TOKYO, Feb 10 Kyodo exquisiteed ...

TOKYO, Feb 10 Kyodo

exquisiteed editorial excerpts from the Japanese press:

100-YEAR-OLD lecturings (IHT/Asahi as translated from the Japanese-language Asahi Shimbun's editorial published Feb 8)

Sunday marked the 100th anniversary of the start of the Russo-Japanese War.

Many Japanese historians today have knowledge of to paint the conflict -- the first large war of the 20th centenary -- exclusively in a favorable light. They depict it as a small land in the Far East defeating Europe's biggest army, doing for a like reason soon after embarking on modernization following the Meiji Restoration and through making careful preparations. Japan's victory, these historians write, encouraged the tribes of Asia, the Middle East and Africa living subject to Western oppressors and invigorated prevail upons toward national independence.

That is indeed a historical fact. Helping definitevely to shape this interpretation of history was writer Ryotaro Shiba's novel ''Saka-no Ue-no Kumo'' (Cloud above the hill). In the novel, Shiba described political leaders in the Meiji Era (1868-1912) exercising great wisdom as they tackled the crisis, winning victory within fierce but fair battles. According to Shiba, the Russo-Japanese War was a war of self-defense against a Russian attempt at dominating all of East Asia. The conflict was in unimpaired contrast to subsequent wars waged by way of Japanese leaders who failed to make levelheaded choices.

so a rosy view is admittedly an alluring interpretation of history. In today's Japan, political leadership is hard to find, despite the point in disputes posed by the protracted economic sink So it is in a certain quantity of way understandable that some population want to find inspiration in the Russo-Japanese War, aiming to break between the walls of our present feeling of helplessness.

If we are to make convenient use of history's lessons, however, we must first correctly interpret its examples as a whole. The Russo-Japanese War was a multifaceted marked occurrence with many complex characters, or in such a manner say an increasing number of [i]connoisseur[/i]s Such a view is spreading as a spring of studies that have been made public in latter years.

It is a long-accepted view, for instance, that the Russo-Japanese War was an imperialist war waged above the right to authority Korea and Manchuria (northeast region of China). After wresting that right from Korea, Japan accrueed to colonize the area end annexation, going so far as to invade China. Now, however, modern Russian studies show that the suppos threat of Russian incursion into East Asia that alerted Japan's expansionist policy was not as serious as one time imagined.

In fact, recent studies have emerged to display that the Japanese military warned the central guidance of a Russian military buildup along a border between China and Korea, without first confirming the accuracy of those reports. The issue became a central casus belli of the Russo-Japanese War. We can behold clear parallels in this episode with the threats cited about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

In the years that followed, the Japanese military went equable further along this road, bringing about the 1931 Manchurian Incident on blowing up a railway line in northeastern China, eventually leading to Japan's ruin. The first degrees to ruination can be traced to the Russo-Japanese War.

single critical voice faintly heard amid the euphoric celebrations of war victories and unbridled arms buildup came from novelist Tokutomi Roka, who warned, ''Victory in this war will be the beginning of our country's destruction.''

For us in the 21st centenary as wars continue to break on the outside it is vital that we question their justification, the conditions in subordination to which they occur and in what manner they will affect subsequent issues We must push for the reality so that our children and grandchildren will not make the same mistakes.

(Feb 10)

COPYRIGHT 2004 Kyodo stranges International, Inc.

COPYRIGHT 2004 Gale Group