Okinawa Prefectural Assembly unanimously declares military forced Okinawans into ‘mass suicide’

   On June 22, one day before the 62nd anniversary marking the end of the Battle of Okinawa in 1945, the Okinawa Prefectural Assembly unanimously adopted a resolution calling on the Education Ministry to retract its directive for deleting from high school history textbooks an account that the Japanese Imperial Army had forced Okinawans to commit “collective suicide” during the battle.

   The resolution stated, “It is crystal clear that the ‘mass suicides’ during the Battle of Okinawa could not have happened without involvement of the Japanese Army. The Education Ministry textbook screening policy amounts to denying a number of testimonies of survivors.”

   “For Okinawans, who went through Japan’s only ground battle during WWII, who lost a great many lives, including the lives of civilians, and had to make tremendous sacrifices that were beyond description, the textbook screening policy should not be condoned,” it went on to state.

   Even Liberal Democratic Party assembly members expressed their agreement with the adoption of the resolution.

   “At the news of the education ministry’s new textbook screening policy, I thought that a war is coming again. We must not have future generations go through the same experience as ours. It is our duty to convey the historical facts. Peace is more important than anything else. Article 9 must not be amended,” said Asato Susumu, an LDP assembly member from the Nago City constituency.

   Asato, who at five wandered around with his family in northern Okinawa to escape capture by the U.S. forces and whose family robbed of their food at gunpoint by Japanese soldiers, said, “I was afraid of the Japanese Army more than the U.S. forces.”

   As of June 22, 36 out of 41 municipal assemblies in Okinawa have already adopted similar resolutions.

   On the same day in Tokyo, a seven-member delegation of the Okinawa Prefectural Assembly consisting of members of the Liberal Democratic, Komei, JCP, and Okinawa Social Mass parties as well as other assembly groups visited the Education Ministry, the Cabinet Office, and Dietmembers elected from the Okinawa constituency to petition for a change of the textbook screening policy.

   They requested that the Education Ministry retract the screening policy so that accounts in textbooks will reflect the facts. The ministry only answered that the matter has been discussed in panels concerned.

   The delegation members later said to reporters, “To our regret, the ministry has shown no interest. It is the consensus of the residents in Okinawa that the ministry directive must be retracted.”               - Akahata, June 23, 2007