Japan Times
READERS IN COUNCIL
October 30, 2002
In his Oct. 16 letter, “Forget the nuclear option,” Joseph Vignos implies that rebuilding Iraq would not be any more difficult that rebuilding Japan in 1945. The suggestion requires that Japanese and Middle Eastern history be addressed.
The societies of 1945 Japan and present-day Iraq bear little resemblance to each other. The Japan that was defeated was a highly centralized, industrial, and ethnically an almost homogenous society that was centered o the cult of Emperor worship. These traits of Japanese society helped the U.S. Occupation forces undertake the remolding of Japanese society by enabling them to work through the Emperor and the Japanese government bureaucracy. By this method of indirect rule, Occupation forces were able to create a semblance of continuity and maintain peace while effecting dramatic changes to the national infrastructure.
By contrast, Iraq has neither the social cohesion nor a fixed national identity to keep it together without force. Iraq is currently ruled by a dictatorship of minority Sunni Muslims. The country has a substantive Kurdish minority that has de facto self-rule in the north, thanks to the United States. Given the opportunity, Iraqi Kurds may link up with Turkish Kurds to create an independent Kurdistan. Disaffected Shiite Iraqis may try for an alliance with predominantly Shiite Iran.
Furthermore, Iraq, which was created out of a League of Nations mandate, has no memory of democratic institutions in its modern history, and the people of the region have bitter memories of Western imperialists. With these differences, it is difficult to see how Vignos could view the rebuilding of Iraq as a job similar to that of rebuilding Japan in 1945.
KO UNOKI
Tokyo
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