Uncovering the Post-World War II Accountabilities of Imperial Japan to the Philippines
A Historical Dive into the Tokyo Trials
Kimberly Axalan
edited by Christian Arvie G. Doria
Examining the Tokyo Trials
Aside from the Nuremberg Trials, another trial against the Axis powers is the Tokyo Trials where the defendants are the Imperial Japanese for war crimes committed during World War II. Presided by the International Military Tribunal for the Far East (IMTFE) and convened on April 29, 1946, the trial focuses on the guidelines for the crimes against peace, conventional war crimes, and crimes against humanity formed during the Nuremberg trials which aim to prosecute senior and significant officials (Hosch, 2017).
General Douglas McArthur forwarded the establishment of the IMTFE and the Supreme Commander of the Allied Powers. General McArthur appointed Joseph Keenan as Chief Prosecutor and Australian Sir William Webb as the president of the IMTFE. The Tokyo Trial had a larger time span than the Nuremberg Trial, lasting two and a half years, beginning on May 3, 1946. The trial discussed crimes ranging from the Japanese invasion of Manchuria in 1931 up to its invasion of different Southeast Asian countries (Public Broadcasting Service, 2018).
The court prosecuted 28 high-ranking Japanese military and political officials, including current and past prime ministers, diplomats, and top generals. Webb stated on November 4, 1948, that all of the accused had been found guilty. Seven people were condemned to death, 16 people were sentenced to life imprisonment, two were given shorter sentences, two died during the trials, and one was declared psychologically incapacitated (Public Broadcasting Service, 2018. Differing from the Nuremberg trials, offenses counted during the Tokyo trials vary towards different countries (see figure 1) [Totani, 2008].
Tokyo Trials: The Philippines perspective
Although the Tokyo Trials have included the Philippines and considered counts of offenses, accountability measures such as reparations, heightened diplomacy, and avoidance of historical revisionism among others are yet to be defined. Considering there were terrible war crimes that existed in the country’s history, these were discussed during the Tokyo Trials by Associate Prosecutor Pedro Lopez, such as the cases of The Rape of Manila, The Bataan Death March, and The Philippine Comfort Women.
There are lots of incomprehensive war accountabilities yet to be addressed by Japan, as proven by them leaving their military men alone in the Philippines until the 1970s to continue sowing chaos in the local communities. Failure on both sides of the Japanese and Philippine governments still took place even after the war. Up to this day, atrocities against civilians are still felt. The Philippine government has faced these issues regarding the Japanese war crimes, especially for the comfort women, with complete denial and tactics of historical revisionism. Its tepid support and early whitewashing of the matter might be due to the country’s fears of jeopardizing vital Japanese deals and losing initial monetary reparations from Japan after the war (Cornelio & Gutlay, 2021).
Several collectivist movements led by some victims of the war, mostly those victimizes as comfort women, applied a lawsuit at the Tokyo District Court in April 1993, requesting the Japanese government to apologize and compensate. The action was disappointingly dismissed in both the District Court and the High Court. The plaintiffs were 46 lolas (the now old, comfort women). The Supreme Court dismissed the appeal on December 25, 2003 (Asian Women’s Fund, 2007).
With the help of the Asian Women’s Fund in 1995, reparations to 211 victims across Asia were issued atonement money and apology letters signed by Japanese Prime Ministers. 34 However, Lila Filipina–a group of Comfort Women victims in the Philippines–still demands further reparations to the victims to this day and recognizes the denial of history by the Japanese and Philippine Governments. The removal of the comfort women statue at Roxas Boulevard last 2018, which occurred shortly after a Japanese official went on a visit that same year, also reflected the type of historical revisionism and accountability denial of the two aforementioned governments which translated into institutional negligence (Robles, 2021).
The United States government plays a role in the delivery of reparations by the Japanese to the Philippines, by pressuring the Philippine government to adopt the drafted San Francisco Peace Treaty. The major issue of contention mediated by the United States government was the recompensation for the damage caused by the Japanese occupation to the Filipinos. Following American pressure, the Philippines declined to forego its pursuit of reparations, which led to the final treaty including a framework for the Philippines and Japan to negotiate fair reparation. The Philippines signed the 1951 San Francisco Treaty but the Philippine Senate only put its ratification five years after (Chamberlain, 2019)
Ratified in 1956, the reparations were found to be insufficient for rebuilding the economy and the nation from scratch. As the Commission on Reparations (Commonwealth Act 715, 1945) compiled the data regarding war damages, Philippine Representative Carlos P. Romulo filed an estimation of eight billion dollars (see Figure 2) as an accurate figure totaling the whole Philippine government’s spending for 75 years from 1946, or 22 years from 1961. Romulo proposed this figure as the costs to be covered by the Japanese government in reparations (Vellut, 1963).
Finally, on April 15, 1954, Carlos P. Garcia, and the head of the Japanese mission to the Philippines Katsumi Ohno, reached an agreement that fell short of the initial Philippine claim. It was agreed that Japan will pay $400 million in capital goods and services over a ten-year period which can be extended for another ten years. The unreasonably priced contract was perceived as a denial of responsibility for the Japanese war crimes to the Philippines. As Filipino diplomat Felino Neri emphasized: “The Philippines was aware that these terms did not provide anything like complete restoration of its losses and relief of its injury” (Vellut, 1963).
Japan-Philippines diplomatic relationship today
Japanese war criminals being exempted from life imprisonment after the trials disheartened Filipino survivors and prompted them to continuously share their personal anecdotes, either to the public or on trials. After the conclusions of several trials, the Philippine government, along with the cooperation of the Japanese government, granted them the opportunity to seek legal redress for the injustices they endured. The trials played a vital role in exposing the pain experienced by victims under the Japanese occupation.
To this day, the Japanese-Philippines diplomatic relationship remains firmly intact. Continuing its 65-year friendship and adopting different bilateral treaties, Japan and the Philippines have always been territorial neighbors helping each other in any time of need as possible. A survey conducted by Pew Research Center last 2013 revealed that Filipinos agreed favorably with Japan (see Figure 3). While many did not accept the Japanese Government’s apology for their war crimes (see Figure 4) [Pew Research Global, 2013], Japan Times reported last 2022 in an opinion survey that over 80% of Filipinos trust Japan — a thought-to-be “wonderful” example of our dynamic cultural crossings and personal relationships (Okubo, 2022).
Looking forward to an accurate history
The trials against Nazi Germany and the Empire of Japan in holding them accountable for their war crimes and prosecuting its criminals have both served their purpose of attaining justice for their victims. The huge difference between the two trials lie in the Germans’ institutionalized acknowledgment of its brutal history and its enormous impact on the world, even paying some reparations existing up to this day. Meanwhile, the Japanese have only subjected themselves to instituting their war crime denials among different countries, including the Philippines.
The Philippine Government and its diplomats tried their best to gain the country’s deserved reparations for rebuilding its economy and eventual recovery. However, the Treaty of San Francisco seemed to favor the Japanese government, since it determined that Japan was already experiencing its own economic downfall due to the war, thus forcing the persecuted countries to negotiate their needed reparation themselves and leading them to settle for unfair compensation.
As flawed as it looks, this part of the treaty emanates that accountabilities of such brutal war crimes can be compromised. Even though the treaty may state that a certain country can choose to postpone or downgrade its reparations to assist the recovery of its own economy, it shall not forget its past atrocities and pay its debts to countries that suffered from their hands. Japan had the capacity to fulfill the Philippines’ eight billion dollar proposal back when their economy was peaking in 1968 with a 12.8% annual Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth (The World Bank, 2015). On top of that, their bubble economy from 1986 to 1991 where inflated real estate and stock market values might have given them higher monetary powers to give out more valuable reparations (Ziemba, 1991). It can be doable as the treaty can still be amended to prolong Japan’s payments based on its capabilities to pay reparations and institutionalize apology programs to its victims.
In the end, history shall never be forgotten and denying it will result in forgetting its lessons, accountabilities, and recognition of the greed and power once connived in a country. Germany’s acknowledgment of its past worked best since it has been institutionalized. Nonetheless, questions have continued surrounding Japan for partially disregarding its history and the Philippines allowing itself to be a helpless victim who failed to seek its own justice.
References
Asian Women’s Fund. (June 28, 2007). The ‘Comfort Women’ Issue and the Asian Women’s Fund. Asian Women’s Fund. https://web.archive.org/web/20070628152156/http://www.awf.or.jp/woman/pdf/ianhu_ei.pdf
Chamberlain, S. (2019). “A Reckoning: Philippine Trials of Japanese War Criminals on JSTOR.” Jstor.org. https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctvfjcxp3.
Commonwealth Act 715, November 1, 1945
Cornelio, R. and Gutlay, K. (September 28, 2021). The Discomforting Narrative of the Philippine ‘Comfort Women. Philippine Collegian. https://phkule.org/article/418/the-discomforting-narrative-of-the-philippine-comfort-women.
Hosch, J.A. (May 13, 2017). More about the IMTFE. Alexander Campbell King Law Library University of Georgia School of Law. https://web.archive.org/web/20180711201449/http://libguides.law.uga.edu/c.php?g=177176&p=1164581.
Okubo, M. (October 16, 2022). Japan-Philippines: A Bright and Dynamic Relationship. The Japan Times. https://www.japantimes.co.jp/country-report/2022/10/17/the-philippines-report-2022/japan-philippines-bright-dynamic-relationship/#%3A~%3Atext%3D
Pew Research Global. (July 11, 2013). Japanese Public’s Mood Rebounding, Abe Highly Popular. Pew Research Center. http://www.pewglobal.org/2013/07/11/japanese-publics-mood-rebounding-abe-strongly-popu lar/.
Public Broadcasting Service. (July 6, 2018). The Tokyo War Crimes Trials. PBS. https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/macarthur-tokyo-war-crimes-trials/
Robles, R. (February 14, 2021). “‘Comfort Women’ Statue Missing in the Philippines as Japan’s Wartime Legacy under Focus.” South China Morning Post. https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/politics/article/3121702/comfort-women-statue-missing-philippines-japans-wartime-legacy
Totani, Y. (2008). The Tokyo War Crimes Trial: The Pursuit of Justice in the Wake of World War II (1st ed.). Harvard University Asia Center. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctt1tm7fq3.
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The World Bank. (2015). GDP Growth (Annual %) — Japan. The World Bank. https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.MKTP.KD.ZG?end=2021&locations=JP&start=1961&view=chart.
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