Wikipedia link below
There is ongoing disagreement between Okinawa's local government and Japan's national government over the role of the Japanese military in civilian mass suicides during the battle. In March 2007, the national Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) advised textbook publishers to reword descriptions that the embattled Imperial Japanese Army forced civilians to kill themselves in the war so they would not be taken prisoner by the U.S. military. MEXT preferred descriptions just to say that civilians received hand grenades from the Japanese military. This move sparked widespread protests among Okinawans. In June 2007, the Okinawa Prefectural Assembly adopted a resolution stating, "We strongly call on the (national) government to retract the instruction and to immediately restore the description in the textbooks so the truth of the Battle of Okinawa will be handed down correctly and a tragic war will never happen again." On September 29, 2007, about 110,000 people held the biggest political rally in the history of Okinawa to demand that MEXT retract its order to textbook publishers on revising the account of the civilian suicides. The resolution stated: "It is an undeniable fact that the 'multiple suicides' would not have occurred without the involvement of the Japanese military and any deletion of or revision to (the descriptions) is a denial and distortion of the many testimonies by those people who survived the incidents." In December 2007, MEXT partially admitted the role of the Japanese military in civilian mass suicides. The ministry's Textbook Authorization Council allowed the publishers to reinstate the reference that civilians "were forced into mass suicides by the Japanese military", on condition it is placed in sufficient context. The council report stated: "It can be said that from the viewpoint of the Okinawa residents, they were forced into the mass suicides."
That was, however, not enough for the survivors who said it is important for children today to know what really happened. The Nobel Prize winning author Kenzaburō Ōe has written a booklet which states that the mass suicide order was given by the military during the battle. He was sued by the revisionists, including a wartime commander during the battle, who disputed this and wanted to stop publication of the booklet. At a court hearing, Ōe testified: "Mass suicides were forced on Okinawa islanders under Japan's hierarchical social structure that ran through the state of Japan, the Japanese armed forces and local garrisons." In March 2008, the Osaka Prefecture Court ruled in favor of Ōe, stating, "It can be said the military was deeply involved in the mass suicides." The court recognized the military's involvement in the mass suicides and murder–suicides, citing the testimony about the distribution of grenades for suicide by soldiers and the fact that mass suicides were not recorded on islands where the military was not stationed. In 2012, Korean-Japanese director Pak Su-nam announced her work on the documentary Nuchigafu (Okinawan for "only if one is alive") collecting the still-living survivors’ accounts in order to show "the truth of history to many people," alleging that "there were two types of orders for 'honorable deaths'--one for residents to kill each other and the other for the military to kill all residents."[ In March 2013, Japanese textbook publisher Shimizu Shoin was permitted by MEXT to publish the statements that, "Orders from Japanese soldiers led to Okinawans committing group suicide," and, "The [Japanese] army caused many tragedies in Okinawa, killing local civilians and forcing them to commit mass suicide."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Okinawa#MEXT_controversy
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| The Battle of Okinawa (4m x 8.5 m) détail - 1984 - Toshi & Iri Maruki - Sakima Art Museum |
That was, however, not enough for the survivors who said it is important for children today to know what really happened. The Nobel Prize winning author Kenzaburō Ōe has written a booklet which states that the mass suicide order was given by the military during the battle. He was sued by the revisionists, including a wartime commander during the battle, who disputed this and wanted to stop publication of the booklet. At a court hearing, Ōe testified: "Mass suicides were forced on Okinawa islanders under Japan's hierarchical social structure that ran through the state of Japan, the Japanese armed forces and local garrisons." In March 2008, the Osaka Prefecture Court ruled in favor of Ōe, stating, "It can be said the military was deeply involved in the mass suicides." The court recognized the military's involvement in the mass suicides and murder–suicides, citing the testimony about the distribution of grenades for suicide by soldiers and the fact that mass suicides were not recorded on islands where the military was not stationed. In 2012, Korean-Japanese director Pak Su-nam announced her work on the documentary Nuchigafu (Okinawan for "only if one is alive") collecting the still-living survivors’ accounts in order to show "the truth of history to many people," alleging that "there were two types of orders for 'honorable deaths'--one for residents to kill each other and the other for the military to kill all residents."[ In March 2013, Japanese textbook publisher Shimizu Shoin was permitted by MEXT to publish the statements that, "Orders from Japanese soldiers led to Okinawans committing group suicide," and, "The [Japanese] army caused many tragedies in Okinawa, killing local civilians and forcing them to commit mass suicide."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Okinawa#MEXT_controversy
GO TO NEXT PAGE
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