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The Spectacle of Global Fascism: The Italian Blackshirt mission to Japan's Asian empire*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 January 2018

DANIEL HEDINGER
DANIEL HEDINGER*
Affiliation:
Historisches Seminar der LMU, München, Germany Email: [email protected]
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Abstract

In the spring of 1938 a mission of the Italian Fascist Party journeyed to the Japanese empire, visiting China, Korea, Manchukuo, and Japan itself. Those were happy days for the Axis and, as such, characterized by a flood of shuttle visits and requests for cooperation between Italy, Japan, and Germany. As we explore the choreography of the visit and accompany the Italian Blackshirts on their two-month-long trip, two processes become clear. On the one hand, the presence of the Blackshirts in Japan helped place the nation's regional war with China in the broader context of worldwide conflicts. On the other hand, this trip assisted in firmly placing the new Axis alliance in the context of a pan-Asianist empire under Japanese control. This article suggests that both processes were linked and mutually enhancing of one another. At the same time they were part of a much more far-reaching phenomenon, namely the globalization of the Axis alliance. This, I will argue, was acted out on the stages provided by what is best described as the ‘spectacle of global fascism’. Of course, this spectacle proved to have its tensions and oddities. But as the focus on the performative aspects of the Italian-Japanese encounters shows, this novel form of fascist diplomacy was a way of handling contradictions within the alliance. At the same time, the spectacle served to strengthen it. In other words, seen through the lens of the Blackshirts’ mission, the Axis appears significantly stronger, diverse, and also more global than conventional diplomatic history has perceived it to be.

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Forum
Information
Modern Asian Studies , Volume 51 , Special Issue 6: Institutions and Economic Development in South Asia , November 2017 , pp. 1999 - 2034
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Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2018 

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Footnotes

*

My research for this article was generously supported by the Center for Advanced Studies, LMU, Munich. For reading, commenting on, and correcting earlier versions of this article, I would like to thank especially Mark Frost, Daniel Schumacher and the two anonymous reviewers of Modern Asian Studies.

References

1 For Walter Benjamin, the aestheticization of politics was a key feature of every fascist regime. See W. Benjamin, ‘Das Kunstwerk im Zeitalter seiner technischen Reproduzierbarkeit’, in Gesammelte Schriften I, 2 (Werkausgabe Band 2), W. Benjamin (ed.), Suhrkamp, Frankfurt, 1991 (1936), pp. 431–469, here pp. 467–469.

2 E. Weizsäcker, Erinnerungen, Paul List Verlag, München, 1950, p. 160.

3 This mission has been neglected by the literature, with one notable exception: Hofmann, R., The fascist effect: Japan and Italy, 1915–1952, Cornell University Press, Ithaca, 2015, pp. 113–115 Google Scholar.

4 Concerning the globalization of the Axis in 1937, see also Ishida, K., ‘The German-Japanese-Italian Axis as seen from fascist Italy’, in Japan and Germany: two latecomers to the world stage, 1890–1945. Volume II, Tajima, N., Kudo, A. and Pauer, E. (eds), Global Oriental, Folkestone, 2009, pp. 262–301 Google Scholar, here especially p. 266.

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12 Studies have also emphasized the colonial nature of the war in East Asia and thus the empire's significance for mobilization on the home front: see Kobayashi, H., Teikoku nihon to sōryokusen taisei. Senzen sengo no renzoku to ajia (帝国日本と総力戦体制. 戦前 · 戦後の連続とアジア), Yushisha, Tokyo, 2004.Google Scholar

13 For instance, Louise Young's notion of ‘mobilizing culture’, which she applies to a specifically Japanese context, might serve as an equally useful tool when discussing the birth of a new kind of fascist spectacle in Europe. See L. Young, ‘Japan's wartime empire in China’, in Chickering, Förster and Greiner (eds), The shadows of total war, pp. 327–345.

14 A recent example is DiNardo, R. L., ‘Axis coalition building’, in A companion to World War II, Zeiler, T. W. and DuBois, D. M. (eds), Blackwell Publishing, Chichester, 2013, pp. 405–414 Google Scholar. Problems, tension, and frictions in the German-Japanese relationship during the war years are also emphasized in Tajima, N., Kudo, A. and Pauer, E. (eds), Japan and Germany: Two latecomers to the world stage, 1890–1945 (in three volumes), Global Oriental, Folkestone, 2009 Google Scholar, see especially Volume 1, pp. xiv–xv. Among the typical examples of such a view are Sommer, T., Deutschland und Japan zwischen den Mächten 1935–1940, Mohr (Siebeck), Tübingen, 1962 Google Scholar; Meskill, J. M., Nazi Germany and imperial Japan: The hollow diplomatic alliance, Aldine Transaction, New Brunswick, 2012 (1966)Google Scholar; Martin, B., ‘Der Schein des Bündnisses—Deutschland und Japan im Krieg (1940–1945)’, in Formierung und Fall der Achse Berlin-Tōkyō. (Monographien aus dem Deutschen Institut für Japanstudien der Philipp-Franz-von-Siebold-Stiftung; Band 8), Krebs, G. (ed.), Iudicium, Munich, 1994, pp. 27–53 Google Scholar.

15 Exceptions are Hofmann, R., The fascist effect: Japan and Italy, 1915–1952, Cornell University Press, Ithaca, 2015 Google Scholar; K. Ishida, ‘The German-Japanese-Italian Axis as seen from fascist Italy’, in Meskill, Japan and Germany. Volume II, pp. 262–301; Ishida, K., Nichi-doku-i sangoku dōmei no kigen. Itaria nihon kara mita sūjiku gaikō (日独伊三国同盟の起源. イタリア · 日本から見た枢軸外交), Kodansha, Tokyo, 2013 Google Scholar. A diplomatic history can be found in Ferretti, V., Il Giappone e la politica estera italiana, 1935–41, Giuffrè, Milano, 1995 Google Scholar, and Frey, P. W., Faschistische Fernostpolitik: Italien, China und die Entstehung des weltpolitischen Dreieckes Rom-Berlin-Tokio, Peter Lang, Bern, 1997 Google Scholar.

16 For cultural diplomacy and the notion of diplomacy as theatre, see Iriye, A., ‘Culture and international history’, in Explaining the history of American foreign relations, Hogan, M. J. and Paterson, T. G. (eds), Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1991, pp. 214–225 Google Scholar, and Shimazu, N., ‘Diplomacy as theatre: recasting the Bandung Conference of 1955 as cultural history’, in Asia Research Institute Working Paper Series No. 164, Asia Research Institute, Singapore, 2011 Google Scholar.

17 For this discussion, see especially Roberts, ‘Myth, style, substance’, here p. 2.

18 On the Japanese side, the main sources for the following can be found in the Japan Center for Asian Historical Records [henceforth cited as JACAR]: Ikoku seifu haken hōnichi shinzen shisetsu-dan ni kansuru ken (伊国政府派遣訪日親善使節団に関する件) [1938], No. C01006957000 and Ikoku seifu haken (伊国政府派遣) [1938], No. A10113263900. See also Akamatsu, S., Shōwa jūsannen no kokusai jōsei (昭和十三年の国際情勢), Nihon Kokusai Kyokai, Tokyo, 1939, pp. 373–374 Google Scholar. For the Italian side, see Archivio Storico del Ministero degli Affari Esteri [henceforth cited as ASMAE], Affari politici [AP], Giappone Busta 21 [1938], ‘Missione del partito nazionale fascista’ and Archivio Centrale dello Stato [henceforth cited as ACS], Presidenza del Consiglio dei Ministri [1937–1939], Fasc. 3 / 2-4, N. 4119 ‘Missione del Partito nazionale Fascista in Giappone’.

19 A detailed description of the Italian mission members from the Japanese point of view can be found in JACAR, Ikoku seifu haken, pp. 4–23.

20 For the programme, see JACAR, Ikoku seifu haken hōnichi shinzen shisetsu-dan ni kansuru ken and Akamatsu, Shōwa jūsannen no kokusai jōsei, p. 373.

21 Galeazzo Ciano was Italy's foreign minister from 1936 until 1943 and thus one of the main architects of the Axis. He was also Mussolini's son-in-law, a fact that did not save him from execution in early 1944 after voting for the Duce's dismissal from the Fascist Grand Council on 24/25 July of the previous year. Achille Starace was a fascist of the first hour and a long-time party secretary of the PNF (1931–1939). During his reign the cult of the Duce and the formalization of the fascist spectacle—or in the words of Emilio Gentile ‘fascist religion’—reached its highest point. See Gentile, ‘Fascism as political religion’, p. 238.

22 See Paulucci's ‘memoriale’ of the mission, June 1938, p. 2, in ASMAE, AP, Giappone B. 21.

23 Ibid.

24 Asahi Gurafu, 6 April 1938, pp. 4–5, here p. 5. See also, for example, in Yomiuri Shinbun, ‘Kuro shatsu kōkan’ (黒シャツ交歓), 20 March 1938 [Evening Edition], p. 1, or Asahi Shinbun, ‘Musorini shushō no zō’ (ムソリニ首相の像), 9 May 1938 [Tokyo Edition/Morning Edition], p. 11.

25 Falasca-Zamponi, Fascist spectacle, p. 101.

26 Ibid., p. 102, and Roberts, ‘Myth, style, substance’, p. 4.

27 Mussolini's famous quote of the late 1920s read ‘all within the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state’. Concerning the subordination of the party to the state, see also Bosworth, R. J. B., Mussolini's Italy: Life under the dictatorship, 1915–1945, Penguin, London, 2005, especially p. 203 Google Scholar.

28 See Asahi Shinbun, ‘Ishisetsu-dan shinninjō o hōtei’ (伊使節団信任状を捧呈), 23 March 1938 [Tokyo Edition/Evening Edition], p. 1, and Il Messaggero, 23 March 1938, to be found in ACS, SPD CO [Secreteria Particolare del Duce, Carteggio Ordinario], B 477, 184.057.

29 Concerning the planning on the Japanese side, see JACAR, Ikoku seifu haken.

30 Bottai, G., Diario 1935–1944: A cura di Giordano Bruno Guerri, Rizzoli, Milano, 2001, p. 295 Google Scholar.

31 For more information about his career, see Tassani, G., Diplomatico tra due guerre: Vita di Giacomo Paulucci di Calboli Barone, La Lettere, Florence, 2012 Google Scholar.

32 Paulucci wrote several letters concerning a cooperation between the publisher Asahi and Luce. See Paulucci to the Ministry of Press and Propaganda [later the Ministry of Popular Culture], 23 September 1935 and 28 May 1936, in ACS, MICP [Ministerio Cultura Populare], Reports, Busta 12.

33 Ciano, G., Diario 1937–1943: A Cura di Renzo de Felice: Edizione integrale, Rizzoli, Milano, 1998, p. 83 Google Scholar.

34 See, for example, S. Itakura, ‘Doku-i no sekkin to chichūkai no haran’ (独伊の接近と地中海波瀾). Tōtairiku, vol. 15, no. 11, November 1937, pp. 110–116. In late 1937 and early 1938 not only right-wing journals published such views but also the Gaikō Jihō, the leading magazine for foreign policy issues with strong connections to the foreign ministry. See also Minoru, Maida, ‘Chichūkai mondai to itarī’ (地中海問題とイタリー). Gaikō Jihō, vol. 84, no. 790, November 1937, pp. 1–15 Google Scholar or Eiichi, Nishizawa, ‘Berin rōma sūjiku to chichūkai seikyoku’ (ベリン ローマ枢軸と地中海政局). Gaikō Jihō, vol. 84, no. 788, October 1937, pp. 57–74 Google Scholar.

35 Since the early 1930s the Duce's articulated aim was to create a fascist empire stretching from the Mediterranean to the Indian Ocean: Mallett, R., The Italian Navy and fascist expansionism, 1935–40, Routledge, London, 1998, p. 111 Google Scholar.

36 Ciano, Diario, p. 82.

37 JACAR, Ikoku seifu haken hōnichi shinzen shisetsu-dan ni kansuru ken, p. 4.

38 For pictures of the event, see Archivio Luce, Giornale Luce B1299, ‘La missione italiana del partito fascista’, 4 May 1938, http://www.archivioluce.com/archivio/, [accessed 11 September 2017] and Asahi Shinbun, ‘‘Bōkyō gaika’ ni tenchi yurugu’ (‘防共凱歌’に天地揺), 28 March 1938 [Tokyo Edition/Evening Edition], p. 2.

39 See the transcript of Paulucci's radio speech after his return in June 1938, in ASMAE, AP, Giappone B. 21. The masses of spectators are also shown in Luce's official documentary of the mission: see Archivio Luce, ‘Missione PNF in Giappone, 1938’, http://www.archivioluce.com/archivio/, [accessed 11 September 2017.] For Ōsaka, see also Asahi Shinbun, ‘Ishisetsu, Ōsaka de kantai’ (伊使節、大阪で歓待), 9 April 1938 [Tokyo Edition/Morning Edition], p. 11.

40 For this exhibition, see Hedinger, D., ‘Kulturen der Mobilisierung: Repräsentationen von Krieg und Gewalt im japanischen Imperium 1937/38’. Yōroppa kenkyū/European Studies (Universität Tokio), vol. 11, 2012, pp. 107–127 Google Scholar, here pp. 114–118. For exhibitions in early Shōwa-Japan more generally, see Hedinger, D., Im Wettstreit mit dem Westen, Campus Verlag, Frankfurt am Main, 2011, especially pp. 307–317 Google Scholar.

41 See Asahi Shinbunsha (ed.), Shina jihen seisen hakurankai gahō (支那事変聖戦博覧会画報), Tokyo, 1938 or Asahi Shinbun, ‘Zessan ni kagayaku seisenhaku: Yonai kaishō to itarī shisetsu’ (絶讃に輝く聖戦博. 米内海相とイタリー使節), 11 April 1938 [Tokyo Edition/Morning Edition], p. 11.

42 Asahi Shinbun, ‘‘Bōkyō gaika’ ni tenchi yurugu’ (‘防共凱歌’に天地揺), 28 March 1938 [Tokyo Edition/Evening Edition], p. 2.

43 Asahi Gurafu, 25 November 1936, pp. 10–11. Pertaining to the bombings of Madrid and Barcelona, see, for example, Asahi Shinbun, 1 November 1936 [Tokyo Edition/Morning Edition], S. 3.

44 Hirano, H., ‘Supain nairan to fukanshō’ (スパイン内乱と不干渉). Gaikō Jihō, vol. 82, no. 781, 1937, pp. 189–193 Google Scholar, here p. 190. See also Chikao, Fujisawa, ‘Nihon kokusai seiji no genri to sekaikan no mondai’ (日本国際政治の原理と世界観の問題). Gaikō Jihō, vol. 80, no. 769, 1936, pp. 1–37 Google Scholar, here p. 1.

45 Grandi to Ciano, ‘Animale reazioni dell'opinione pubblica britannica all'occupazione giapponese di Hainan: Timore di una politica concertata tra Roma. Berlino e Tokio’, 13 February 1939, in I documenti diplomatici italiani, Serie 8, Volume 11, Ministero degli affari esteri (ed.), La liberia dello stato, Rome, 2006, pp. 223–224. See also Galimberti, Cesare, ‘Appunit sul conflitto cino-giapponese’. Gerarchia, vol. 18, no. 9, 1938, pp. 606–614, here p. 612Google Scholar.

46 See Archivio Luce, Gioranle Luce B1299, ‘La missione italiana del partito fascista’, 4 May 1938, http://www.archivioluce.com/archivio/, [accessed 11 September 2017].

47 Yomiuri Shinbun, ‘Risshoku no kōkan: Ishisetsu-dan doitsu taishikan e’ (立食の交歓. 伊使節団ドイツ大使館へ), 27 March 1938 [Morning Edition], p. 7.

48 See, for example, Yomiuri Shinbun, 7 November 1937, p. 1.

49 Konoe quoted in Lebra, J. C., Japan's greater East Asia co-prosperity sphere in World War II: Selected readings and documents, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1975, p. 69 Google Scholar.

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51 Cook, H. T. and Cook, T. F., Japan at war: An oral history, The New Press, New York, 1992, p. 208 Google Scholar. See also Troni, A., ‘Giornalismo Giapponese’. Yamato, vol. 1, no. 10, 1941, pp. 302–303, here p. 303Google Scholar.

52 Earhart, D. C., Certain victory: Images of World War II in the Japanese media, M. E. Sharpe, Armonk, 2008, p. 53 Google Scholar.

53 Kumagaya quoted in Cook and Cook, Japan at war, p. 49.

54 Ibid., p. 208.

55 Troni, ‘Giornalismo Giapponese’, pp. 302–303.

56 国家総動員法 Kokka sōdōin hō.

57 For a discussion of censorship in the early 1930s, see Wilson, S., The Manchurian crisis and Japanese society, 1931–33, Routledge, London, 2002, especially pp. 30–41 Google Scholar. For Japanese wartime propaganda, see also B. Kushner, The thought war: Japanese imperial propaganda, University of Hawai'i Press, Honolulu, 2006, and Ruoff, K. J., Imperial Japan at its zenith: The wartime celebration of the empire's 2,600th anniversary, Cornell University Press, Ithaca, 2010 Google Scholar.

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59 Young, ‘Japan's wartime empire in China’, p. 333.

60 Il Popolo d'Italia, 7 April 1938, p. 5, and Il Popolo d'Italia, 16 April 1938, p. 3.

61 Archivio Luce, Giornale Luce, 20 April 1938, ‘La Missione del partito fascista’, http://www.archivioluce.com/archivio/, [accessed 11 September 2017].

62 For the official documentary, see Archivio Luce, ‘Missione PNF in Giappone, 1938’, http://www.archivioluce.com/archivio/, [accessed 11 September 2017].

63 M. Appelius, ‘Può la Russia bolscevizzare la Cina?’. Il Popolo d'Italia, 3 April 1938, p. 5.

64 Il Popolo d'Italia, 1 May 1938, p. 5 and 17 May 1938, p. 9.

65 G. Ciano, ‘L'Italia fascista e il mondo’. La Stampa, 3 June 1938, p. 1.

66 Letter from Ciano to Starace, 21 May 1938, in ASMAE, AP, Giappone B. 21.

67 Tassani, Diplomatico tra due guerre, p. 349 and p. 472.

68 G. Paulucci Di Calboli, ‘Il patto tripartito e il nuovo ordine mondiale nel pensiero e nell'azione di Mussolini’. Echi e Commenti, no. 22/23, December 1940. He also gave talks at the ISMEO [Istituto per il Medio ed Estremo Oriente] in 1939. See Frey, Faschistische Fernostpolitik, p. 137.

69 Ciano, Diario, p. 150.

70 Ibid., p. 144. For more details about Italian initiatives to expand the alliance in the first half of 1938, see Ferretti, Il Giappone e la politica estera italiana, especially pp. 212–215.

71 Auriti to Ciano, ‘Schema del progetto per gli accordi politico–militari tra Italia e Giappone’, 31 May 1938, in I documenti diplomatici italiani, Serie 8, Volume 9, Ministero degli affari esteri (ed.), La liberia dello stato, Rome, 2001, p. 238.

72 Ibid.

73 Ciano, Diario, p. 144.

74 The Five Ministers Conference was composed of the prime minister, the army and navy minister as well as the finance and foreign minister; during the early Shōwa period they met regularly and took important decisions. Ōhata, T., ‘The Anti-Comintern Pact, 1935–1939’, in Deterrent diplomacy: Japan, Germany, and the USSR, 1935–1940, Selected Translations from Taiheiyo senso e no michi. Kaisen gaiko shi, Morley, J. W. (ed.), Columbia University Press, New York, 1976 Google Scholar, p. 55, and Sommer, Deutschland und Japan zwischen den Mächten, p. 120.

75 Aizawa, K., ‘Nihon to sangoku gunji dōmei’ (日本と三国軍事同盟), in Kenhō: Taiheiyō sensō to sono gairyaku 2 (検証 太平洋戦争とその戦略 2), Miyake, M. et al. (eds), Chuo Koron Shinsha, Tokyo, 2013, pp. 149–166, here p. 160Google Scholar

76 Telegram to the Embassy in Tokyo, 28 January 1938, in ASMAE, AP, Giappone B. 21.

77 Concerning the political upheavals, see Schmidt, R. F., Die Aussenpolitik des Dritten Reiches 1933–1939, Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart, 2002, pp. 225–232 Google Scholar.

78 Kordt, E., Wahn und Wirklichkeit: Die Außenpolitik des Dritten Reiches: Versuch einer Darstellung: Herausgegeben unter Mitwirkung von Karl Heinz Abshagen, Union Deutsche Verlagsgesellschaft, Stuttgart, 1948 (1947), p. 110 Google Scholar.

79 Suvich to Ciano, ‘Sentimenti anti-giapponesi ed anti-italiani dell'opinione pubblica americana’, 14 January 1938, in I documenti diplomatici italiani, Serie 8, Volume 8, Ministero degli affari esteri (ed.), La liberia dello stato, Rome, 1999, pp. 38–41, here pp. 39–40.

80 Frey, Faschistische Fernostpolitik.

81 Cortese to Ciano, ‘Compiti della missione economica: conclusione di accordi con il Giappone e il Manciukuò’, 10 March 1938, in I documenti diplomatici italiani, Serie 8, Volume 8, pp. 334–335. A contract between Manchuria, Japan, and Italy was finally signed in early July 1938. For Japanese reactions to this, see Anonymous, ‘Nichi-man-i bōeki kyōtei no gi’ (日満伊貿易協定の義). Tōyō Keizai Shinpō, no. 1823, July 1938, pp. 14–15.

82 Gauss to the Secretary of State, 16 March 1938, in Foreign Relations of the United States Diplomatic Papers, 1938: The Far East. Volume III, United States Department of State (ed.), United States Government Printing Office, Washington, 1954, p. 125.

83 Such reports from Shanghai can be found in Asahi Shinbun 16 March 1938 [Tokyo Edition/Morning Edition], p. 3, and The Shanghai Times, 16 March 1938, in ASMAE, AP, Giappone B. 21. For the figures, see Harmsen, P., Shanghai 1937: Stalingrad on the Yangtze, Casemate Publishers, Oxford, 2013, p. 247 and p. 251Google Scholar.

84 The Shanghai Times, 16 March 1938, in ASMAE, AP, Giappone B. 21.

85 Il Popolo d'Italia, 7 April 1938, p. 5.

86 For Italy's presence in Shanghai, see Paoletti, C., La Marina Italiana in Estremo Oriente 1866–2000, Ufficio storico della marina militare, Rome, 2000, especially p. 142 Google Scholar.

87 Details of the programme in Korea and China can be found in JACAR, Ikoku seifu haken hōnichi shinzen shisetsu-dan ni kansuru ken, pp. 37–39.

88 Telegram from Paulucci to Ciano, 19 May 1938, p. 1, in ASMAE, AP, Giappone B. 21.

89 Ibid.

90 See, for example, ‘Fashisuto hōnichi shinzen shisetsu-dan o mukaete: Meihō Itarī sobyō’ (ファシスト訪日親善使節団を迎へて. 盟邦イタリー素描). Shashin Shūhō, No. 7 (30 March 1938), pp. 4–5.

91 For more details on these meetings, see Corvaja, Santi, Hitler and Mussolini: The secret meetings, Enigma Books, New York, 2008 Google Scholar; as well as Baxa, P., ‘Capturing the fascist moment: Hitler's visit to Italy in 1938 and the radicalization of fascist Italy’. Journal of Contemporary History, vol. 42, no. 2, 2007, pp. 227–242 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Watt, D. C., ‘An earlier model for the Pact of Steel: the draft treaties exchanged between Germany and Italy during Hitler's visit to Rome in May 1938’. International Affairs, vol. 33, no. 2, 1957, pp. 185–197 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For Mussolini's travel to Germany in 1937, see C. Goeschel, ‘Staging friendship: Mussolini and Hitler in Germany in 1937’. The Historical Journal, pp. 1–24. Doi: 10.1017/S0018246X15000540. For details about the different exchange activities between Italy and Germany in 1938, see Petersen, J., ‘Vorspiel zu “Stahlpakt” und Kriegsallianz: Das deutsch-italienische Kulturabkommen vom 23. November 1938’. Vierteljahreshefte für Zeitgeschichte, vol. 36, no. 1, January 1988, pp. 41–77, here pp. 48–49Google Scholar. More generally on German-Italian cultural relations, see: B. Martin, The Nazi-Fascist new order for European culture, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 2016.

92 Asahi Gurafu, 8 June 1938, pp. 4–5 or Yomiuri Shinbun, 21 May 1938, [Morning Edition], p. 2.

93 Asahi Gurafu, 6 April 1938, p. 5.

94 See telegram from Paulucci to the Foreign Office from Mukden, 3 May 1938, in ASMAE, AP, Giappone B. 21.

95 Il Popolo d'Italia, 19 April 1938, p. 3.

96 B. Mussolini, ‘Estremo Oriente’. Il Popolo d'Italia, 17 January 1934.

97 Notes of a conversation with Paulucci, undated, in ASMAE, AP, Giappone B. 21, p. 2.

98 Varanini, V., ‘Le forze armate del “Sol Levante”’. Gerarchia, vol. 17, no. 11, November 1937, pp. 781–786 Google Scholar, here p. 786. See also Galimberti, C., ‘Appunit sul conflitto cino-giapponese’. Gerarchia, vol. 18, no. 9, September 1938, pp. 606–614 Google Scholar, here especially p. 614, and Bellotti, R., ‘Le Concessioni ed il nuovo ordine asiatico’. Gerarchia, vol. 19, no. 8, August 1939, pp. 551–557, here p. 557Google Scholar.

99 Galimberti, C., ‘Appunit sul conflitto cino-giapponese’. Gerarchia, vol. 18, no. 9, September 1938, pp. 606–614 Google Scholar, here p. 614.

100 For such developments in Japan and the United States during the Second World War, see Fujitani, T., Race for empire: Koreans as Japanese and Japanese as Americans during World War Two, University of California Press, Berkeley, 2011 Google Scholar.

101 ‘X annuale della fondazione del Manciukuò: Supplemento al N. 3 di Yamato’. Yamato, vol. 2, no. 3, March 1942.

102 Paulucci Di Calboli, G., ‘Il ‘I nuovo ordine’ e l'impero mancese’. Yamato, vol. 2, no. 6, June 1942, pp. 144–145, here p. 145Google Scholar.

103 On the cult of the Duce in the late 1930s, see Roberts, ‘Myth, style, substance’, pp. 3–4.

104 Compare Baxa, ‘Capturing the fascist moment’, pp. 227–228.

105 Ibid., p. 235.

106 Francois-Poncet, Souvenirs d'une Ambassade a` Berlin, septembre 1931–octobre 1938, Flammarion, Paris, 1948, p. 271.

107 On the increased number of exchanges between Germany and Italy after 1936, see Collotti, E., Fascismo e politica di potenza: politica estera 1922–1939. Con la collaborazione di Nicola Labanca e Teodoro Sala, La nuova Italia, Milano, 2000, pp. 338–339 Google Scholar; as well as W. Schieder, Der italienische Faschismus: 1919–1945, C.H. Beck, München, 2010, p. 80.

108 Tamagna, F. M., Italy's interests and policies in the Far East, Institute for Pacific Relations, New York, 1941, p. 32 Google Scholar.

109 Investigation of un-American propaganda activities in the United States. Hearings before a special committee on un-american activities: house of representatives: seventy-seventh congress, first session, H. Res. 282: Appendix VI. Report on Japanese activities, United States Government Printing Office, Washington, 1942, pp. 1927–1934.