I had sworn to myself I would not write again about L'Affaire Tamamoto.
However, I will break my promise to myself.
At the time of Komori Yasuhisa's attacks on Tamamoto Masaru's character and person and the "suspension" of the JIIA's nascent online essay series "Commentary," apologists excused Ambassador Satō Yukio's caving in to pressure on the grounds that the essays Tamamoto was publishing "were just not very good."
That Tamamoto's effective dismissal (he was madogiwaed) and the effective cancellation of "Commentary" came as the result of his poor judgment over the quality of the essays, not due to his progressive politics.
I would submit, ladies and gentlemen of the Jury, for your review, a pair of recent essays from the now properly vetted and reviewed "AJISS Commentary" as evidence:
- Simpleminded or Farsighted? - The US' handling of North Korea
- Japan's Role in a New Paradigm Shift
I am sure you will agree that whatever reasons JIIA may claim compels it to disseminate these two essays, the "quality" of the argument presented is not one of them.
The alarmists were right: the 2006 dispute was very much about politics...and about how close we were to come to witnessing the rise of a very ugly Japan.
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Bell of the Jimmu-ji
Zushi City, Kanagawa Prefecture
July 6, 2008
