A month or so ago a reader sent me a link to some interesting footage of an assassination that happened 48 yrs ago today.
I’d never heard of him before and was interested to find out a bit more about it. According to wikipedia ……
“Inejiro Asanuma (浅沼稲次郎 Asanuma Inejirō, December 27, 1898 – October 12, 1960) was a Japanese politician, and head of the Japanese Socialist Party. Inejiro was noted for speaking publicly about Socialism and economic and cultural opportunities.
His criticism of the United States and left-wing positions were not welcomed by conservatives. He was assassinated by 17-year-old Otoya Yamaguchi, an extreme rightist, at a televised rally for the upcoming Lower-house election”
{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }
That is crazy. It seems the 1960s was filled with all sorts of radical chaos no matter where you were in the world.
17-year-old Otoya Yamaguchi
What happened to him??
Meanwhile…
That was a big f’ing knife/sword!!!!
“Less than three weeks later, while being held in a juvenile detention facility, Yamaguchi mixed a small amount of tooth paste with water and wrote on his cell wall, “Seven lives for my country. Ten thousand years for His Imperial Majesty, the Emperor!” Yamaguchi then knotted strips of his bedsheet into a makeshift rope and used it to hang himself from a light fixture.” – wikipedia has the answers once again.
Oe Kenzaburo wrote a short story about this lad called “Seventeen.” If you get a chance, go pick up a copy and read it. I thought it was a brilliant attack on the uyoku mindset that created tragic individuals like Yamaguchi. I mean, he was just a kid. Who the hell put this kind of crap into his mind?
that’s one crazy assassination..
I remember being dumb founded when I first saw this video. Absolutely brutal in a civilized sort of way.
Well, that settles it… I’m giving up my career in Japanese politics.