Iraq = post-war Japan?

We’ve already been sick and tired to see bloodsheds in Iraq through the monitor of TV every day. It seems a never-ending story. Everybody wonders why we have so many struggles in Iraq continuously. Why, why, and why… Why can’t Iraqis get together to stop sectarian violence and build up their new nation with their own power? Why?

Well, things are not so easy, obviously. Sometimes, watching what is happening in Iraq on TV reminds me one story. I’ve heard that, before invasion to Iraq, US top officials had Japan in their minds as a model of post-war nation-building. Why? Well, it’s so obvious. Even though there might have been struggles, no one would say that nation-building process in post-war Japan was a failure. As native Japanese, I would say it was a big success. It’s economically revived drastically within a few decades, even though Tokyo was completely destroyed during the wartime. And, its politics was relatively stable. With assistance mainly from US, it’s revived in only a few decades after the World War II. It’s simply a good example of post-war nation-building for Bush Administration. No wonder why they tried to adopt this example to Iraq.

But, could we successfully have adopted Japan-model to Iraq so far? No one would think so. Well, of course, it is too early to judge how it would be in the future. But seeing today’s severe sectarian violence and bloodsheds in Iraq, it’s very difficult to be optimistic to imagine Iraq would experience success as Japan did in a few decades.

Then, next question would be “What is (are) the reason(s) that we cannot implement post-war strategies as we did in Japan?” To me, it’s also so obviosus. The biggest difference between today’s Iraq and post-war Japan of 60 years ago, is the extent of ethnic diversity.

Japan, even in the Globalized Age of 21^st century, still relatively keeps its mono-ethnic culture. In my opinion, it’s very amazing (I don’t take it favorably, though). I guess, more than 90 percent of people living in Japan are born and raised in Japan. Most of them (or should I say “many”? But I guess it’s close to “most”) are basically Buddhists, even though they tend to keep its Buddhist tradition only when there’s a ceremony like a funeral (of course, there are people believing in other religions). Virtually almost 100% (not 100%) of people in Japan speak Japanese, and there’s no second national language. Most of them can speak only Japanese. Ethnically, Japan is also monotone. Other tribes and ethnic groups are totally marginalized, and virtually (and sadly) Japanese people don’t know even their existence. But, historically Japan have imported culture from all over the world, and interpreted in its own Japanese way.

Of course, Japan cannot escape from the tide of globalization and has to accept some level of cultural and ethnic diversity, as it has done gradually. But still, even now, the level of cultural monotone in Japan is very special among developed countries. So, you could easily imagine how monotone Japanese society was sixty years ago.

Compared to it, Iraq is totally different. It has Sunnis, Shiites, Kurds, Christians, etc. And Iraqi’s social and economical status was likely to be separated by which ethnic groups they belonged to under Hussein Regime. It is so easy to imagine that some level of sectarian struggles could not be avoided after the dictator was gone. Then, we see what’s happening in Iraq.

Japan? Before the war ended, Emperor Hirohito was thought as living God. Everybody was supposed to lose his/her life for him. Simply because, he was God. But after the war ended, he became just “one of us,” a human being like everybody.

Then, had there been a power struggle like Iraq of now? As far as I know, I don’t think so. I think Japanese collectivism mentality united them to rebuild nation from zero again. Also, mono-culture-ness of Japan at that time helped them to avoid what we’ve seen in Iraq as sectarian violence.

I’m really curious how seriously high US officials thought about Iraqi ethnic diversity in the post-war projection, before they invaded Iraq. Of course, I guess they knew this fact. But it’s matter of degree. How serious were they? Maybe, they didn’t take it seriously, or even if they did, President Bush and its surroundings just ignored the fact.

If it is easy to overcome the wall between different ethnicities and religions, we don’t need Religions for Peace in this world. But it is not. We cannot underestimate how high the wall is. Even if people understand cooperation beyond the religious and ethnic differences is important in their head, it is still hard to overcome their hatred flowing under their consciousness. The process takes time. Interfaith dialogues take time. Understanding diversity to the level of working together is hard. We should not forget this, and should not underestimate how difficult it is. We should not easily connect Iraq with post-war Japan.