Prosperous Alarmism/Literature
On April 30, 1947, the International Military Tribunal for the Far East sent a detachment to The City of Sakata in Yamagata Prefecture, Japan, to collect evidence from Ishihara Guan'er.
After the trial, the judge asked Ishihara straight to the point: Do you have anything to say to the International Military Tribunal?
Ishihara replied: Yes, the words I want to say are piled up.
The judge said: Well, you say.
Then, Ishihara Guan'er said an incredible word to the judge, he said: Well, you listen, the central figure of the "Manchurian Incident" is me Ishihara Guan'er, but why am I not a war criminal? This is simply not logical! ”
The judge went on to ask: I heard that you and Hideki Tojo are opposed, is that right?
Ishihara laughed bitterly: Tojo is a person without opinion, how can there be an opinion confrontation with a person without an opinion?
The judge found the old man difficult to deal with and stopped him: Note, witnesses, please do not say anything unrelated to the questioning, just answer yes or no!
The prosecutor continued to ask: Do you know how much damage the Manchurian incident caused to China?
Ishihara replied: Please ask the judge to teach me, how to answer this question with yes or no?
……
In this way, the judge inquired for 2 days and did not get any valuable evidence.
Why is this old man desperately trying to qualify himself as a war criminal? After the trial, the reporters asked Ishihara with great interest: Why do you say that Hideki Tojo is a person without opinion?
Shi Principle said contemptuously: That superior soldier, he should be an accounting officer, let him manage 10 machine guns should not have any problems, but more than 10 do not know.
You know, when toshi was defeated, Hideki Tojo was a combination of prime minister, land minister, and foreign minister, but in Ishihara's mouth, he became a small "superior soldier". Moreover, after the defeat, everyone in the Japanese military circles endangered themselves and wanted to escape the trial, but Ishihara Guan'er became an outlier, and he who had escaped trial fought for himself as a war criminal. Did he really want to repent because he had done too much evil?
Ishihara has been an "outlier" since childhood. His father, Keisuke Ishihara, was once the head of the local police department, so he was sent to the Army Kindergarten School at an early age. During his studies, he did not bathe for many years, and he also put the lice caught from his body into a pencil case to enjoy. When the school arranged a combat drawing class, he turned in his homework to the amazement of the teacher, which drew a man's genitals on it, and also wrote a small line of writing below—my baby, painted on the toilet on November 1st. He believes that the school, from the teacher to the student, is a group of dead readers, and he is a completely different person from them.
Ishihara did have a proud capital, and after graduating from the Army's early school, he was admitted to the Army University, known as the cradle of the elite among Japan's elite. At Lu University, he still maintains his own weird style. The Prince of Japan inspected Lu Da, and Ishihara deliberately did not wear a formal military uniform in order to deliberately discredit Lu Da. He didn't study very hard, but his grades were outstanding. He was originally the first of the graduates of that class, but the first place was to give a speech in front of the emperor, and the school was afraid that he would do something out of the ordinary, so it demoted him to the second place. However, all the teachers and students of Luku University agreed that Ishihara Guan'er was the most outstanding brain of Japan's Lu University and the best student cultivated by Lu University.
After graduating from Lu University, Ishihara was sent to Hankou, China. In the eyes of others, this is a job that was only snubbed, but Ishihara did not care at all, and he was even a little happy. Ishihara has very strange feelings for China, which must be introduced here.
In 1911, after the outbreak of the Xinhai Revolution, he happened to live in Chuncheon, North Korea. When he heard the news of the success of the Wuchang Uprising, he shouted happily: Long live the Republic of China. Then he led a small group of soldiers to a small hill and began to fire a gun at the sky in celebration. At that time, Ishihara believed that the fates of China and Japan were one. If there were only one people of color in Japan, they would definitely be wiped out by the Western powers. If China had risen like Japan, Japan would have a homogeneous dependency.
However, after coming to Hankou, his thoughts began to waver. During his espionage activities, he traveled all over Hunan, Sichuan, Nanjing, Shanghai and other places, covering half of China. During this time, his view of China was impacted. He believes that the officials of this country are corrupt officials, the people are the people, and the soldiers are soldiers. In a word, China is a nation that has failed politically. In addition to his disappointment with China, Ishihara developed a sense of superiority over the Japanese nation. He believes that although China and Japan are the same language and the same species, but you can't do it, then I should lead you, and I will lead you to change your destiny.
During this period, Ishihara also became acquainted with Seishiro Sakagaki, who was also a staff officer, and Sakagaki later became the "best partner" during Ishihara's tenure as a staff officer in the Kwantung Army, and was also a collaborator in instigating the "918 Incident". In 1921, Ishihara returned to Japan to serve as an instructor at the Army University, where he taught the history of war. The following year, he was sent to Germany to study for 3 years as an excellent talent. This study abroad became a key period for the formation of his view of history and the history of war. During this period, he spent a lot of time studying the history of European warfare, arguing about the development of war and the war that Japan would be willing to carry out in the future, and his research results were also personally seen by the Japanese emperor. It was not until 1925 that Ishihara ended his study abroad career and returned to luku to teach.
In October 1928, Ishihara came to China again under the title of staff officer of the Japanese Kwantung Army. At this time, Ishihara was no longer what it used to be, and he had already published the book "The Final War", which is still popular among Japanese people. This book mainly expounds one of Ishihara's ideas. He believes that human civilization originating in Central Asia is divided into two branches, east and west, which have developed their own strengths and characteristics for thousands of years and made continuous progress, while the development of the last two or three centuries has been by leaps and bounds. Today, these two civilizations have developed into a situation of confrontation across the Pacific Ocean. This situation has developed to a certain period, and it will lead to unification through war, thus creating the last supreme civilization and bringing human culture into a golden age. This final war between mankind and Russia will be a real world war centered on Japan and the United States, that is, the final war of the world.
In the "Theory of the Final War", Ishihara also proposed the theory of the "Manchurian lifeline". He believed that northeast China should be taken first, then used as a base to conquer the Soviet Union, conquer China in the south, and finally represent the entire yellow world and engage in a showdown between Eastern and Western civilizations with the United States.
Ishihara's view of war is quite historical, which makes his theory stand out from other Japanese generals of his contemporaries. Ishihara predicted that the situation of the coming war would be a general war. In terms of the number of soldiers, it is currently all men of the right age who participate in the war, and the next war is not only men of the right age, but also men, women and children. As far as tactical changes are concerned, historically, the phalanx of dense formations from the beginning has become horizontal, then into scattered troops, and then into the tactics of battle groups, that is, from point to surface. And the next war will be a three-dimensional war.
Ishihara put forward the theory of feeding war with war. He believed that once a war could not be won quickly, it would inevitably be dragged into a protracted war. Then, it is necessary to collect war resources from the other country to achieve the purpose of feeding the war with war. The core of war is to occupy the territory of the other country, control the main strategic resources, and systematically engage in resource collection to provide resources for the military industry.
In 1930, Ishihara began to actively plan the "Manchurian Incident". He proposed to occupy Manchuria from the inside out, first taking the opportunity to occupy Fengtian, and then occupying the entire northeast. At that time, there were only more than 10,000 Kwantung Army stationed in northeast China, while Zhang Xueliang's Northeast Army had 440,000 people. Japan ridiculed the Kwantung Army for being a bamboo knife, but Ishihara dismissed it. Ishihara boasted that Fengtian would be pacified within two days, and as a result, the Japanese army occupied Fengtian in less than 12 hours in the "918 Incident".
The next step is to gradually absorb the land of the three eastern provinces. Long before the "918 Incident", Ishihara had already begun to arrange for the Japanese agent in Jilin to force Tongzhen to create a riot in Jilin and then demand the dispatch of troops under the pretext of protecting overseas Chinese. Ōkō Tōjō instructed the Japanese ronin to shoot shops in the Japanese concentration and then reported to the Kwantung Army that more than 900 Japanese expatriates were in danger. Therefore, under the persuasion of Ishihara and others, the commander of the Kwantung Army ordered the march into Jilin under the pretext of saving the Japanese overseas Chinese in Jilin Province. At the same time, Xi Cha, chief of staff of the Jilin Border Defense Army, who was known for his pro-Japanese tendencies, took the initiative to contact the Japanese army. On September 21, the Japanese army occupied Jilin without bloodshed.
On October 5, Ishihara was promoted to chief of the Operations Division of the Kwantung Army. The Kwantung Army then expanded the second step of the invasion plan, bombing Jinzhou and attacking Qiqihar. This time, Ishihara personally flew 12 Japanese bombers to bomb the Jiangbei Border Defense Office and the two offices of Liaoning Province in Jinzhou, and also attacked the Dahushan and Goubangzi stations.
In late October, Ishihara actively prepared to attack Qiqihar in Heilongjiang. Qiqihar is located in the Songliao Plain, which is easy to attack and difficult to defend, and only the Nen River can be used as a natural barrier. In order to prevent the Japanese from invading, the Chinese defenders Ma Zhanshan blew up the No. 1, 2, and 5 bridges of the Nenjiang Railway Bridge. The Japanese army then used the River Bridge as an excuse, and with the cooperation of the puppet army, attacked the Nen River. However, the battle did not go as smoothly as Ishihara thought, and both Japanese attacks were repelled by the Chinese defenders with frontal resistance and flanking and roundabout tactics.
In order to save face, the Japanese army sent 2 additional infantry battalions to Jiangqiao to launch an attack on Daxing Station on the north bank of the Nen River, but still met with stubborn resistance from the Chinese defenders. In order to preserve his living forces, Ma Zhanshan decided to abandon the Jiangqiao and Daxing positions and retreat his troops to the three-room position. Just as Ishihara was planning to approach the three rooms, the Kwantung Army Command sent him a telegram ordering him to return to the General Staff immediately.
It turned out that there were huge differences between the Kwantung Army and Japan over the issue of the Kwantung Army sending troops to Tohoku. The former firmly advocated the capture of Qiqihar, while the latter, because of his concern for the Soviet Union, advocated controlling the war in southern Manchuria. However, because the wood was already in the boat, Ishihara was not punished in any way. A month after the establishment of the puppet Manchukuo, Ishihara was ordered to return to China under the name of General Kaixuan and was awarded the Order of the Golden Rooster by Emperor Hirohito. For a time, this "Manchurian hero" became popular throughout the Japanese archipelago and became an example for Japanese young officers. But at the same time, it also left a foreshadowing for his future exclusion.
In 1937, after Ishihara became deputy chief of staff of the Kwantung Army, Hideki Tojo, then chief of staff of the Kwantung Army, became his immediate superior. Ishihara never hid his contempt for Tojo, believing that Tojo was stubborn and stupid and incompetent for his position. Tojo was intolerant, and the contradictions between the two sides heated up sharply.
During his tenure in the Kwantung Army, Ishihara insisted on the idea of gradually invading China, while Tojo advocated a one-hit theory against China. When the Lugou Bridge Incident broke out, Tojo believed that the incident was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and believed that China's resistance would never exceed a year. Under the supervision of Zaitojo, the "Mengjiang" Corps of the Kwantung Army captured Zhangjiakou on August 29, and Datong on September 13.
At the strategic level, the Japanese army has always hovered between moving north or south. Ishihara believed that Japan was temporarily unable to fight the United States and must recharge its strength to prepare for war against the Soviet Union, forcing the Soviet Union to abandon the Far East. After this step is implemented, the Japanese army can consider going south. However, Tojo believes that the northern border is relatively safe and has no worries. The Japanese army should take this opportunity to attack China with all its might and occupy the "Mongolian Frontier" area. Although the aggressive intentions of the two men are the same, they can be described as needle-pointing against Mai Mang in terms of strategy.
Tojo was also very dissatisfied with Ishihara's finger-pointing at work. At a meeting of ministers, Tojo publicly pointed out that Ishihara should concentrate on assisting the chief of staff in combat and station relations, and should intervene less in matters related to "Manchukuo", and that as the chief of staff, he should be the core of all decision-making. Ishihara naturally refused to show weakness, so the two sides remained in a stalemate. In the end, Ishihara was expelled from the Kwantung Army, which was naturally expected.
In 1938, Ishihara became commander of Maizuru Fortress. In 1939, Ishihara was promoted to lieutenant general, but was transferred back to Japan as commander of the 16th Division in Kyoto. In October 1939, Ishihara founded the so-called Association of the East Asian League in Tokyo to actively advocate the East Asian Union Movement, which was once sought after by some Japanese and Japanese puppet regimes. Ishihara said that he should take the royal way as the guide and asked the three kingdoms of Japan, Manchuria, and China to adhere to the following principles.
1. National Defense: To guard against caucasia and defend the east Asian world, Manchukuo must be established.
2. Politics: Japan, Manchuria and China are politically independent according to the characteristics of their own countries and do not interfere in internal affairs.
3. Economy: Seeking integration for the purpose of coexistence and common prosperity.
4. Culture: The two ethnic groups should respect each other's culture, create an oriental culture centered on morality, and absorb Western culture to achieve the highest civilization of mankind.
Obviously, the principle proposed by Ishihara still requires the practice of the theory of gradual aggression against China previously proposed. For his part, Ishihara personally wanted to build his political capital through the East Asian Union movement in order to compete with Hideki Tojo and others. However, in July 1940, Hideki Tojo became Minister of War. The following year, at the urging of Hideki Tojo, the Cabinet declared the East Asian Union Movement an illegitimate political movement. Then, ishihara was relieved of all his duties and transferred to the reserve. In Japanese military circles, being placed in the reserve basically means the end of a military career. After Ishihara retired from the military, he became the director of the National Defense Research Institute at Ritsumeikan University, where he taught "The Final War Theory" and continued to sell his theory. However, Hideki Tojo still did not spare him, and even used the gendarmes to monitor him, and finally forced him to leave the university.
In this political struggle, the fundamental reason why Ishihara lost was still to blame himself. Ishihara was originally only a small lieutenant colonel, but after the "918 Incident", he quickly became a major and was later promoted to general. Behind him, there are countless dejinzos like him, all of whom want to imitate his behavior and make a contribution. Peacetime soldiers cannot make meritorious contributions, and Ishihara's proposal at this time to gradually invade China is equivalent to blocking their ascent channels. As a result, Ishihara was left aside by his imitators and marginalized along the way.
Due to different political views, Ishihara was excluded all the way and finally had to withdraw from the war. He also argued that Japan should abandon resistance altogether and act like a pacifist. Because of this, Ishihara was not held accountable by the Tokyo trial after the war, and even became a witness against war criminals. Therefore, there are many Japanese people who affirm his theory, they believe that Japan's defeat was due to a departure from Ishihara's ideas, and if Ishihara's ideas were followed, Japan could avoid a crushing defeat in the Pacific War. However, we should be clear that Ishihara and Tojo are only strategically different, and the nature of their aggression has not changed.
Ishihara's struggle to be a war criminal was not because he repented of his crimes. One of the reasons was the comparison between the militarists, and the Hideki Tojo that he despised the most was positioned as a Class A war criminal, was he not as good as the superior soldier? The second reason is that the broken jar of the dying person is broken. At this time, Ishihara had already learned that he had bladder cancer, and he did not live long anyway, so it was better to "sacrifice his life for righteousness" to become a hero of the entire nation.
Two years later, on August 15, 1949, the day of the fourth anniversary of Japan's surrender, Ishihara, who regretted not becoming a war criminal for the rest of his life, died of uremia caused by bladder cancer at his home in the village of Takase in Yamato. Eight months before his death, sekijiro Sakagaki and seven other Class-A war criminals were sent to the Far East Military Tribunal for execution, along with Ishihara's co-conspirators in planning the September 18 Incident. I don't know how Ishihara, who was angry at home because of bladder cancer, felt!