Category: Politics

In the International New York Times of October 6, Roger Cohen spoke of ‘the community of expulsion’. He was referring not only to the expulsion of Jews and the diaspora, but also the expulsion of the Palestinians. He said “Palestinians have joined the ever recurring community of expulsion. The words of Leviticus are worth repeating for any Jew in or concerned by Israel today: Treat the stranger as yourself for ‘you were strangers in the land of Egypt’.”

For full article see link below.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/07/opinion/roger-cohen-for-israel-a-time-of-self-scrutiny.html

Jeffrey Goldberg in The Atlantic on 4 October 2014 said ‘I remain partial to the view that American Jewry is threatened more by its own ignorance than by anything that may happen in the Middle East. But if Rabbis are going to speak about Israel, then they should speak with clarity …’ The article is available online below:

http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/10/understanding-the-goals-of-hamas-and-israel/381048/

In July 1940, five months before the attack on Pearl Harbor, Emperor Hirohito met with his military planners to discuss the details of Japan’s new “southward advance” policy. An apparently skeptical Hirohito asked them a series of questions, including whether the policy would involve “occupying points in India, Australia and New Zealand.”

Although Japan’s supreme commander felt nervous about his country’s impending military adventure, he did not resist it––as he had, for instance, in 1936 when his disapproval was sufficient to crush a military coup by disaffected elements of the Imperial Army.

Both episodes show Hirohito to have been a much more activist leader than some portrayals suggest.

The latest attempt to paint Hirohito as a strict constitutionalist, obliged to follow the advice of his ministers, and look mildly martial on a white horse, is a 61-volume, 12,000-page publishing colossus, the Annals of the Showa Emperor. (Showa is the era name of Hirohito’s reign that lasted from 1926 to 1989.)

Commissioned by the Imperial Household Agency, and 24 years in the making, it supposedly brings together all available documents related to the Emperor’s life. The first volumes are due to be published next year, with the remainder dribbled out to the public over five years.

Although the work contains some new material of interest to academic researchers, critics complain that, on major points of historical conjecture, it is both incomplete and intentionally obscure. The Mainichi newspaper found it contained “hardly anything new” of real significance. The annals’ summaries make it impossible to link information to a particular source; it omits any direct quotations attributable to the Emperor; and some records of his close aides are withheld altogether. (I rely for this analysis on Japanese media and academic sources, since only a select group of individuals so far has been allowed to see the contents of the annals.)

One example stands out. While the annals make reference to a 2006 newspaper article about a memo in which Hirohito is quoted as criticizing the honouring of Class “A” war criminals at Tokyo’s Yasukuni Shrine, the actual memo is not among the documents reproduced. It is not known whether this particular omission was done to appease the Abe Government, with its strong nationalist bent, but there can be no doubt that the project as a whole set out to avoid controversy.

Professor Herbert Bix, author of Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan* told the New York Times he had been asked by a Japanese newspaper to comment on the annals––on condition he refrained from discussing Hirohito’s “role and responsibility” in World War II. Having expended much time and effort researching the Emperor’s close involvement in military planning, Bix naturally declined: “The very idea of a carefully vetted official biography of a leader fits within the Sino-Japanese historical tradition, but raises deep suspicions of a whitewash…”

The annals cultivate the image of a leader who was war shy and peace friendly, and yet this analysis cannot withstand even the most superficial investigation. If Hirohito had the power to end the Pacific War in August 1945––and he did play a decisive role––why did he not have the power to prevent it starting in December 1941 or to bring it to an end much sooner? The evidence, in fact, shows he was enthusiastic about Japan’s early military successes and only swung his support behind the “peace faction” once his very existence was threatened by atomic annihilation.

Australia wanted Emperor Hirohito put on trial as a war criminal, together with the military, industrial and political leaders who were convicted, and in some cases, executed. The United States, however, took the view that hanging Hirohito would play into the hands of Japan’s Communists and make the postwar occupation (and security realignment) of Japan that much harder. The Chifley Government eventually concurred.

For the President of the International Military Tribunal for the Far East, the Australian Justice William Webb, Hirohito’s immunity from prosecution rankled: “No ruler,” he wrote in his separate opinion on the Tokyo Trials, “can commit the crime of launching aggressive war and then validly claim to be excused for so doing because his life would otherwise have been in danger.” Evidence of Hirohito’s responsibility was suppressed during the actual hearings until Hideki Tojo slipped up while being questioned by a defense lawyer. “No Japanese subject,” insisted the loyal wartime prime minister, “let alone a high official of Japan, would ever go against the will of the Emperor.” Tojo was later given a chance (by the prosecution) to “correct” his mistake, but that ghost could never be laid to rest.

Hirohito died in 1989 at the grand old age of 87. I remember, on the occasion of his funeral, standing with the crowds lining the streets near the Imperial Palace, sleet falling on a bitterly cold February day, and reflecting on the legacy of a man who had led Japan through its darkest and its brightest days, first by means of war and then by means of peace. The shuffling, bespectacled, grandfatherly figure I had witnessed performing his many official duties––whose only public opinion was an enigmatic smile––seemed to have redeemed himself. Certainly, at least, he and the Americans (those mighty republicans) had saved the imperial institution.

But there was a cost, which we are still paying.

Professor Bix, in his analysis of Japanese power, identified a “system of irresponsibility,” a closed circle of buck-passing in which politicians and generals acted in the name of an Emperor who, in turn, acted in accordance with their advice. Thus no individual took the blame (each of the Tokyo Trial defendants pleaded “not guilty”) for ideas and actions that resulted in the deaths of tens of millions of people.

In some respects modern, democratic Japan perpetuates this system of irresponsibility, including in the way it refuses to render a full and proper accounting for the past.

Japan spent ten years between 1931 and 1941 creeping towards war with the great powers. The imperial institution was the chandelier in the barracks: a decorative incongruity lighting the way for the militarists. Still remote and unaccountable, I wonder what way it will light for Japan in the days ahead.

* From my reading of his book, Bix seems unable to make up his mind whether Hirohito was a warmonger or an acquiescent nationalist, and some of his conclusions about the personality and temperament of the young Hirohito go beyond the evidence adduced. But, particularly in its second half, the book effectively demolishes the revisionist arguments of Japan’s “textbook” patriots.

Walter Hamilton reported from Japan for the ABC for eleven years.

The jingoistic pressures applied to the media, commentators, academics, policy advisors in order to contain their commentary on the US’ illegal invasion of Iraq in 2003, have been in evidence again following President Obama’s decision to commence war on ISIL. This time, however those pressures have been significantly smaller. Then it took almost three years before it was considered acceptable to question the operation. It has now taken only some three weeks for doubts and serious questions to be voiced and, published in mainstream media.

Why, what’s happened?

A decline in US patriotism, or belief in seeking military solutions to complex foreign policy problems, is nowhere discernible. What is readily visible however is the change in the President. This appears to have been widely noticed.

The President swept to office 6 years ago on the promise of an end to the US’ “wars of choice”. He pledged a foreign policy based on cooperation with others, consultation and diplomacy rather than coercion, respect for international law.

He repeated this promise at the United Nations. He went to Cairo and addressed the Muslim world in terms of amity and tolerance, and he went to Prague and voiced his commitment to a world without nuclear weapons. The Nobel Committee promptly awarded him the Peace Prize.

Last week, he returned to the United Nations and pledged war on ISIL because he said it constituted “a network of death”, perhaps echoing George W Bush’s now infamous “ axis of evil” remarks to justify his actions in Iraq and Afghanistan – the very “wars of choice” rejected by Obama.

In spite of the clear provisions of the UN Charter, which requires authorization by the Security Council for the actions now being taken, and the requirement of the US Constitution for Congress to declare war, he has rejected both legal obligations.

Congress has ducked a decision on the matter for now, as midterm elections are due in a month. They appear to be unwilling to have their vote on the war subjected to scrutiny in the electorate. In Australia, Prime Minister Abbott has sent Australian forces to the war, repeating President Obama’s justification for this action; that ISIL is a murderous group, which is of course true, but he has not attempted to explain precisely why                    Australia should enter the fight, half a world away. He has refused to permit a parliamentary debate on his decision, presumably because he, like the Congress, would not welcome such scrutiny.

Naturally, the concerns being expressed about current policy decisions do not ignore or sweep aside the criminality of ISIL. Rather, the focus has been on the key questions: where did all this come from, exactly whose problem is it, what exactly is ISIL, how do they get their funds and weapons, what will be achieved by the bombing campaign, how will it end, will it end, what will happen in Iraq, Syria, the wider Middle East; to name only a very few of the major questions at issue. And, it must be emphasized, the legal aspects of the current actions are not merely academic. They touch upon the structure and fabric of both international relations and the conduct of governments, especially those of popular democracies.

In addition to the need for answers to the key questions on the operation, we need to know what now motivates the President of the United States, in his newly assumed role of leader of the new, allegedly vital, global, battle.

It surely cannot simply be the beheadings. This would take a concession to populism and vengeance into absurd irrationality in policy formulation. We need to know what constituency President Obama is addressing. Its certainly not the Nobel Prize Committee.

He seems to continue to recognize that American voters don’t want another war, but he assesses that they do want action on ISIL and the Caliphate. Is this the fact. Do they?

He has the job to lead, not simply follow, and leadership would begin by telling the people and their representatives, the Congress, what exactly the plan is, beyond the aspiration to “degrade and destroy” ISIL, and, why it is now America’s fight and by extension, those he is calling on to join America in the fight. A telephone call, or two, to Tony Abbott should not be sufficient.

The latter contentions raise the largest question of all; that of external intervention in the affairs of States, in this case those of the Middle East. There are strict rules in international law setting the conditions under which such intervention can be considered licit. There are sound reasons for this, as the sorry history of western intervention in the Middle East attests. Many have asserted that the rise of ISIL is, at least in some measure, a consequence of such interventions.

The only external intervention in the Middle East, during the last 30 years, which was licit was that to expel Iraq from Kuwait. That action was legal because it was authorized by the Security Council. In the ISIL case, the reason being given for the current interventions in Iraq and Syria, is that if ISIL is not defeated, its presence in those two countries will harm us. The validity of this claim is a matter of speculation. So, it would be best if this were more fully explained, including how precisely the objective will be achieved and when it might be considered that what is at issue is within the responsibility of the States directly affected.

Finally, on nuclear weapons. In his Prague speech President Obama said the US has a “moral responsibility” to seek the “security of a world without nuclear weapons”. Yet, he recently authorized an immense expansion and revitalization of the US nuclear weapons arsenal, costing some 3 trillion dollars. This appears to kiss goodbye to any further reduction in nuclear weapons in the foreseeable future.

The President would, indeed, appear to be transformed and if so, this will affect us all.

As a footnote, the Russians are also expanding their nuclear force. Do they both inwardly lament the passing of the Cold War and its nuclear arms race? Another subject, for another time.

Richard Butler is a former Australian Ambassador to the United Nations and Executive Chairman of the UN Special Commission to Disarm Iraq.

John Le Carre (real name David Cornwall) has written a lot of books about the fairly predictable workings of spies. The Dirty Tricks manual doesn’t have a lot of chapters and you don’t have to be too smart to anticipate the moves and motives of different players. But they can make a thrilling read.

Hong Kong’s Umbrella Revolution is petering out. Basically, for a business town, the behavior of the students was becoming an interruption to trade. And so business leaders joined with police and government officials in telling the students and their allies that the game is over.

But the denouement had a pointy end. Both on Hong Kong Island (in the area of Admiralty railway station) and on the Kowloon side (at Mong Kok) a gaggle of “anti-democracy” protestors started bashing up the students and pulling their tents down aiming to have them go away.

It was very important for the week to end on a winning note for Beijing because the Government in China – as anxious as any of its predecessors about national fragmentation – needed to send a forceful message about how it deals with dissent.

Allegations were everywhere in Hong Kong that the “anti-democracy” protestors were nothing of the kind but really thugs, mobsters and guns for hire from the notorious underworld of triads in Hong Kong, doing the bidding of their paymaster – the Chinese Communist Party.

And on the other side, when the student protests began, conspiracy stories were rife that the students and their allies were in fact the front people for something much more complicated – local Hong Kong activists surely, but as well agents from Taiwan and along with the secretive work of the ever active CIA.

In Taiwan, there is ever-stronger criticism of the country’s deeply unpopular President Ma Ying-jeou, leader of the KMT that, like the CCP, had its origins in Leninism. Ma has taken a positive and proactive approach to engaging China despite the traditional hostility to the government once led by Mao Zedong, the nemesis of KMT founder Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek. That line is taken up now by Taiwan’s opposition parties who have a lot to gain from the weakly performing Ma, seen to be soft on the untrustworthy Chinese Communists. Now with HK students creating an event that brought the bear out of its lair, it’s all that the doctor could order for Taiwan’s opposition.

For the United States, its local interests can only be served by destabilizing Hong Kong’s Beijing focused government. China is at odds with many of its neighbours who look to the US as their ultimate underwriter.

Just consider the list: China’s aggressive oil searches in parts of the South China Sea that had been considered the territorial waters of Vietnam and the Philippines; its sabre rattling with Japan over the disputed ownership of the Senkaku Islands; and inconveniencing air travellers over the use of its air space without new and regularly sought permissions.

Creating trouble for Beijing in its own and very visible front garden makes good tactical sense for a coalition with the US of some surprising partners – Asia’s second largest Communist State (Vietnam); the world’s second largest capitalist economy (Japan); and the Philippines, the country in Asia with the most Catholics – who all have a common anxiety about China’s behaviour in the region.

And, strangely, it’s the entrance of the religious factor into the equation that may hold the most enduring force for China.

Christians are a growing minority in China to be measured in the many tens of millions. Accurate figures are not and, while the Communists run the country, will never be available. The only place the figures could exist would be on baptismal registers and no one who controls them will let the Government see them. Doing so would only let the Government know the scale of the threat it faces but credible estimates range between 60 million -100million.

In northern China, and especially around Beijing, being a Christian is synonymous with being a democrat. In the south, it’s not so much the agitation for democratic processes that focuses the effort. It’s creating a space in civil society where Christians can be seen and heard that is the preferred way and also a central tenant of business networks in cities such as Wenzhou.

The Catholics become an easy target if they get politically active because generally they are visible and well organized. There’s not much evidence of any political activism and after the way Catholics copped it in the 1950s, ‘60s and ‘70s, there is no surprise there.

The Catholic champion and much-praised democrat in Hong Kong is Cardinal Zen. Growing up in Shanghai, the Salesian Cardinal and retired bishop of Hong Kong has spent most of his life in Taiwan and Hong Kong. Cardinal Zen’s political energy comes as much from his positive appreciation of the values and institutions of a democratic society as it does from his profound loathing of Communism and anyone who compromises in any way with them.

Chinese governments from Imperial times to the present have always been suspicious of the capacity of religions to provide enclaves for dissidents, especially Daoist and Christian groups. The revolution that killed more people than any in history per head of population was the 19^th Century anti-Imperial Taiping Rebellion led by a madman who thought himself the reincarnation of Jesus.

What happened last week in Hong Kong was made possible and successful for the demonstrators by a few factors: the presence of reinforcements in the secondary and tertiary students who played truant from school (with their teachers’ permission) to revive the spirits and campaign of groups who have been at this agitation for some time; the choice of two public holidays as the major days of protest, thus making the city free for gathering and marching; the inept use of tear gas and pepper spray by Hong Kong police – when it was used against the students it aroused massive public sympathy for them; and finally the appearance of thugs to break up the demonstrations at week’s end.

That should be the end of it for some time. But it will simmer for the next twelve months before reappearing in the build up to the 2016 Legislative Council elections and then – the big one – the election of the next Chief Executive the following year. By Beijing fiat, the election of that person will be only from among those chosen by authorities in Beijing. Hong Kongers are unhappy about the way they are governed and Beijing’s rising influence and this is highly unlikely to change.

In earlier blogs – See July 6, 2014 ‘Turbocharging our trade or mainly hype’ – I drew attention to the exaggerated benefits of bilateral free trade agreements. We now have 7 of them with more under negotiation, including with China and two signed but not yet in force.

These FTAs are third-rate in promoting trade compared with multi-lateral agreements.

The recent September Report of the Joint Standing Committee on Treaties on the FTA with Korea confirms my doubts about the net benefits of these arrangements.

Peter Martin in the SMH of the 5^th September 2014 said ‘A government dominated investigation of the proposed Australia-Korea Free Trade Agreement damned it with faint praise saying its benefits are “minimal” and that the intellectual property provisions lack “recognition of the broader public interest”.’

Peter Martin added further ‘The unusually luke warm endorsement of the committee headed by Liberal National MP Wyatt Roy reflects concern about the incorporation of so-called investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) mechanisms.’

The two ALP members of the committee and the Green member said that they could not support the agreement at all.

Doubts about FTAs feature in the Report which said ‘The World Trade Organisation cautions that, although such agreements can complement the multi-lateral trading scheme there are a number of concerns.’ The Report then elaborates on these serious concerns like trade diversion and confusing country of origin rules.

The Report noted that ‘The Productivity Commission found that commercial benefits for Australian businesses from bilateral Free Trade Agreements were limited as the agreements did not address the non-tariff barriers that prevented market access.’

The Report queried the economic modelling of the likely benefits to the Australian economy of the agreement with Korea. The Report noted ‘that the Committee’s attention had been drawn to the Productivity Commission’s findings that the general equilibrium model used to establish the figures is generally over-optimistic – overstating the gains and underestimating the losses.’

On investor-state dispute settlement arrangements the conclusion of the Committee was equivocal. It said ‘The evidence suggests that the escalated use of ISDS mechanisms has produced unintended consequences for governments globally …’ The Report noted that the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade had advised that Korea would not have signed the agreement without the ISDS mechanism.

There will undoubtedly be some important benefits for particular Australian export sectors but on balance the report is suggesting that considering the downsides and the over-optimistic estimates, the benefits will be marginal.

This agreement with Korea like the agreement with Japan received acclamation from Tony Abbott and Andrew Robb as a great break through. This all party committee of the parliament has given it a very cool reception

In his chairing of the G20 meeting in Brisbane in November the Prime Minister would best serve our trade interests if he can persuade other countries to put life back into the Doha Round of multilateral trade negotiations that have lost their way. Our interests are best served in multilateral trade negotiations, as difficult as they may be, rather than spending so much time obtaining marginal benefits from bilateral free trade arrangements which are really preferential rather than free trade deals.

The same question might be asked of many places on earth in these security-conscious times. On this occasion, however, the subject is Japan: a state several times removed, one would have thought, from legitimate concerns about an imminent threat from an alien creed enforced by a ruthless blood-cult. (Enough of that; you only have turn on commercial radio to know what I mean.)

Japanese paranoia comes to mind for several reasons. I could hardly believe my eyes when watching the main evening current affairs program on NHK (the national broadcaster) the other night. During a story on last week’s International Whaling Commission meeting, a graphic appeared giving the reason why New Zealand had brought a motion to impose stricter conditions on “scientific whaling”. The purpose, said NHK, was to “cause Japan international embarrassment.” It’s believed the program, News Center-9, is closely monitored by NHK’s conservative president––a man who on taking up his job stated that it was not the business of a public broadcaster to contradict the government of the day­­––and, under pressure from above, nervous editors can go to absurd lengths to toe the line. By the way, I can report that whale meat has just been added to the menu at the ruling Liberal Democratic Party’s headquarters in Tokyo. If that is not a snub to the International Court of Justice, which this year ruled against Japan’s whaling program, I don’t know what is.

But enough of cetaceans, there are bigger “fish” to fry in this discussion.

A Japanese friend of mine recently returned from a visit to Uluru. She enjoyed the trip very much, she said, especially the cordiality of the Australian tourists she encountered at the Rock. Most had either visited Japan or knew people who had, and they were eager to share their favourable impressions of the country. This affability came as a shock to her: “I had the impression foreigners did not like Japan,” she told me. My friend is a well-educated and widely travelled individual; so how can we account for her paranoia?

The “foreigners” to which she refers, of course, are Chinese and Koreans––although NHK’s characterization of New Zealand as a hostile state suggests a deeper strain of vulnerability and grievance.

Japanese antipathy towards China and South Korea, and vice versa, has rarely been as intense as it is now. About 53% of Chinese respondents (and 29% of Japanese), in a recent poll, said they expected a war to break out between the two countries before the end of the decade. The percentage of Japanese respondents who said they had a negative impression of China increased to 93% from 90% a year earlier, according to Genron NPO, a Tokyo-based non-profit group. Similar findings have emerged from surveys on attitudes between Koreans and Japanese.

This siege mentality has been on display, too, in the nation’s mass media. I’ve mentioned NHK. There’s also the case of the Asahi Shimbun, the country’s venerable, left-of-centre newspaper that has been under fire from rivals on the right over its coverage of the “comfort women” issue. Some of the Asahi’s assailants have even called for its closure on the grounds that it willfully damaged relations with South Korea by publishing a false account of the Imperial Japanese Army rounding up Korean women on the island of Cheju during the war and forcing them into prostitution. The articles that ran in the newspaper in the 1980s and 1990s were based on the testimony of one Seiji Yoshida, who claimed to have witnessed the round-ups (his evidence is also cited in several “authoritative” books). The Asahi now accepts (many years after his claims were first challenged) that Yoshida fabricated his testimony and, under relentless attacks from right-wing commentators, the president of the newspaper group has made a public apology.

In the context of the “history wars” now raging in Japan––fed, as I suggest, by a siege mentality verging on paranoia––this admission of error is not necessarily beneficial to the cause of reasoned debate. While the Yoshida claims undoubtedly should have been retracted earlier, the public is now being led into believing his testimony singularly brought about South Korea’s hardline position on the issue and caused the breakdown in bilateral relations. Some on the right are demanding that Japan abandon its earlier admissions of culpability, despite an abundance of other, unassailable, evidence of state-sponsored prostitution in Japan and its colonies. (Readers may care to review the treatment of this issue in my book Children of the Occupation: Japan’s Untold Story.)

A far-right candidate in the last Tokyo gubernatorial election, Toshio Tamogami (who garnered 12% of the vote), has joined the chorus with a new book entitled Why Does the Asahi Shimbun So Hate Abe Shinzo? General Tamogami served as Chief-of-Staff of Japan’s Air Self-Defense Force until he was sacked in 2008 for publishing an article justifying Japanese imperialism: “If you say that Japan was the aggressor nation, then I would like to ask what country among the great powers of that time was not an aggressor?” If the Asahi can, at one stroke, be discredited in the public eye, then alternative versions of history propagated by Tamogami and his ilk gain traction by default.

In the interest of disclosure, I should point out that I have used this blog-site to criticize Shinzo Abe myself on a number of occasions. I don’t hate him and neither do I judge, from reading its editorial pages, does the Asahi. Its criticisms of Abe’s new security laws, military ambitions and other actions provocative of Japan’s near neighbours reflect policy disagreements not personal animus. Given that the government has a skilled and well-resourced public relations machine at its disposal (not excluding NHK) to prosecute its side of any argument, the attacks on the Asahi seem superfluous, except for an ideological purpose.

But if this blog is about paranoia, perhaps the author should take care not to succumb as well. And what is paranoia, anyway, but an unreasonable sense of persecution. When we take a look behind the poll figures quoted earlier, we find evidence of just that: a common tendency of human beings to feel antagonistic towards those whom it is presumed harbour ill feelings towards us. Both the Chinese and the Japanese are convinced that the other is hostile towards them, and because of this they must return hostility. In the vicious cycle the origins of their discord disappear into a fog of self-justification. Opinion polls may tap into the public consciousness, but they are often poorer predictors of behaviour. Is the prospect of war, alarmingly foreseen by a majority of Chinese respondents, as real if we also know that they expect the other side to start it?

Contrary to the opinion-poll view of the future we have evidence that Chinese tourists, for instance, are growing tired of Japan being unofficially “off-limits” to their curiosity. As reported in the Nihon Keizai Shimbun: “In July, Chinese visitors to Japan doubled on the year to 281,000, making them the largest tourist group from aboard, according to the Japanese government. The figure has climbed back above the level seen in July 2012, before tensions flared.” Japanese businesses are said to be growing more optimistic about the Chinese market, as political considerations give way to pragmatic commercial interests. Perhaps the many Chinese tourists mingling with the temple crowds in Kyoto or taking their lunch at a noodle bar in Tokyo will discover that ordinary Japanese don’t really feel about them quite as they imagined they did.

It would be a good beginning to a sounder dialogue.

Walter Hamilton reported from Japan for eleven years for the ABC.