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podcasts. Hello and welcome to the History of Japan podcast, episode 255, The Beautiful Island, Part 5.

In many ways, one of the most interesting aspects of this period of Taiwanese history

is the sort of fantastic nature of the colonial planning documents of the era, and I mean

fantastic in the sense of being fantasy.

You see, on two levels, these documents are rife with self-deception.

First, as we've covered before, by 1942, it was pretty obvious Japan was not going to win its war against the United States.

The Battle of Midway and the catastrophic

destruction of most of the elite elements of the Imperial Japanese Navy really saw to that.

By 1943, it was increasingly clear that any peace settlements would by default include a lot

...