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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 May 2025
Japan's information policy did not change suddenly during the Manchurian Crisis in September 1931-March 1933. Rather there was continuing development of state policy and institutions for news propaganda in response to two ongoing phenomena: growing mass political participation as indicated by universal manhood suffrage, and technological changes in mass media and communication.
The Japanese metropolitan government did, however, begin a coordinated and systematic approach to news propaganda during the Manchurian Crisis, one primarily driven by foreign policy concerns, rather than concerns with domestic thought control. At the same time, in the period that is often regarded as the beginning of Japan's diplomatic isolationism, MOFA and other foreign policy elites actively sought to engage international public opinion through management of the news for overseas propaganda. They further emphasized coordination between metropolitan centre, Tokyo, and a parallel news institution in Japanese-occupied Manchuria in 1931-3. The process of unifying news coverage, however, met strong oppositions from various stake holders in 1931-5.
1 For the orthodox view, see, for example, Sadako N. Ogata, Defiance in Manchuria: The Making of Japanese Foreign Policy, 1931-1932 (Berkeley & Los Angles: University of California Press, 1964), pp. 176-7. See also a summary of the orthodox view in Sandra Wilson, The Manchurian Crisis and Japanese Society, 1931-33 (New York: Routledge, 2002), pp. 2-3. In contrast, Wilson stresses the transitory impact of the Manchurian Incident, and questions the notion of the fifteen-year war. Ibid, pp. 3, 5-8, 217-18.
2 See, for example, Uchikawa, Masu media hoseisakushi kenyū, pp. 217-18.
3 I have argued elsewhere a similar point about the active propaganda activities of ‘liberal internationalists’ and their internationalist organizations especially in the mid-late 1930s. Akami, Internationalizing the Pacific, pp. 188-91, 227-31. Inoue also argues that Japan withdrew from the League in order to maintain good relations with other empires, while saving the face of the League. Inoue Toshikazu, ‘Kokusai renmei dattai to kokusai kyōchō gaikō’, Hitotsubashi ronso, vol. 93, no. 3, pp. 365-6, 369. Wilson examines MOFA's active campaign in 1931-3, and refutes the label of isolationism. Sandra Wilson, ‘Containing the crisis: Japan's Diplomatic Offensive in the West, 1931-33’, Modern Asian Studies, vol. 29, No. 2 (May 1995), pp. 269-70, 338.
4 It was a war. Japanese aggression met little military opposition from the Nationalist Government or the warlord Zhang Xueliang in Manchuria in 1931-2, while there were major armed confrontations in Shanghai in January-May 1932.
5 Andrew Gordon, Labor and Imperial Democracy in Prewar Japan (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991), pp. 283-7.
6 Ikei Masaru, ‘1930 nendai no masu media: Manshū jihen e no taiō o chūshin toshite’, in Miwa Kimitada ed., Saikō Taiheiyō sensō zenya: Nihon no 1930 nendairon toshite (Tokyo: Sōseiki, 1981). On radio and news movies, see Louise Young, Japan's Total Empire: Manchuria and the Culture of Wartime Imperialism (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998), pp. 63-4, 65-6, 67-8, 82-3. Wilson argues that this metropolitan new media had limited influence in rural areas in Japan in the early 1930s. Wilson, The Manchurian Crisis, pp. 49-52, 139-40.
7 The journal was initially sold for 25 sen (a quarter of one yen). By the end of 1935, its circulation was around 7,000, and it created an annual revenue of ¥43,000. Tsūshinshashi kankōkai ed., Tsūshinshashi, pp. 284, 330.
8 John Dower, ‘Throwing off Asia II: Woodblock prints of the Sino-Japanese War (1894-95)’, and ‘Throwing off Asia III: Woodblock prints of the Russo-Japanese War (1904-05)’ in a series of Visualizing Cultures, Cambridge Mass: MIT 2008, here, and here.
9 See note 6 for Young, Japan's Total Empire.
10 Asahi shimbun ‘shimbun to senso’ shuzaihan, Shimbun to senso (Tokyo: Asahi shimbunsha, 2008).
11 Gordon, Labor and Imperial Democracy, pp. 316-7.
12 Furukawa Takahisa, Showa senchūki no sōgō kokusaku kikan (Tokyo: Yoshikawa kōbunkan, 1992), p. 25; Michael A. Barnhart, Japan Prepares for Total War: The Search for Economic Security, 1919-1941 (Cornell: Cornell University Press, 1987), pp. 23-4.
13 Satō, Genron tōsei, p. 232. The Newspaper Section was moved under the Research Committee on Military Affairs in 1929, and then under the Department of Research on Military Affairs in 1933. The section was strengthened during the Manchurian crisis, and after the February 26 Incident of 1936, it was regarded as a significant post in the Military Affairs Bureau and functioned as policy-making adviser to the Army Minister.
14 On the term kakushin, see Ito Takashi, Showa shoki seijishi kenkyū (Tokyo: Tokyo daigaku shuppankai, 1969), pp. 7-11. For the terminology of ‘statist reformism’, see also Akami, Internationalizing the Pacific, p. 77. These reformists saw the state as the key institution to implement reform and welfare schemes in order to strengthen the power of the state and the nation. These statist reformists agreed on the need for a drastic restructure of the state machinery and a greater state control of national resources. They prioritized the rights of the state over those of workers and farmers. Furukawa, Showa senchūki, p. 16. Furukawa, however, notes that kakushin bureaucrats at MOFA were distinct from those in other ministries.
15 Ide Yoshinori, ‘Hijōji taisei to Nihon “kan”sei’, in Tokyo daigaku shakai kagaku kenkyūsho ‘Fashizumu to minshu shugi’ kenkyūkai ed., Undo to teikō, vol. 1 (Tokyo: Tokyo daigaku shuppankai, 1979), pp. 254-5.
16 The point also supports Yi's argument that despite the military's dominance in politics, even in the late 1930s and early 1940s the Army sought not a military dictatorship, but a constitutional, and indirect political influence over the civilian government. Yi, Gunbu no Showashi, vol. 1, pp. 6-7.
17 These attempts were Gunjukyoku (at the Cabinet Office), June 1918-May 1920, and Kokuseiin (an outer bureau), May 1920-November 1922. Furukawa, Showa senchūki, pp. 25-6; Barnhart, Japan Prepares for Total War, p. 24.
18 Furukawa, Showa senchūki, p. 27. It was planned to encompass all economic activities of Japan at all times, not only in wartime. Barnhart, Japan Prepares for Total War, p. 25.
19 Katō Yōko, ‘Sōryokusenka no sei-gun kankei’, in Kurasawa Aiko et. al. ed., Ajia Taiheiyō sensō vol. 2 (Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 2005), p. 15. The bureau was to last until it was absorbed into the Planning Board in October 1937.
20 ‘Shigenkyoku kansei’, 27 May 1927, reprinted in Ishikawa Junkichi ed., Kokka sōdōinshi: Shiryō hen, vol. 3 (Fujisawa: Kokka sōdōinshi kankōkai, 1975), pp. 17-20. In 1930, the bureau began planning national mobilization. The Cabinet decided on the first national mobilization plan in 1933. The last and third plan began in 1936, which was then interrupted by the outbreak of the Sino- Japanese War in 1937. Furukawa, Showa senchūki, p. 28.
21 Ishikawa Junkichi, ‘Kaidai’, in Ishikawa ed., Kokka sōdōinshi: Shiryō hen, vol. 3, p. 4.
22 It also attached a survey of key countries’ national mobilization schemes, such as those of France, Italy, the U.S., Germany, and Britain. Shigen kyoku, ‘Shigen no tōsei unyō jumbi shisetsu ni tsuite’, 1935, reprinted in Ishikawa ed., Kokka sōdōinshi: Shiryō hen, vol. 3, pp. 113-14.
23 It also noted: ‘resources are defined as sources of state power’. Ibid., pp. 107, 109.
24 Ibid., p. 109.
25 Pak Sunae, ‘“15 nen sensōki” niokeru naikaku jōhō kikō’, Media shi kenkyū, vol. 3 (June 1995), p. 3.
26 Gaimushō hyakunenshi hensan iinkai, Gaimushō, vol. 1, p. 1038.
27 Furuno had been the head of the Bureau of Domestic News and the Bureau of Foreign News at Rengō's headquarters in Tokyo, while Higashikawa Kaichi had managed Osaka-based economic news (especially news of the stock market). After Higashikawa's death, in October 1931, Furuno absorbed this Osaka operation, and became General Manager in charge of all regions in Japan. ‘Furuno Inosuke nenpu’, in Furuno Inosuke denki henshū iinkai ed., Furuno Inosuke, p. 532.
28 On this international aspect of the crisis, see Christopher Thorne, The Limits of Foreign Policy: The West, the League and the Far Eastern Crisis of 1931-1933 (London: Hamish Hamilton, 1972); Ian Nish, ‘Introduction’, in Japan's Struggle with Internationalism: Japan, China and the League of Nations, 1931-3 (London: K. Paul International, 1993), pp. vii, viii, 22.
29 O’Connor, The English Language Press Networks, p. 201. Japan's attack on Shanghai also outraged Chinese public opinion. Coble, Facing Japan, p. 44. Wilson, however, points out that the responses of the top officials and business leaders in the U.S. and Britain were more nuanced. Wilson, ‘Containing the crisis’, pp. 366-8.
30 Nish, Japan's Struggle with Internationalism, pp. 191, 239, 240; O’Connor, The English Language Press Networks, p. 213.
31 Wilson's analysis of MOFA overseas mission activities in 1931-3 suggests that massive propaganda activities took place in the U.S., while MOFA also stressed Europe and South American countries, and did not totally neglect China. Wilson, ‘Containing the Crisis’, pp. 340, 341, 348, 352-3.
32 As a result, he was charged as a war criminal at the International Military Tribunal for the Far East (the Tokyo Trial) in 1945, and purged from public office. The charge was dropped and he was released from the Sugamo Prison in 1948. His purge was lifted in 1951. Amō's papers, which have been reprinted, include MOFA documents, his diary, his notes, and published and unpublished articles which he wrote before and after 1945.
33 [Amō Eiji], ‘Shintsūshinsha setsuritsu keikaku keika gaiyō’, reprinted in Amō Tamio ed., Amō Eiji nikki shiryōshū, shiryō hen, vol. 2 (Tokyo: Editor, 1989), pp. 1529-36.
34 Ibid., p. 1529.
35 Ibid.
36 Mori Kaku (Tsutomu) began his career in business as the head of the Tianjin branch of Mitsui Trading Company in 1914. After a brief but successful business career, he became a politician (Seiyūkai) in 1918 and was elected to the Diet in 1921. As Parliamentary ViceMinister for Foreign Affairs during the Tanaka Giichi Cabinet (April 1927-July 1929) he pushed a hardline policy towards China. After the outbreak of the Manchurian Incident, he became instrumental in the Army's increasing involvement in politics. He served as Cabinet Secretary of the Inukai Cabinet in December 1931.
37 Domei tsūshinsha, Dōmei no soshiki to katsudō (Tokyo: Dōmei tsūshinsha, 1941), reprinted in Ariyama and Nishiyama eds, Dōmei tsūshinsha, vol. 5, pp. 236-7.
38 Iwanaga Yūkichi, ‘Kokkateki daitsūshinsha setsuritsuron’, December 1931, reprinted in Furuno ed., Iwanaga Yūkichi kun, (Part III), pp. 163-73.
39 Furuno Inosuke denki henshū iinkai ed., Furuno Inosuke, p. 193.
40 Iwanaga, ‘Kokkateki daitsūshinsha setsuritsuron’, December 1931, (reprinted), pp. 163, 164, 166, 167-8, 170.
41 The department was located at the office of the Director of the SMR, and it began research on media and information policies of Manchuria in 1927 when Matsuoka Yōsuke became Vice Director. Katō Shinkichi, ‘Kioku o tadoru’, in Manshūkoku tsūshinsha ed., Kokutsū jūnen shi (Xinjing [Changchun]: Editor, [1942]), p. 24.
42 Sasaki created a serious problem with the Nationalist Government of Nanjing in March-September 1931. See Chapter Seven and Chapter Nine.
43 Sasaki Kenji, ‘Kokutsū no shinwa o kataru’, in Manshūkoku tsūshinsha ed., Kokutsū jūnen shi, pp. 28-30.
44 Manshūkoku tsūshinsha ed., Kokutsū jūnen shi, p. 39.
45 Iwanaga Yūkichi, ‘Manmō tsūshinsha ron’ [December 1931], reprinted in Manshūkoku tsūshinsha ed., Kokutsū jūnen shi, p. 39.
46 Katakura Tadashi, ‘Manshū jihen kimitsu seiryaku nisshi’, 18 September-31 October 1931, reprinted in Kobayashi Tatsuo and Shimada Toshihiko eds, Gendaishi shiryō, vol. 7 (Tokyo: Misuzu shobō, 1964), p. 189.
47 Y. Tak Matsusaka, ‘Managing occupied Manchuria, 1931-1934’, in Peter Duus, Ramon H. Myers, and Mark R. Peattie eds, The Japanese Wartime Empire, 1931-1945 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996), pp. 103-4; Gaimushō hyakunenshi hensan iinkai, Gaimushō, vol. 2, pp. 215-19.
48 Based on the Guandong Army's proposal, the Ministry of the Army began research on the legal and economic aspects of an autonomous state on 1 October 1931. The idea of the establishment of a new ‘independent’ state became the core of the submission of the Guandong Army of 24 October 1931 to the Ministry of the Army, ‘Manmo mondai kaiketsu no konpon hōsaku’, 24 October 1931, reprinted in Inaba Masao, Kobayashi Tatsuo, and Shimada Toshihiko eds, Gendaishi shiryo, vol. 11 (Tokyo: Misuzu shobō, 1965), pp. 337-8.
49 In 1932, proletarian parties won five seats. In 1930, Minseitō had won a landslide majority of 273 against Seiyūkai (174) and proletarian parties (5). The total number of the House of Representatives was 466 in this period, and the rest of the seats were won by other independent parties. The exact number of the seats won by both major parties in 1932 varies by two seats from one source to another. Kitaoka Shin’ichi, Seitō kara gunbu e (Tokyo: Chūo koron shinsha, 1999), p. 171.
50 Gordon, Labor and Imperial democracy, pp. 275-6, 283-4.
51 The Japanese Navy had attacked the Chinese military in Shanghai on 28 January 1931.
52 Duara argues that such a claim had been valid until the late nineteenth century, and had been commonly acknowledged in Japanese and Western scholarship. Japanese scholarship, however, deliberately ignored the substantial Han-Chinese migration into the area in the first two decades of the twentieth century. This served Japan's strategic and economic interests. Prasenjit Duara, Sovereignty and Authenticity: Manchukuo and the East Asian Modern (London: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2003), pp. 56-8.
53 Such an idea was also commonly expressed at MOFA and its diplomatic missions in Manchuria in December 1931-January 1932. Gaimushō hyakunenshi hensan iinkai, Gaimushō, vol. 2, pp. 217-18.
54 Ōtani, ‘ “Shimbun sōjū” kara’, pp. 88-9.
55 Iwanaga, ‘Manmō tsūshinsha ron’, pp. 39-41.
56 Sasaki, ‘Kokutsū no shinwa o kataru’, p. 32; Tsūshinshashi kankōkai ed., Tsūshinshashi, p. 356; Furuno Inosuke denki henshū iinkai ed., Furuno Inosuke, pp. 187-8.
57 Sasaki, ‘Kokutsū no shinwa o kataru’, p. 31.
58 Satō Junko, ‘Manshūkoku tsūshinsha no setsuritsu to jōhō taisaku’, Media shi kenkyū, vol. 9 (March 2000), p. 39.
59 ‘Iwayuru sangatsu jiken’, cited in Masumi Junnosuke, Nihon seitō shiron, vol. 6 (Tokyo: Tokyo daigaku shuppankai, 1980), pp. 100-1.
60 Masumi, Nihon seitō shiron, vol. 6, pp. 9-10.
61 ‘Tanaka shuki’, cited in Masumi, Nihon seitō shiron, vol. 6, pp. 113-16.
62 Ketsumeidan assassinated Inoue Junnosuke, a prominent Minseitō politician, in February 1932, and Dan Takuma, Director of Mitsui Company, in March 1932.
63 ‘Manmō shinkokka seiritsu ni kansuru taigai kankei shori yōkō’, (Cabinet decision, 12 March 1931), reprinted in Kobayashi and Shimada eds, Gendaishi shiryō, vol. 7, p. 495.
64 Masumi, Nihon seitō shiron, vol. 6, pp. 118-21.
65 Matsusaka analyses the Guandong Army's failure in controlling the SMR in 1932-3. Matsusaka, ‘Managing occupied Manchuria, 1931-1934’, pp. 120-7.
66 Ibid., pp. 112-20, 127-33.
67 Matsusaka, ‘Managing occupied Manchuria, 1931-1934’, p. 107; Masumi, Nihon seitō shiron, vol. 6, pp. 59-67.
68 Masumi, Nihon seitō shiron, vol. 6, pp. 65-7; Gaimushō hyakunenshi hensan iinkai, Gaimusho, vol. 2, pp. 228-66.
69 Jōhōkyoku, ‘Jōhōkyoku setsuritsu ni itaru made no rekishi’, 1 April 1941, reprinted in Ishikawa Junkichi, Kokka sōdōinshi: Shiryōhen, vol. 4 (Fujisawa: Kokka sōdōinshi kankōkai, 1976), p. 109. The same document is also reprinted in Ogino Fujio ed., Jōhōkyoku kankei gokuhi shiryo, vol. 1 (Tokyo: Fuji shuppan, 2003).
70 Furuno Inosuke denki henshū iinkai ed., Furuno Inosuke, pp. 171, 193-4.
71 Ibid. pp. 193-4. It is unclear, however, whether such negotiations took place before or after June 1932. Furuno's biography mentions the involvement of Uchida Yasuya, Shigemitsu Mamoru, and Amō Eiji. Uchida was Foreign Minister after July 1932. Shigemitsu became Vice Minister one year later in May 1933, and Amō became Director of the Department of Information, also in June 1933.
72 Jōhōkyoku, ‘Jōhōkyoku setsuritsu’, 1 April 1941, (reprinted), p. 109.
73 Ibid.
74 Ibid.
75 Manshūkoku tsūshinsha ed., Kokutsū jūnen shi, p. 47.
76 Katō, ‘Kioku o tadoru’, pp. 25-6; Satō, ‘Manshūkoku tsūshinsha’, pp. 30-32.
77 Katō, ‘Kioku o tadoru’, p. 26.
78 On this organization, see Douglas R. Reynolds, ‘Training young China hands: Toa Dōbun Shoin and its precursors, 1886-1945’, in Duus, Myers, and Peattie eds, The Japanese Informal Empire in China, 1895-1937, pp. 210-71.
79 Tsūshinshashi kankōkai ed., Tsūshinshashi, p. 359; Satomi Hajime, ‘Sōritsu no zengo dan’, in Manshūkoku tsūshinsha ed., Kokutsū jūnen shi, pp. 15, 23; Matsumoto Shigeharu, Shanhai jidai, vol. 1 (Tokyo: Chūō kōronsha, 1974), p. 186.
80 He in fact argued that the committee should have an administrative group, headed by the Director of the Department of Information of MOFA. This group should be composed of representatives of these ministries and if necessary, include representatives of private organizations. Jōhōkyoku, ‘Jōhōkyoku setsuritsu’, 1 April 1941, (reprinted), p. 109.
81 Jōhōkyoku, ‘Jōhōkyoku setsuritsu’, 1 April 1941, (reprinted), p. 110.
82 Ibid., pp. 110-11. The Army documents suggested that the Ministry of the Army and the Guandong Army worked closely to facilitate foreign journalists’ visit to Manchuria, such as an AP journalist, James A Mills. [Rikugun] shimbunhan to Rikugun daijin, 7 November 1932; ‘Fukukan yori Kantōgun sanbōchō ate tsūchō’, 7 November 1932, in the file of ‘Rikuman kimitsu: Mitsu fu dainikki’, Bōeishō bōei kenkyūsho (formally called Bōeichō Bōei kenshūsho Senshi shiryō shitsu).
83 Satō, ‘Manshūkoku tsūshinsha’, pp. 34-5.
84 Satomi, ‘Sōritsu no zengo dan’, p. 19.
85 Satomi, ‘Sōritsu no zengo dan’, p. 20; Tsūshinshashi kankōkai ed., Tsūshinshashi, pp. 359-60.
86 [Amō], ‘Shintsūshinsha setsuritsu’, (reprinted), pp. 1529-30.
87 [AmO Eiji], [No title], 26 September 1932, reprinted in Amō ed., Amo Eiji nikki shiryoshū, shiryo hen, vol. 2, pp. 1450-57.
88 ‘Dainihon tsūshinsha teikan sōan yōryō’, reprinted in Amō ed., Amō Eiji nikki shiryoshū, shiryo hen, vol. 2, p. 1458.
89 [Amō], [No title], 26 September 1932, (reprinted), p. 1451.
90 Iwanaga, ‘Kokkateki daitsūshinsha’, December 1931, (reprinted), p. 163.
91 ‘Dainihon tsūshinsha teikan sōan yōryō’, (reprinted), pp. 1460, 1461.
92 [Amō], ‘Shintsūshinsha setsuritsu’, (reprinted), pp. 1529, 1530.
93 Ibid., pp. 1530-31; ‘Shimbun rengōsha kaitōsho’, October 1933, reprinted in Tsūshinshashi kankōkai ed., Tsūshinshashi, pp. 426-7.
94 Iwanaga to Cooper, 27 May 1933; Cooper to Elliott, 31 May 1933, reprinted in Ariyama and Nishiyama eds, Kokusai tsūshinsha, vol. 2, pp. 419-21.
95 Tsūshinshashi kankōkai ed., Tsūshinshashi, p. 336.
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