Yasukuni, the War Dead and the Struggle for Japan’s Past (review)

Few topics within Japan studies invite a controversy as strong as the Yasukuni shrine. This volume edited by John Breen is a timely, up-to-date addition to the ongoing debates about the significance of Yasukuni, the constitutionality of Japanese official visits, the foreign relations strain with China caused by these visits, and the ongoing construction of national memory and identity. What does Yasukuni mean for the Japanese and non-Japanese? Do the prime minister’s visits at Yasukuni constitute a violation of the separation between state and religion? Should the 14 Class A war criminals who have been enshrined there since 1978 be removed? What about the spirits of colonial subjects, including Taiwanese, Koreans, and Okinawans, and the pending lawsuits demanding their removal from the shrine? In what ways is Yasukuni related to the overwhelming issue of Japan’s war responsibility? These are some of the main questions this volume tries to address. In the editor’s words, it seeks “neither to attack Yasukuni nor, indeed, to commend it. Rather it seeks to bring together authoritative voices from different points on the Yasukuni spectrum, and asks the reader to judge the merits of the arguments presented” (p. 20).

The book is structured in eight chapters by scholars in history, Japan studies, literature, education, philosophy, and media studies. Breen introduces the volume by laying out a Yasukuni genealogy that traces the shifting meaning of the shrine in the Meiji, prewar, World War II, and postwar periods. He urges the reader to “allow the possibility that there are multiple Yasukunis. Adopting a historical perspective on the shrine is essential for underscoring this point. Yasukuni was, at the time of its creation in 1869, a site very different from what is today” (p. 12). The imperial connection was clear from the outset. Yasukuni was the only shrine that was overseen jointly by the Army and Navy ministries, and it was constructed for the apotheosis, propitiation, and honoring of those who sacrificed their lives in the emperor’s name.

In the postwar period, however, after Yasukuni was turned into a regular religious juridical person independent from the government, the interpretation of the meaning of Yasukuni has become far more open-ended. The book showcases a spectrum of positions. On the one end lies a more liberal notion of the freedom of religion. Kevin Doak, for example, sees Yasukuni primarily as an issue of spirituality:

to die for the protection of one’s family friends or fellow countrymen is the most sacred of acts. . . . The paying of respect is an act of mourning their death and of praying for their souls. Can the Chinese leaders and those who argue that Class A war criminals should be removed from Yasukuni really be so arrogant as to believe that they themselves are perfect human beings? Will they themselves not need our prayers some day?

(pp. 53 and 56)

Neither the prime minister’s visits nor the enshrinement of Class A war criminals is an issue for Doak. Similarly, Nitta Hitoshi argues that “it is a citizen’s important duty and right to pay respects, and offer thanks, to those who sacrificed their lives for the nation. It is therefore only right and proper that those responsible in the government venerate at the shrine” (p. 126). On the issue of war criminals, Nitta argues that “Japanese leaders were indicted for crimes that had not previously existed in international law” and that “Class A war criminals are treated at Yasukuni as war dead, and venerated there just like the other ordinary soldiers who sacrificed their lives for the nation” (pp. 131 and 133). Nitta does not see any problem in the Japanese prime minister’s worship at Yasukuni.

Along the rest of the spectrum lie several related but differently articulated arguments against a “personal religious belief”/spirituality position. For Caroline Rose, Yasukuni is problematic because of its continuous role in...