The Phantom of "Jianguo University"

Author: Shikio Mizoguchi
Publisher:
Publication Date: 2004-07-01
Features: This book was written by Shikio Mizoguchi, a former Central Committee member of the Japanese Communist Party and a student of the former Manchurian "Kodai University" (alongside Taiwan's "Taipei Imperial University" and Korea's "Seoul Imperial University," all of which were institutions of Japan's cultural colonial policy during its imperial expansion). As a participant, Mizoguchi combines personal experiences with extensive research materials to detail the illusory nature of the former Manchurian "Kodai University." Mizoguchi's main argument is that the essence of invasion determines that the so-called "national consciousness" attempted to be established in occupied regions inherently contains contradictions and divisions in national identity. In such an educational institution that suppresses language, controls thought, humiliates personality, and even damages life, the suicide of a Japanese student like Sonosuke Morisaki, the emergence of anti-Manchurian and anti-Japanese organizations among Chinese students, and the acts of Korean students defying authority and teachers—all are natural outcomes. Mizoguchi further critiques colonial rule to introduce the theme of the Japanese people as victims of the invasion war. After Japan's defeat, the Kwantung Army only sent the families of the "Manchurian Empire" leadership to Japan, leaving ordinary Japanese civilians behind, even actively proposing to have them serve labor for the Soviet Union. Mizoguchi concludes that as long as there is a lack of depth in understanding the war or the existence of rhetoric that glorifies the invasion, the suffering of the Japanese—including the immense disasters in the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the Tokyo air raids—will remain shrouded in the shadow of Japan itself being an "aggressor," unable to be distinguished.