Militarism & Fascism

Jobial alex

 Critically analyze the failure of democracy and rise of militarism in Japan. (2018)
 The militarism in Japan was inextricably linked with its imperialist ambitions. Comment. (2017)
 Account for the rise of militarism in Japan. (2016)
 Does the failure of the political parties to establish a parliamentary form of government provide an adequate
explanation for the emergence of militarism in Japan? (2015)
 The rise of militarism in Japan was due to the failure of parliamentary democracy. Discuss. (2014)
 Critically analyze the failure of democracy and rise of militarism in Japan. Can Japanese militarism be characterized as
“fascism”? (SLS)

The period from 1931 to 1941 in the Japanese history has been referred to as a dark age (Kurai Janima – dark valley) which
witnessed the emergence of militarism as well as ultra-nationalism. By the late 1920s the failure of political parties was well
evident leading to a chaotic state of affairs in the governmental apparatus. It was a disturbed period when there was intense
conflict between military and civil government and ultimately, the military established its dominance over the socio-
economic and political life. The characterization of this period as militarist or fascist is a bone of contention among the
historians. Western scholars like Barrington Moore Jr. and Andrew Gordon tend to call it fascist whereas Japanese scholars
call it militarist.

The political parties had been growing steadily since 1890s, reaching its climax during the prime minister-ship of Kato
Takaaki (1924-1926) whose rule (Taisho democracy) has been hailed as the best period of parliamentary government. The
Cabinet finally acquired a concrete shape and the Japanese political system seemed to have acquired the character of a
responsible civil government. The government tried to curtail the influence of the military in politics and reduced the
massive expenditure on army and navy. However, simultaneously, certain changes occurred that were not very conducive to
the long term existence of the party government. By the early 1920s, most of the Meiji oligarchs (Genro), who had been
dominating the political scenario, had either passed away or retired and were not replaced by equally competent and
experienced leaders. The conflict between the military and the civil government became more frequent, reaching its pinnacle
by the late 1920s. Furthermore, the army emerged as a highly radicalized, unified, strong and aggressive group which by the
late 1920s attracted huge zaibatsu support. Zaibatsu saw many advantages in the army’s expansionist policy. This change in
policy gave the military in general and army in particular a very strong sense of direction, for example, the notion of doka.
The growth of army influence in government was the outcome of the conquest of Manchuria which turned out to be a
decisive incident in proving who is superior in this battle between the military and the civil government.

Apart from the decline of the Genro and the increased military activism, there were some deep embedded factors in Japanese
society that contributed to the rise of militarism, viz, Shintoism centered on emperor worship, kokotai principle (the love for
the emperor and the love for the country), the notion of Samurai glory, etc. Moreover, by the beginning of the 20 th century
nationalism turned more radical, giving rise to ultra-nationalism intertwined with the notions of doka, pan-Asianism, Greater
East Asia Co-prosperity sphere etc. along with a strong anti-west fervor. Yet another factor was the emergence of new
intellectuals like Minobe Tatsukichi, Yanaihara Tadao and many other Showa scholars who admired Germany under Hitler
and advocated military hegemony, closed economic empire and anti-democratic hierarchic political structure.

The rise of militarism in Japan can be traced back to the century-old military tradition of the samurai. Hundreds of years of
rule by men-of-sword had made the people ready to accept the claims of militarists to national leadership. Fundamentally,
Japan had a strong tradition of unquestioned obedience to authority. The spirit of Bushido had existed in the hearts of the
Japanese and it permeated into all social strata through the nation-wide conscription army.

Furthermore, foreign threats emphasized the importance of militarism. Japan in the 1850s had been forced to sign unequal
treaties, and her independence was threatened in an age of imperialism. These facts taught the Japanese the realities of
power politics — that “might is right.” As such, the Meiji leaders, mostly ex-samurai, learnt the necessity of a strong
military force. In time, they carried out important military reforms and created an army second only to Germany in the
world. Inevitably, the military services were to have decisive influence in the nation’s affairs.
Institutional loopholes helped to increase the influence of the militarists. The Meiji Constitution 1889 gave autonomy to
the armed services. It stated that the services had the right of direct access to the emperor, and thus may bypass the
government if it became necessary to do so. A second loophole was the 1900 decree which established the rule that only
serving generals and admirals could become Ministers of War and of the Navy. As such, the army and navy could wreck a
government which was against their interests by refusing to supply it with army or navy ministers. These institutional
loopholes, no doubt, encouraged the growth of military influence and autonomy.

Another factor that strengthened the tradition of militarism was Japan’s victories in the Sino-Japanese and Russo-
Japanese Wars. These two victories brought great benefits to Japan - in terms of money and territorial gains as well as
international status. These gave great prestige to the militarists and taught the Japanese a lesson that war was the best
instrument to further national interest and it paid high dividends. In short, victories justified the advocates of militarism and
expansion.

The military was displeased with the performance of the civil government since the end of World War 1 and objected firmly
to the rejection of their proposals. The military men resented the reduction in size of the armed forces (Washington
Conference, 1921) and regarded Foreign Minister Shidehara’s policy of improving relations with China as a sign of
weakness. The Japanese government entered into a bilateral agreement with China on 4 th February, 1922 which returned the
Shantung province to China. Henceforth the China policy of Japan was aimed at economic gains rather than military
expansion. Shidehara who spearheaded this Soft China Policy became popular as a peace-loving pacifist leader. Above all,
in the London Naval Disarmament Conference, 1930 Japan agreed to a naval inferiority relative to Britain and the United
States. Meanwhile the military was reaping territorial gains in the Chinese mainland.

Yet another cause was the weak base of democracy in Japan which Barrington Moore Jr. relates to the dependent nature
of Japanese capitalism. There were no independent bourgeoisie who could become the carriers of democracy. Although the
Constitution introduced a democratic government, all such liberal ideas were overshadowed by the authoritarian and
aristocratic elements of the Meiji government. The Meiji government never made any claims to establish democracy as well
as quickly quelled any movement for democratic rights. The Peace Preservation Law enacted in 1925 was the last nail in the
coffin.

Despite its achievements in the earlier years, the failure of party government became apparent by the late 1920s. This
failure of the parties to provide national leadership gave the militarists their chance to rise to power. This failure was derived
partly from its own weaknesses, namely, internal disunity, corruption, lack of mass support, and economic failures. By early
1930s, the balance of power tilted in favour of the military. A turning point came with the ratification of the London Naval
Treaty of 1930. Prime Minister Osachi Hamaguchi and his Rikken Minseito party agreed to a treaty which would severely
limit Japanese naval power. This treaty was strongly opposed by the military, who claimed that it would endanger national
defense, and was portrayed by the opposition Rikken Seiyukai party as having been forced upon Japan by a hostile United
States, which further inflamed growing anti-foreign sentiment.

The Japanese system of party government finally met its demise with the May 15th Incident in 1932, when a group of
junior naval officers and army cadets assassinated Prime Minister Inukai Tsuyoshi. Although the assassins were put on trial
and sentenced to fifteen years' imprisonment, they were seen popularly as having acted out of patriotism and the atmosphere
was set where the military was able to act with little restraint.

Though it may appear to be an abrupt change, the long term factors which have already been discussed shows that it was not
a revolution, rather a mere shift in power equations just like that of the Meiji Restoration. J. K. Fairbank claims that there
was no reversion to the pre-1913 pattern of oligarchic control; nor were there revolutionary changes in the post-1890
structure of government. Rather, what happened was a small shift in the balance between the elites, the advantages passing
from the parties to the military. This small shift produced an enormous change in political climate and policy setting Japan
upon the course that led to disaster in the 2 nd World War. The major external influences which affected the Japanese socio-
economic and political scenario were: the world depression that began in the United States in 1929, the march north of the
Kuomintang troops together with the emergence of a strong Chinese nationalism that threatened Japan’s position in
Manchuria and the rise to power of Hitler and Mussolini in Germany and Italy respectively.

In Japan the domestic depression of 1926 led to the bank crisis of 1927 in which a number of weak banks were wiped out.
These developments took place against the backdrop of the relatively weak showing of the Japanese economy during the
1920’s. The Prime Minister Kato Takaaki and the Finance Minister Osachi Hamaguchi tried to alleviate the crisis by
introducing nationalization, deflationary policies, reducing investment in strategic industries, etc. However, these measures
generated an unemployment crisis, further aggravated by the Great Depression. This world-wide depression led to a
collapse of international trade because each country raised protective tariffs to protect their own interests. This development
was fatal to Japan’s economy which depended heavily on export trade. Thus, between 1929 and 1931, Japan’s exports
dropped 50%, unemployment reached 3 million, and peasants’ real income dropped one-third as a result of falling prices for
silk. Besides, there was a failure of rice crop in 1932. Such rural distresses intensified the discontents of the army officers,
many of whom had connections with the rural population.

The blame for the depression fell on the parties as the party leaders, in the public mind, were intimately associated with the
zaibatsu, the bureaucracy, the landlords, and the urban white-collar class opines Fairbank. All the groups of this
“parliamentary coalition,” with the possible exception of the landlords, had a common vision of economic growth by
participation in the international economic order that paralleled the comity of democratic nations. This was the 1920
outgrowth of the Meiji vision of limited democracy and paternalistic capitalism at home working in cooperation with the
great powers abroad. The depression called into question the validity of the international economic order; this in turn cast
doubts on the worth of the comity of democratic nations and Japan’s parliamentary government.

The economic crisis gave rise to class tensions – rural rich vs. poor and urban vs. rural – which grew intense as the urban
economic groups recovered faster than their rural counterparts due to the political policies of the party government which
favoured urban industrialists, exposing their zaibatsu loyalties. Hence the economic depression coupled with class conflicts
provided a huge encouragement to radicalism as well as anti-zaibatsu and anti-party government sentiments.

The rise of militant nationalism in China from late 1920s emerged as a hindrance to the Japanese intention of asserting its
supremacy. China by 1928 was on the verge of being unified by Chiang Kai-shek. A unified and strong China could threaten
Japan’s position in Manchuria where the Kwangtung Army was stationed. The Western powers, particularly USA, started
moving closer to Chiang Kai-shek as he was seen as a counter to Communism and Russian influence in China as well as to
restrain the role of Japan in Pacific Ocean. Apparently, the Nanking government was trying to bring Manchuria back into
China’s control. The Manchurian warlord, Chang Hsueh-liang defied Japan by associating himself with the Nanking
government. In the eye of the militarists, Japan had to act fast in order to safeguard her vested interests. Consequently, in
September 1931, the Kwangtung Army took independent action and seized control of Manchuria. This act was criticized by
the League of Nations and in 1933 Japan left the organization.

The presence of a very strong anti-west fervor in Japan was translated into a belief that the west was dangerous for the
entire Asia. The notions of Doka – assimilation in order to save themselves from non-Asian nations – and Pan-Asianism –
all Asian nations must unite under Japan to oust the Western powers- acquired an extremely aggressive character with the
goal of replacing Western dominance with Japanese dominance. The spread of these ideas further strengthened the ultra-
nationalist groups and military mustered a mass appeal cutting across various social groups.

At the same time the emergence of the Fascists in Italy and the Nazis in Germany contributed to the rise of anti-democratic
forces in Japan. It seemed particularly significant to many that Germany, the most admired of Western states and the
Constitutional model for Japan, had turned its back on democracy and was looking to authoritarian and militarist policies as
the wave of the future, suggests Fairbank. Their aggressive actions echoed and reinforced each other’s, thereby drawing
these three countries closer together. By 1940, the Axis Alliance took shape and this became an important factor for the
outbreak of the Second World War.

The most crucial features of politics in the 1930s were continued turbulence within the military and the rising power of the
army over the bureaucracy, the court, and the parties. The Japanese military never had a homogeneous character, the army
was plagues with differences, whereas the navy, being a smaller group did not have much inconsistencies. Right from the
Meiji period, Army had been dominated by ex-Choshu officials and the thrust of their foreign policy was essentially anti-
Russian and they firmly insisted on Expansion within Asia. Navy was always dominated by ex-Satsuma officials and had an
anti-American strand from 1920s as US navy was seen as a direct threat in Pacific Ocean. Among them army played a more
significant role in the emergence of militarism.

The army had diverse views with regard to the course of action to be taken to deal with the economic and political crisis
which got crystallized into two factions, viz., Military Academy Faction and War College Faction. The Military Academy
Faction(MAF)/Imperial Way Faction/Kodo-ha led by Araki Sadao and Mazaki encompassed army men mostly from
middle or low ranks with plebian origins hailing from rural areas. These officers and some civilian sympathizers wanted to
eliminate the influence not only of parties and zaibatsu but also of status quo–minded senior statesmen and court figures.
They stressed the importance of spiritual education and loyalty to the emperor as foundations of national strength. Younger
activists in this group enjoyed support at the very top from people such as Araki Sadao, especially during Araki’s term as
army minister from 1932 to 1934. Imperial Way sympathizers were responsible for numerous acts of terror in the name of
the emperor, from the assassinations of political and business leaders in 1930–32 to the assassination of opponents within
the military itself. They were highly aggressive, ultra-nationalist, anti-zaibatsu and anti-party government. This right wing
radicalism was the dominant force from late 1920s to mid-1930s.

On the contrary, the War College Faction(WCF)/Control Faction/Tosei-ha, composed of high ranking officers like
Nagata and Tojo Hideki, preferred to collaborate with the existing elites. Andrew Gordon points out that though they
rejected terrorist violence, they were hardly moderate in other ways. They wanted to concentrate power in military hands
and mobilize society for an impending total war. They were not so opposed to zaibatsu or capitalism or parliamentary
system, and advocated modern technology as well as joint effort to prepare the country for war. They ensured the sustenance
of militarism as they believed in proper planning and dominated the 2 nd Sino-Japanese war, Pearl Harbor attack, Nanking
massacre etc.

The MAF began to see Manchuria as a symbol of Japanese glory and established a new order there – with complete state
control and free from zaibatsu - to test their idea. From 1932 onwards young soldiers of MAF carried out terrorist attacks
which attained its zenith with the Showa Restoration on 26th February 1936 when they took over Tokyo and assassinated
many top leaders including the Finance minister, Lord of Privy Council, Inspector General of Military Education etc. They
wanted to restore Japan’s glory by honoring the emperor, defending the empire, and improving the lot of common people
opines Gordon. Henceforth, the MAF began to decline as they faced opposition from diverse sections like bureaucracy,
civil government, high ranking military officials etc. who felt that Tokyo is under threat and objected to extreme violence.
Even the emperor expressed his displeasure with MAF actions. Moreover, Manchuria remained under developed and
modernization could only be achieved through financial assistance from Zaibatsu. Hence the necessity of Zaibatsu support
was realized.

In the post 1936 period, the radicalism gave way to WCF, the 1936 incident was highly condemned and the officers
involved in it were tried and executed. Nevertheless, this internal struggle in no way affected the strength or influence of the
military and the army continued to wield the supreme power. After mid-1930s MAF was completely relegated to the
background and WCF emerged dominant. This has been described by Barrington Moore Jr. as “fascism from below
ending and fascism from above takes over.” He observes that WCF was much more organized, disciplined and strong since
it was based on an alliance with the government, zaibatsu as well as all superior officials.

The characterization of this period in Japanese history as militarist or fascist is a bone of contention among the historians.
Western scholars like Barrington Moore Jr. and Andrew Gordon tend to call it fascist whereas the Japanese scholars call it
militarist. Fascism is characterized by aggressive nationalism based on a sense of innate superiority of a group or a
community of people and the presence of a single leader symbolizing the entire state. It represents a highly regimented and
authoritarian polity. In militarism, the military plays a predominant role in the administration as well as the formulation of
economic and political policies and a highly aggressive expansionist policy will be pursued in foreign relations.

Barrington Moore Jr. argues that Japan in 1930s shared many similarities with Germany in terms of an aggressive foreign
policy, highly repressive policy towards dissent in the home country as well as a sense of superiority among other nations
and hence infers that Japan was fascist. Andrew Gordon claims that it is more important to note the dynamics and
outcomes of political and cultural life in Japan which shared much with the experience of the fascist states of Europe. One
can identify in the German, Italian, and Japanese experiences a common response of a second generation of modernizing
nations. European fascist models inspired the men who came to rule Japan in the 1930s. Rulers in all three nations shared
the objective of funneling the energies of a glorified national body (whether the “Volk” or the Yamato race) into a quest for
military hegemony, authoritarianism, aggressive expansionism, a closed economic empire, and an anti-democratic,
hierarchic domestic politics, culture, and economy with restricted civil rights. The Japanese and Italian rulers, and even
Hitler to a lesser extent, also shared the inability finally to dissolve all existing plural bases of political and economic power
into a totalitarian system.
Certainly there were important differences between these nations as well. A fascist party never came to power in Japan. No
figure emerged with charisma or longevity comparable to that of Hitler or Mussolini. But the process that produced these
regimes shared a great deal suggests, Gordon. They all experienced economic crisis, sharp polarization of left versus right,
intense conflicts in industrial workplaces and rural society, and murderous right-wing terror. In each case a perception took
root among intellectuals and the political elite that a cultural malaise gripped the nation. Fear spread that established gender
roles were breaking down. Elite and popular opinion in each case held that Anglo-American power blocked the nation’s
legitimate international aspirations to empire. The problems facing Japan in the 1930s ultimately were not those of
monolithic homogeneity or a feudalistic society and beliefs. They were the problems of coping with modern diversity and
tension. The nation’s response to these problems led to the catastrophe of war and sparked a postwar revulsion for fascism
and militarism. But programs of political and economic reform and mobilization also set in motion enduring trans-war
changes in industrial, agrarian, and social policy.

J. K. Fairbank points out that even though, at a high level of abstraction it is possible to combine these features of Japan
and Germany with their common historical character as late modernizers and construct a “fascist model” of political change,
the differences between them seem as important as the similarities. First of all, their governmental structures were basically
dissimilar. Germany had undergone the Weimar change; its government was completely parliamentary while the Japanese
government in the 1930s was still at the “pre-Weimar” stage. Likewise the Japanese society was also considerably less
“modern” than that of Hitler’s Germany. Since the government structures and societies were different, the process by which
the “anti-parliamentary forces” rose was also very different. Whereas the Nazis rose as a mass party with a revolutionary
program, in Japan the anti-parliamentary forces were not a dynamic, purposive and united group. Above all he also draws
our attention towards the spiritual differences between the two countries. Thus he infers that the period was characterized by
militarism.

(Please provide a conclusion according to the given question.)