Japan marks 80th anniversary of WWII surrender as concern grows about fading memory

TOKYO — Japan is paying tribute to more than 3 million war dead as the country marks its surrender 80 years ago, ending World War II, as concern grows about the rapidly fading memories of the tragedy of war and the bitter lessons from the era of Japanese militarism.

Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba expressed “remorse” over the war, which he called a mistake, restoring the word in a Japanese leader’s Aug. 15 address for the first time since 2013, when former premier Shinzo Abe shunned it.

Ishiba, however, did not mention Japan’s aggression across Asia or apologize.

Moment of silence, peace pledge and chrysanthemum flowers

“We will never repeat the tragedy of the war. We will never go the wrong way,” Ishiba said. “Once again, we must deeply keep to our hearts the remorse and lesson from that war.”

He vowed to keep passing down the tragedy of war and peace pledge to next generations.

In a national ceremony Friday at Tokyo’s Budokan hall, about 4,500 officials and bereaved families and their descendants from around the country observed a moment of silence at noon, the time when the then-emperor’s surrender speech began on Aug. 15, 1945. Participants later offered chrysanthemum flowers for the war dead.

Yaskuni Shrine and lawmakers

Just a block away at the Yasukuni Shrine, dozens of Japanese rightwing politicians and their supporters came to pray.

The shrine honors Japan’s 2.5 million war dead, including convicted war criminals. Victims of Japanese aggression, especially China and the Koreas, see visits to the shrine as a lack of remorse about Japan’s wartime past.

Ishiba stayed away from Yasukuni and sent a religious ornament as a personal gesture instead of praying at the controversial shrine.

But Shinjiro Koizumi, the agriculture minister considered as a top candidate to replace the beleaguered prime minister, prayed at the shrine. Koizumi, the son of popular former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi whose Yasukuni visit as a serving leader in 2001 outraged China, is a regular at the shrine.

Back at his ministry, Koizumi told reporters that he made the no-war pledge to the spirits. “It is important to not forget those who sacrificed their lives for their country,” he said.

Rightwing lawmakers, including former economic security ministers Sanae Takaichi and Takayuki Kobayashi, as well as governing Liberal Democratic Party heavyweight Koichi Hagiuda, also visited the shrine Friday.

A non-partisan group of 87 parliamentarians led by Liberal Democrat Ichiro Aisawa also prayed at Yasukuni, pledging “to uphold peace” in Japan and in the Indo-Pacific region. Aisawa vowed to “pass down the historical facts of war to future generations.”

Separately, Sohei Kamiya, head of the populist far-right Sanseito, came with 17 parliamentarians and 70 local assembly members from his party and said he prayed for the war dead. He told reporters that the prime minister should visit Yasukuni.

Emperor shows ‘deep remorse’ and stresses importance to keep telling the war’s tragedy

Japanese emperors have stopped visiting the Yasukuni site since the enshrinement of top war criminals there in 1978.

Emperor Naruhito, in his address at the Budokan memorial Friday, expressed his hope that the ravages of war will never be repeated while “reflecting on our past and bearing in mind the feelings of deep remorse.”

Naruhito reiterated the importance of telling the war’s tragic history and the ordeals faced during and after the conflict to younger generations as “we continue to seek the peace and happiness of the people in the future.”

As part of the 80th anniversary, he has traveled to Iwo Jima, Okinawa and Hiroshima, and is expected to visit Nagasaki with his daughter, Princess Aiko, in September.

Passing on history to younger generations amid revisionism

Hajime Eda, whose father died on his way home from Korea when his ship was hit by a mine, said he will never forget his father and others who never made it home. In his speech representing the bereaved families, Eda said it is Japan’s responsibility to share the lesson — the emptiness of the conflict, the difficulty of reconstruction and the preciousness of peace.

There was some hope at the ceremony, with a number of teenagers participating after learning about their great-grandfathers who died in the battlefields.

Among them, Ami Tashiro, a 15-year-old high school student from Hiroshima, said she joined a memorial marking the end of the battle on Iwo Jima last year after reading a letter her great-grandfather sent from the island. She also hopes to join in the search for his remains.

As the population of wartime generations rapidly decline, Japan faces serious questions on how it should pass on the wartime history to the next generation. The country already faced revisionist pushbacks since the 2010s under Abe, who said Japan should correct a “self-deprecating view” of its wartime history and regain national pride.

Since 2013, Japanese prime ministers stopped apologizing to Asian victims, under the precedent set by Abe.

Some lawmakers’ denial of Japan’s military role in massive civilian deaths on Okinawa or the Nanking Massacre have stirred controversy.

Naoya Endo, 64, came to Yasukuni in place of his late father who was among a few out of his unit’s 50 members who returned from Taiwan. He said he worries about the growing global tension and hopes there will be no war in his lifetime. He lamented that many Japanese have lost pride and a love of their homeland.

In an editorial Friday, the Mainichi newspaper noted that Japan’s pacifist principle was mostly about staying out of global conflict, rather than thinking how to make peace, and called the country to work together with Asian neighbors as equal partners.

“It’s time to show a vision toward ‘a world without war’ based on the lesson from its own history,” the Mainichi said.