International Military Tribunal For The Far East - Legacy

Legacy

In 1978 the kami of 1,068 convicted war criminals, including 14 convicted Class-A war criminals were secretly enshrined at Yasukuni Shrine. Those enshrined include Hideki Tōjō, Kenji Doihara, Iwane Matsui, Heitarō Kimura, Kōki Hirota, Seishirō Itagaki, Akira Mutō, Yosuke Matsuoka, Osami Nagano, Toshio Shiratori, Hiranuma Kiichirō, Kuniaki Koiso and Yoshijirō Umezu. Since 1985, visits made by Japanese government officials to the Shrine have aroused protests in China and Korea.

In a survey of 3,000 Japanese conducted by Asahi News as the 60th anniversary approached in 2006, 70% of those questioned were unaware of the details of the trials, a figure that rose to 90% for those in the 20–29 age group. Some 76% of the people polled recognized a degree of aggression on Japan's part during the war, while only 7% believed it was a war strictly for self-defense.

A Korean government commission cleared 83 of 148 Koreans convicted by the Allies of war crimes during World War II. The commission ruled that the Koreans, who were categorized as Class B and Class C war criminals, were in fact victims of Japanese imperialism.