Japanese nationalism in the context of "Kokkashugi"

The Empire of Japan, also known as the Japanese Empire or Imperial Japan, was the Japanese nation state that existed from the Meiji Restoration on January 3, 1868, until the Constitution of Japan took effect on May 3, 1947. From August 1910 to September 1945, it included the Japanese archipelago, the Kurils, Karafuto, Korea, and Taiwan. The South Seas Mandate and concessions such as the Kwantung Leased Territory were de jure not internal parts of the empire but dependent territories. In the closing stages of World War II, with Japan defeated alongside the rest of the Axis powers, the formalized surrender was issued on September 2, 1945, in compliance with the Potsdam Declaration of the Allies, and the empire's territory subsequently shrunk to cover only the Japanese archipelago resembling modern Japan.

Under the slogans of "Enrich the Country, Strengthen the Armed Forces" and "Promote Industry" which followed the Boshin War and the restoration of power to the emperor from the shogun, Japan underwent a period of large-scale industrialization and militarization, often regarded as the fastest modernization of any country to date. All of these aspects contributed to Japan's emergence as a great power following the First Sino-Japanese War, the Boxer Rebellion, the Russo-Japanese War, and World War I. Economic and political turmoil in the 1920s, including the Great Depression, led to the rise of militarism, nationalism, statism and authoritarianism, during which Japan joined the Axis alliance with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, conquering a large part of the Asia–Pacific; during this period, the Imperial Japanese Army (IJA) and the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) committed numerous atrocities and war crimes, including the Nanjing Massacre. There has been a debate over defining the political system of Japan as a dictatorship, which has been disputed due by the absence of a dictator, and over calling it fascist. The other suggested terms were para-fascism, militarism, corporatism, totalitarianism, and police state.

The Liberal Democratic Party (LDP; Japanese: 自由民主党, romanized: Jiyū-Minshutō), also known as Jimintō (自民党), is a major conservative and nationalist political party in Japan. Since its foundation in 1955, the LDP has been in power almost continuously—a period called the 1955 System—except from 1993 to 1996, and again from 2009 to 2012.

The LDP was formed in 1955 as a merger of two conservative parties, the Liberal Party and the Japan Democratic Party, and was initially led by prime minister Ichirō Hatoyama. The LDP supported Japan's alliance with the United States and fostered close links between Japanese business and government, playing a major role in the country's economic miracle from the 1960s to early 1970s and subsequent stability under prime ministers including Hayato Ikeda, Eisaku Satō, Kakuei Tanaka, Takeo Fukuda, and Yasuhiro Nakasone. Scandals and economic difficulties led to the LDP losing power in 1993 and 1994, and governing under a non-LDP prime minister from 1994 before regaining power in 1996. In 1999, the LDP entered into a coalition with Komeito.

Hideki Tojo (東條 英機, Tōjō Hideki; pronounced [toːʑoː çideki] ; 30 December 1884 – 23 December 1948) was a Japanese general who served as Prime Minister of Japan from 1941 to 1944 during the Second World War. His leadership was marked by widespread state violence and mass killings perpetrated in the name of Japanese nationalism.

Born in Tokyo to a military family, Tojo was educated at the Imperial Japanese Army Academy and began his career in the Imperial Japanese Army (IJA) in 1905. He served as a military attaché in Germany from 1919 to 1922, and rose through the ranks to become a general in 1934. In March 1937, he was promoted to chief of staff of the Kwantung Army whereby he led military operations against the Chinese in Inner Mongolia and the Chahar-Suiyan provinces. Later in 1938, Tojo was recalled to Tokyo to serve as vice-minister of the army. By July 1940, he was appointed minister of the army in the premiership of Fumimaro Konoe.

The ABCD line (ABCDライン, Ēbīshīdī rain) was a series of embargoes against the Empire of Japan by foreign nations, including the United States, Britain, China, and the Dutch. It was also known as the ABCD encirclement (ABCD包囲陣, Ēbīshīdī hōijin). In 1940, in an effort to discourage Japanese militarism, these nations and others stopped selling iron ore, steel, and oil to Japan, denying it the raw materials needed to continue its activities in China and French Indochina. In Japan, the government and nationalists viewed these embargoes as acts of aggression; imported oil made up about 80% of domestic consumption, without which Japan's economy, let alone its military, would grind to a halt. The Japanese media, influenced by military propagandists, began to refer to the embargoes as the "ABCD ("American-British-Chinese-Dutch") encirclement" or "ABCD line".

Faced with the possibility of economic collapse and forced withdrawal from its recent conquests, the Japanese Imperial General Headquarters began planning for a war with the Western powers in April 1941. This culminated in the Japanese invasion of Malaya and Thailand, and the bombing of Pearl Harbor in December 1941.

Kokkashugi (国家主義) was the ruling ideology of the Empire of Japan, particularly during the first decades of the Shōwa era. It is sometimes also referred to as Emperor-system fascism (天皇制ファシズム, Tennōsei fashizumu), Japanese-style fascism (日本型ファシズム, Nihongata fashizumu) or Shōwa Statism. Developed over time following the Meiji Restoration, Kokkashugi incorporated ultranationalism, traditionalist conservatism, militarist imperialism, and a dirigisme-based economy.