Greater East Asian Prosperity Sphere

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Greater East Asian Prosperity Sphere (largest expansion)
Greater East Asian Prosperity Sphere 1942 (excluding Thailand).
light green = satellite states of the Japanese Empire
medium green = colonies of Japan
dark green = Japan
A poster from Manchukuo shows harmony between the Japanese , Chinese and Manchu . The headline reads: “With the help of Japan, China and Manchukuos, the world can find peace.” The person on the right, representing China, holds the flag of the “ Five Races Under One Union ” (1935)

Greater East Asian Prosperity Sphere ( Japanese 大 東 亜 共 栄 圏 , daitōa kyōeiken ) was the euphemistic name for a concept founded by the military and the government of the Japanese Empire to create a "block of Asian nations led by Japanese and free from Western influences".

Member states

aims

The concept was initiated by Prime Minister Konoe Fumimaro to create a Greater East Asia consisting of China , Japan , Manchukuo and parts of Southeast Asia . According to Japanese propaganda, this would build a new international system in which the Asian member states would strive for “common prosperity” and share the peace that goes with it, free from Western colonialism and domination. Military objectives of this expansion included naval operations in the Indian Ocean and the isolation of Australia .

This was one of many plans that served to justify Japanese aggression in East Asia from the 1930s to the end of World War II. The name "Greater East Asian Prosperity Sphere" is now largely perceived as a word facade for a control of the Japanese Empire over the countries occupied during World War II, in which puppet governments , the local populations and their economies were to serve the Japanese Empire to the advantage.

Japan's attempts to expand power through the use of financial resources, also known as "yen diplomacy" or "yen bloc" , have been used against official and semi-official colonies. Between 1895, when Taiwan was annexed, and 1937, when the Second Sino-Japanese War broke out, money specialists in Tokyo initiated and directed financial reform programs in Taiwan, Korea, Manchuria, and the outer Japanese-controlled islands in the Pacific. The aim of the reforms was to build a network of interconnected political and economic relationships. This achievement ended with the collapse of the Greater East Asian Prosperity Sphere.

The negative connotation that many people associate with the expression "Greater East Asia" ( 大 東 亜 , daitōa ) is still one of the many difficulties that have been hindering the annual East Asian Summits that have been held since 2005 , where the possibility of establishing a stronger and better coordinated East Asian community is discussed.

history

During the Second World War, many Japanese-occupied countries were ruled by puppet governments, which influenced the local populations and made their economies available to the Japanese Empire, supported by the above-mentioned concept of a united Asia. It was a concept of the Imperial Japanese Army , devised by General Arita Hachirō , who was foreign minister and an army ideologist at the time. "Greater East Asia" was a Japanese term ( forbidden in occupied post-war Japan ) which referred to the Far East .

The idea of ​​a common sphere of prosperity was officially announced on August 1, 1940 by Foreign Minister Matsuoka Yosuke in a press interview, but had existed in various forms for several years. Leaders in Japan had been interested in this idea for a long time, ostensibly in order to free Asia from imperialism , practically in order to be able to expand the Japanese sphere of influence and to create an empire based on the European model.

As part of its war campaign, the Japanese Empire's propaganda included phrases such as "Asia for Asians!" And talked about the perceived need to liberate Asian countries from imperialist powers. In some cases, they have been greeted by neighboring countries as they invaded and driven out the British and French and other governments and military powers. However, in general, the subsequent brutality and racism of the Japanese led to the view of viewing them as equally bad or, more often, worse than that of the Western imperialists.

From a Japanese point of view, the main reason behind the establishment of the Greater East Asian Sphere of Prosperity was the same thing that caused Japan to start war with the United States: the Chinese market. Japan wanted the "most important relationship" into the Chinese market, recognized by the US government. In any case, the US saw the wealth that could be found in these markets and therefore refused to give the Japanese an advantage in distributing these markets. Therefore, in an attempt to gain a formal advantage for Japan through Chinese markets, the imperial government attacked China and proclaimed the Greater East Asian Prosperity Sphere.

According to Foreign Minister Tōgō Shigenori , if Japan had been successful in creating this sphere , it would have emerged as the leading nation in Eastern Asia and the Greater East Asian Prosperity Sphere would have become another name for the Japanese Empire. The "Inquiry into World Politics Showing the Yamato Race as the Core ", a secret government document completed in 1943, explicitly states that the Japanese are chosen over other Asian races and indicates that the sphere was only intended for propaganda, to hide Japan's supremacy over Asia as a true intention. The Greater East Asian sphere of prosperity collapsed with the unconditional surrender of Japan in 1945.

Reasons for the failure of the Greater East Asian Prosperity Sphere

Although Japan was successful in generating anti-Western sentiment in Asia, the sphere never resulted in a unified Asia. Ba Maw , President of Myanmar during the war among the Japanese, claims that this was due to the actions of the Japanese military:

The military representatives saw everything from a Japanese point of view and, what was worse, they insisted that everyone else they dealt with should do the same. For them there was only one way to tackle one thing: the Japanese way; only one goal and interest: the Japanese interests; only one purpose for the East Asian countries: to let them become many Manchukuos or Koreas, forever bound to Japan. This racist enforcement [...] made any real understanding between the Japanese military representatives and the people of our region practically impossible.

In other words, the Greater East Asian Prosperity Sphere was not created to promote all East Asian countries, but rather for the self-interest of Japan. Because of this, she could not get any support in other East Asian countries. National movements did occur in these countries and the nationalists there cooperated to some extent with the Japanese. However, Willard Elbree, Professor Emeritus of Political Science at Ohio University , claims that the Japanese government and nationalist leaders never developed "a real unity of interests between the two parties," and that there was no overwhelming desperation among Asians in this regard over Japan's defeat gave.

It seems that Japan's failure to understand the aims and interests of the other countries involved in the Greater East Asian Prosperity Sphere resulted in a weak association of countries that were only theoretically connected to Japan, but not spiritually connected. Ba Maw believes that Japan's fate would have been very different if the Japanese had only managed to act in concert with the encouraging concept of "Asia for Asians". He justifies this by saying that if Japan had proclaimed this principle at the beginning of the war and had really advocated this idea, this would have led to a completely different assessment of Japan by its neighbors:

“No military defeat would then have deprived [Japan] of the trust and gratitude of half of Asia, and that would have made a big difference to [Japan], namely to find a new, great and permanent place for them in a post-war world in which Asia itself would have become aware. "

administration

From November 1942 to August 1945, the " Greater East Asia Ministry " ( 大 東 亜 省 , daitōa-shō ) in the Japanese cabinet existed as at least nominal successor to the Colonial Ministry . Its task was the administration of the overseas territories, which Japan had acquired in the Pacific war , and the already existing colonies, as well as the coordination of the creation and development of the Greater East Asian prosperity sphere.

Political parties and movements that supported the Greater East Asian Prosperity Sphere

The Greater East Asian Conference

The Greater East Asia Conference in November 1943, participants from left to right: Ba Maw , Zhang Jinghui , Wang Jingwei , Tōjō Hideki , Wan Waithayakon , José P. Laurel , Subhash Chandra Bose

The Greater East Asian Conference ( 大 東 亜 会議 , daitōa kaigi ) was held in Tokyo from November 5 to 6, 1943 , at which Japan hosted the heads of state of various members of the participating countries of the Greater East Asian Prosperity Sphere . This conference was also known as the Tokyo Conference . The conference addressed a few topics with important content, but was planned as a propaganda showpiece to show the Japanese Empire's commitment to the ideals of the Pan-Asian movement and to highlight its role as the “liberator” of Asia from Western colonialism .

The conference was attended by:

In its final declaration, the conference named economic and political cooperation against the allies of World War II .

See also

Japanese 10-sen postage stamp with an approximate map of Greater East Asia with the imperial seal in the middle at the top

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Adam Lifshey: Allegory and archipelago: Jesús Balmori's los pájaros de fuego and the global vantages of Filipino literature in spanish ( Memento of the original from August 27, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , Kritika Kultura , issue 17, 2011, p. 9, accessed on December 20, 2014. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.mbc.edu
  2. ^ William Gordon: Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. March 2000.
  3. ^ A b Akira Iriye: Pearl Harbor and the coming of the Pacific War: a Brief History with Documents and Essays. 1999, p. 6.
  4. ^ Matome Ugaki: Fading Victory: The Diary of Ugaki Matome, 1941-1945. 1991.
  5. ↑ Willy Vande Walle u. a .: The 'money doctors' from Japan: finance, imperialism, and the building of the Yen Bloc, 1894-1937. ( Memento of the original from December 28, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (abstract). FRIS / Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, 2007–2010. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.researchportal.be
  6. ^ John W. Dower, War Without Mercy: Race and Power in the Pacific War 1986, pp. 262-290.
  7. ^ Joyce C. Lebra: Japan's Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere in World War II: Selected Readings and Documents. 1975, p. 157.
  8. ^ Joyce C. Lebra: Japan's Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere in World War II: Selected Readings and Documents. 1975, p. 160.
  9. ^ Joyce C. Lebra: Japan's Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere in World War II: Selected Readings and Documents. 1975, p. 158.
  10. ^ World War II Database (WW2DB): "Greater East Asia Conference."

literature

Web links