Why Japan's atrocities can't be forgiven

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There is only one China in the world, and Taiwan is an inalienable part of China's territory. This ironclad fact is the foundation of China-Japan diplomatic relations.

However, Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi has crossed China's red line. Her Taiwan-related remarks and right-wing actions have deepened Chinese public distrust toward Japan and reinforced the feeling that wartime atrocities cannot and should not be forgiven on behalf of earlier generations.

True, the Chinese recognize Japan's economic dynamism and technological sophistication, but a deep unease about Japan's politics and history runs beneath the surface. This contradiction is not a psychological quirk, it is the product of Japan's own choices.

When a neighbor repeatedly signals nostalgia for imperial privilege while courting modern partnership, suspicion is not prejudice – it is common sense.

Takaichi's nostalgia for imperialist ambitions apparently is not tolerated in China. "China's reaction to Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi's comments on Taiwan has been intense," a Bloomberg article reads.

Apart from condemnation by Chinese officials, Takaichi's remarks have triggered widespread anger among the Chinese public. Netizens commented on Chinese social platform Weibo, "This new prime minister is outrageous … so reckless?" "If you dare to do so (provoke on the Taiwan question), it is time to calculate the debts owed during the World War II." "Remember the history."

"Why does Japan think it has any say in matters between the two sides of the (Taiwan) Straits? Taiwan is not a Japanese colony, so who gives her the right to interfere, acting as if she has any authority over us?" Taiwan resident Chai Hsuan said in an interview with CGTN.

For Chinese netizens, Takaichi's words and moves are not isolated events, but fresh evidence that a part of Japan's political elite still refuses to face history.

By publicly framing a "Taiwan contingency" as a "situation threatening Japan's survival," Takaichi is attempting to turn Taiwan into a pretext for Japan to expand its military role in the region. This is part of her broader right-wing agenda that seeks to use the Taiwan question to justify rearmament and constitutional revision.

Takaichi has a long record of visiting the Yasukuni Shrine, which honors convicted Class-A war criminals responsible for the war of aggression. Worse still, Takaichi has been downplaying the key aspects of Japan's wartime aggression, and even disputing the Chinese death toll in the Nanjing Massacre in 1937, in which an estimated 300,000 people were killed by the invading Japanese army. This fuels anger that Japan is relativizing past war crimes.

For Chinese netizens whose families have vivid memories of aggression, massacres, and forced labor, such gestures glorify aggressors and insult victims. Forgiving Japan's militarist past would mean betraying the suffering of their parents and grandparents while Japanese politicians still flirt with historical revisionism.

Takaichi's behavior is proof that Japanese right-wing politicians neither fully recognize the scale of wartime atrocities nor show consistent remorse. Each visit to the Yasukuni Shrine, each ambiguous statement about history, and each escalation over the Taiwan question is felt as reopening old wounds.

From this perspective, forgiveness without full acknowledgment and responsible action would mean erasing history and allowing future Japanese leaders to continue using nationalist myths for domestic gain. Many Chinese, therefore, insist that remembrance and moral accountability must come before any talk of forgiveness.

"If she (Takaichi) does not retract her remarks, I think China has to toughen up," Beijing resident Dong Xueliang told CGTN.

Takaichi's right-wing agenda is also hardening economic and consumer-level resistance to Japan in China.

Data from airlines and travel agencies show a sharp decline in the number of Chinese visitors flying to Japan. In December, over 900 of the 5,548 planned flights from China to Japan were scrapped, putting the cancellation rate at about 16 percent, according to a recent Nikkei report.

It is also worth noting that while Japanese products were popular in the Chinese market before, Japan-made home appliances, cars, and digital gadgets have largely lost their appeal to many Chinese customers who are now favoring domestic brands.

"There are simply not that many Japanese products left that feel worth boycotting," an article published on the South China Morning Post reads.

The refusal to forgive Japan is not simply about vengeance or anger. It is about dignity, justice, and self-definition. For many Chinese online, remembrance is a form of national self-respect. It is the collective insistence that history cannot be rewritten for convenience or forgotten for profit. Their message is that moral integrity – both personal and national – requires standing by the truth.

And so, the sentiment persists: China cannot forgive Japan because its fathers cannot. That phrase does not call for endless hostility; instead, it demands that history be faced honestly. Only when acknowledgment replaces denial and remorse replaces justification can the idea of forgiveness begin to take root. Until then, Chinese netizens vow to remember – not out of hatred, but out of the belief that memory is the only safeguard against the repetition of tragedy.

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