I want to thank Kiroku Hanai for his Sept. 22 article, "The road to Yasukuni's survival." I visited Yasukuni Shrine in 2004 to do research for a film about hibakusha (atomic bomb victims). My answer to the question posed in the article ("Is Washington now inclined to allow a resurgence of militarism in Japan?") is that I believe Washington has wanted to re-arm Japan since 1950.
With the beginning of the Korean War, the United States tried to coerce Japan into dropping Article 9 of the Constitution and go to war against Korea. To Japan's credit, it refused and has lived in peace for 63 years. One does not have to look far to see that the U.S. has been pressuring Japan to play a more active role in military affairs globally to the extent that Japan may someday soon be capable of making preemptive military strikes against potential enemies.
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