Yasukuni

So, Japan's Prime Minister, Mr. Koizumi, states people should stop making a big deal out of his visits to the Yasukuni shrine. Frankly, I don't have any problems with Mr. Koizumi visiting shrines to pray for those who lost their lives in wars. But when he, especially while in his position as the leader of Japan, visits a shrine that propagates revisionist history, worships class-A war criminals as deities, etc. expect other countries who've suffered greatly under Japan's aggression to make some noise.

What really irks me is Koizumi's condescending responses to China and South Korea's protests over his visits to the shrine. I thought this whole shrine trying to justify Japan's past aggression, worshipping class-A war criminals as deities were pretty obvious reasons to be upset about..

No matter what Mr. Koizumi or any other Japanese politicans say, when they insist on going to the Yasukuni shrine despite what it stands for, in my opinion, it's a tacit approval of the shrine's views. So, I can empathize with some people's assertion that Mr. Koizumi and many Japanese people aren't truly sorry for their past atrocities, just truly sorry that they lost the "Greater East Asian War"(WW2)..

Here're some quotes from Yasukuni website:

"War is truly sorrowful. Yet to maintain the independence and peace of the nation and for the prosperity of all of Asia, Japan was forced into conflict."

"There were also 1,068 "Martyrs of Showa" who were cruelly and unjustly tried as war criminals by a sham-like tribunal of the Allied forces (United States, England, the Netherlands, China and others). These martyrs are also the Kami of Yasukuni Jinja."

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