Japan brainwashing kids

The media in Japan reported on Tuesday that the Japanese education ministry will revise its teaching materials so that the Diaoyu Islands an integral part of Chinese territories, will be described as an integral part of Japan's under the name Senkaku.

The fact-twisting textbooks for schools will teach Japanese students a false version of history, which risks breeding generations of confrontation, says a Xinhua News Agency commentary.

Japan's revisionists have for a long time attempted to whitewash Japan's wartime past in its school history books, hurting and outraging its Asian neighbors whose suffering as a result of Japan's brutal wartime aggression is never mentioned.

Coming so soon after the shocking comments on "comfort women" by Japan's public broadcaster NHK's new boss on Saturday, this provocative act aimed at leading young minds down the path of ignorance, shows that right-leaning Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his like-minded colleagues want to extend their distorted and dangerous view of what Japan was and what they would like it to be throughout society.

Abe likes to boast he upholds a doctrine of "active pacifism," but the doings of his administration reveal this for the sham it is.

During his one-year leadership, Abe's administration has been repeatedly provocative in both word and deed, and it has approved defense program guidelines and a five-year plan to further expand its defense forces into a fully fledged military.

Abe himself, while sparing no efforts to push forward the revision of his country's war-renouncing Constitution, paid a calculated visit to the notorious Yasukuni Shrine, where 14 Japanese Class-A World War II criminals are honored.

Such moves have drawn international condemnation, as it is evident that Abe is prepared to jeopardize regional peace and stability to have his way.

The facts-twisting schoolbooks and other attempts to whitewash history by Abe and his like-minded supporters are creating new obstacles for Japan to improve ties with its neighbors, not to mention building greater trust in the long run.

Keeping Japan's younger generations, the future of the nation, ignorant of the truth of history shows the recklessness of the Abe administration and its willingness to gamble regional peace for its own shameful aims.

(China Daily 01/30/2014 page8)