WAR RESPONSIBILITY--delving into the past / Yomiuri sums up who's to blame for 'Showa War'

The Yomiuri Shimbun

The Yomiuri Shimbun and The Daily Yomiuri will report today and Tuesday the findings of a yearlong examination by an in-house committee into the responsibility of wartime national leaders.

The Yomiuri Shimbun's War Responsibility Verification Committee has examined the series of wars from the Manchurian Incident to the end of World War II--hostilities that from today we will collectively call the "Showa War"--with particular focus on why Japan recklessly entered the war and why it took so long to bring the fighting to an end.

The committee's reports have been carried occasionally in The Yomiuri Shimbun.

To conclude the War Responsibility series, The Yomiuri Shimbun and The Daily Yomiuri will carry final reports today and Tuesday in which we clarify the degree of responsibility borne by Japanese political and military leaders, as well as chiefs and officials in the army and naval general staff offices and ranking bureaucrats. At the same time, we look at what lessons the country and people should learn from the war.

The War Responsibility series, which started in August last year in The Yomiuri Shimbun, covered the period from the Manchurian Incident of 1931 (sixth year in the Showa era) until the end of the fighting in 1945 (20th year in Showa era).

The series of war has been called the Greater East Asia War, the Pacific War, the 15-Year War, the Asia-Pacific War or the Second World War.

Each of these terms has some justification, but they are not necessarily appropriate when considering factors such as a sense of resistance against certain ideologies, the period of the war and areas where fighting took place.

These names have been used independently. Some people refer to the war as "that war" or "the latest war." As a result, no name has been universally adopted by the Japanese, even though this year marks the 61st year since the war ended. Hence, The Yomiuri Shimbun adopted the name Showa War.

The Showa era lasted for a relatively long period--slightly more than 62 years from Dec. 25, 1926, to Jan. 7, 1989. The war lasted for about one-fourth of the entire Showa era. Many Japanese already consider the war in a historical context.

The Yomiuri Shimbun decided to call the war the Showa War not because of consideration to Emperor Showa, but because the war occurred during the Showa era.

For the first part of the final report, turn to Pages 10-12.