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Manila Bulletin devider devider Released memo points to Hirohito's role in Pearl Harbor raid

Released memo points to Hirohito's role in Pearl Harbor raid

Published Jul 27, 2018 01:45 pm
By the Associated Press A newly released memo by a wartime Japanese official provides what a historian says is the first look at the thinking of Emperor Hirohito and Prime Minister Hideki Tojo on the eve of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. In this July 26, 2018, photo, Takeo Hatano, a used bookstore owner, shows the five-page In this July 26, 2018, photo, Takeo Hatano, a used bookstore owner, shows the five-page "Yuzawa memo," written by Michio Yuzawa, interior vice minister in 1941, in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko / MANILA BULLETIN) While far from conclusive, the five-page document lends credence to the view that Hirohito bears at least some responsibility for starting the war. To what extent Hirohito was responsible for the war is a sensitive topic in Japan, and the bookseller who discovered the memo kept it under wraps for nearly a decade before releasing it to Japan's Yomiuri newspaper, which published it this week. Hirohito was protected from indictment during a U.S. occupation that wanted to use him as a symbol to rebuild Japan as a democratic nation.
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