I was a kid who grown up in 60’s. I used to like plastic models, tanks, fighter jets. German tank, Tiger I and aircraft, Messerschmitt were among my favorites. I liked the WWII history, read books and watched many American war movies.
I was not dreaming for WWIII. On the contrary, my mother was born in occupied Korea during the war, and my father grew up near Hiroshima where he had to deal with victims of the Atomic Bomb. Those stories often were my bedtime story.
Then by the time I started my study in the university, I grew up enough to understand the reality of the war. I often talked with my friend about Gundam, in rather negative way. From Gundam, :the enemy nation” started showing up in the story, as compared to Gozilla or Ultraman (before Gaundam) where the enemy was always monster, not a group of people. It seemed to me as if by having enemy groups, those stories made young Japanese forget about the war.
Being in the U.S. teaching students from all over the world, I heard a lot of sad stories of war.
Korean students told me what Japanese military did in Korea, which nobody, even my Korean born mother did not tell me. Or maybe she didn’t know those facts.
My colleague was in Vietnam and even 80’s he was still suffering from PTSD. Then I was in Vietnam and came across with the stories from their side about American brutality. So, I am totally opposed to the war.
In August, because of HIroshima and Nagasaki, Japanese TV programs often show the brutality of the war. We sometimes have demonstartion, or hear a harsh criticism toward the government.
The politicians, I regret to say, only work according to they own interest. The same everywhere in this world.
Since the Constantine switched to Christianity to have the control over Roman empire, until present, politicians only did what they thought beneficial for them. Maybe that is their job and there are some truth in that. However, we can easily conclude that there have not been and will not be any politician who will bring the peace in to this world.
So, what should we do? I really don’t know.
One thing that might work is that all of us strongly insist against the war deep inside. To insist, the thought should come from inside of us.
Just like insisting upon the importance of the art. Maybe you will never find any news that help your voice. Maybe all the news discourage you. But we insist.
I think this is very important because, Germany, Japan, Russia, Korea, everywhere when the war started, people willingly or not, reluctantly or not, accepted the start of the war. We should keep insisting “No” to the war.