With the 70th anniversary of the end of W.W.2 approaching this year, Shinzo Abe has weighed, with the subtlety of a brick through a window, into the debate. He is quoted today as saying that it has never been established that Japan fought a war of aggression. Perhaps in 1945 it was not deemed necessary to lay out with clarity the fact that Japan had acted aggressively, since the evidence for such a claim was everywhere to be found. Wherever one looked.

Japan seized Taiwan from China after a brief war in 1894/95, then annexed Korea in 1910. Japan invaded Manchuria in 1931, then provoked another conflict with China in 1937. The latter invasion was still in full swing when Japan attacked the United States at Pearl Harbor, before waltzing through South-East Asia on a war of, ahem, liberation and friendship.

As you can see, the evidence for Japanese aggression is very thin indeed and perhaps we should revise our textbooks in line with Mr Abe's critique.



I give you a new peace in our time!