Textbook authors demand correction of account of wartime ‘mass suicide’ in Okinawa

   Textbook authors as well as publishing industry workers and citizen groups decided to raise the public opinion demanding that the Education Ministry make corrections before next April, when new textbooks will be distributed to students nationwide, to descriptions of the Battle of Okinawa in 1945 in high school history textbooks in order to make students known the reality of the war.

   The Education Ministry last spring ordered textbook publishers to delete from high school history textbooks an account that the Japanese Imperial Army forced Okinawans into “mass suicide” during the battle.

   In a meeting held on July 24 in Tokyo, a textbook author with dismay disclosed what had happened in the Education Ministry’s textbook screening process. He said that he had no other choice than to accept the ministry order because the duration of discussions with the ministry’s textbook examiner on the account in question was limited to only a few minutes and at that time he had no material with him to argue back against the order.

   He pointed out that in the background of this new textbook screening policy is the rise of forces that refuse to teach students the fact that the military did not protect civilian residents.

   Yamaguchi Takeshi, secretary of the Association for Promoting Peace Education from Okinawa, reported that since the result of the textbook screening order was made public at the end of March, public indignation has spread irrespective of differences of political ideology, and that even junior high school students petitioned the Education Ministry to retract the order. He said that the Federation of Parents and Teachers Associations and other organizations in Okinawa are planning to hold a large rally.

   This meeting was organized by the Historical Science Society of Japan, History Educationalist Conference of Japan, Japan Federation of Publishing Workers’ Unions, and seven other organizations, and was attended by over 100 people.                                       - Akahata, July 26, 2007