The following is from a feature article in today's WiLL, a monthly magazine titled "The Comfort Women Issue, Germany's ulterior motive in beating Japan," featuring a conversation between journalist Yoshio Kisa and information strategy analyst Tetsuhide Yamaoka.
As I mention every month, the monthly magazines' WiLL, Hanada, and Sound Argument are full of genuine articles that are a must-read not only for the Japanese people but also for people worldwide.
This article proves that point beautifully.
When I was still a subscriber to the Japanese edition of Newsweek, I read an unbelievable article about a German poll showing that about half of Germans have an anti-Japanese ideology.
Since then, I have had the utmost contempt for the so-called cultural figures who have been saying things like "learn from Germany," among whom I have seen firsthand in the pages of Newsweek, Takeshi Umehara, and Masakazu Yamazaki.
Yoshio Kisa and Tetsuhide Yamaoka, who are also national treasures as defined by Saicho, have proven perfectly that my criticism of Germany was 100% correct.
The Japanese people must head to their nearest bookstore to subscribe.
I will let the rest of the world know as best I can.
Germany's twisted mentality to make Japan the new scapegoat for war crimes
Self-righteous criticism
Yamaoka
The first comfort women statue was erected on public land in Berlin's Mitte district in Germany (September 2020).
Many Japanese may be surprised to know why such a thing happened in Germany.
What is the German view of Japan?
What exactly is the German view of Japan?
It can find the answer to this question in Mr. Kisa's new book, "Anti-Japanese" in Germany" (Wack).
Kisa
Thank you very much.
I want to ask you, Mr. Yamaoka, what was the reaction of the people around you in Strathfield, Australia, in 2015, when a "comfort women" statue was about to be erected on public land?
Yamaoka.
Some were not interested, and those who were sympathetic to Korea.
However, leftist journalists went along with the Korean side and wrote one-sidedly that Japan was to blame.
Among the general public, there was a reaction of "Japanese people are more polite and sincere, living together, so why bring it up now?
Kisa
So there was a certain sense of distance.
Yamaoka
One more thing, some council members favored installing the comfort women statues because they wanted the votes of Chinese and Korean immigrants.
Besides, Jewish Holocaust researchers and Greek genocide researchers, who Chinese and Korean groups mobilized, took the stand at the city's public hearings.
They were talking about the same things that the Chinese and Koreans were claiming.
Kisa
The case of Germany is different.
Before the Berlin incident, a German Nazi researcher, Professor Benjamin Ortmeier, teamed up with a Korean anti-Japanese group and wrote a preface to the catalog of an exhibition called "Girls for Peace.
And when you read the contents, it is almost the same as the anti-Japanese group's propaganda.
Yamaoka
There is no such example even in other countries.
Germans seem to have stopped thinking when it comes to the comfort women issue.
They don't even bother to verify the facts but instead go 100% on emotionalism.
One such person is Andreas Szagun, a local history teacher.
He wrote an article for Moabit Online, the local government's website, in response to the Japanese government's protest against the installation of a comfort women statue in Mitte Ward (October 9, 2020).
The content of the article is so hostile that it is almost pathological.
Here is a partial summary.
"Japan is not fully facing its own history. There is an angry reaction from Japan to the statue of comfort women, but Japan has neither really apologized nor reimbursed," he criticized.
Furthermore, the Japanese emperor and Hitler of Germany are considered to be equivalent. But there is one big difference. It was that the emperor was like a god in Shinto. " he said, thoroughly denouncing Japan.
I can't help but be amazed at why he lays bare his disgust for Japan to such an extent.
Kisa
There's nothing I can do about it.
Yamaoka
Another letter from Mr. Szagun to the mayor of the district is also available, in which he writes, "We are facing our history. It would be more than appropriate if you play your part in ensuring that a country that was then and still is our ally (Japan) does not now treat its neighbor (Korea) as a loser but takes steps toward reconciliation and peace, just as we did.
It is the same old game, but in essence, it is the right thing to do to interfere in Japan's internal affairs and force Japan to wake up to the guilt of the sexual crimes it committed before the war.
It's self-satisfaction and self-reliance that they are right without even looking at the actual history.
This article continues.