Conclusion - A Lesson, 2001
"... did you see Kōhaku, Sachiko?"
"Not really, my dad was channel surfing and for most of the night we were watching the TBS 21st Century Project thingy."
"Seriously, Sada Masashi was..."
"bing-bong, bang-bong"
The door swung open and in stepped Mr. Tanaka the History teacher, a jovial, slightly balding man in his late 40s. He arrived at the podium and gestured for the class representative to do her thing.
The call to "Attention", was followed by the mass of students rising from their seats with a degree of energy, the subsequent "Bow," brought along a less energetic look at the floor and the "Be seated," was followed by the 36 students of class 8-3 returning to the same place that they had started this small routine in.
"Right class, first of all I would like to wish you a happy new year. I hope all of you had a good break and had time to finish your homework. Pass it to the front. I will be taking attendance in the meanwhile."
The class was soon filled with the sound of papers being shuffled and passed to the front, as well as names being answered by calls of present. After Tanaka was sure that the students were all present and the papers had reached his podium he put the classbook away.
"Now, given that it is the start of a new term I thought we would take it somewhat easily and I would give you a brief recap of what we are going to talk about for the next three months. Although I would be overjoyed to take this slowly, I know that this term will be last time I meet a number of you in a classroom setting. Therefore let us tie things up so none of you would need to be embarrassed in your adult lives about not knowing your past. Now where did we leave off... Katō?
"Teacher, Katō is a sleep."
"Well wake him up then."
The sleeping Katō was silently nudged from all four directions by history textbooks and jumped awake.
"What..."
"Now that you've rejoined the class Katō would you mind telling us, what topic we finished on last term."
"Ah, yes.... The... The.."
"Mishima incident," a voice whispered from behind him.
"The Mishima incident"
"Right you are Katō, try to stay awake. Just because the intro won't be on the test doesn't mean that you ought to sleep through it."
"Now, where were we. Ah right, the Mishima Incident, which we discussed last year, represented something of a shock for both the general public and the political establishment of the Japanese Empire. The anti-Seiyūkai coalition that had been formed by Taishūtō, Komeitō, Nihon Shintō, Seimeitō, the remains of Rikken Minseitō and some independents put aside their internal squabbling for the time being and was overcome with a spirit of compromise. Under this newly found uniting light, the coalition pushed through, what is now known as the Three Irreversible Changes. These were - the rapid and permanent withdrawal of all Japanese troops from Northern China to their positions in Manchuria, the Legation Cities and the Home Islands as well as the demobilisation of newly called up units; the expansion of suffrage to women; and finally weakening control and oversight over religious and trade organisations. This reform package represented a lot of concessions from a lot of different members and was formulated so as to pass in a single vote so that coalition partners could not pick and choose. It was indeed a mixed bag of things similar to, but different from what each coalition partner had truly lobbied for in the sweeping reforms. Some, like the socialists and the political arm of the Buddhist sect got off better, as the loose wording in the reform allowed their support organisations to assert their independence from central oversight and the long arm of the Home Ministry. Others got of worse with the grand plans of the reformists in regards to campaign finance law and altering the sizes of districts being reduced to a mere expansion of suffrage to women. The anti-war/pro-Chinese faction within the coalition perhaps drew the shortest straw of all, as the Empire remained fully lodged in continental affairs and although its direct conflict with the Chinese would be over, it would still remain in a long standstill with the Russians. The reforms left no one political force in the coalition particularly pleased, not to even mention the reactions on the right, and thus the spirit of compromise that the Mishima Incident had caused began to rise between the different parties began to wane, leading to what... Kobayashi?"
"The Grand Coalition and the Revolving Door Premierships?"
"Correct, you are Kobayashi. Right in March of 1971, just a month after the reforms had passed Prime Minister Konoe resigned and announced the withdrawal of his party from the anti-Seiyūkai coalition citing internal issues within the coalition, which were at the time largely thought to be the result of an unwillingness to proceed with restructuring the campaign finance laws. This prompted the once united coalition into a race to see who could remain in power as a partner of the Seiyūkai, as the country was left largely adrift and in the control of bureaucracy. In the fighting, the Taishūtō emerged victorious with Prime Minister Eda being crowned interim Prime Minister and leading the Grand Coalition government to snap elections. It is thought that their willingness for elections is what saw the socialists win out over Komeitō, as Minseitō with its three Diet members was found lacking and the rest of the former coalition partners were never really in the running. The snap elections of 1971 saw the election of the first female parliamentarians to the Japanese Diet and the restoration of a narrow Seiyūkai majority through a number of massive electoral defeats for the Seimeitō, whose remaining membership would subsequently merge into the Nihon Shintō. The aforementioned Shintō and the Taishūtō, whose more left-wing membership were now in full revolt after the death of Asanuma Inejiro, would also see minor defeats. Despite the victory, 1971-73 would see four different prime ministers, after Konoe, as factions within the Seiyūkai fought defensive and offensive battles in regards to the Three Irreversible Changes, but by summer of 1973 stability began to set in as it had become clear that these changes were here to stay. The collapse of the Qing government, following rapid efforts to withdraw Imperial troops, marked the end of the China War. The Republican leaders would not have long to rest on their laurels as Double Ten Day in 1973 marked an end for Chinese Democracy, at least for some time, as military officials seized control of the state. The Chinese military regime would subsequently get into conflict with most of its neighbours over various issues, including its previous allies the Mongolian State after they intervened to protect Han civilians being terrorised by the Mongolians. After tensions began to grow on the Sino-Manchurian border, as well as hints that the Chinese government was considering seizing Japanese property within their borders, Prime Minister Fukuda saw the need to avoid another costly war on the mainland as the most important issue of his premiership. Following negotiations lead by former prime minister Tanaka Kakuei, the Port Arthur Accords were signed in 1974. The Japanese government wished for amiable relations with Republican China in order to avoid their drift into the Russian sphere as well as assurances to its economic holdings. In exchange for confirming these requests, the Chinese wanted aid, the gradual return of Manchuria as well as acceptance into the Legations Council as equals, thereby beginning the restoration of control over the coastal cities of China... Someone wake up Nakamura."
"I'm awake teacher."
"Not you, your brother."
"Nakamura, why did the Chinese Republicans agree to the Port Arthur Accords?"
"... Because they were foolish?"
"No, the Chinese government agreed to the treaty not because they were foolish, but because they were a military dictatorship with less regard to the opinions of the general public and because they were engaged in conflict with most of their neighbours. The gradual cession of control over Manchuria and through it the introduction of the Chinese into the conflict concluding in the handover ceremony in 1980, helped to finally bring an end to the stalemate that the Japanese had reached with the Russians. Primarily through handing the conflict off to the Chinese to solve. The subsequent Russian withdrawal from Manchuria is largely seen as the reasoning behind the collapse of the gerontocratic and by now deeply unpopular Russian Junta, leading to the formation of a democratic government under the Czar. The Port Arthur Accords, although deemed necessary, would prove quite unpopular among politicians back home leading to the end to the short period of stability that had the Japanese political scene had enjoyed under Fukuda, who was toppled after the Seiyūkai only maintained its rule only after finally absorbing the remains of the Minseito. 1974-75 would see a different prime minister elected each year, until finally in 1976 a longer period of stability returned following the election of Prime Minister Nakasone. The Prime Minister charted a more liberal course for the economy, one that was well received as growth had failed to live up to the heights of the Shōwa Golden Era. Nakasone, a former high-ranking bureaucrat, had long since attacked the massive role that the Japanese state played in the economy and campaigned heavily on privatisation as well as deregulation. The beginning of the the Nakasone period is often also called the beginning of the end for the vice-like grip that the bureaucracy had held over the Japanese economy, central control which has often been called the bedrock of the Shōwa Democracy or Japanese one-nation conservatism, as our friends down under have called it. These efforts also saw the recognition of Korea and some of the South-Sea Regions as naichi and opened to industrial investment, actions which lead to a great deal of economic growth for the Empire through the influx of workers with lower wages into the labour market. During this time political decisions in Europe also saw the region loosen its export restrictions, allowing for Japanese exports to reach an unprecedented period of dominance on the global market. The investments into the colonies also worked well to bind the previously restive natives ever closer to the Imperial whole. The Nakasone reforms were of course not all positive, as they also put a large amount of strain on the economic well being of less educated residents of the Home Islands with a considerable amounts of them finding themselves laid off and thrown into the increasingly competitive labour market at a late period in their lives. This would however do little to stop the reforms, as snap elections held in 1977 to push through widely debated reforms seeking to further weaken the control of the bureaucracy over the country through strengthening and democratising local government, confirmed that the people of the Empire stood behind Nakasone and not his backbench. The 1977 elections would also mark the last election that the Nihon Shintō would compete in, as the Seiyūkai under Nakasone had campaigned for much the same policies and the party found itself outflanked and outgunned. The party would later return as the Nihon Jiyūtō. Murayama, what do you think happened next?"
"The Aleutian Crisis?"
"Yes, but what I meant was closer to the period we discussed, not that much after. Shimada, can you help Murayama out?"
"The Second Black Veil Scandal?"
"Correct, you are Shimada. The economic growth caused by the deregulatory policies and other attacks on bureaucratic control meant that by the 1980s different consultant organisations had begun to play an ever larger role in politics as the bureaucratic side of the iron triangle weakened due to political pressure. These organisations were usually staffed by former big wigs from the business world, retired politicians and even people whose previous employer had been the bureaucracy. The rise of these consultancy firms only served to thin the once again increasingly close relationship between government and big business. The years following the resignation of Prime Minister Nakasone in 1981, would be mired in an ever increasing number of corruption cases. These cases took a toll on public trust, as they would often incriminate rather high-ranking politicians and the sums of yen in question would put the First Black Veil Scandal era to shame. These issues within the party also brought about another period of revolving door premierships as the party began to desperately find clean politicians with weak internal support to shuffle into power. Attempts by these politicians to reverse course or probe deeper would be met with them ending up deposed. This period of internal strife would eventually culminate in the Seiyūkai once again losing unilateral control of the Diet in the 1989 snap elections, held following the death of the Shōwa Emperor and to mark the beginning of the beginning of the Hofū era. The splintering of the Taishūtō in the 70s following the death of Asanuma, into left and right wing factions, meant that the opposition was far too deeply split for an anti-Seiyūkai coalition to be formed. This meant that Seiyūkai rule continued with support from the right-wing socialists in exchange for halting and reversing some of the less than popular decisions that the party had taken during the Nakasone era. These elections marked the end of the Shōwa era and thus the end of our curriculum. The Aleutian crisis that Murayama mentioned is currently considered too recent an event to be covered in history class, even though it is often cited as an important representation of the rebirth of Red America. The same is true of our cold relations with the Chinese after the collapse of their military government, although the downturn in relations had already begun after their unilateral invasion of Brunei."
"bing-bong, bang-bong"
"Well seems like that is all the time we have for today. See you all on Thursday, I hope you'll have a wonderful year. Class rep."
"Attention, bow, dismissed."
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Action causes reaction, so it seems. The political right is pushed from power, and new left thinking pushes its way into society as a result of social and economic changes - so, political thought on the right is energized into trying to find answers. Although maybe the answers that this militia was trying to give, aren't so much new as rather old ideas, rehashed and made more shrill so that they sound like something new...
Thank you for this insight into Japan at the dawn of the new era in Japanese and world politics. It seems that Japan and its empire are pretty well set up to coast into the last quarter of the 20th century. Internal conflict seems pretty loud beef very civilized, what with a bit of arson and a fist to the face and two ritual suicides taking center stage. Mishima was a writer of Nō threatre, right? Maybe Japanese culture actually internalized this civilized style so much, they can do with hints and gestures where actors (political and performing arts likewise) in other stages cultures must communicate with stomping and screaming and on stage physical fighting. The Japanese, masters of the minimal.
Whose astronauts are on the moon during those last months of the narrative?? Japanese, German, American? I'd think they were Japanese, there were hints in the earlier chapter, but I'm too much of a western brute to be able to read subtle hints, let alone remember them
The world map looks intriguing!
It's scary to think that the American red empire is still intact at the turn of the 21st century. Must be a surveillance state like OTL PRC, to withstand the centrifugal forces in this unholy dystopia.
The Arab world appears very united. I don't remember if this was already so in earlier maps? Makes me think that the time of German dominion over parts of Africa, really must be over, if the Arab nations in Germany's former sphere unite in such a way, and confront the global north with one voice.
Vietnam looks like it's now no longer the same color as the Japanese empire. Did they manage to break off, and restore their independence?
China, all republican turquoise... Ah well... The empire, long divided, must unite, and all that. Must be difficult for the Japanese to come to terms with this neighbor. What form of government are they running in China?
Lastly, the observation of Korea in the yellow of the Japanese empire, hmm, I must say I didn't expect that. Especially with China united and likely not friendly with China. Did the Japanese reform their empire into a not-empire, a union of equals? I'd think that with Japan as of 1970 set on a course towards social liberalization, there should be a moment when the Koreans just stand up and demand equal rights, or they'll just walk out of the door. Or did the social liberalization not last, and the hot heads of the Tatenokai actually succeed in turning opinion around, and bring back iron fisted repression against all divergences in the outer parts of the Japanese empire?
He did indeed write Nō and Kabuki plays or well it is among those are among the things that he wrote. Perhaps you are right and the theatrics did indeed have some influence on him and his actions. You are quite welcome, I started this project off because I wanted to write something and the real reason that I started posting it was so as to not be able to back down and trash it. Glad to see that someone enjoyed it as well.
Well, considering that one of these nations was in total pandemonium at the time, another had only just conducted their first spacewalk and the final one was at one time described as "racing itself into space", which of these do you think is most likely to be the one?
I kid of course, it is indeed Germany. I did at one point have a plan to write a chapter about the moon landings, it was one of those things that I was really sure that I wanted to cover. However when I eventually got to it, I was already sure that this was ending and I was somewhat unsure how to write it, so I ended up trashing the chapter without having written much.
The AUSS is a rather friendly state, provided of course that you are not a dissident within it or don't get in the way of some important people some way, I'll gladly tell you that much. At the very least that is how the general public sees it, given that many still remember the Cultural Revolution, which lasted way past the forever nap of Chairman Browder and well into the 1980s. It is currently becoming more of a strong police state, largely due to the fact that it has recently emerge from the Third Great South American War, where it tried to bring the rest of the Americas under its sway. The war only stopped due to massive casualties costing tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of American lives... I kid of course, it did cost those lives, but the real reason it stopped was due to extensive threats from Europe and Asia, particularly Japan due to the fairly large role that Argentina and its food exports play. In the end, the war saw the La Platan bloc collapse, Brazil reassert its independence under a rather Anglophile ie pro-American popular front government and saw the Caribbean become an internal sea of the Pan-American Council through the establishment of the Bolivarian Republic of New Granada as well as the integration of the UPCA into Centroamerica. The large amounts of casualties can largely be put down both due to extensive damage caused by the Cultural Revolution, but America has begun its period of reinvention much to the concern of every other power. Washington is sending the message of over there, over there that the Yanks are coming over there.
I think I hinted to the Arab situation before. The Arab states themselves were never 100% in the German sphere, more orbiting it due to necessity while trying to undermine the Ottomans - the real German ally in the region. The Caliphate, or as it is officially known the Arab Federation, is the by product of botched coup, which left Arabia leaderless after the military knocked off a very large portion of the Hashemites, necessitating an intervention by the Egyptians given their long term cold war with the Iranians. The temporary solution fairly quickly turned into permanent one with the King of Egypt being proclaimed the Caliph and leading to the establishment of a united Arab state. Note this is not to say that it is a stable creation, but it has been stable enough and its fairly massive control over oil exports means that nobody has really tried to meddle there aggressively enough thus far. This fact was also the reason that helped them blackmail the Germans into retreating from the Suez, a fact which massively boosted the popularity of the state. No humiliations at the hand of an "Outremer" state on a number of separate occasions and the presence of the Turkish and Iranian threats also helped quite a bit. Although no side has gained the upper hand over the other in the Arab-Iranian debacle, the Arabs did give the Turks a bloody nose during the Turkish-Greek war in the 1980s ending in the Greeks taking the Turkish held Aegean islands.
However yes, as the increased number of states in Africa suggests, German direct dominion over Africa is more or less over. The brunt of that effort has fallen on the South African bloc, ie South Africa, Namibia, North Rhodesia and Mozambique, which... Need I say more? Most of the settlers that did not want to return home or stay in the collapsed remains of the Syndicalist-aligned African states moved there. Some also moved to the German Indian Ocean territories, which also includes Zanzibar and is there because it has proven to be the cheapest way to maintain a pretence of power projection in the region and because nobody.
Vietnam has always been independent or well, as far as this AAR is concerned. It just used to be called Indochina, you can freely add the words Red or Independent to it if you so wish. The Syndicalist Indochinese state however became a bit of an eyesore for the regional powers, ie India, Japan and China, and following a series of mind games and support for nationalist groups it was dismantled. The Indians kicked the whole thing off by supporting the independence of the Laotians, which destabilised the Indochinese Federation. The Japanese were next with the Chinese acting soon after. Japanese action was prompted by increasing instability in the region after the death of Uncle Ho, which spread to their allied state of Thailand particularly the parts of Thailand inhabited by the Khmer. The Japanese solution to this issue was to sponsor the creation of an independent Khmer state, standing of course under Thai supervision, which only lead to more instability in Indochina, particularly the regions inhabited by the Khmer that wanted to join this state. These Khmer would break off soon afterwards, as the Chinese Junta invaded to protect the rights of ethnic Chinese in Vietnam and to "protect" the rump state from the Indians. The invasion unsurprisingly resulted in the installation of a less radical government in Vietnam. One that is deeply unpopular, but has managed to stay in power as the Chinese democrats have thus far seen the region as too important.
China has once again come to resemble something along the lines of a democracy, at least as far as this world is concerned. I mentioned that thee Republican Army took a more direct approach to governance for much of the 1970s-80s. The toppling of the Qing was quite popular, don't get me wrong, but the coup was triggered by displeasure in the Army about some of the rather unpopular decisions that the Kuomintang had taken in this conflict. Decisions such as giving up large chunks of "rightful Chinese territory" to the Mongolians, which had seriously shaken public trust in the government. Also, not responding to the "humiliation" that the Indians, who also occupied "rightful Chinese territory", had caused to the Chinese public by spitting in the face of "Chinese friendship" and not sharing their plans on how to produce nuclear weapons. In the end the junta was brought down by cronyism, which lead to economic mismanagement, as well as a rather unpopular foreign adventures, khm Brunei. Also, the continued cooperation with the Japanese that sort of screwed China royally in the past century, still hold a fairly important position in the economy and are really the only force still standing in the true reunification of China - the Legations and the Liaodong concession.
Onto Korea then. The previously warm relations between the Japanese and the Junta in China sort of meant that Korea was a bit of a none issue between the two nations, at least geopolitically speaking. On the domestic front, as RV-Ye put it rather effectively, the Korean independence group were more or less "beheaded" for a considerable period and the idea was reduced to a niche one for a bit. By the point that Korean nationalism recovers from this debacle, we've already reached the Nakasone era and the rapid rise in Korean living standards after being recognised as a naichi. An overwhelmingly Japanese mass media and education system that is geared towards turning the kids Japanese, as well as other methods in the approximately 2 decades of passive and 4 of active Japanification have allegedly turned the province Japanese enough to trust it, or at least that is what the government claimed. Industrial concerns flood in to take advantage of the cheaper labour, as well as shorter supply chains due to the closer proximity of resources kickstarting an aggressive rise in living conditions for the up until this point fairly agrarian Korean peninsula. This is not to say that all is fine and dandy and that some Imperial institutions or citizens still don't discriminate against Koreans or that a certain percentage of the public aren't still mad at losing at their jobs to the peninsula nor that a certain percentage of Koreans aren't trying to lobby for independence, just that for the moment the issue of Korean independence is a non-issue. Given that most of the around 50 million or so Koreans are currently enjoying living standards that their ancestors could never have even imagined in their wildest dreams, at least the ones that weren't nobility or whose families didn't return from whatever labour migration pitch Imperial officials sold about Australia or whatever other god forsaken place needed extra hands. Once the effect of that economic boom wears off... Well that's another story for another time is it not. The Empire may have socially liberalised to a degree, but it is still an empire. Once the people get too rowdy and start disturbing "public order", the velvet glove of economic incentive can come off to reveal an iron fist. A state will inevitably defend itself from those that seek to undermine it, don't our liberal democracies do the same? So to answer your question, the Koreans got something resembling equal rights and are now treated as equals on the peninsula and the Home Islands. That is if they don't start actively pushing for those "wild theories" on how the Korean people deserve independence and how Korean is not just a historical curiosity, but the language that should be used officially across the peninsula.
edit; 404 seems like a good point to end it...
Anyway, this AAR is done then, if anyone has any more questions they're free to ask them. Just that the periods that I answer them in might get a bit more... Erratic as I'm once again trying to wean myself off the forums.
