Yukio Mishima and Political Extremism

The novelist Yukio Mishima wished to see Japan return to its 1930s values. Like the militarists of the 1930s, he disliked modernity, he opposed foreign influences and he revered the emperor. He wished for Japan to revive its imperialism, but where he wished Japan to invade is not clear. Mishima was dreaming, failing to see that Japan's imperialism had developed as a part of a worldwide imperialism and that such imperialism was now finished, that any return to conquest would have brought to Japan another disaster.

Japan had its "Red Army Faction" which grew out of the disturbances of the 1960s. Here, too, were young people who took a purist moral stand and devoted themselves to uncompromising opposition to the present order. Extending the battle to what they saw as the evil of Israeli oppression of Palestinians, they made a suicidal assault on the Tel Aviv airport, killing twenty-six people and wounding eighty. Their movement also came to nothing. The Japanese government eventually apprehended the Red Army's remaining activists, and their leader committed suicide in prison.

Mishima was devoted to bodybuilding, the martial arts and other displays of manliness. He had been rejected for military service toward the end of World War II, and like John Wayne, who in World War II chose to pursue his acting career rather than join the military, Mishima followed through with a glorification of soldiering. And Mishima retained his nation's glorification of the military man's death.

Mishima had a tiny army of followers that paraded around in uniforms. On November 25, 1970, in Tokyo, Mishima and his army stormed the headquarters of Japan defense forces. On the headquarters balcony he shouted to a thousand or so soldiers on the parade ground below, voicing in military fashion his opposition to Japan's disgraceful defeat in World War II. The soldiers could hardly hear him because of the helicopters circling above, but it was obvious that they disliked Mishima. There were shouts of "shoot him," while Mishima was chanting, "Long Live the Emperor!" Mishima turned from the balcony and stepped into the commander's office. There he slit open his stomach, and one of his followers tried to behead him but missed, his sword hitting Mishima on his back. Another follower did the job right and in the same fashion helped the first follower kill himself, and he draped the two severed heads on the necks of the corpses.

Mishima and his little army had accomplished nothing. But a few people saw Mishima as having displayed truth. "Mishima got it right," one of his admirers would write in online commentary to a website devoted to Mishima. Another described Mishima's suicide as an example of strength and nobility. A Japanese wrote of Mishima representing "our spirit." Mishima was described as having won spiritually and as having upheld honor, pride and glory. One wrote of Mishima as having upheld Buddhist values. And from Italy came a description of Mishima as having rebelled against materialism, vileness, stupidity, liberalism and false democracy.