Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II

by John W. Dower

This new left-wing image of the victor as more hypocrite than liberator was memorably conveyed by Ii Yashirō, the chief coordinator of the strike’s organizing committee, whose account of SCAP’s intervention became an indelible part of postwar labor history. As Ii told the story, he was summoned by General Marquat, the head of GHQ’s Economic and Scientific Section, on January 31 and ordered to sign a statement canceling the strike. He responded by asking: “What kind of democracy is this?” Japan’s unions were democratic, he declared, and decided policy by majority vote. That being the case, he had no authority to cancel the proposed strike. He vainly tried to assure Marquat that the strikers had no intention of impeding occupation activities or food deliveries. At that point, Marquat evidently banged the table in fury and some seven or eight military police spilled into the room brandishing their pistols. Ii, in his own turn, erupted. He asked the Americans why they were threatening violence, and exclaimed: “Japanese workers are not American slaves! Japanese workers are not fools!”