Fukushima within the Configuration of the U.S. Cold War Strategy

Interview with Yuko Yamaguchi, Interviewed by Naoki Sakai, Translated by Joshua Young

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When I went to college after graduating high school, there was absolutely no critical perspective toward nuclear power. There was of course no nuclear engineering department at the University of Tokyo at the time [in the 1950s]. Later on [in the 1960s] we had the student protest movement against the university system. During those struggles Mr. Takagi and I realized that scientists at the university could not be faithful to their sense of social responsibility. Knowledge production was called into question in the student protest movement. Knowledge itself was problematized as a matter of politics. And this questioning of knowledge had a major impact on the student movement. Each of us responded to this question differently; we were young and at the beginning of our careers. For those of us who took this question seriously and were starting out as young researchers, it was impossible to avoid asking whether we could possibly do our scientific work outside the proscriptions imposed by our employers, be it the government, a university, or a corporation. This was a critical problem of "the microphysics of work-place politics." It is in this context that in his later life Mr. Takagi came up with the idea of the “citizen scientist.” In contrast, those intellectuals who supported nuclear power were untroubled by this question. You mentioned this question of the micro physics of work-place politics in a note you sent me a few days ago. We are conditioned by this physics, which has created an antagonism among us, researchers, between the supporters and the opponents of nuclear power. Antagonism over nuclear power is not only about policy; it has to do with the way of life and thought from the 1960's until today. The fundamental meaning of the March 11 Fukushima disaster is the history of this antagonism.

Yesterday when I interviewed Mutō Ichiyō, he talked about postwar Japanese history. In short, he demonstrated how problematic the idea of the peaceful use of nuclear power is. He claimed that this idea was part of the U. S. global military strategy of the 1950's when the phrase “peaceful use of the atom” was invented. The Japanese state took clever advantage of the U. S. strategy so as to establish the nuclear power industry in Japan. But you cannot agree with Mr. Mutō, can you?

As a general assessment, his view is right. Basically, I agree with his recent book on Japan's nuclear armament. In the 1950's, who in Japan understood the U. S. strategy? The question is, who on the Japanese side decided on these policies, what group in Japan? What I am interested in is to ask what were Japanese physicists doing at the time? I understand Mutō's point of view, but for me as a scientist, I want to know whether on the Japanese side there were scientists in that group who went along with the U.S. nuclear strategy.

That is something I wanted to ask you. During the war, evidently, Japanese scientists were working on a nuclear weapons program--though I'm not certain how feasible they believed their nuclear project was. Japanese physicists were fully aware of the possibility of using nuclear science to develop nuclear weapons during the war. In Japan, nuclear science was fully integrated into the Japanese state's structure a long time before the end of WWII. Thus, it is not surprising that this complicit relationship should remain in place postwar. Almost every nuclear physicist in Japan was involved in the Japanese state's military program.

Every single Japanese nuclear physicist was involved during the war. After the war, almost every one of them. Strictly speaking, to some extent Yukawa Hideki resisted this complicity. But I'm not sure if these few acts were at all effective. In the case of nuclear armament, the overwhelming majority of Japanese scientists were against it. But in regard to the peaceful use of nuclear technology there was not any dissent, I think.

It's a real problem that the ethics of intellectuals and scientists, in the end, were always posed in terms of their loyalty and devotion to the country or the nation.

Yes, it is a problem. At least in Japan education is an obstacle, what is taught in school. Let me show you a very interesting thing. It is a section of a U. S. school textbook called “Hall, Science” (1996).

Let's show this diagram to the camera.

What has been done in this U. S. textbook is genuinely impressive. In this science textbook for 4th and 5th graders, there are several pages devoted to nuclear energy. This illustrates how a nuclear pressure reactor produces energy. It says that, for people on the outside of the plant, the buildings appear clean and white, with no smoke or anything coming out. That's where power is produced, and inside of that is this: what is pictured here in the diagram. Thus, power production is explained in its basic mechanism. But what is surprising is this: this textbook actually says that it is not certain whether or not the processing and storage of nuclear waste is safe. This textbook also mentions that there is a possibility of the failure of the cooling system for the fuel rods. Evidently the textbook was prepared after the Three Mile Island incident, so it tried to learn from that accident. And one more thing: in the Q&A part of this textbook, it asks primary school children to respond to both sides of the debate on nuclear energy: on the one hand, nuclear power seems quite clean but on the other, scientists have to worry about exposure to nuclear material. So, it asks the children to judge for themselves what they think of the debate. This textbook actually poses the question “what kind of thing is atomic energy?” And “what merit or demerit does it have?” In Japan there is no such textbook. The question is never asked. In order to sustain the civil society, you cannot hide contradictory views or opinions that are inconvenient to the authorities. That is the lesson the March 11 Fukushima disaster taught us. Yet in Japan the repression of contradictions or inconvenient opinions has been taken for granted by the state bureaucracy and business. So, those in the state bureaucracy and business could not figure out what to do after 3/11. The data of SPEEDI could have been released earlier to reduce the effects of radioactive contamination. It is clear that the age when people's economic and social well-being can be comprehended and judged within the scope of one nation is over. The age when usefulness in life – in which I would like to include the conception of industrial time – can be promoted within one state sovereignty without regard to other nations, other regions, other peoples --- that age is over. Essential things in life go beyond the scope of one nation. This is best shown by biodiversity, not just of humans but of other life on earth. And now, immediately, we need to make this point in our education of young people, in textbooks and the like. Children who are taught to be aware of biodiversity and social responsibility will eventually become scientists, and, hopefully, they will be able to sustain an ethical sensitivity to science and knowledge. This is what Mr. Takagi's idea of “citizen science” attempted to explicate. “Citizen science” is a modality of knowledge production, science generated from the perspective of citizens, from within people's daily life.

To try to grasp science from these other perspectives. To conceive of a new modality of knowledge production outside those rationalities imposed by state bureaucracy and corporations.

In addition to the failure in Japanese education, the Fukushima disaster disclosed the disingenuous role of mass media in Japan. And this is nothing new; it is something that has been evident for some decades and has often been pointed out by foreign reporters stationed in Japan. It has been pointed out that Japanese media and reporters are “spineless.” They have no clear sense of their professional mission as journalists and are only aggressive in the pursuit of lucrative scandals. But as soon as the story veers away from that track toward some political situation, they pull back from it. They don't investigate thoroughly and do not delve into the records of the past as much as they should. So, you may say they are soft, but really they appear anxious to accommodate themselves to whatever is the dominant opinion. They are afraid of standing alone, isolated. Japanese mass media failed to serve an absolutely essential function for the civil society. The major national newspapers did not report about what was going on within the so-called “nuclear village” after the Fukushima disaster. They must do some soul searching. Including NHK [Japan National Broadcasting Company], all the public press has been useless.

Well, as you say, from immediately after the incident, NHK has invited many opportunist scholars from Tokyo University and made them say what the government and Tokyo Electric Power Company wanted them to say on the problems of the Fukushima reactors. From the viewpoint of those of us who have been criticizing the nuclear industry and the Japanese government, their selection of scholars is just outrageous. But NHK has been doing that for a long time. That structure is beyond our comprehension.

I wonder how such a program could be justified within the NHK. Were there any who complained about such a policy? I cannot understand it, either. Tokyo Shinbun has been active in reporting on the problems of nuclear power. They collect information widely and investigate news sources thoroughly. But Tokyo Shimbun is an exception. Many young idealistic people join the world of journalism every year, yet generally speaking, they are tamed and deprived of their idealism. Is it because of a structure of the state?

Interview with Ichiyo Muto, interviewed by Naoki Sakai

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1954 was a very, very important year in many senses, but one important thing that happened was the Bikini Atoll incident. On March 1, an American hydrogen bomb was detonated for experimental purposes on Bikini Atoll in the Pacific. This caused the radioactive exposure of the Japanese fishing boat Lucky Dragon #5. Twenty-three Japanese fishermen were exposed to what was called “the ash of death,” radioactive fallout from the nuclear explosion. The Bikini incident triggered a tremendous popular movement, and that movement was one of the two or three major, mass movements in post-war Japanese history. The Bikini incident started the first of these mass movements. Out of it came a sort of permanent movement that from the beginning addressed both world public opinion and the governments of the world. This initiative led to an international movement and the first world conference was held in Hiroshima in 1955.

I was employed by that movement as a staff member in charge of the international section. I enjoyed the work very much. It was a very vivid, sort of active and high-spirited movement. And I was young and so I did not hesitate to accept the job offer; I went to Hiroshima for the first time in my life and, of course, visited the Peace Museum. Then I walked along the route, and at the end there was another door. That door opened and I stepped into the annex, a brightly lit place, not very large, but yellowish as I remember. It was a great contrast to the grey and darkish atmosphere of the main hall. It was such a nice, but strange place, and it smelled of the occupation forces. The occupation forces had a certain soapy, hygienic smell. It was not that smell exactly, but the place instantly reminded me of those forces. This was my impression of this yellowish, bright place.

Anyway, what was this strange place? It was the special room for the exhibit of the peaceful use of atomic energy. [The exhibit seemed to say,] “Here is the future of humanity, the bright future of humanity...” Supposedly that was all thanks to the great achievement of modern scientists: the creation of nuclear power. Actually, I was stunned and speechless. I went through this exhibit, but I couldn't understand why it was there. At that time, I didn't investigate any further. I was working for the anti-nuclear bomb movement, and atomic bombs were my focus; I was not particularly concerned with the peaceful use [of nuclear technology]. And so, I set that aside and buried that memory... until the catastrophe in Fukushima.

Eventually two things, Fukushima and the exhibition of the peaceful use of nuclear energy, came together for me. I went back to some writings of those times, by Professor Ichirô Moritaki (1901 –1994), philosopher, activist, and leader of Hiroshima, who was widely regarded as a spiritual guide for the entire anti-bomb movement. He recalled that he encountered the idea of the peaceful utilization of nuclear power for the first time in 1955. In 1955, the victims of the atomic bombs came out and spoke in public for the first time. That year, a proposal also came from the United States that a nuclear power station should be built in Hiroshima. It was proposed by a Democratic congressman. This was Moritaki's first encounter with the idea of the peaceful use of nuclear power. In 1956, the following year, an exhibition of the peaceful use of nuclear power came to Hiroshima.

I think that three factors led to the presence of nuclear power generation in Japan. First, America. Second, the Japanese desire to have nuclear bombs. Third, a philosophical and ideological tendency to accept whatever is new, whatever is represented as an achievement of science – development, economic growth, prosperity etc. Of these three factors, the first – the American initiative – began to work in 1956, because this exhibition, a part of an international project, was brought to Japan to up-root the so-called “nuclear allergy.” And specifically, it should be held in Hiroshima as a remedy, to overwhelm the anti-bomb feeling and the image of nuclear power as a bomb, to replace it with the image of the good guy.

Moritaki met Futsi, the president of the American Cultural Center, who was in charge of the exhibition in Hiroshima. The American Cultural Center promoted an exhibition for the peaceful use of nuclear energy in Hiroshima. Everybody there, the city government, university, newspaper, had to support the exhibition, following President Eisenhower's famous speech at the United Nations on “atoms for peace” in the previous year. Futsi proposed holding the exhibition at the Hiroshima Peace Museum. But the museum was not big enough, so all the atomic bomb exhibits had to be moved to make space for this “atom for peace” exhibition. You cannot say that the exhibition was welcomed by the people. Moritaki told Futsi that the American Cultural Center should not use the [Hiroshima Peace] Museum. Then Futsi replied, “we will overwhelm Hiroshima, with [the idea of] peaceful use.” Futsi repeatedly said this, according to Moritaki. No doubt, Futsi's determination reflected the will of the United States government and its people, a will to overwhelm the global anti-war movements. This point has been documented and studied by many scholars and journalists including the NHK, the Japanese semi-governmental Broadcasting Company. NHK produced a very interesting documentary, depicting the Central Intelligence Agency and a Japanese wartime intelligence officer, Matsutarô Shôriki (1885–1969). Matsutarô was a war criminal imprisoned in Sugamo Prison after the war who established the Yomiuri Shimbun, the largest national newspaper in Japan. This documentary even disclosed the CIA code name for this operation for the peaceful use of nuclear energy. Thus, American strategies for Japan after the end of the Allied Occupation of Japan have been well-documented. These historical documents, which clearly show how threatened the U.S. government was by those anti-war and anti-nuclear bomb movements, can be read today in such archives as the Library of Congress.

It is interesting that the phrase “peaceful use” is only used for nuclear power. It is never used for petroleum; we have never heard of the “peaceful use of iron.” Surely only mad scientists think of this extremely dangerous technology in order to boil water and feed steam into turbines. Globally, it is evident that the peaceful use of nuclear energy was part of the Cold War strategy.

Thus, the American factor was present from the beginning as far as nuclear power in Japan is concerned, and it continues to be present until now. But, unless the Japanese side had wanted it, America would have had difficulty to establish this kind of relationship [between the US and Japan] in the nuclear industry. There were certain people, many and various groups who wanted the nuclear industry. But the main force was a political one, connected to the name Nakasone Yasuhiro (1918–2019).

So, it was accidental, but very ironic, that the day after the Bikini Atoll incident, March 2, 1954, the first budget for nuclear power was presented to the Japanese Diet by Nakasone Yasuhiro and his colleagues from different parties. And the person presenting that budget explained why Japan should have nuclear power development, why they should study nuclear power generation. The reason cited at the time was astonishing, because it was a military one. He started with an explanation of how the military technology was developing. He said that this technology was expanding so fast that we [Japan] would fall behind unless we trained the young generation to cope with the situation, that is, enable them to handle such weaponry. Otherwise, we would have to be satisfied with old, used-up weapons provided by the U.S. under the Military Security Agreement (MSA) which had just been signed.

Hence the motivation was explicit from the beginning. But people stopped expressing the real intention after the budget was passed; it was only once, at the beginning, that the military implication was stressed. Instead, there was another channel that was opened, of a legal nature. While the nuclear power development itself was a material basis, the other was a legal foundation. This was laid by Kishi Nobusuke (1896–1987), who was fresh out of Sugamo Prison [as a war criminal]. In 1957 he had already become Prime Minister of Japan. And he was the first one to tell Parliament that keeping nuclear weapons illegal was not good. He didn't say that having such weapons was a good idea, but rather he said that having certain such weapons was not against the Constitution. And this reasoning was later repeated by various conservative governments. So, it is still the official interpretation of the Constitution. In that process the core, the political-industrial core, of the Japanese nuclear industry emerged. This political-industrial core is often called the “nuclear village.” It is equivalent to the military-industrial complex in America.

Actually, it was in the 1960's that nuclear power generation was adopted in Japan. In 1966, the Tokai nuclear power plant was opened. Then a rapid expansion of nuclear industry followed. Now there are 54 nuclear stations, more than half of the total number of such stations in the U.S.

In Japan, the military-industrial complex is not as strong as it is in America. You shouldn't underestimate it, but its size is far smaller. However, the nuclear village complex has a very special position in the Japanese economy and society and politics. It encompasses bureaucracies, electric power companies, reactor makers, scholars, and the media. It was fully formed during the Sato government period. This was between '65 and '72. Yes, Sato Eisaku (1901–1975) was Kishi's brother. And he's a Nobel Peace Prize winner. He's the one who actually seriously studied and pursued nuclearization or nuclear armament.

This was a very crucial period in many senses. In 1962, China became a nuclear superpower. The Vietnam War, China's nuclearization, and the Soviet-China conflict all took place. The Sino-Soviet confrontation was a dangerous one that could have developed into a nuclear war. So, around that time, nuclear power was key. Henry Kissinger (1923–) pursued an expansionist policy, ultimately toward a nuclear war, so he wanted the other side, the Soviet Union and China, to step away from the possibility of a nuclear confrontation. This crisis ended with the U.S.-China rapprochement.

The end of the Sato Administration came in the midst of the Nixon-Kissinger period. This was a very important turning point. Sato decided that Japan should prepare itself for nuclear warfare and arm itself with nuclear weapons. But previously, as soon as he became prime minister, he went to Washington to meet Lyndon B. Johnson (1908–1973) and his Secretary of State, Dean Rusk (1909–1994). Rusk asked Sato what Japan would do vis-à-vis a China armed with nuclear weapons. Sato said, “Although Japanese people do not like nuclear armament, I am for it.” Sato said this deliberately. But America didn't want Japan to go nuclear. So, Sato said, “Okay, we can build [nuclear weapons], but we won't build [them]. So please continue to place us under your nuclear umbrella and return Okinawa without nuclear weapons.” So that was the sort of a deal that he wanted to make. But it did not work at all because America wanted Japan to sign a secret agreement. This agreement has now been exposed: it says that, in case of emergency, America can bring nuclear weapons in [to Japan]. Sato's deal didn't work. Upon returning to Japan, he triggered a serious study of the technological, economic, and political feasibilities of Japan's nuclear armament.

But that nuclear card was used by America later, in fact, by Henry Kissinger, in dealing with China. In 1971 there was the Kissinger-Zhou Enlai discussion, the full text of which is now available. They started the discussion with Vietnam and Korea and so forth. But in 1969 there was the Sato-Nixon joint agreement which related to Okinawa's reversion, and also Japan's increased military commitment to the security of Korea and Taiwan. This was a very harsh anti-China commitment. Zhou Enlai did not approve of this. To Zhou, who disliked anti-Chinese Japan, Kissinger replied, “Okay we can withdraw from the Far East and let Japan go free. But that would mean that Japan would be a nuclear power. Are you ready to accept that?” He used Sato's nuclear card to justify America's presence. And that's the beginning of the “cap of the bottle” theory. So, the Japanese nuclear industry, the “nuclear village,” is not just an economic or energy industry. It's a security matter at the core of the national security consideration of the Japanese state.