I think Shiba has given civil rights to such a vulgar portrayal of Korean criticism of Japan, which is not typical of Japanese people.
September 29, 2018
Every week, I subscribe to Weekly Shincho to read Masayuki Takayama and Yoshiko Sakurai's serial columns.
The serial columns in this week's issue testify to his knowledge, insight, excellent verification, and reporting skills.
Ryotaro Shiba was probably his senior and close to him as a reporter for the Sankei Shimbun.
I'm not proud of saying this, but I have never read his book.
I've never wanted to read it, but I knew him well.
It is because I have subscribed to Weekly Asahi for a long time.
It was because I read Shiba's "Walk Along the Road'' almost weekly, a signature serial in this weekly magazine.
At the same time, I connected with him because I had run into him twice at the bar of Hotel Horkura in Tokyo.
I was chatting with a friend at Dentsu, with whom I was very close.
He was having a meeting with industry officials.
It is because I encountered him twice, sitting right next to me.
I had no choice but to write a sentence mocking him in 2010, not long after I appeared on the Internet, the most extensive library in human history.
Takayama's brilliant criticism in this week's issue was insightful.
A friend of mine, a great reader, joked that the only people who could kill Ryotaro Shiba were Takayama and you.
the 150th year of the Meiji era
When I joined the Sankei Shimbun in 1890, Ryotaro Shiba's "Ryoma ga Yuku'' was serialized in the evening edition.
I remember being very impressed with the depiction of the characters. During the Anpo period in 1970, "Saka no Ue no Kumo'' was serialized in the Sankei Evening Edition.
I couldn't wait for the evening paper to arrive.
My older brother, who had been complaining since then that "The Asahi is the newspaper,'' switched to the Sankei newspaper.
It was the "Saka no Ue no Kumo'' effect.
However, as the series progressed, the descriptions of the characters I admired became strangely heavy, and I even started to hate reading them.
For example, there is the story of Maresuke Nogi, who lost many lives in capturing the Port Arthur Fortress.
They rebuke him, calling him incompetent or something.
He was even more abusive towards his staff officer, Kosuke Ijichi.
I don't know of any Japanese writer who insults people this much. Recently, Masayasu Hosaka wrote a vague article about Hideki Tojo.
Shiba has given civil rights to such a vulgar portrayal of Korean criticism of Japan, which is not typical of Japanese people.
When the series ended, I was at the Haneda Press Club.
When I was visiting airlines, I came across an executive at Japan Airlines who was the grandson of Kiyota Anbo, the gunnery chief of the Combined Fleet.
He was the one who was by Heihachiro Togo's side and directed the concentrated bombardment of the Baltic Fleet.
At All Nippon Airways, the grandson of Kosuke Ijichi, whom Shiba had abused, was the head of the business management office.
I asked the two of them how they drew their grandfather, and they were divided.
I wanted to ask Shiba about this, but before I knew it, he had moved from Sankei to Asahi and started writing travelogues.
Around that time, the color of the morning sun began to appear.
Around that time, he said, "Go run him over."
Before the end of the war, Shiba returned from Manchuria and was at a tank corps base in Sano City, Tochigi Prefecture.
There were also rumors that the U.S. military would land him.
In that case, the Imperial Headquarters staff told him to go down from Sano and stop the attack at the water's edge.
However, the streets are full of evacuees. When asked what to do, the staff officer said, "Run him over.''
His words fit perfectly with the officers of the "brutal Japanese army'' created by Asahi, but I thought it was a little weird.
When the U.S. military landed, and everyone fled from Tokyo, a tank corps was still leisurely staying in Sano.
Is there a situation where we would have to go out and do it?
In fact, none of his fellow tank corps members heard what the staff officer said.
Why did Shiba imitate Katsuichi Honda?
His way of drawing people also surpassed that of Kousuke Ijichi.
In his travelogue, Shimabara discussed Shigemasa Matsukura, who oppressed Christianity, saying, "There is no one more detestable in Japanese history than him."
The basis for this is the records of the Portuguese captain and the head of the Dutch trading post.
It is said that he "clothed the believers with cloaks and set them on fire.'' Did they verify the record?
If you examine it, you should find that it perfectly matches the description in Las Casas's "A Brief Report on the Destruction of the Indies," which sold well in Europe then.
This yellow country brazenly shut out Christianity, calling it an evil religion that knew no mercy.
It makes sense to see it as a depiction of Japan's brutality, imitating Las Casas's words, suggesting that he would slander Japan in revenge.
Asahi worships MacArthur and other white people and has no doubts.
Did it also infect Shiba?
In a European travelogue, when Yoshinobu Tokugawa's younger brother, Akitake, visited Belgium, King Leopold II happily described him as "showing special favor to him.''
However, the king then plans to make Japan a colony.
He also said that "the virgin lands of Asia will surely welcome European civilization.''
In the end, the king made Congo a colony and cut off the wrists of half of the people, killing 70% of the population.
There is not a single word of criticism against such a king.
Shiba has wholly adapted to the Asahi culture of being "stern with Japanese people and highly appreciative of foreigners, even Koreans.
After rising to the top of the hill, Japan became arrogant and headed for destruction,'' says Siba's view of history.
However, in his view of history, he melds his hatred of modern Japan and childish worship of foreigners.
It is by no means a coincidence that it bears a strange resemblance to the Asahi Shimbun, which has been corrupting since the 150th year of the Meiji era.
2024/4/1 in Kyoto
