'Japan is back': A dangerous legacy resurrected

Editor's note: Xiang Haoyu, a special commentator for CGTN, is a specially appointed research fellow at the Department for Asia-Pacific Studies, China Institute of International Studies. The article reflects the author's opinions and not necessarily the views of CGTN.

"Japan is back," Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi declared. However, it appears that the dangerous version of old Japan has returned.

Recently, a 23-year-old active-duty officer in the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force scaled the wall of the Chinese Embassy in Tokyo and broke in, threatening to kill Chinese diplomats "in the name of God." This egregious incident, unprecedented in post-war Japan, is far from a mere "isolated security issue," as the Japanese authorities have tried to downplay it; rather, it symbolizes the extreme rightward shift in Japan's political landscape and the resurgence of militarist remnants.

The event has not only severely damaged China-Japan relations but also damaged Japan's self-proclaimed image as a "peaceful nation."

Flagrant violation of international law

The intruder's radical actions crossed all legal boundaries, reflecting Japan's failure to purge the toxic remains of militarism and the severe erosion of the Self-Defense Forces by far-right ideologies.

The Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations explicitly states that the premises of a diplomatic mission shall be inviolable, and host nations bear an absolute obligation to ensure their security. Allowing active-duty armed personnel to break into a foreign diplomatic mission is a flagrant violation of international law and a crude transgression against another nation's sovereignty and diplomatic dignity. The officer's actions – scaling the wall, concealing a knife and issuing death threats – were clearly a premeditated act of violent provocation and not impulsive.

This incident echoes the pre-World War II (WWII) Japanese military tradition of "gekokujo" – insubordination. In the 1930s, junior officers acted in the name of "patriotism" and "revering the Emperor" to bypass civilian control and military discipline, orchestrating violent events.

Japan's Kwantung Army unilaterally provoked the "September 18 Incident" in northeast China, destroying a section of railway track and blaming China as a pretext for invasion. The act triggered a full-scale war of aggression. That an active-duty officer targeted a foreign embassy raises fears that this dangerous tradition is being revived within the Self-Defense Forces.

The incident is the bitter fruit of the long-term right-wing radicalization of Japanese forces. The Officer Candidate School, where the marauding officer was trained, and the National Defense Academy have long become breeding grounds for historical revisionism.

According to Japanese media reports, the 2024 curriculum at the Officer Candidate School blatantly glorifies the 1945 Battle of Okinawa between Japan and the United States, while remaining silent on the atrocities committed by the Japanese military, such as the killing and forced suicides of civilians.

Mandatory courses at the National Defense Academy openly use militaristic terms like the "China Incident" and the "Great East Asia War," distorting Japan's war of aggression as a "defensive war against Western colonizers." The school also frequently invites far-right scholars to give lectures, and students maintain an annual tradition of marching 70 kilometers to worship at the controversial Yasukuni Shrine that commemorates Japanese war criminals. Under the influence of such ideologies, the radicalization of the younger generation of officers was inevitable.

Japanese government’s perfunctory response

Following the incident, the response from the Japanese government and Self-Defense Forces leadership has remained confined to expressions of "deep regret," with no formal apology issued to China to date. Japanese police have charged the intruder only with "illegal entry into a building," ignoring the severe nature of his armed death threats – a move that essentially condones extreme violence.

Mainstream Japanese media too has deliberately downplayed the incident, projecting the officer’s testimony that he only "wanted to speak with the Chinese ambassador." This exposes the long-standing anti-China bias and tolerance for far-right sentiment in Japanese media circles.

The government's perfunctory response is a reflection of its own political rightward shift. Since taking office, the Takaichi administration has charged ahead on a path of radicalization, hyping the fallacy that "a contingency in Taiwan is a contingency for Japan," while accelerating military expansion and seeking to dismantle the post-war peace system.

The appointment of former Self-Defense Forces personnel as prime ministerial aides has broken the post-war tradition of keeping military figures out of the core decision-making circle.

Against this backdrop, the Japanese government has neither the will nor the courage to reflect on the militaristic roots of this incident, as its own agenda aligns closely with the demands of far-right forces; investigating the incident thoroughly would expose its own flaws.

The government's failure to act has sparked strong dissatisfaction and skepticism among the Japanese public. Social media has exposed far-right scholars lecturing at the National Defense Academy and the glorification of imperial history. Some scholars warn that the government's leniency toward the embassy intrusion will further embolden far-right forces, potentially leading to more extreme and violent behavior in Japanese society.

On March 28, over a thousand people gathered in Shinjuku, Tokyo, to protest, demanding that Takaichi apologize to China. Even before this, Japanese citizens had been gathering daily outside the prime minister's official residence to protest the Takaichi government's militaristic policies that squeeze civilian livelihoods and its inflammatory rhetoric regarding China's Taiwan region, which increases the risk of war.

Vigilance against neo-militarism

The embassy intrusion serves as yet another footnote to the collapse of Japan's post-war image as a "peaceful nation." With the rightward shift in politics and re-militarization, the constraints of Article 9 of the Constitution have been hollowed out. Beneath the veneer of peace lies rampant historical revisionism, a foreign policy hostile to neighbors and unprecedented military expansion.

Neo-militarism is not a simple repeat of the WWII-era militarism, but a mutation of those toxic remnants spanning politics, economy, military, media and ideology.

Under the guise of "national normalization," Japan is continuously breaking through the post-war peace framework. Right-wing forces are promoting notions of Japanese racial superiority and manufacturing a sense of "existential crisis" to incite public anxiety. The Self-Defense Forces are becoming a tool for right-wing political agendas, transforming from a strictly regulated peaceful force into a breeding ground for extremist ideas and an actor for violent provocations.

If Japan wishes to restore its international image and repair relations with its neighbors, it must engage in deep reflection, purge extremist ideologies within the Self-Defense Forces, and stop manufacturing perceived threats from neighboring countries. If the government continues to allow far-right ideologies to grow, it will not only destroy over 70 years of peaceful development but could once again bring disaster to the region.

The international community must be vigilant and curb the development of Japan's neo-militarism to safeguard the post-war international order. The future of China-Japan relations depends on whether Japan can truly honor its peace commitments and stop actions that harm China's core interests. Only by making a clean break from its militaristic past can Japan rebuild trust with China and achieve true peace and stability in the region.

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