Renewed peace agitation

The Militant, 2 June 1945

Japan's critical military situation, combined with steadily worsening economic conditions caused by virtual blockade and devastating air raids, has led to renewed peace agitation by the terribly oppressed Japanese masses.

A high Tokyo judiciary official, Procurator-General Namisuki Nakano, last week warned of the danger of such peace agitation and threatened arrest of any person making speeches that might disrupt national unity.

This renewed agitation against the war gives the lie once again to the assertions of the capitalist press in this country that the Japanese people are united behind their rulers, that they are a warlike nation which revels in violence and bloodshed.

Capitalist press liars who say the Japanese people wanted war and that they glory in bloodletting, never point out that the people were thrust into the war by their rulers. An iron totalitarian regime (with which the Anglo-American imperialists maintained the friendliest of relations before Pearl Harbor) stifled all voices of protest. The truth is that the Japanese people no more wanted war than did the masses of Germany, Italy, Britain or any other country.