Yomiuri's soul searching

Japan’s top daily forces war reappraisal

By David PillingDecember 27 2006FTcom

I guess this is the part of the book on line.

It is good to make it known how Japan has tackled the issue of war crimes.

I don't necessarily agree that Japan was indifferent to the war responsibility.
Even Harvart Bix says:

During the early years of the Occupation, Japanese intellectuals went much further than their German counterparts in grappling with issues of war responsibility. This has not been sufficiently appreciated.

But the problem as he sees it is

At the same time, however, there is no unified "Japan" that hews to erroneous views of the past. Divisions remain deep. Every generation of Japanese has revisited World War II, and will continue to do so.

I have another perspective.
For most Japanese, they perceieve themselves as the victims first and utmost ; they were victims of their own regime, their superior, and hungers, air-raids, atomic bombs. They concluded the war means disaster, cruel, irrational, demonic, something to be avoided by any means.

In this reasoning process, there are two things they tend to ignore.

1) they could have stopped Japanese invasion and non-Japanese victims could have saved.
2) there might be times when the war is necessary.