Staff writer
NAGANO -- The Olympic Games have always mirrored international politics, says Shozo Sasahara. A participant in the past 11 Summer Games as an athlete, coach and official, he has witnessed this firsthand.
At the 1956 Melbourne Games, where Sasahara won the gold medal in freestyle featherweight wrestling, Hungarian athletes burned the then Soviet Union's national flag in the Olympic Village, the residential compound for Olympians.
The water polo match between the two nations was marked by continuous fistfights. "I remember the swimming pool was stained red with blood," said Sasahara, who is currently serving as mayor of the Nagano Olympic Village, temporary home to some 2,800 athletes from 72 countries.
During the 1972 Games in Munich, Germany, Palestinian terrorists stormed the residence of the Israeli delegation, killing 11 Israeli athletes and officials. A friend of Sasahara was among the victims.
Amid mounting East-West confrontations, Japan followed the lead of its ally, the United States, and boycotted the 1980 Moscow Games. Four years later, communist nations boycotted the Los Angeles Olympics.
Although some Japanese athletic officials, including Sasahara, strongly insisted that Japan participate in the Moscow Games, the Japan Olympic Committee voted against it two months before the Games began. "I was positive that boycotting was not the right thing to do," he said. "The wrestlers I coached were all crying. I still regret that decision."
But the 68-year-old said he thinks the future of the Games is promising. "Now that the Cold War is over and the Iron Curtain is gone, the atmosphere of the Olympics has changed. Athletes are becoming friends and relating in a more casual manner, it seems," Sasahara said. "Nationalism places too much pressure on athletes. But I always fought for myself, never for the country."