to face the possibility that their government was fully aware that those planes were carrying atomic bombs but let the bombing happen anyway, if the NHK documentary is correct. (For those who wants to know more about the NHK documentary, see my posts from last year, here and here.)

Meanwhile, Mr. Abe's comrade in copying and pasting, Ms. Obokata, is still with Riken drawing nice salary no doubt while she gets ready for delicate lab work and preparing tea, thanks to the strong pressure Mr. Abe and his Education Minister exerted on Riken, a research institution funded by public money, not to fire her.

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Japan Under Prime Minister Abe: Back to the Future (to Pre-World War II)?

Someone is ripping the pages off over 300 copies of Anne Frank's "Diary of a Young Girl" in libraries in parts of Tokyo and Yokohama. The police thinks the same person may be doing it.

Minami Kyushu City in Kagoshima Prefecture in Kyushu has applied to the UNESCO to have over 300 pieces of farewell letters by "kamikaze" pilots during the World War II designated as "world heritage", so that people will remember how awful a war is. (Anne Frank's "Diary" is designated as "world heritage".)

Kasai City in Hyogo Prefecture wants to memorialize the runway used by kamikaze pilots during the World War II as a historic site.

William Pesek, Bloomberg's columnist in Tokyo wonders aloud: Where is Prime Minister Abe?

From Bloomberg News (2/23/2014):

Is Abe Encouraging Japan's Nut Jobs?

There's a reason the nuns in Queens had me and my classmates read Anne Frank's "The Diary of a Young Girl" several times -- the same reason that's made the book required reading around the globe. The 15-year-old's account of hiding from the Nazis is impervious to nut jobs who argue the Holocaust is fiction.

Shockingly, in recent days at least 282 copies of Frank's memoirs have been vandalized at 36 libraries across Tokyo -- their pages torn or defaced. No one knows who did it, or why. But it requires an acrobatic feat of compartmentalization not to see the connection to Japan's own recent efforts to deface history.

Earlier this month, the southern Japanese city of Minami Kyushu asked the U.N. World Heritage organization to enshrine farewell letters written by World War II kamikaze suicide pilots alongside documents like Frank's diaries and the Magna Carta. The request drew an immediate rebuke from China and stirred up Japan's right wing. What many see as evidence of Japan's wartime fanaticism, nationalists view as testaments to manly duty and devotion to the Emperor.

I have no evidence that Japan's right-wingers are behind this clearly coordinated campaign to desecrate Frank's work. Anti-Semitism isn't particularly pervasive among Japanese (although one extremist group is organizing a 125th birthday party for the Fuhrer so fans can "converse, listening to Wagner's music and enjoying wine together"). But it would be a coincidence of astounding proportions if this shameful vandalism weren't related to the kamikaze letters controversy.

One has to ask to what extent the return of nationalistic leader Shinzo Abe has encouraged such behavior. Though most attention has focused on Abe's efforts to revive the economy, right-wingers have delighted in the prime minister's other initiatives -- to whitewash textbooks, beautify Japan's wartime aggression, load the governing board of national broadcaster NHK with like-minded conservatives, and embolden the nation's military.

No, I'm not suggesting Abe bears responsibility for the Frank diary attacks. But his 14 months in office have created an atmosphere that's encouraging fringe activists, who may believe Abe secretly supports them. Intentionally or not, the Prime Minister has fed this impression by visiting Yasukuni Shrine, which honors 14 World War II Class A war criminals, and hinting that he wants to revisit a past apology for the military's sex-slave program. Among Abe's picks for the NHK board is a man who claims the Nanjing Massacre of the 1930s never happened.

When Abe and his ilk explain why Japan should be able to honor its dead soldiers and rewrite its pacifist constitution, they highlight how their nation has been a model global citizen. The argument is not without merit. For 68 years now, Japan has been a peaceful, generous, and reasonably cooperative power.

Yet Abe's rightward turn could squander much of the "soft power" Japan amassed since then. Japanese don't tend to track events in Richmond, Virginia and Glendale, California very closely. But it’s in these two American cities that officials in Tokyo can get a glimpse of their nation's future. It's not pretty.

On Feb. 6, the Virginia legislature passed a bill to change textbooks to say the Sea of Japan is also known as the East Sea. It may not seem like a big deal, but the move outraged Japan. The change came at the behest of fast-rising contingent of Korean-American voters who are wielding that power to right what they view as historical wrongs by Japan 7,000 miles away. Tokyo has also taken great umbrage at a "comfort women" statue in the Los Angeles area erected by Asian Americans, and protests from Japanese diplomats and an online petition to President Barack Obama have gone unheeded. More and more, Chinese-Americans are showing up at Japanese consulates with protest placards, including in December when Abe visited Yasukuni.

As Abe preaches the glory of patriotism more than capitalism, expect Korea and China to intensify efforts around the world to shame Tokyo. Take Xi Jinping's trip to Germany next month. According to Reuters, the Chinese president plans to highlight Germany's atonement for the sins of World War II, in order to embarrass Japan. It's a reminder that statements from Japanese politicians have repeatedly undercut the country's many apologies for its wartime behavior.

Abe's mandate from voters is the economy, not prettifying some ugly moments in the nation's history. He should get back to that job. But first he must unequivocally condemn the Frank attacks in clear and strong terms. Few issues are more cut-and-dry than the need to denounce anti-Semitism in all forms. This isn't an issue to be left to Abe's cabinet chief, Yoshihide Suga, whose name isn't widely known outside Japan. Suga has promised a full investigation. But this is a task for the nation's leader, and Abe's silence is, like much of his other signaling thus far, damaging the nation's interests.

Mr. Pesek seems to think the culprit behind the defaced copies of Anne Frank's "Diary" is an Abe supporter. It is indeed possible that his supporters are that dumb.

JTA (2/21/2014; emphasis is mine) notes that Anne Frank's "Diary" is extremely popular in Japan, with the number of copies sold only next to the United States:

Vandals destroy copies of Anne Frank’s diary in Japan

(JTA) — More than 100 copies of Anne Frank’s “Diary of a Young Girl” have been vandalized in public libraries in Japan’s capital Tokyo.

Pages have been ripped from at least 265 copies of the diary and other related books, Japanese officials told the BBC on Thursday. It is not clear who is behind the vandalism, they said.

Anne Frank’s diary was written during World War II, while the teenager hid from the Nazis in occupied Amsterdam. The book made her a symbol of the suffering of Jews during the war.

The head of Japan’s library council, Satomi Murata, told the French AFP news agency that five of Tokyo’s wards had reported the vandalism so far. “We don’t know why this happened or who did it,” he added.

Toshihiro Obayashi, a library official in West Tokyo’s Suginsami area, said, “Each and every book which comes up under the index of Anne Frank has been damaged at our library.”

The Simon Wiesenthal Center said in a statement that it was shocked and concerned by the incidents, and called for the authorities to investigate.

“The geographic scope of these incidents strongly suggest an organized effort to denigrate the memory of the most famous of the 1.5 million Jewish children murdered by the Nazis in the World War II Holocaust,” Associate Dean Abraham Cooper said.

Rotem Kowner, a professor of Japanese history and culture at Israel’s University of Haifa, told the BBC that the book has been exceptionally popular and successful in Japan.

He said that in terms of absolute numbers of copies of the book sold, Japan is second only to the United States.

About 30,000 Japanese tourists visit the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam every year, about 5,000 visitors more than the number of visitors from Israel.

Japan is also the only East Asian country with statues and a museum in memory of Anne Frank.

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UK Telegraph: Top Secret "Project Seal" - US and New Zealand Tested "Tsunami Bomb" During World War II

It was deemed "feasible", as it would inundate and destroy a small coastal city with 33-foot tidal wave.

How they could have lined up the explosives 5 miles off the coast (of Japan, presumably) would be a separate issue. But I have a feeling that Japanese would have preferred this "tsunami bomb" over two atomic bombs it got, 3 days apart in August 1945.

From UK's Telegraph (1/1/2013):

'Tsunami bomb' tested off New Zealand coast

The United States and New Zealand conducted secret tests of a "tsunami bomb" designed to destroy coastal cities by using underwater blasts to trigger massive tidal waves.

The tests were carried out in waters around New Caledonia and Auckland during the Second World War and showed that the weapon was feasible and a series of 10 large offshore blasts could potentially create a 33-foot tsunami capable of inundating a small city.

The top secret operation, code-named "Project Seal", tested the doomsday device as a possible rival to the nuclear bomb. About 3,700 bombs were exploded during the tests, first in New Caledonia and later at Whangaparaoa Peninsula, near Auckland.

The plans came to light during research by a New Zealand author and film-maker, Ray Waru, who examined military files buried in the national archives.

"Presumably if the atomic bomb had not worked as well as it did, we might have been tsunami-ing people," said Mr Waru.

"It was absolutely astonishing. First that anyone would come up with the idea of developing a weapon of mass destruction based on a tsunami ... and also that New Zealand seems to have successfully developed it to the degree that it might have worked." The project was launched in June 1944 after a US naval officer, E A Gibson, noticed that blasting operations to clear coral reefs around Pacific islands sometimes produced a large wave, raising the possibility of creating a "tsunami bomb".

Mr Waru said the initial testing was positive but the project was eventually shelved in early 1945, though New Zealand authorities continued to produce reports on the experiments into the 1950s. Experts concluded that single explosions were not powerful enough and a successful tsunami bomb would require about 2 million kilograms of explosive arrayed in a line about five miles from shore.

"If you put it in a James Bond movie it would be viewed as fantasy but it was a real thing," he said.

"I only came across it because they were still vetting the report, so there it was sitting on somebody's desk [in the archives]."

Forty years after the joint testing, New Zealand faced a dramatic breakdown in its security ties with the US after it banned the entry of nuclear-armed ships from entering its territory during the 1980s. The dispute led to the US downgrading its relationship with New Zealand from an "ally" to a "friend".

(Full article at the link)

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