Spiderman
Veteran Member
Tojo had an education typical of a Japanese youth in the Meiji era.[7] The purpose of the Meiji educational system was to train the boys to be soldiers as adults, and the message was relentlessly drilled into Japanese students that war was the most beautiful thing in the entire world, that the Emperor was a living god and that the greatest honor for a Japanese man was to die for the Emperor.[8] Japanese girls were taught that the highest honor for a woman was to have as many sons as possible who could die for the Emperor in war.
Tojoh's boyhood hero was the 17th century shogun Tokugawa Ieyasu who issued the injunction: "Avoid the things you like, turn your attention to unpleasant duties".[9] Tojo liked to say: "I am just an ordinary man possessing no shining talents. Anything I have achieved I owe to my capacity for hard work and never giving up".[9]
A stern, humorless man, Tojo was known for his brusque manner, his obsession with etiquette, and for his coldness.[19] Like almost all Japanese officers at the time, Tojo routinely slapped the faces of the men under his command when giving orders, saying that face-slapping was a "means of training" men who came from families that were not part of the samurai caste, and for whom bushido was not second nature.[20]
Tojo was a militant ultra-nationalist, well respected for his work ethic and his ability to handle paperwork, who believed that the Emperor was a living god and favored "direct imperial rule", ensuring that he would faithfully follow any order from the Emperor....."
anyway, I didn't read the whole article.....to make a long story short, his dreams and plans were foiled...
"As American soldiers surrounded Tojo's house on September 11, he shot himself in the chest with a pistol, but missed his heart.
As a result of this experience, the Army had medical personnel present during the later arrests of other accused Japanese war criminals, such as Shimada Shigetarō.
As he bled, Tojo began to talk, and two Japanese reporters recorded his words: "I am very sorry it is taking me so long to die. The Greater East Asia War was justified and righteous. I am very sorry for the nation and all the races of the Greater Asiatic powers. I wait for the righteous judgment of history. I wished to commit suicide but sometimes that fails."[100]
After recovering from his injuries, Tojo was moved to Sugamo Prison. While there, he received a new set of dentures, made by an American dentist, into which the phrase "Remember Pearl Harbor" had been secretly drilled in Morse code.[101]
Crimes committed by Imperial Japan were responsible for the deaths of millions, some estimate between 3,000,000[104] and 14,000,000[105] civilians and prisoners of war through massacre, human experimentation, starvation, and forced labor that was either directly perpetrated or condoned by the Japanese military and government with a significant portion of them occurring during Tojo's rule of the military.[106][107][108][109][110] One source attributes 5,000,000 civilian deaths to Tojo's rule of the military.
Tojo before the International Military Tribunal for the Far East
Hideki Tojo accepted full responsibility in the end for his actions during the war, and made this speech:
It is natural that I should bear entire responsibility for the war in general, and, needless to say, I am prepared to do so. Consequently, now that the war has been lost, it is presumably necessary that I be judged so that the circumstances of the time can be clarified and the future peace of the world be assured. Therefore, with respect to my trial, it is my intention to speak frankly, according to my recollection, even though when the vanquished stands before the victor, who has over him the power of life and death, he may be apt to toady and flatter. I mean to pay considerable attention to this in my actions, and say to the end that what is true is true and what is false is false. To shade one's words in flattery to the point of untruthfulness would falsify the trial and do incalculable harm to the nation, and great care must be taken to avoid this.[111][2]
Tojo was sentenced to death on November 12, 1948, and executed by hanging 41 days later on December 23, 1948. Before his execution, he gave his military ribbons to one of his guards; they are on display in the National Museum for Naval Aviation in Pensacola, Florida.[112] In his final statement, he apologized for the atrocities committed by the Japanese military and urged the American military to show compassion toward the Japanese people, who had suffered devastating air attacks and the two atomic bombings.[113]
Historians Herbert P. Bix and John W. Dower criticize the work done by General MacArthur and his staff to exonerate Emperor Hirohito and all members of the imperial family from criminal prosecutions. According to them, MacArthur and Brigadier General Bonner Fellers worked to protect the Emperor and shift ultimate responsibility to Tojo.[114][115][116]
The sustained intensity of this campaign to protect the Emperor was revealed when, in testifying before the tribunal on December 31, 1947, Tojo momentarily strayed from the agreed-upon line concerning imperial innocence and referred to the Emperor's ultimate authority. The American-led prosecution immediately arranged that he be secretly coached to recant this testimony. Ryūkichi Tanaka, a former general who testified at the trial and had close connections with chief prosecutor Joseph B. Keenan, was used as an intermediary to persuade Tojo to revise his testimony.[119]
Tojo's commemorating tomb is located in a shrine in Hazu, Aichi (now Nishio, Aichi), and he is one of those enshrined at the controversial Yasukuni Shrine. His ashes are divided between Yasukuni Shrine and Zōshigaya Cemetery in Toshima ward, Tokyo.
120] In the 1998 film Puraido (Pride), Tojo was portrayed as a national hero, forced against his will by the Hull note into attacking America and executed after a rigged trial, a picture of Tojo that is widely accepted in Japan while giving offense abroad
Hideki Tojo - Wikipedia
Anyway, crowds of people of the Shinto faith still treat him as a Catholic would treat a Saint, in the sense that they publicly venerate and honor him, enshrine him, portray him as a national hero and one of the kami (spirits that are worshiped.) Could be I guess...
He seemed to have repented. Maybe he's in heaven or purgatory.
(to be continued)
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