Purge of March 15, 1928

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The March 15, 1928 purge ( Japanese 三 ・ 一 五 事件 , San-ichigo jiken) was a mass arrest of communists in Japan.

The action

Around 1,600 people who were suspected of being communists were arrested during the operation. With these measures, the government responded to the increasing communist activities of the outlawed Communist Party of Japan to support the legal left-wing parties during the February 1928 elections under the new law on equality between men and women. The law for the maintenance of public safety (治安 維持 法, Chian Iji-hō) from 1925 was applied for the third time.

500 of those arrested came to court. The conservative cabinet Tanaka Giichi used the communist party's disclosed working methods as a pretext to set up the “Workers-Peasants Party” (労 働 農民 党, Rōdō Nōmin-tō), the “Union of Proletarian Youth” (全 日本 無 産 青年 同盟, Zen- Nihon Musan Seinen Dōmei), and the "Council of Japanese Trade Unions" (日本 労 働 組合 評議 会, Nihon Rōdō-Kumiai Hyōgi-kai) to dissolve. The cabinet also took the opportunity to add the possibility of the death penalty to the law on the maintenance of public safety.

The March 15 action was the first in a series of mass arrests aimed at the elimination of communism. This has become deeply embedded in the consciousness of the population. Those arrested included Nosaka Sanzō , Tokuda Kyūichi , Sakisaka Itsurō .

literature

  • S. Noma (Ed.): March 15th Incident . In: Japan. An Illustrated Encyclopedia. Kodansha, 1993, ISBN 4-06-205938-X , p. 923.