U.S. newspaper blames Abe for Japan's failure to settle wartime history

The New York Times on Monday blamed Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe for his country's failure to settle its wartime history, one week before he sets foot on U.S. soil for a visit.

The newspaper, in an editorial, linked the success of Abe's upcoming visit partly to his efforts to "confront Japan's wartime history, including its decision to wage war, its brutal occupation of China and Korea, its atrocities and its enslavement of thousands of women forced to work as sex slaves or comfort women in wartime brothels."

"By now, that history should have been settled," the paper asserted. "That it is not settled is largely the fault of Mr. Abe and his right-wing political allies who keep questioning history and even trying to rewrite it, stoking regional tensions."

Abe's intransigence over wartime past, coupled with territorial disputes, has roiled Japan's relations with China and the Republic of Korea (ROK), while the United States has been trying to harmonize ties between Tokyo and Seoul, its two treaty allies.

"Mr. Abe's nationalist views and pressure from competing political forces have affected his judgment on these delicate issues," the editorial said, noting "He has publicly expressed remorse for the war and said he will honor Japan's past apologies for its aggression, including the sex slavery. Yet he has added vague qualifiers to his comments, creating suspicions that he doesn't take the apologies seriously and will try to water them down."

"His government has compounded the problem by trying to whitewash that history," the paper added.

Japan's latest efforts to distort history this month, in newly approved textbooks in which the ownership of disputed islands and war crimes were recast, have come under attack by both the ROK and China.

The Abe government tried unsuccessfully last year to get the United Nations to revise a 1996 human rights report on the issue of "comfort women."

"Many Japanese right-wingers believe their country was wrongly maligned by America and its allies after the war," the newspaper noted. "Mr. Abe has given the impression that he believes Japan has already done enough to make amends for its militarism and atrocities."

It advised that Japan cannot "credibly fill that broader role" of a 21st-century leader, as envisioned by Abe, "if it seeks to repudiate criticism of its past."

Referring to the potential outcomes of Abe's summit with President Barack Obama, the paper said "A lot will depend on whether Mr. Abe is willing to push aside his right-wing supporters and set a tone that can strengthen stability in Asia, rather than weakening it." Endite