The Thought War: Japanese Imperial Propaganda

Conclusion

184 We will fight until there is a lone leaf on a single tree standing on the burnt ground of Okinawa! —Rear Admiral Ota Minoru J apanese wartime propaganda persisted because it evolved from multiple centers of production. The Cabinet Board of Information, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, military propaganda platoons sent to the Chinese mainland, the Special Higher Police, private individuals, advertisers, comedians, publishers, and writers all worked to urge the nation to support the war. The aim of the propaganda was also multivocal. It championed a variety of messages to a diverse nation and empire, not simply blind devotion to the emperor. Japanese propaganda attempted to convince the Japanese that fighting for Japan meant fighting for modernity. Even when the heady Japanese propaganda abroad ultimately failed in its purpose, the message of Japan as organized, clean, and in pursuit of modernity struck a chord. In the early years of the Japanese occupation of the Philippines, in 1942, one well-respected Japanese propagandist working for the military took to traveling around the countryside delivering fiery orations filled with allegory about Japan’s mission in Asia. Another Japanese listening to both the speech and the translation burst out laughing and had to explain himself. It turned out the lofty presentation had not only gone over the translator’s head, it had totally surpassed his ability in Japanese as well, so he had simply told another story in Tagalog about “when I went to Japan as a study-abroad student, this is what I saw.”1 In Japan and often elsewhere, the vision that wartime propaganda frequently offered seemed appealing because it showed a modern Japan that symbolized healthy people, fast and timely trains, fine consumer products, extensive urban centers, and efficient government. This image of modernity was precisely what the Filipino translator had retained from his stay in Japan. These representations of modernity also made the propaganda resilient, and that is Conclusion Conclusion / 185 why wartime propaganda survived into the postwar era. In the same manner, postwar Japan remained a projection of what wartime propaganda had initially espoused—a modern, economically viable Asian nation offering itself as the model for the rest of the region. This idea of transwar continuity in politics, government, and economy is not new, but the assertion that the same propaganda agencies carried Japan through the war and the occupation is.2 In ways very different from the Nazi experience, Japanese wartime propaganda survived the war precisely because a small coterie of bureaucratic cronies did not dominate. Instead, a large and diffuse body of individuals created both the wartime and the postwar propaganda. Moreover, the process reinforced itself. Japanese propaganda convinced the authorities and the Japanese people that social stability necessitated good propaganda. Few Japanese viewed propaganda as a necessary evil, but rather defined it as a desirable tool for keeping society unified and on the track toward modernization. Even though Japan“swallowed defeat,”voices in Japan’s public sphere did not thereupon clamor for reduced propaganda efforts. Quite the contrary, bureaucrats and the population at large called for redoubled efforts since the war had dissolved so much of what, paradoxically, wartime propaganda had envisioned. For men and for women as well, the war offered a place in the new society. Wartime Japanese society vigorously promoted the institution of marriage and clear identities for women in a mobilized society. Wartime women’s magazines established roles for women that included producing future soldiers, providing additional labor in the war effort, and acting as cheerleaders to spur the society on from the home front.3 This wartime society also considered “loose” women—those who engaged in illicit love affairs—not only as antiwar, but as threatening the fabric of Japanese society and thus disrupting the sensitive relationship between battlefront and home front. Japanese wartime propaganda also endured during the occupation because of the broad social consensus surrounding its implementation. Obviously , the goals of the Japanese state changed after the war, but the mechanisms for influencing such decisions remained constant. Even the individuals who espoused these goals remained the same. Comedians who had performed during the war often later headed various performers’ associations. Both the Japanese and the Americans considered it imperative for the police to maintain social order, but they differed on which path to follow. In the end,“the confusion characterizing the relationship between SCAP and Japanese government officials was complemented by an ambivalent reform program that demanded radical change on one...