Political lies are more plausible than reality: American and Japanese lies about atomic bombing

Join Professor Yuki Tanaka (retired) for this Inagaki Seminar series event online as they explore the topic of "Political lies are more plausible than reality: American and Japanese lies about atomic bombing".

This event is delivered in partnership with the Tokyo University of Foreign Studies (TUFS) Global Japan Office.

About Inagaki Seminar #44

The Japanese government and the Japanese people in general always emphasise the fact that Japan is the only nation in the world to have suffered the atomic bombing, while they tend to ignore the terrible wartime atrocities committed by the Japanese Imperial forces.

Why did the Japanese, unlike the Germans, fail to develop a sense of collective responsibility for the wartime and colonial atrocities they committed, and why do they continue to fail to do so?

Professor Tanaka aims to find answers to this question by focusing on the atomic bombings - how the US made their decision, how Japan came to accept defeat, how both the US and Japan created their own state-sanctioned narratives to justify each decision, and how they accepted such narratives from each other for their own interests.

Professor Tanaka will also examine what kind of social and political problems arose as a result of this collaboration, and how the prevailing social and political problems currently confronted by the Japanese people are in essence, fundamentally rooted in the manner in which the war ended.

About the speaker

Yuki Tanaka (田中 利幸) was a research professor at the Hiroshima Peace Institute, Hiroshima City University, until his retirement in 2015. He was also a visiting professor at Birkbeck College, University of London, UK, and the Sir Ninian Stephen Visiting Scholar at the Law School, University of Melbourne, Australia. He lives in Melbourne and works as a freelance historian.

Professor Tanaka has published many books in Japanese and his English language publications include:

• Entwined Atrocities: New Insights into the U.S.- Japan Alliance (2023)

• Hidden Horrors: Japanese War Crimes in World War II (second edition 2018)

• Japan's Comfort Women: Sexual Slavery and Prostitution During World War II and the US Occupation (2002)

• Beyond Victor's Justice? The Tokyo War Crimes Trial Revisited (2011) co-edited collection

Facilitator of this Inagaki Seminar on Japan

Akihiro Ogawa 小川 晃弘（おがわ・あきひろ） - Professor of Japanese Studies and Chair of Japanese Studies (since 2015) at the Asia Institute, University of Melbourne, Australia

About the Inagaki Seminar on Japan Series

This seminar series is named after Mr Senkichi 'Moshi' Inagaki, the pioneer of Japanese language instruction at the University of Melbourne, Australia.

Moshi Inagaki arrived in Australia from Japan in 1897 and commenced teaching of Japanese language at the University of Melbourne in 1919.

Launched in 2017, the Inagaki Seminar on Japan features talks from expert speakers on current topics on Japan within the areas of society, politics, language, and culture, as well as on the Australia-Japan relationship.

Today, the Inagaki Seminar continues to provide updated knowledge on Japan to Japan-interested audiences. Learn about past and upcoming Inagaki Seminars on Japan

Event Format

This event is an online only event delivered via Zoom.

Please register to receive the Zoom details and a reminder email will be sent immediately prior to the online event.

Contact and Accessibility

If you have specific requirements, please don't hesitate to contact us.

For inquiries, please contact Simon Bian at sbian@unimelb.edu.au

Image credit

Archival photo for Moshi Inagaki

Japanese and American flags sourced from Dpd3ut under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license.

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