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Curse on This Country : The Rebellious Army of Imperial Japan / Danny Orbach.

By: Material type: TextTextPublisher: Ithaca, NY : Cornell University Press, [2017]Copyright date: ©2017Description: 1 online resource (384 p.)Content type:
Media type:
Carrier type:
ISBN:
  • 9781501708343
Subject(s): DDC classification:
  • 355.00952/09041 23
LOC classification:
  • UB789
Other classification:
  • online - DeGruyter
Online resources:
Contents:
Frontmatter -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Note on Names and Dates -- Introduction -- 1. Warriors of High Aspirations: The Origins of Military Insubordination, 1858–1868 -- Part I. AGE OF CHAOS: 1868–1878 -- 2. Jewel in the Palace: The New Political Order, 1868–1873 -- 3. “By Not Stopping”: Military Insubordination and the Taiwan Expedition, 1874 -- 4. Fatal Optimism: Rebels and Assassins in the 1870s -- 5. Gold-Eating Monsters: Military Independence and the Prerogative of Supreme Command -- 6. Three Puffs on a Cigarette: Miura Gorō and the Assassination of Queen Min -- 7. Coup D’état in Three Acts: The Taishō Political Crisis, 1912–1913 -- Part III. INTO THE DARK VALLEY, 1928–1936 -- 8. The King of Manchuria: Kōmoto Daisaku and the Assassination of Zhang Zuolin, 1928 -- 9. Cherry Blossom: From Resistance to Rebellion, 1931 -- 10. Pure as Water: The Incident of February 1936 and the Limits of Military Insubordination -- Conclusion: The Dreadful and the Trivial -- Abbreviations -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index
Summary: Imperial Japanese soldiers were notorious for blindly following orders, and their enemies in the Pacific War derided them as "cattle to the slaughter." But, in fact, the Japanese Army had a long history as one of the most disobedient armies in the world. Officers repeatedly staged coups d'états, violent insurrections, and political assassinations; their associates defied orders given by both the government and the general staff, launched independent military operations against other countries, and in two notorious cases conspired to assassinate foreign leaders despite direct orders to the contrary.In Curse on This Country, Danny Orbach explains the culture of rebellion in the Japanese armed forces. It was a culture created by a series of seemingly innocent decisions, each reasonable in its own right, which led to a gradual weakening of Japanese government control over its army and navy. The consequences were dire, as the armed forces dragged the government into more and more of China across the 1930s—a culture of rebellion that made the Pacific War possible. Orbach argues that brazen defiance, rather than blind obedience, was the motive force of modern Japanese history.Curse on This Country follows a series of dramatic events: assassinations in the dark corners of Tokyo, the famous rebellion of Saigō Takamori, the "accidental" invasion of Taiwan, the Japanese ambassador’s plot to murder the queen of Korea, and the military-political crisis in which the Japanese prime minister "changed colors." Finally, through the sinister plots of the clandestine Cherry Blossom Society, we follow the deterioration of Japan into chaos, fascism, and world war.
Holdings
Item type Current library Call number URL Status Notes Barcode
eBook eBook Biblioteca "Angelicum" Pont. Univ. S.Tommaso d'Aquino Nuvola online online - DeGruyter (Browse shelf(Opens below)) Online access Not for loan (Accesso limitato) Accesso per gli utenti autorizzati / Access for authorized users (dgr)9781501708343

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Note on Names and Dates -- Introduction -- 1. Warriors of High Aspirations: The Origins of Military Insubordination, 1858–1868 -- Part I. AGE OF CHAOS: 1868–1878 -- 2. Jewel in the Palace: The New Political Order, 1868–1873 -- 3. “By Not Stopping”: Military Insubordination and the Taiwan Expedition, 1874 -- 4. Fatal Optimism: Rebels and Assassins in the 1870s -- 5. Gold-Eating Monsters: Military Independence and the Prerogative of Supreme Command -- 6. Three Puffs on a Cigarette: Miura Gorō and the Assassination of Queen Min -- 7. Coup D’état in Three Acts: The Taishō Political Crisis, 1912–1913 -- Part III. INTO THE DARK VALLEY, 1928–1936 -- 8. The King of Manchuria: Kōmoto Daisaku and the Assassination of Zhang Zuolin, 1928 -- 9. Cherry Blossom: From Resistance to Rebellion, 1931 -- 10. Pure as Water: The Incident of February 1936 and the Limits of Military Insubordination -- Conclusion: The Dreadful and the Trivial -- Abbreviations -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index

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http://purl.org/coar/access_right/c_16ec

Imperial Japanese soldiers were notorious for blindly following orders, and their enemies in the Pacific War derided them as "cattle to the slaughter." But, in fact, the Japanese Army had a long history as one of the most disobedient armies in the world. Officers repeatedly staged coups d'états, violent insurrections, and political assassinations; their associates defied orders given by both the government and the general staff, launched independent military operations against other countries, and in two notorious cases conspired to assassinate foreign leaders despite direct orders to the contrary.In Curse on This Country, Danny Orbach explains the culture of rebellion in the Japanese armed forces. It was a culture created by a series of seemingly innocent decisions, each reasonable in its own right, which led to a gradual weakening of Japanese government control over its army and navy. The consequences were dire, as the armed forces dragged the government into more and more of China across the 1930s—a culture of rebellion that made the Pacific War possible. Orbach argues that brazen defiance, rather than blind obedience, was the motive force of modern Japanese history.Curse on This Country follows a series of dramatic events: assassinations in the dark corners of Tokyo, the famous rebellion of Saigō Takamori, the "accidental" invasion of Taiwan, the Japanese ambassador’s plot to murder the queen of Korea, and the military-political crisis in which the Japanese prime minister "changed colors." Finally, through the sinister plots of the clandestine Cherry Blossom Society, we follow the deterioration of Japan into chaos, fascism, and world war.

Mode of access: Internet via World Wide Web.

In English.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 26. Apr 2024)