Abe Shinzo Thought, Without Apologies

In the run up to the December 16 election, Abe Shinzo and the Liberal Democratic Party were coy about the campaign slogan on their official poster.　



"Nihon o, torimodosu" -- "Japan, We'll Take It Back!"

"Take Japan back?" wags asked, arching an eyebrow. "From where? To where?"

One would think that Abe & Company would leave the questions hanging, with no one admitting the darker reading.

One would be wrong.

Here are the last two paragraphs from Abe Shinzo's just released book Atarashii kuni e:

　今回の総選挙で自民党は「日本を、取り戻す。」というスローガンを揚げています。

これは単に民主党政権から日本を取り戻すという意味ではありません。敢えて言うなら、これは戦後の歴史から、日本という国を日本国民の手に取り戻す戦いであります。

In the last general election, the LDP held aloft the slogan, "Japan, We'll Take It Back!"

This does not simply mean taking Japan back from the administration of the Democratic Party of Japan. If I dare say so, it is the fight to return the country called Japan to the hands of the citizens of Japan from out of the grip of postwar history.

[emphasis added]

How much does Abe Shinzo despise post-1945 Japan, that is to say Japan as it is? So much that he seems to not even admit that the country called "Japan" is the actual Japan. He has to qualify, using the locution Nippon to iu kuni -- "the country called Japan" -- because calling Japan "Japan" would be a...travesty?

As for freeing "the country called Japan" from the clutches of postwar history...

A little passage to quote to anyone who tries to peddle the line that Abe Shinzo has mellowed or learned to keep his revisionism private.