Tanaka Memorial

The nihongo|Tanaka Memorial|田中上奏文|Tanaka Josobun is an alleged Japanese strategic planning document from 1927, in which Prime Minister Baron Tanaka Giichi laid out for the Emperor Hirohito a strategy to take over the world. It is believed by most historians to be a forgery [ Chang, the Rape of Nanking, pp.178] which was used to justify a long-term war against Japan, and by others to be genuine and an accurate prediction of Japanese action in the region.

Background

The "Tanaka Memorial" gained its first publicity when it was published in the 1929, December edition of "China Critic" (Current Affair Monthly, 時事月報) in Nanking, a Nationalist Chinese publication. [Harries, Soldiers of the Rising Sun pp.162]

quote
In order to take over the world, you need to take over China;
In order to take over China, you need to take over Manchuria and Mongolia.
If we succeed in conquering China, the rest of the Asiatic countries and the South Sea countries will fear us and surrender to us.
Then the world will realize that Eastern Asia is ours.

The English translation of this document was in circulation before February 1934, and formed the foundation of the lead article on the front page of the first edition of "The Plain Truth" magazine published by Herbert W. Armstrong in February of that year, [http://www.coghomeschool.org/site/cog_archives/plain_truth/1934/02%20February%201934.pdf Cog] ] although it had first appeared in the less widely circulated "Communist International" magazine in 1931.

The "Tanaka Memorial" was depicted extensively by United States wartime propaganda as a sort of Japanese answer to "Mein Kampf". Frank Capra's Academy Award-winning movie series "Why We Fight", the installments "The Battle of China" and Prelude to War describe the "Tanaka Memorial" as the document that was the Japanese plan for war with the United States [Dower, War Without Mercy, pp. 22] . As presented in "Battle of China", the four sequential steps to achieve Japan's goal of conquests are

#Conquest of Manchuria
#Conquest of China
#Establishment of bases in the Pacific
#Conquest of the United States

Even though its authenticity has been called into question by some today, the "Tanaka Memorial" was widely accepted as authentic in the 1930s and 40s because Japan's actions corresponded so closely to these plans. The 1931 Mukden Incident, 1937 Second Sino-Japanese War, and the 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor and the subsequent Pacific War seemed to confirm this suspicion. [Coble, Parks M. "Facing Japan: Chinese politics and Japanese imperialism, 1931–1937" p. 36. Harvard University Press, 1991. ISBN 0674775309] Some historical experts such as Edwin P. Hoyt, state unequivocally that "... the "Tanaka Memorial" was real. It was just too good a copy of what Prime Minister Tanaka had said and what the supernationalists had been saying for months to be otherwise." [Hoyt, Edwin P. (2001). "Japan's War The Great Pacific Conflict". Cooper Square Press, 62. ISBN 0-8154-1118-9] Others, such as Meirion Harries, state just as unequivocally that the Tanaka Memorial "...was one of the most successful “dirty tricks” of the twentieth century – a bogus document so brilliantly conceived that thirty years later Westerns were still being taken in by it". [Harries, Soldiers of the Rising Sun, pp. 162 ] Likewise, famed historian W G Beasley, states "…the nature of this document, as published variously in English and Chinese, does not carry conviction as to its authenticity". [Beasley, Japanese Imperialism 1894-1945. pp. 185 ]

peculation of forgery

In the summer of 1927, Tanaka convened a ‘Far East Conference’ with members of the Japanese Foreign Ministry, Army Ministry, Navy Ministry, and Finance Ministry. However, instead of producing a master plan for world domination, the result of the Conference was a rough consensus that Japan should support the Kuomintang government of China against the Chinese communists, as long as the Japanese could convince General Chang Tso-lin to consolidate his base in a virtually autonomous Manchuria, which would serve as a buffer state, and would fall eventually within Japanese domination. [Jansen, The Making of Modern Japan, pp.525] It is alleged that the Tanaka Memorial is a secret report of this Conference.

When the Allies searched for incriminating documents to support war crime charges following the surrender of Japan, no drafts or copies of anything corresponding to the "Tanaka Memorial" appeared among them. Almost all academic historians now regard the "Memorial" as a forgery [ Chang, the Rape of Nanking, pp.178] and consider it in the same category as the Zinoviev letter and The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. [Dower, War Without Mercy, pp. 22 and 320]

The origin of the Memorial is still in question. Because the initial edition of the Memorial was in Chinese, many historians have attributed it to Chinese, most probably Chinese communist sources. [Jansen, The Making of Modern Japan, pp.525]

There have been claims of forgery by the Soviet Union to encourage war between China and Japan, and so to advance Soviet interests. [Rommerstein, The Venoma Secrets, pp. 520 ] The two theories are not mutually exclusive, as the Chinese Communist Party was a branch of Comintern under control of the Soviet Union, and Soviet policy from the 1930s was to wage a propaganda war against Japanese expansionism. Also, the first translation of the Memorial into English was done by the Communist Party of America and published in the December 1931 issue of "Communist International" magazine. It was later re-printed in book format. [Schecter, Shared Secrets. pp.8 ]

In 1939, Peter Fleming claimed to have produced an ‘update’ to the "Tanaka Memorial", by writing an imaginary report on a secret Allied strategy conference attended by Kuomintang leader Chiang Kai-Shek, and having it leaked to the Japanese. This indicates that the Tanaka Memorial was known to be a forgery by the British prior to World War II. [ Holt, The Deceivers, pp.298]

Newspapers and school textbooks in the People's Republic of China still mention the "Tanaka Memorial" as fact without stating that the Japanese and most western historians contend that the document is a forgery. [ Chang, the Rape of Nanking, pp.178]

ee also

*Blood on the Sun

Notes

Rommerstein, The Venona Secrets, pp. 520

References

*cite book
last = Beasley
first = W.G.
authorlink =
coauthors =
year = 1991
title = Japanese Imperialism 1894-1945
publisher = Oxford University Press
location =
id = ISBN 0198221681
*cite book
last = Chang
first = Iris
year = 1998
title = The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II
publisher = Penguin
location =
id = ISBN 0-14-027744-7
*cite book
last = Dower
first = John W
year = 1987
title = War Without Mercy: Race and Power in the Pacific WarWar Without Mercy: Race and Power in the Pacific War
publisher = Pantheon
location =
id = 0394751728
*cite book
last = Gordon
first = Andrew
year = 2003
title = A Modern History of Japan: From Tokugawa Times to the Present
publisher = Oxford University Press
location =
id = 0195110617
*cite book
last = Harries
first = Meirion
year = 1994
title = Soldiers of the Sun: The Rise and Fall of the Imperial Japanese Army
publisher = Random House; Reprint edition
location =
id = 0-679-75303-6
*cite book
last = Holt
first = Thaddeus
year = 2007
title =The Deceivers: Allied Military Deception in the Second World War
publisher = Skyhorse Publishing
location =
id = 1602391424
*cite book
last = Jansen
first = Marius B.
year = 2000
title = The Making of Modern Japan
publisher = Belknap Press
location =
id = ISBN 0674009916
*cite book
last = Rommerstein
first = Herbert
year = 2001
title = The Venona Secrets, Exposing Soviet Espionage and America's Traitors
publisher = Regniery Publishing
location =
id = ISBN 0895262258
*cite book
last = Schecter
first = Leona
year = 2003
title = Sacred Secrets: How Soviet Intelligence Operations Changed American History
publisher = Potomac Books
location =
id = ISBN 1574885227
*Stein, Gordon "Encyclopedia of Hoaxes", Gale Group, 1993. (On itself) ISBN 0-8103-8414-0
* Allen S. Whiting, "China Eyes Japan", University of California Press, 1989. ISBN 0-520-06511-5

External links

These sources deny the authenticity of the Memorial:
* [http://www.encyclopedia.com/html/T/Tanaka-G1.asp encyclopedia.com]
* [http://homepage3.nifty.com/reveal/conspiracy/1932.htm Japan Speaks about Conspiracy of Japan in 1932] (revealed by Kiyoshi Kawakami)
* [http://homepage3.nifty.com/reveal/conspiracy/tokyo.htm Conspiracy of Japan in the Tokyo Trial]

These sources accept the authenticity of the Memorial:
* [http://homepage3.nifty.com/reveal/conspiracy/97-16.html Profound lessons in past incidents] (a mirror of Chinese statement page of 1997)
* [http://www.archive.org/details/PreludeToWar "Prelude to War" download] on the Internet Archive