American Occupation Of Japan Essay, Research Paper

The occupation of Japan was, from start to finish, an American

operation. General Douglans MacArthur, sole supreme commander of the

Allied Power was in charge. The Americans had insufficient men to make

a military government of Japan possible; so they decided to act

through the existing Japanese gobernment. General MacArthur became,

except in name, dictator of Japan. He imposed his will on Japan.

Demilitarization was speedily carried out, demobilization of the

former imperial forces was completed by early 1946.

Japan was extensively fire bomded during the second world war.

The stench of sewer gas, rotting garbage, and the acrid smell of ashes

and scorched debris pervaded the air. The Japanese people had to live

in the damp, and cold of the concrete buildings, because they were the

only ones left. Little remained of the vulnerable wooden frame, tile

roof dwelling lived in by most Japanese. When the first signs of

winter set in, the occupation forces immediately took over all the

steam-heated buildings. The Japanese were out in the cold in the first

post war winter fuel was very hard to find, a family was considered

lucky if they had a small barely glowing charcoal brazier to huddle

around. That next summer in random spots new ho uses were built, each

house was standardized at 216 square feet, and required 2400 board

feet of material in order to be built. A master plan for a modernistic

city had been drafted, but it was cast aside because of the lack of

time before the next winter. The thousands of people who lived in

railroad stations and public parks needed housing.

All the Japanese heard was democracy from the Americans. All

they cared about was food. General MacArthur asked the government to

send food, when they refus ed he sent another telegram that said,

“Send me food, or send me bullets.” American troops were forbidden to

eat local food, as to keep from cutting from cutting into the sparse

local supply.

No food was was brought in expressly for the Japanese durning

the first six months after the American presence there. Herbert

Hoover, serving as chairman of a special presidential advisory

committee, recommended minimum imports to Japan of 870,000 tons of

food to be distributed in different urban areas. Fish, the source of

so much of the protein in the Japanese diet, were no longer available

in adequate quantities because the fishing fleet, particularly the

large vessels, had been badly decimated by the war and because the

U.S.S.R. closed off the fishing grounds in the north.

The most important aspect of the democratization policy was the

adoption of a new constitution and its supporting legislation. When

the Japanese government proved too confused or too reluctant to come

up with a constitutional reform that satisfied MacArthur, he had his

own staff draft a new constitution in February 1946. This, with only

minor changes, was then adopted by the Japanese government in the form

of an imperial amendment to the 1889 constitution and went into effect

on May 3, 1947. The new Constitution was a perfection of the British

parliamentary form of government that the Japanese had been moving

toward in the 1920s. Supreme political power was assigned to the Diet.

Cabinets were made responsible to the Diet by having the prime

minister elected by the lower house. The House of Peers was replaced

by an elected House of Councillors. The judicial system was made as

independent of executive interference as possible, and a newly created

supreme court was given the power to review the constitutionality of

laws. Local governments were given greatly increased powers.

The Emperor was reduced to being a symbol of the unity of the

nation. Japanese began to see him in person. He went to hospitals,

schools, mines, industrial plants; he broke ground for public

buildings and snipped tape at the opening of gates and highways. He

was steered here and there, shown things, and kept muttering, “Ah so,

ah so.” People started to call him “Ah-so-san.” Suddenly the puyblic

began to take this shy, ill-at-ease man to their hearts. They saw in

him something of their own conqured selves, force to do what was alien

to them. In 1948, in a newspaper poll, Emperior Hirohito was voted the

most popular man in Japan.

Civil liberties were emphasized, women were given full equality

with men. Article 13 and 19 in the new Constitution, prohibits

discrimination in political, economic, and social relations because of

race, creed, sex, social status, or family origen. This is one of the

most explicitly progressive statements on human rights anywhere in

law. Gerneral Douglas MacArthur emerged as a radical feminist because

he was “convinced that the place of women in Japan must be brought to

a level consistent with that of women in the western democracies.” So

the Japanese women got their equal rights amendment long before a

concerted effort was made to obtain one in America.

Compulsory education was extened to nine years, efforts were

made to make education more a traning in thinking than in rote memory,

and the school system above the six elementary grades was revised to

conform to the American pattern. This last mechanical change produced

great confusion and dissatisfaction but became so entrenched that it

could not be revised even after the Americans departed.

Japan’s agriculture was the quickest of national activities to

recover because of land reform. The Australians came up with the best

plan. It was basis was this: There were to be no absentee landlards.

A person who actually worked the land could own up to 7.5 arcers.

Anyone living in a village near by could keep 2.5 acres. Larger plots

of land, exceeding these limits, were bought up by the government and

sold on easy terms to former tenants. Within two years 2 million

tenants became landowners. The American occupation immediately gained

not only a large constituency, for the new owners had a vested

interest in preserving the change, but also a psychological momentum

for other changes they wanted to initiate.

The American labor policy in Japan had a double goal: to

encourage the growth of democratic unions while keeping them free of

communists. Union organization was used as a balance to the power of

management. To the surprise of the American authorties, this movement

took a decidedly more radical turn. In the desperate economic

conditions of early postwar Japan, there was little room for

successful bargaining over wages, and many labor unions instead made a

bid to take over industry and operate it in their own behalf. Moreover

large numbers of workers in Japan were government employees, such as

railroad workers and teachers, whose wages were set not by management

but by the government. Direct political action therefore seemed more

meani ngful to these people than wage bargaining. The Japanese unions

called for a general strike on February 1, 1947. MacArthur warned the

union leadership that he would not countenace a nationwide strike. The

strike leaders yieled to MacArthur’s will. The reafter the political

appeal of radical labor action appeared to wane.

The Americans wanted to disband the great Zaibatsu trust as a

means of reducing Japan’s war-making potential. There were about 15

Zaibatsu families such as – Mitsui, Mitsubishi, Yasuda, and Sumitomo.

The Zaibatsu controled the industry of Japan. MacArthur’s liaison men

pressured the Diet into passing the Deconcentration Law in December

1947. In the eyes of most Japanese this law was designed to cripple

Japanese business and industry forever. The first step in breaking up

the Zaibatsu was to spread their ownership out among the people and to

prevent the old owners from ever again exercising control. The stocks

of all the key holding companies were to be sold to the public.

Friends of the old Zaibatsu bought the stock. In the long run the

Zaibatsu were not exactly destroyed, but a few were weakened and

others underwent a considerable shuffle.

The initial period of the occupation from 1945 to 1948 was

marked by reform, the second phase was one of stabilization. Greater

attention was given to improvement of the economy. Japan was a heavy

expense to the United States. The ordered breakup of the Zaibatsu was

slowed down. The union movement continued to grow, to the ult imate

benefit of the worker. Unremitting pressure on employers brought

swelling wages, which meant the steady expansion of Japan domestic

consumer market. This market was a major reason for Japan’s subsequent

economic boom. Another boom to the economy was the Korean War which

proved to be a blessing in disguise. Japan became the main staging

area for military action in Korea and went on a war boom economy with

out having to fight in or pay for a war.

The treaty of peace with Japan was signed at San Francisco in

September 1951 by Japan, the United States, and forty-seven other

nations. The Soviet Union refused to sign it. The treaty went into

effect in April 1952, officially terminating the United States

military occupation and restoring full independence.

What is extraordinary in the Occupation and its aftermath was

the insignificance of the unpleasant. For the Japanese, the nobility

of American ideals and the essential benignity of the American

presence assuaged much of the bitterness and anguish of defeat. For

the Americans, the joys of promoting peace and democracy triumphed

over the attendant fustrations and grievances. Consequently, the

Occupation served to lay down a substantial capital of good will on

which both America and Japan would draw in the years ahead.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY

Christopher, Robert C. /The Japanese Mind/. New York: Fawcett

Columbine, 1983

La Cerda, John. /The Conqueror Comes to Tea/. New Brunswick: R utgers

University Press, 1946

Manchester, William. /American Caesar/. New York: Dell Publishing

Company, Inc., 1978

Perry, John Curtis. /Beneath the Eagle’s Wings/. New York: Dodd, Mead

And Company, 1980

Reischauer, Edwin O. / The Japanese/. London: Belknap Press, 1977

Seth, Ronald. /Milestones in Japanese History/. Philadelphia: Chilton

Book Company, 1969

Sheldon, Walt. /The Honorable Conquerors/. New York: The Macmillan

Company., 1965