Hello and welcome to the History of Japan podcast, episode 567, The Revolutionary, Part 2.

Take a moment and just imagine what a dislocating experience it would have been to be a young

person in post-war Japan. Imagine, for example, that you were born in 1940. You'd spend the first few years of your life being inculcated with propaganda of sacrifice and loyalty to the state

in everything from children's books to what daycare was available.

Then, suddenly the war ends, and instead everything's all,

look, democracy, freedom, rights, the Americans are here to help,

and they're giving you all these wonderful reforms and freedoms.

But then a few years in, maybe a few of your elementary school teachers who are a bit too

critical of the old regime, or a bit too active in their union, get dismissed or shuffled around. Maybe the Mayday protests

you'd seen for a few years started to draw a bit more police attention. And as you get into

the 1950s, you have an increasingly polarized society between the left and right, increasing

tensions in the realm of politics, accusations that the conservative prime

minister, Kishi Nobuske, is trying to wind things back to the pre-war era with his new

policing and anti-union laws, and of course, you'll turn 20, just in time for the security

treaty protests. Given those circumstances, it's probably not that surprising that a lot of young people

were swept towards political radicalization.

How could you not be?

Miyazaki Manabu was, of course, on the younger end of this generation, he was not 20, but

14, fresh into his high school years, when the

Security Treaty protests of May and June 1960 broke out.

But his tutelage under his friend and mentor Amagase meant that he was aware of what was

happening, and interestingly, despite his Yakuza background, his father was actually fairly supportive of his son showing an interest in the left-wing side of the political spectrum.

...