The American people have become used to government trickery in foreign affairs—wars and interventions based on lies and falsified evidence, “national security” used to justify the whittling away of privacy, classification of documents to hide embarrassing disclosures, massaging of budget figures to mask outrageous spending on arms, and demands for new weapons when already in possession of an unmatched conventional and nuclear arsenal.

In three articles published in 2013/14 in this journal, Brian Victoria and Karl Baier shed light on the relationship of Japanese Buddhists, in particular of Daisetz Suzuki, to German National Socialism, and, in turn, of German National Socialism to Buddhism, in particular to Japanese Zen Buddhism and to the history of the Japanese samurai. All three articles are highly commendable because these relations were hitherto nearly unknown and provide interesting insight into the cultural ties between Germany and Japan in the years of the “axis”. I would like to reexamine some of the assertions made in these articles, to present additional details and introduce certain sources, which neither Victoria nor Baier, nor other authors quoted by them, had utilized. I discovered these sources while conducting research for a comprehensive study on German-Japanese cultural relations between 1933 and 1945 which was published recently.

Thanks to a referral from my university's government relations office and an ability to head to Washington on short notice, I attended Prime Minister Abe's April 29 speech before a Joint Session of Congress as a guest of Rhode Island Senator Sheldon Whitehouse. This essay began as an attempt to convey a few impressions of the event from the perspective of the House gallery, but upon reflection, and after encountering the generally uncritical reception the speech received from the media in the U.S., it seemed useful to engage more directly with what Abe had said, and with the arguments I think he meant to convey. I am very grateful to the Senator and his staff for the opportunity and for their hospitality. I should stress, however, that the views expressed in this essay are entirely my own.