日本政客应放弃参拜靖国神社
Last week, on the first anniversary of his premiership, Shinzo Abe expressed “severe remorse” over Japan’s wartime actions and pledged that Japan would “never wage a war again”. Naturally no one paid much attention since on the very same day he undermined those words by visiting Yasukuni shrine, a memorial reviled throughout Asia for its association with Japanese aggression.
His visit ignited predictable, if stage-managed, fury in China and South Korea, two countries that suffered horrendously under Japan’s empire-building onslaught. Beijing said his actions “grossly trampled on the sentiment of the Chinese people” and proved that Mr Abe wanted to whitewash history.
安倍的参拜激起了中国和韩国可以预料的强烈愤慨，这两个国家曾在日本建立帝国的铁蹄下遭受令人发指的苦难。中国政府表示，安倍的行为“粗暴践踏中国和其他亚洲战争受害国人民感情”，并证明其企图美化历史。It is a common accusation that Japan has never apologised for its wartime behaviour. This is demonstrably untrue. Over the years, a procession of Japanese prime ministers has expressed contrition for colonial rule and wartime aggression. What is questioned is the sincerity – or otherwise – of those apologies. Japan stands accused of covering up its history in school textbooks, most of which – though not all – mention Japanese wartime atrocities but do not go into great detail. Some of its politicians, including Mr Abe, have publicly debated elements of the official apology, including quibbling over the fact of Japan’s “invasion”.
一个常见的指责是，日本从未就其战争期间的行为道歉。这显然不符合事实。多年来，一届又一届日本首相就该国的殖民统治和战争侵略行为表达了忏悔之意。受到质疑的是这些道歉的诚意（或者说是缺乏诚意）。日本还被指在教科书中掩盖其历史，许多教科书（虽然不是全部）提到日本战争期间的暴行，但不提细节。包括安倍在内的一些日本政客曾公开质疑官方道歉的某些细枝末节，包括对日本“侵略”的事实咬文嚼字。
Qin Gang, China’s foreign ministry spokesman, urged Japan to “repent”, not merely to apologise. In other words, what is required of Japanese leaders is to change not only what they say, but what they believe.
中国外交部新闻发言人秦刚敦促日本进行“反省”，而不仅仅是道歉。换句话说，对日本领导人的要求是，不仅要改变言论，还要改变信念。Beliefs are hard things to regulate. Japan would prefer to be judged by its postwar actions, for example the fact that it has not fired a shot in battle in seven decades. Sadly, for Japan, it is the victims, not the perpetrators, who determine when the perpetrator is sufficiently contrite. Still, it is worth looking at the wording of Japan’s official apology, best articulated by former prime minister Tomiichi Murayama. It includes the following: “Japan . . . through its colonial rule and aggression, caused tremendous damage and suffering to the people of many countries, particularly to those of Asian nations. I regard . . . these irrefutable facts of history, and express here once again my feelings of deep remorse and state my heartfelt apology.”
信念是难以规范的东西。日本更希望外界根据其战后的行为对其做出评价，比如70年来日本从未介入过战争，从未在战场上放过一枪一弹。但不幸的是，对日本来说，评判肇事者何时才算充分悔悟的人是受害者，而不是肇事者自己。不过，日本官方道歉的措辞仍值得关注，其中的最佳表述来自前首相村山富市(Tomiichi Murayama)。他的道歉包括以下措辞：“日本…殖民统治和侵略给许多国家，特别是亚洲各国人民带来了巨大的伤害和痛苦。为了避免以后发生错误，毫无疑问，我们应谦虚地接受历史事实，并再次表示深刻的反省和由衷的歉意。”That statement may sound mealy mouthed to some, particularly when compared with the more stirring apologies issued by Germany. Those were backed by symbolic actions such as when, in 1970, then chancellor Willy Brandt fell to his knees before a monument to Jewish victims at the Warsaw ghetto. No serving Japanese prime minister, let alone the emperor, has ever prostrated before the memorial to the Nanjing massacre or the site of Unit 731 in Manchuria, where Japanese “scientists” performed lethal chemical and biological experiments on victims referred to as “logs” rather than as human beings.
有些人可能觉得，这份声明听上去还不够直白坦诚，特别是与德国发表的更触动人心的道歉相比。德国的道歉还得到了一些象征性举动的强化：例如1970年，时任德国总理的维利•勃兰特(Willy Brandt)在华沙犹太区犹太受害者的纪念碑前下跪。没有一位在职的日本首相（更不用说天皇了）曾在南京大屠杀的纪念碑或是在东北731部队旧址前下跪。在当年的731部队，日本“科学家”曾在受害者身上进行致命的生化实验，受到非人对待的受害者被称为“圆木”。Nevertheless, Japan’s apologies compare pretty well with those of many other nations. Take a statement in 2013 by David Cameron, in which the UK prime minister called the 1919 Amritsar massacre “deeply shameful”. Yet Mr Cameron explicitly refused to apologise for an incident in which British troops fired for 10 minutes into an unarmed crowd, killing up to 1,000 Indian men, women and children. It would be inappropriate, he said, to say sorry for something that had happened before he was born – an excuse that presumably would not wash if uttered by a Japanese leader.
尽管如此，同其他很多国家相比，日本的道歉还是不错的。拿2013年戴维•卡梅伦(David Cameron)的一个表态为例。这位英国首相称1919年的阿姆利泽屠杀事件“非常可耻”，但明确拒绝为这起事件道歉。在阿姆利泽事件中，英国军队向手无寸铁的人群持续开火10分钟，杀死1000名印度人，包括妇女和儿童。卡梅伦称，为在他出生前发生的一件事道歉是不合适的——这个借口若出自一位日本领导人之口，恐怕会引发强烈反弹。Similarly, no US president has ever apologised for the Vietnam war, in which up to 3m Vietnamese, Cambodians and Laotians died. Samantha Power, US ambassador to the UN, recently articulated Washington’s attitude to statements of regret. “This country is the greatest country on earth. I would never apologise for America.”
与此类似，至今没有一位美国总统为越南战争道歉，这场战争造成多达300万越南人、柬埔寨人和老挝人丧生。美国驻联合国大使萨曼莎•鲍尔(Samantha Power)近日表述了美方对有关表达遗憾之声明的态度：“美国是世界上最伟大的国家。我永远不会为美国道歉。”Japan is being held to higher standards. That could either be because its wartime behaviour was intrinsically more heinous than any other nation, or because its neighbours still do not feel properly assuaged. (Some Japanese would say the difference is that Japan lost.)
相比之下，外界以更高的标准来要求日本。这或许是因为其战时行为在性质上比其他任何国家都更令人发指，或是因为其邻国仍觉得自己的伤痛没有得到妥善抚平。（有些日本人会说，区别仅在于日本输了战争。）Can Japan do anything to convince China and South Korea that it is sincere? Seventy years after the war, at a time when many Japanese – to borrow historian Kenneth Pyle’s phrase – regard the Chinese more as rivals than victims, the answer is probably not. A wholesale national reappraisal of what went on before most Japanese were born seems implausible. But one thing it could do is ditch Yasukuni in favour of a secular memorial, where those who died in war could be properly and less controversially mourned. One such site, the Chidorigafuchi cemetery to unknown soldiers, exists in the heart of Tokyo.
那么日本能不能做些事，令中韩相信它的诚意？那场战争已经过去70年了，在这个许多日本人把中国人更多地视为竞争对手而不是受害者的时代——这里借用了历史学家肯尼斯•派尔(Kenneth Pyle)的措辞——答案很可能是否定的。对于多数日本人出生前发生的事，在国家层面开展彻底反思似乎是不太可行的。然而，日本可以做的一件事是放弃靖国神社，改用一个世俗的纪念场所，在那里对战争的死难者进行恰当且少一些争议的悼念。东京市中心纪念无名军人的千鸟渊战亡者墓园(Chidorigafuchi cemetery)是现成的此类场所之一。Plans have been floated to clean up Yasukuni by removing the “souls” of the 14 Class-A war criminals commemorated there among 2m other spirits who died for the emperor. (There are no physical remains at the shrine.) Yet Yasukuni is too tainted by its association with the militaristic and racist imperial cult to be redeemable. Having Japanese prime ministers shun Yasukuni in favour of Chidorigafuchi would not be enough to placate China and South Korea. At the very least, though, it would demonstrate a kind of sincerity.
有人提出了将14名甲级战犯“亡灵”移出靖国神社，以净化该神社的计划。这些亡灵目前与其他200万为天皇丧生的亡魂一同供奉在神社内。（靖国神社内并无遗骸。）然而，与军国主义和种族主义帝王崇拜的关联，已给靖国神社打上太深烙印，使其难以得到救赎。日本首相舍弃靖国神社而去千鸟渊墓园，也许不足以抚慰中韩，但至少可以展现出某种诚意。
