Hirohito Laments War Dead on Anniversary of Surrender

A bent, frail Emperor Hirohito led ceremonies marking the 40th anniversary of Japan’s World War II surrender today, and Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone visited a shrine for Japan’s war dead.

The 84-year-old Hirohito, appearing unsteady, paid tribute to the country’s 3.1 million war dead at a memorial outside the Imperial Palace.

“My heart still pains over a great number of people who died on the battlefront and in ravages in the past war,” he said.

Afterward, Nakasone became the first postwar prime minister to make an official visit to the Yasukuni Shrine, a Shinto shrine dedicated to the war dead. Shintoism, the state religion of Japan before 1945, emphasizes the worship of nature, ancestors and ancient heroes and the divinity of the emperor.

Critics fear that the gesture will encourage those who hope to revive Shinto nationalist militarism, but Nakasone defended the visit.

“I believe an overwhelming majority of the Japanese people support my decision,” Nakasone said. “Japan will never return to the prewar militarism or Shintoist rule.”