Prince Takahito Mikasa
Prince Takahito Mikasa (2 December 1915 – 27 October 2016) was a Japanese imperial family member who was the younger brother of Emperor Hirohito and the uncle of Emperor Akihito, who launched the invasion of China. His father was Emperor Taisho and his mother, Empress Seimei. He is 14 years younger than Emperor Hirohito and is not considered an heir. Sent to China as a Japanese Army soldier during World War II, the anti-war attitude was very resolute after seeing the war hazards caused by the atrocities of the Japanese army, so japan was not prosecuted when it surrendered. Because of his left-wing political color, he was one of the most important figures in Sino-Japanese diplomacy and reconciliation, and apologized to the victims of China and South Korea on behalf of the emperor's family.
1. Origin
On December 2, 1915, the fourth child of Emperor Taisho and Empress Sadaaki was born at the Imperial Palace in Tokyo, and was named "Sumigami Palace" at an early age. Because of the age gap with his three brothers, he grew up in different palaces. He was awarded the title of Mikasa Palace in 1935 and has since studied at the Xizhi Field Cavalry School and the Army University. Prince Chongren studied in the Elementary and Secondary Sections of the Academy of Studies, and graduated from the 48th class of the Army Non-Commissioned Officer School in 1936.
On the left is Emperor Hirohito, with Prince Chongren in the middle and Prince Chongren on the right and prince Chongren's other two brothers
During the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, from January 1943 to January 1944, Prince Chongren, under the pseudonym "Wakasa", was sent to nanjing as a staff officer at the Nanjing headquarters of the Japanese army invading China in Nanjing with the rank of lieutenant of the army, and also served as a member of the House of Nobles and a member of the Japanese Imperial Family.
2. Anti-war
During his tenure as a staff officer in China, Prince Chongren inspected almost all of the Japanese occupation zones in China. On January 5, 1944, Prince Chongren made a speech to the officers of the ranks of Zo and Lieutenant in the General Headquarters. In this speech, he listed the fact that Japan had invaded China since the Sino-Japanese War, exposed the brutal acts of Japanese servicemen, and said that Japan was "taking everything and plundering everything" against China; he also praised the Eighth Route Army and the New Fourth Army for "the relationship between men and women is extremely serious, rape is equal to nothing else; military discipline is also particularly strict, which is absolutely beyond the reach of the Japanese army." This speech was confiscated by the Japanese military as a "dangerous document" at the time.
Prince Chongren in his youth
In January 1944, Prince Chongren was transferred back to Japan as scheduled and served as an army staff officer at the base camp. Prince Chongjin, as an unofficial member of the "Peace Faction", was associated with the forces within the Japanese army that opposed Hideki Tojo. At that time, the "peace faction" in Japan, in view of the fact that the general trend in Japan had gone, tried to assassinate Hideki Tojo to achieve an armistice. Then Prince Chongren, as commander-in-chief of the Japanese army, led the army to retreat back to China, returned to the invading Chinese territory, confessed the crime of aggression, and made an armistice with the Allies to save Japan. However, Prince Chonghito considered the plan too many to kill and was not conducive to an armistice, so in the second half of 1944 he turned himself in to the Tokyo Gendarmerie Command to prevent the plan from being implemented. Prince Chongren was not punished, and the mastermind was sentenced to dismissal, five years' imprisonment, and a two-year suspension of execution, and the whole incident ended. Because of this incident, Emperor Hirohito was very jealous of his fourth brother, and when they met, he asked him what his plans were for the future.
After the end of the Second World War, Prince Chongren was not greatly affected and pursued because of his anti-war ideas and royal status. Prince Chongren renounced the privileges he enjoyed as a royal family and openly criticized the war and the imperial system. He was the first to give up many royal privileges and commute to work by public transport. Because Prince Chongren's anti-war and anti-imperial system words and deeds caused strong dissatisfaction among the Japanese right-wing, the Japanese right-wing later broke into Prince Chongren's residence as a warning.
3. Apologize to China
In the 1970s, in the process of normalizing Sino-Japanese diplomatic relations, Prince Chongjin, as the younger brother of Emperor Hirohito, successfully played a role in promoting the signing of the Sino-Japanese Joint Declaration between Japanese Prime Minister Kakuei Tanaka and Premier Zhou Enlai on September 29, 1972.
Prince Chongren
In November 1998, when President Jiang Zemin visited Tokyo, Japan, Prince Chongren publicly apologized to President Jiang Zemin for the Japanese army's aggression and atrocities during the war, saying: "My conscience still hurts me very much, and I want to apologize to Chinese. ”
4. Death
On October 27, 2016, Prince Mikasa Mikamiya Died at the age of 100 in a hospital in Tokyo due to heart failure. Prince Takahito Mikasa is the longest-lived member of the Japanese imperial family since the Meiji period.
Prince Chongren and his wife Yuriko