 Welcome to our show looking to the east. Very happy to be engaged with you on a fortunate topic that we focused on for this week and that's the recent assassination of Shinzo Abe in Japan. I've asked Jay, everybody knows Jay to help me with this particular webcast. This is a format that we used when I first started doing this webcast, maybe a year or so ago now. So, would like Jay for you to go ahead and take the driver's wheel here and let's go ahead and get started on this, this webcast and on this topic. A few years ago, Shinzo Abe Shinzo Abe was assassinated. It's really interesting because the American perception of life in Japan is it's no violence, no guns, nothing like this. This was completely out of the blue. And it was a horrible story like something like the story of Abe Lincoln assassination, you know, still alive you hope you'll pull through the doctors are working. By a few hours later he's gone. Tragic tragic because of his statements as a political figure in Japan and what he did for Japan. We were all shocked. We were shocked at a number of levels of assassinations are shocking by by definition but shocking in Japan even more. And shop, shocking in the world order somehow, or country that is, you know, nonviolent all of a sudden we have violence. And we're close with Japan, which makes it, you know, all the more shocking. And you've been in Japan for decades and you can appreciate so many issues and angles around this. You can help us understand what this, what this what happened and what this means to Japan to the relationship between Japan in the US. And to the world order, I would say, Steve, your thoughts, please. Yeah, I think Jay you've captured the initial response that was also evident in the country of Japan as well. I'm sure you and many of the viewers have saw statistics on gun violence in Japan versus the United States on an annual basis the number of deaths by guns is usually less than 10. We're talking about for the entire year, as opposed to the United States, which has a very strongly developed gun culture, as everyone knows, and the deaths per year are in the 30 to 40,000 range. So the fact that this occurred through the use of a gun, an improvised gun, one that the assassin actually created himself made this story, particularly shocking. So that's one aspect that it was a gun, it wasn't a sword. It wasn't a knife. There are occasional outbreaks of terrorism violence and but usually involves swords are nice and the reasons for that is that gun control in Japan is unbelievably strict. Basically, unless you're a policeman. You don't have access to a gun. There is hunting in the country. But the regulations, the application the interviews directly with the police force. The requirements for holding the gun are just so incredibly difficult and strict that in essence. You never see a gun or you don't read about gun violence in the United States. So that was one aspect the other aspect. What can I interrupt you. Yes, go of course. We have a cultural connection with Japan, and that includes entertainment. And one of the problems in the American culture is our entertainment includes fun fights all the time is the okay corral every day. Right. Thousands of shots being fired and hundreds of people being killed every night on an ordinary night of TV movies. To those movies to that entertainment reached Japan. Back to Japan. Of course. Yeah, American media American cultural artifacts those types of things are very, very popular in Japan so on any given night. And there's a Rambo movie or, you know, one of those violence oriented movies so Japan is exposed to violence all the time in popular media guns themselves are popular but they are popular in the sense that they don't really care about them. They don't acquire them, and they don't use them, unless it's on a very limited basis. So that was one aspect the other aspect is the political assassination which in Japan is also extremely rare. The last time a major assassination of a national figure occurred was in 1960. People who were born in that period have never experienced a political assassination of this type in Japan so the fact that was done by a gun a homemade gun, and the fact that was a political assassination just really shocked Japan. And frankly, I think even now a week or so later, there's still trying to figure out what exactly happened why did this guy do that. And what are the ramifications going to be. So for those, I think, most Americans or most viewers are probably somewhat familiar with Abe because he was a prime minister for a number of years. In fact, he was the longest serving prime minister ever for the country in two different states. And he was a pretty right leaning politician came from a very wealthy family that had political political lineage. His grandfather was a prime minister before World War two. So often in Japan, these political figures are in politics because their father or their grandfather or their great uncle was in politics as well. He comes somewhat of family business and Abe certainly fell into that category. He is what when I was doing the research for this was some political scientists considered to be a sociocultural politician. He was very aware of how culture and politics mix. So he was able to pick items or issues to use to promote his party and also himself. He was also a very aware of the power of media and how important that is in terms of persuading people to vote one way or the other. So one example of this is slickness when it comes to political issues is that there's an, there was a kidnapping that occurred by North Korean government agents of Japanese citizens back in the 1970s. It's the abduction issue. It surfaces every once in a while. In fact, even Biden has addressed this recently saying that it's something that we need to solve. But this is occurred in the 1970s. When I became prime minister the first time, he picked this as his signature issue. We have to fix this problem. We have to get North Korea to return these Japanese citizens. One of the things it was really not a major issue but he was able to use it as a political trump card and that is the issue that helped to make him the prime minister the first time, which was in 2006 he was prime minister for one year. I didn't do very well, he ended up waiting, but then came back later in 2012. So just in summary, he comes from a very politically successful family with history of his ancestors being in the prime minister role or other government roles. And he used the media and all social cultural issues to create an image of himself and his party that was very very successful, and was able to make sure that his party stayed in power. During the time that he was the prime minister. In fact, his party has been in power for almost the entire time since World War two. Japan in that respect is a one party state actually it's a little bit like the Communist Party although when I talk about that with Japanese people they don't want to think about Japan and China being similar. And there are of course, huge differences but the fact that the obvious party which is called the Jiminto or the liberal Democratic Party has been in power since World War two pretty much consistently all the way through. It's quite, quite amazing. And his popularity must have something to do with that. Yeah, he, his first stint as a prime minister I think people perceived him as being ineffective. He ended up resigning after many scandals for health reasons, but his consolidation of power within the party continued even beyond that one year disappointing episodes so he was able to establish power in the party so that he had an opportunity once again to become the leader of the Jiminto or the liberal Democratic Party and therefore because that party always wins the highest number of seats in the diet which is a Congress. He was able to maintain his prime minister again. And overall, because of the utilization of the media, and these political issues like the abduction issue, he was able to maintain popularity through the course of his prime There were there were scandals and many issues and some of his legislation was not all that popular. But overall, even prior to his assassination. He was perceived as being quite effective, and he was quite popular. But now Jay the big question is, he's gone. Right, so what happens next, even though he's not the Prime Minister I'm sorry he wasn't the Prime Minister when he was assassinated. He was still the most important politician in the country. So the current Prime Minister his name is Shida comes from the same party naturally as I mentioned that party has been in power for all of these decades. But the real power broker and this is how Japanese politics works it's not the guy who's in the front, necessarily who is the one who's actually driving the levers of government it's people who are in the background who may no longer be the Prime Minister and that certainly was Abe Abe was a head of the largest faction group within the Liberal Democratic Party, and he pretty much can veto any initiative that Prime Minister Shida would want to put forward. He really was the one who was the most powerful person. This is another reason why it's so incredibly shocking, even though he was not the Prime Minister he was still the most important politician in the country. I had a play into the assassins, the targeting him you assassin might have gone through the same analysis. There, the police are releasing interview information slowly about the assassin himself he's a middle aged, unemployed guy who had served some time in the Japanese military which is unusual because the Japanese military like in America it's voluntary. But the primary motivation at least to this point, or the assassination seems to not be political. It seems to be more having to do with religion. So this is still somewhat tentative, but this the assassin's mother was a part of the Mooney's organization, I don't know if this is getting reported in the United States but it's coming out slowly in Japan. The son saw his mother give the bulk of her wealth to that religious organization in his view, basically, they were ripping him, ripping her off, right. And as in the United States, these far right religious organizations like the Mooney's you know they only Washington Times for example, and they advocate for political politically conservative issues all the time. That's true also in Japan. So there has been somewhat of a symbiotic relationship between the Gemento, the Liberal Democratic Party and Abbe in particular, and the Mooney's organization, which kind of funds right wing initiatives and so forth. So just recently, Abbe appeared in a video supporting the Mooney's organization in Japan. So that seems to be the motivation of the assassin, at least as far as we can tell so far. He's not talking. Well, he is but the police are slowly really revealing this information. He's seen, you know it's hard to tell exactly because you read this in the mainstream press and then pick up other hints of this in the alternative press but he seems to be fairly open about what he did. He searched his home. They have all of his records, electronic records and they had other guns that he was who's making that were in his apartment and he was also apparently trying to build a bomb as well but he ended up using this makeshift. It's called a shotgun actually to assassinate Abbe. Another issue Jay that's coming up is is how did this happen. How could someone with a do it yourself gun be able to get so close to the Prime Minister and be able to shoot not just once but twice without the Japanese equivalent of the Secret Service being able to prevent this from happening. So I think, because political violence, this type of stuff is so unusual. Maybe the Secret Service protocols were not as strict as what you see certainly United States where this is a, you know, this is a fact that someone could take a shot at the president on any given day. So that's an issue that's going to be addressed. And maybe the way the politicians go out into the public this is their style they go to train stations. I mean everybody sees this during the election period. They're standing out in the open and security when I've watched this in downtown Kobe. You really don't see those guys and I'm sure they're there but I they're not in front. So that's the last protection, for example, so that's an issue to that surface since the assassination. Well, aside from security. What are their implications for change that there's this raised in Japan politics. What is the dynamic of the country. It changes it changes the view of people from the outside about whether Japan would include violence and assassination, but what about inside. Yeah, I, it's a little hard to tell us since we're so close to when the assassination actually occurred. These things again are so rare that I think over time, people will maybe not think about it in such a dramatic sense as it's being thought about right now in terms of political violence, and the use of guns. I don't think that the Japan society will change and gun regulation is already as strict as it could possibly be. This guy did not buy a gun he actually made a gun. Maybe there'll be some effort to try and prevent whatever components he used to build a gun from being sold so easily that apparently anybody can put together a gun in Japan with these basic components. What's interesting about the ramifications is this occurred on Friday, and there was a national election on Sunday. Right, so I was assassinated as the fact a leader of the liberal Democratic Party. Now liberal Democratic Party was favored to win and a pretty strong fashion in the election. The diet in Japan, the Congress equivalent has two components it's a little bit like the house. There's a lower house, which is the most important component of the diet, and then there's an upper house which I guess you can think of as kind of the Senate Senate. It's a military system that they have in Japan. So on Sunday this upper house election occurred. And it's very clear from the results because the liberal Democratic Party actually did better than what the initial forecasts were for the election, everyone knew they were going to win but they won by even more numbers and the opposition party lost by more than what they expected to lose There was a sympathy vote Jay that occurred. It's quite remarkable occurred on Friday and the vote was on Sunday but many people apparently switched their vote to the liberal Democratic Party, kind of as a sense of honor or respect for Abbe and the fact that this terrible thing happened to him as the leader of the Jimminton Party. So I think that's one of the major ramifications and we've seen that in the election results. When you talk about criminal justice system. You said there were strict controls on guns and I guess that would mean criminal penalties if you have a gun, or use a gun. But there's also the matter of assassination and murder. And I wonder how that works ordinarily, how it's going to work in this case, and whether there will be changes to make the sanctions. Or, you know, strict. The, my observation, I have certainly not an expert in this area but as you mentioned I've been in Japan a long time. You know in 1995. There was the disaster of this strange religious sect. I don't know if you remember that chain 1995. They put together toxic gases, and they allow them to spread in the subway systems in Tokyo and several people died and many many people were injured. Now, the guy who was responsible for that the leader of that religious sex. Recently, if I recall correctly was was killed by the state he experienced the death penalty but it took over 20 years for that to actually occur. So this individual will go through the Japanese legal system which will move very very very slowly. At this point, my guess would be that he would be put to death, because in Japan there is a death penalty it's not used all that often but it is an option for the government to request and I think in this case it will probably occur. I'm reminded of our conversation you and me, I guess a few months ago about this corporate executive I think his first name was Carlos. Yeah, Carlos gone. Yeah. And, you know, he was put in jail by the Japanese authorities and he somehow escaped. After we escaped he, he told the story of how tough and rough it was in jail. So what is it what is it like for this fellow to be in jail, pending, you know, the ultimate outcome of the garages against him. In the profile of this case, he will be in solitary confinement for the entire period, and he would not be put into the general population because someone would probably kill him in there. So I'm, again, I'm not an expert in this area but to for his own protection and the fact that they, they don't want him to be prematurely killed. You know, they're going to try and find out as much information from him as possible and show the Japanese people that justice is being served in this murder and this assassination so that in the end, it's not some random inmate that kills him it's going to be the state that does it. I think as in the select committee in Congress. There'll be a public investigation, or even, you know, an intelligence investigation on his connection with others with organization, whether there was anybody else involved in inspiring with him or, you know, somehow encouraging him. So here they're looking at his, his computer files and the records in his apartment for exactly that and if anybody else is implemented is implicated in this one thing that just did come up Jay is it. You know, it's a very interesting thing about Japanese law it's a reflection of the sense of community that Japan has the collective nature of the culture. There's a big difference in terms of how Japanese people collaborate with each other and there's many benefits of that. As opposed to United States where we tend to operate more independently from each other relatively speaking, but one of the aspects where the surfaces is in court cases so there are instances where individuals create carry out a crime like for there's a driver and he has certain medical problems and has actually lied about those problems in order to get his driver's license for example he's epileptic right and if you're epileptic you can only get a driver's license if your doctor would recommend you. So in Kyoto a number of years ago, someone who was epileptic actually had a seizure while he's driving and he ended up running over. I think it was five or six school children. And he was convicted he was convicted but his parents were also brought into this because the parents knew that he had a driver's license and that he was epileptic. Or they were in part responsible for this terrible action to occur. So in the case of the assassin this individual, his parents now are being looked at. You know, how come you didn't know he was going to do this, what was your responsibility in this area so I think this is being a surface a few times in the states now with some of the gun violence that's occurred with younger younger people. In Japan that that occurs relatively often so it may be that his families brought up and held partially responsible for allowing this to happen when they knew their son may have been thinking about doing this. So his motivation, you know, the first the first thought that struck me and people I know is that somehow this was sort of a viral reaction to what is going on and publicized from the United States. So if this happens mass shootings happen 11 times a week on the average in this country, it's horrible and query whether you know this guy was operating on some similar kind of cult motivation. You know violence is good and I, I need to express my political views in violence with guns, and he was a copycat for what happens on many occasions in the United States. And the second part of my question in that regard is, do you think this stands alone as a solitary incident, or do you think people will copy cut in Japan after this. In terms of his motivation. I, as far as I know, it had to do with this religious issue. But that's just preliminary information that's slowly being leaked. Whether there was, he was viewing American media, or was influenced by violent games and so forth which seems to be a pattern sometimes we see with a violent crime United States so that hasn't come out yet or not. The police and the government is responding to this with the expectation that there will be copycat crimes occurring. So that's already been in the news, and the government's trying to figure out how to prevent that from happening. A little bit of closing of the barn door after the horse is left but right now obvious residents is completely blanketed by police. So any place where there's any exposure to his family right now, the police are, you know, going way way way to the extreme to make sure that someone doesn't go Oh I can do the same thing maybe, but I can take out a family member or maybe some other family member as well. So that is being reflected upon right now Jay. You know, to the extent that this was the assassination of an important government official to the minds of some a most, the most well known popular official who served many years and defined, you know, in Japan's politics for many many many years and decades. There's, there's got to be, you know, an implication of an international implication that now seems for now. There's an open door green light if you will on assassinations of public officials, and then it won't stop that at Japan, and that some sort of violent person in another country might take off after another political official or somebody who who is a popular political name in that country too. What's the concern about that? And I guess that would certainly include the US, although the US is so much violence it almost doesn't matter who you shoot at. But other countries that are otherwise peaceful may have a similar experience because it sounds like there's an open door in this possibility. Yeah, I would think maybe various countries in Asia because Japan is a leading country, is perceived as being very peaceful, but now this horrible episode has occurred and it was a political assassination. Maybe some of the leaders like in China, Korea, Singapore, Malaysia, other countries are going, wow, this can happen in Japan. Maybe we need to re-look at our security procedures. Maybe we need to look at our investment in mental health issues to try and prevent this from occurring. So there's probably going to be a ripple effect because Japan is so influential in the Asian region and the expectation is that this doesn't happen in Japan. If I was to think about political disasters and write down a thousand things, this would not be one of it. I just wouldn't have thought of this as occurring in Japan. Lots of other things potentially can happen, but this one was really a great, great surprise. So other countries were probably going, if this happens in Japan, maybe we need to be careful as well. But we're running out of time, but the thing I want to close on is what's going to happen with the LDP now? The fact that Abe is gone and he was the most powerful person and he headed the faction that was the largest, that's a power vacuum right now that exists within the Japan political area. So how it's going to be filled? What's going to come out of that? Who's going to take his place? Those are open questions right now. Nobody has the answer to. We'll have to see how it goes. That'll be interesting to follow. Yeah, and interesting to follow. We know it's an inflection point. We don't know the extent of the inflection. And it'd be interesting for you to follow as somebody who follows everything in Japan to see how wide and deep that inflection point is and what changes under the hood and over the hood will happen. Thank you, Steve. Yeah, thank you. Thank you all for the viewers of this. Thank you, Jay, for filling in as AMC for going to our old pattern. I'm working on my next show. It might be the next one or the one after. Jay, you might be interested in this where Japan as a whole is trying to bring students from Ukraine to study at Japanese universities because obviously they can't study in their own country now. So my school, Kansai Gaida University is participating in this program. And I want to set up an interview with the person who originated this program. I think probably 20 or 30 Ukrainian students are already in the country and there could be 100 more starting in the fall. And we're subsidizing their tuition and their dorm costs and so forth. So it's kind of, as opposed to the story today, this is more of a feel-good story. Of course, Ukraine's a disaster, but Japan's reaching out to the students and trying to give them a way to complete their studies in Japan and maybe eventually set up a professional life in Japan like I did after I was an exchange student in Japan many, many years ago. So that's what's coming up. That's great, Steve. And it's also a look into the Japanese sensibilities, the Japanese philanthropy, if you will. Right. And I'd be interested to see how that plays out. Okay. All right. Thank you, everyone. Thank you so much, Jay. Thank you, Steve. Thank you so much for watching Think Tech Hawaii. If you like what we do, please like us and click the subscribe button on YouTube and the follow button on Vimeo. You can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn and donate to us at thinktechhawaii.com. Mahalo.