The Japanese and Chinese governments have announced plans to come up with a mutually acceptable shared history. Prime Minister Shintaro Abe recognizes that the bilateral relationship is far too important to hold hostage to history, and is eager to climb out of the deep hole his predecessor dug at Yasukuni. He hopes that this initiative will finally enable Japan to bury a past that remains divisive both in the region and at home.
Alas, Japan still has so much to come to terms with that the 2008 deadline is hardly encouraging. Yet again, Japan seems to want to hastily bury an under-examined past, ensuring that its first half of the 20th century will remain polarizing in the 21st century. The road map to historical reconciliation can not be drawn according to politically driven timetables.
For a majority of Japanese, owning up to the atrocities and excesses of Imperial Japan is not a problem. Unfortunately, Japan's conservative leaders and Dr. Feelgoods of history have made this a problem by justifying, denying, minimizing, mitigating or otherwise shifting responsibility for a past they find inconvenient and shameful. In their view, the purpose of history is to instill a pride in nation, meaning that the bad bits must be sanitized or airbrushed out of the narrative.