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A RELUCTANT SOLDIER

From the 1890s to the 1920s, Japan was governed under a hybrid system of democracy and imperialism. The British-style constitutional monarchy and the newly established parliamentary system fostered an era of social and economic plurality, which flourished during the reign of Emperor Taisho (1912–26). Simultaneously, a fast-burgeoning military was expanding Japan’s reach across Asia, pursuing international influence and economic gains. In 1895, the armed forces counted seventy thousand men; a decade later, in the Russo-Japanese War, it had surpassed one million.

Victory over Russia created a foothold in Manchuria, rich in natural resources such as iron, coking coal, soybeans, salt, and developable land, which was in short supply within the Japanese empire. Factories were opened, and people migrated in search of prosperous new beginnings. In 1906 Japan began work on the massive South Manchuria Railroad, which forged the route for Japanese colonization across the province and fomented the Chinese nationalist resistance to it.

The reign of Emperor Hirohito, known as the Showa period (1926–89) or the “period of enlightened peace,” began rather ironically with domestic and international upheavals threatening Japan’s delicate balance of liberal democracy and rising military power. The 1929 US stock market crash and ensuing global depression pinched international trade and highlighted Japan’s lack of territory and resources compared to the Western powers. The pretext for a full-blown invasion of China was fabricated on September 18, 1931, when Japanese soldiers bombed a railroad they were purportedly guarding, and blamed Chinese nationalists. This staged provocation enabled the Japanese army to invade the northeast provinces of China and Inner Mongolia, establishing the puppet state of Manchukuo in February 1932, which became the Empire of Manchukuo (Manshu Teikoku) from 1934 to 1945. Japan’s civilian government couldn’t stop the generals for fear of a coup d’etat, and Hirohito proved unable to restrain the armed forces. Public euphoria over annexing Manchuria further cemented the military’s political power, and condemnation from the West only fed rising nationalism. Thus began the period known as the Fifteen Years’ War, encompassing the Manchurian Incident (1931–32), the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–45), and the Pacific War against the Anglo-American powers (1941–45).

Honda (right) with a fellow army recruit, mid-1930s.Courtesy of Honda Film Inc.

Japan’s Kwantung Army in Manchukuo needed able-bodied young men, and so Honda was drafted in the fall of 1934. He was twenty-three years old. “It was only a year after I had entered PCL, and it was the saddest thing for me. I heard some people drank a whole bottle of soy sauce to raise their blood pressure in order to avoid serving, but I gave up on that.”¹

Honda received an “A” grade on his physical examination, but was not required to report for duty immediately. Several months passed while he waited for his call-up, during which he continued working at PCL. His ascension through the assistant director ranks began, and he had been promoted to second assistant director by the time he worked on Three Sisters with Maiden Hearts (1935), a technically sophisticated early talkie from Mikio Naruse, who was emerging as a major talent.

Duty called in January 1935. Honda was enlisted in the Dai-ichi rentai (First Division, First Infantry Regiment), which was garrisoned in Tokyo and was one of the oldest divisions of the Imperial Japanese Army. He began his military training at the entry-level rank of ippeisotsu, the rough equivalent of petty officer first class. As weeks passed, he endured by focusing on his eventual return to the studio. Tensions were rising in China, but there was no indication yet of massive troop deployments. Honda believed he would complete his service without being sent overseas.

The opposite would prove true. Events far beyond his control would doom him to a long military career.

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Snow blanketed Tokyo on the morning of February 26, 1936. Just before 5:00 a.m., Lt. Yasuhide Kurihara of the First Division overpowered the sleeping policemen guarding the prime minister’s residence. Once inside, Kurihara opened fire—a signal to his comrades outside, who stormed in, guns blazing. A coup was under way, engineered by a rebel faction of young, right-wing army zealots determined to rub out government leaders whose support for the military they considered lacking.

Honda, stationed just a short distance away, was awakened by the shots. Confused, he wondered if the conflict with China had made its way there. Soon the gravity of the situation was apparent: The rebels occupied a square mile of central Tokyo, including the Diet Building. Dubbed the Restoration Army, they railed against the civilian government and invoked Emperor Hirohito to expand Japan’s imperial conquest all the way to Russia. Hirohito, in a rare display of authority, instead denounced them. Soon the 2/26 Incident, as it became known, fizzled; its leaders were soon court-martialed. The rebels had killed a handful on their hit list, but they missed the prime minister and other targets.

In China, late 1930s.Courtesy of Honda Film Inc.

Honda had no knowledge of the plot, but he could easily have been swept up in it. Kurihara, one of the primary instigators, was Honda’s former commanding officer. Sometime before the event, Honda had overheard Kurihara talking to sympathizers about “revolution,” though Honda had no idea what it meant. The night before the coup, Kurihara visited Honda’s barracks, looking for a machine gun. Honda later recalled that Kurihara had hesitated there—perhaps considering whether to recruit these young soldiers for his nefarious mission—before moving on.

Only a small faction within the First Division had participated, but everyone associated with Kurihara was tainted. Their unit was now considered dangerous; the brass wanted them gone. And so in May 1936 Honda and his regiment were sent to Manchukuo under questionable pretenses, on a mission to track down the leader of a Chinese resistance group who, as it turned out, wasn’t in the area.

If not for the 2/26 Incident, Honda would likely have completed his compulsory military service within eighteen months, as was customary. But by the time he came home in March 1937, he had spent two years in the military; and as the war in China escalated, he would be recalled again and again in an apparent series of tacit reprisals against those connected, even tangentially, to the coup.

And yet, even though the revolt had failed and its leaders were duly punished, the violence instilled the fear of further assassinations and terrorist plots. The Diet subsequently increased military spending. The march toward totalitarianism was on.