74th anniversary 2019/8/16
Yesterday it was the 74th anniversary of the end of World War II. The national memorial service was held in Tokyo and new Emperor, who ascended to the throne on May 1, attended the ceremony together with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and about 6,500 people, including bereaved relatives.
I had a chance to talk with an old veteran who was ready to go on a no-return attack at the end of war. He could not understand the speech of Showa Emperor on the end of war and did not know what he should do, after his planned attack was cancelled.
He was born poor and could not afford to take higher education. However after he was summoned to Navy, he trained himself hard and studied eagerly. Afterword he was promoted to officer and selected as a member of no-return special mission.
He tried hard to get higher position only because his parents who did not give him enough education, could receive higher pension for his death in war, which was given according to class in Army.
He did not have a grudge against his parents but tried his best to reward parents.
Meiji new government published the Imperial Script on education and strongly recommended people to do best for parents, to trust mutually between friends, to study hard and develop oneself, to try best for public interest and nation and so on.
Most Japanese had been keeping these lessons until the end of war. However, 74 years has passed since the end of war and regretfully Japanese mentality has changed gradually.
After Japanese Army surrendered, United Nations occupied Japan for 7 years, and unfortunately they forced various measures to destroy Japanese traditional mentality, society, education and so on.
We, Japanese were not strong enough to resist those attempts and modern Japanese mentality are regretfully far from those mentality before war.
On the day of 74th anniversary, it is most important to consider how to reconstruct traditional Japanese mentality.
