Shinzo Abe’s Duty to History
The Japanese prime minister does the U.S. no favors by overlooking his country’s past atrocities.
All eyes in Asia are on Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe as he prepares to address a joint session of the U.S. Congress on April 29. This year being the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II, what historical message will Mr. Abe choose to deliver?
He has roughly three options: admit the horrible wrongdoings of Japan’s military regime before and during World War II; stress a kind of moral equivalence between Japan and the U.S., as Tokyo started the war by attacking Pearl Harbor but Washington ended it by dropping...