Sugamo Diary

Sasakawa Tyoichi's Sugamo Diary is a fascinating document, and Sasakawa is a fascinating person. His prison-based reflections and attitude toward communists and his American captors, as well as toward fellow Japanese citizens, including the emperor and other class-A war criminals, all make for fascinating reading."-John Breen, editor Yasukuni, the War Dead and the Struggle for Japan's Past

Sasakawa Ryoichi was a wealthy business tycoon, statesman, nationalist leader, philanthropist, and suspected war criminal. Many have also cast him as a Japanese don, power broker, political fixer, and right-wing godfather. In these diaries and letters, written by Sasakawa himself, a strikingly different picture emerges, one that reveals a man fighting to adhere to his convictions within an ethical system that placed Japan's well-being above all other concerns

From 1945 to 1948, Sasakawa was imprisoned in Sugamo with a host of other class-A war criminals. His path to incarceration was uniquely dramatic: he volunteered for indictment in order to protect the emperor and the nation from the consequences of victor's justice. Sasakawa's motivations are apparent in his writing, along with his relentless criticism of Japan's wartime leaders, in which he challenges the behavior of the Tokyo court and warns against the adoption of postwar Japanese communism. Sasakawa instead proposed that Japan pursue friendly relations with the West, including the United States. After his release in 1948, he founded what is now the Nippon Foundation, a philanthropic body that became, under his leadership, Japan's largest charitable organizations

Through an intimate encounter with Sasakawa's thoughts, struggles, and philosophy, this vibrant volume introduces one of the twentieth century's most influential political figures