The Mitsubishi Zero
I was talking with a young Canadian woman English teacher about places in Tokyo to visit for sightseeing. She is an avid traveler, and more enthusiastic about sightseeing than I am. Maybe it’s because I’m male, or just my personality, but I favor monuments and buildings, iconic places like temples and shrines, castles and museums. She prefers more nature-oriented destinations - places where she can trek. So, she is more receptive to my suggestions of various scenic parks and gardens than she is to my suggestions about famous sites. But her objection to many of my other suggestions is a familiar one, that all temples, shrines and castles look the same, and that once you’ve seen one you’ve seen them all. I disagree now, but when I first came to Japan I certainly thought much the same way. I was wrong. Nevertheless, I enjoy hearing her describe her excursions every time I see her. She inspires me to see more, although she has a lot more energy than I do.
I repeatedly suggest a number of museums, temples and shrines that are easy to find in Tokyo. One in particular is the controversial national war shrine, Yasukuni Shrine, in Tokyo’s central Chiyoda Ward. Yasukuni is especially controversial among Koreans and Chinese because it enshrines the souls of millions of Japan’s modern war dead, dating from the end of the Edo Period and including the dead of WWII, plus the souls of convicted Class A war criminals. Koreans and Chinese resent that because of their mutual bad experience with Japanese military aggression and expansion a hundred years ago. Conservative prime ministers repeatedly spark controversy when they pay their respects at the shrine on the August 15th anniversary of Japan’s surrender in the Second World War.
Yasukuni Shrine is home to the Yushukan, the National War Museum. I’ve visited the museum half a dozen times. Although it presents material from centuries of Japan’s martial history, it’s most interesting exhibits deal with the Pacific War. The prize artifact is an intact and restored Mitsubishi A6M Zero long-range carrier-based fighter sitting in the museum’s lobby. The Zero, of course, is one of the most famous fighter aircraft in aviation history and one of the outstanding pieces of military hardware from the Second World War. The Mitsubishi Zero is legendary.
So, I recommended the Yushukan to this Canadian woman and mentioned the presence there of the Zero as kind of added incentive to visit. But the suggestion didn’t motivate her at all. It didn’t impress her. It meant nothing to her because she had NEVER HEARD OF THE ZERO!!!!! When she failed to react to the news of the presence of a Mitsubishi Zero, I figured that was the reason.
She never researched and wrote essays, so she never learned how to collect information. She excelled in Science, and that’s what she studied at university, without ever having to write a research paper.
To me, that is absolutely unbelievable!! I mean, even in a person as young as she is, even if a person doesn’t particularly like history, how is it possible for anyone to be ignorant of names like Spitfire, Messerschmitt, Mustang, Boeing and Mitsubishi? The B-17 Flying Fortress? The B-29 Superfortress? The Tiger Tank, the Panzer, the Sherman? The Thompson submachine gun? The M1 Garand rifle?
These military machines and hardware are so incredibly famous that their names are forever circulating in our culture. Is she a dolt? Has her entire life been buried in deliberate ignorance? Is she proud to be so historically illiterate? Is she unaware of how illiterate she is? I know what it is: she didn’t study history in high school at all. She never researched and wrote essays, so she never learned how to collect information, organize it and write it up. She excelled in Science, and that’s what she studied at university, without ever having to write a research paper. I used to take it for granted that if a person graduated from high school, that automatically meant that they knew how to write, how to express themselves in print on a variety of topics. That was my school experience. But …