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At the end of the Second World War, Japan was occupied by the Allied Powers. The United States played the leading role in the occupation. The San Francisco Peace Treaty, signed on September 8, 1951, marked the end of the Allied occupation, and when it went into effect on April 28, 1952, Japan was once again an independent state. Surrender
Disarmament Japan's postwar Constitution, adopted under Allied supervision, included a "Peace Clause" (Article 9), which renounced war and banned Japan from maintaining any armed forces. This was intended to prevent the country from ever becoming an aggressive military power again. However, within less than a decade, America was pressuring Japan to rebuild its army as a bulwark against Communism in Asia after the Chinese Revolution and the Korean War, and Japan established Self-Defense Forces. Traditionally, Japan's military spending has been restricted to about 1% of its GNP, though this is by popular practice, not law, and has fluctuated up and down from this figure (see Defense budget of Japan). Recently, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and other politicians have tried to repeal or amend the clause. Liberalization The Allies attempted to dismantle the Japanese Zaibatsu. However, the Japanese resisted these attempts, claiming that the zaibatsu were required in order for Japan to compete internationally, and looser industrial groupings known as keiretsu evolved. A major land reform was also conducted, and five million acres (20,000 km²) of land were taken out of the hands of landlords and given to the farmers who worked them. Democratization In 1946, the Diet ratified a new Constitution of Japan which followed closely a 'model copy' prepared by the Occupational authorities, and was promulgated as an amendment to the old Prussian-style Meiji Constitution. The new constitution guaranteed basic freedoms and civil liberties, abolished nobility, and, perhaps most importantly, made the emperor the symbol of Japan, removing him from politics. Shinto was abolished as a state religion, and Christianity reappeared in the open for the first time in decades. Women gained the right to vote, and in April of that year, 14 million turned out for the election that gave Japan its first modern prime minister, Shigeru Yoshida. Unionization This turned out to be one of the greatest hurdles of the occupation, as communism had become increasingly popular among the poorer Japanese workers for several decades, and took advantage of Japan's recent left-leaning atmosphere. In February 1947, Japan's workers were ready to call a general strike, in an attempt to take over their factories ; MacArthur warned that he would not allow such a strike to take place, and the unions eventually relented, making them lose face and effectively subduing them for the remainder of the occupation. Education reform Before and during the war, Japanese education was based on the German system, with "Gymnasien" (English: High Schools) and universities to train students after primary school. During the occupation, Japan's secondary education system was changed to incorporate three-year junior high schools and senior high schools similar to those in the US: junior high became compulsory, but senior high remained optional. The Imperial Rescript on Education was repealed, and the Imperial University system reorganized. The longstanding issue of restricting Kanji usage, which had been planned for decades but continuously opposed by more conservative elements, was also resolved during this time. The Japanese written system was drastically reorganized to give the Toyo Kanji, predecessor of today's Jōyō kanji, and grammar was greatly altered to reflect conversational usage. Purging of war leaders While these other reforms were taking place, various military tribunals, most notably the International Military Tribunal for the Far East in Ichigaya, were trying Japan's war criminals and sentencing many to death and imprisonment. Once Japan's wartime leaders were weeded out, a generation of junior officers was ready to take command of the country. Japanese Politics during the Occupation Period Political parties had begun to revive almost immediately after the occupation began. Left-wing organizations, such as the Japan Socialist Party and the Japan Communist Party, quickly reestablished themselves, as did various conservative parties. The old Seiyukai and Rikken Minseito came back as, respectively, the Liberal Party (Nihon Jiyuto) and the Japan Progressive Party (Nihon Shimpoto). The first postwar elections were held in 1946 (women were given the franchise for the first time), and the Liberal Party's vice president, Yoshida Shigeru (1878-1967), became prime minister. For the 1947 elections, anti-Yoshida forces left the Liberal Party and joined forces with the Progressive Party to establish the new Democratic Party (Minshuto). This divisiveness in conservative ranks gave a plurality to the Japan Socialist Party, which was allowed to form a cabinet, which lasted less than a year. Thereafter, the socialist party steadily declined in its electoral successes. After a short period of Democratic Party administration, Yoshida returned in late 1948 and continued to serve as prime minister until 1954. The end of the occupation In 1949, MacArthur rubber-stamped a sweeping change in the SCAP power structure that greatly increased the power of Japan's native rulers, and as his attention (and that of the White House) gradually diverted to the Korean War, the occupation began to draw to a close. The San Francisco Peace Treaty, signed on September 8, 1951, marked the end of the Allied occupation, and when it went into effect on April 28, 1952, Japan was once again an independent state (with the exception of Okinawa, which remained under US control until 1972). Even though some 47,000 US military personnel remain in Japan today, they are there at the invitation of the Japanese government under the terms of the Treaty of Mutual Cooperation and Security between the United States and Japan and not as an occupying force. Cultural reaction Legacy The U.S. occupation left a lasting impact. The Japanese now believed in democracy, and had less respect for the proponents of a hierarchical society. Japanese democracy, freedom of the press, rejection of militarism and nationalism are all legacies of McArthur’s post-war policies. See also Recommended reading Dower, John W. Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II. Norton, 1999. Robert Guillain, I saw Tokyo burning: An eyewitness narrative from Pearl Harbor to Hiroshima (J. Murray, 1981). ISBN 0-7195-3862-9 | |||||||||
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