The US House of Representatives Committee on International Relations adopted a resolution on Sept. 13, appealing to the government of Japan that it should formally acknowledge and accept responsibility for its sexual enslavement of young women, known to the world as "comfort women" during its colonial occupation of Asia and the Pacific Islands from the 1930s through the duration of World War II (WWII) and conduct the relevant education among the younger generation. This is the "first time" in history that US House of Representatives passed a resolution on a historical issue in Northeast Asia.

On Sept. 14, the committee also held a Full Committee Oversight Hearing on Japan's relations with its neighbors, during which senior congressmen slammed the erroneous views of Japanese leaders and Japan's strained ties with Northeast Asian nations and clearly demanded the next Japanese prime minister stop visiting the Yasukuni Shrine.

The government of Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi has followed the external policy of taking the Japanese-US alliance as the axis in recent years. On one hand, it stands erect with the U.S. in combating terrorism and containing China and, on the other hand, it relies on the U.S. to realize its ambition as a major political power in "the shed of a big tree." Despite good gestures shown by Japan, some US statesmen, nevertheless, have sternly denounced its viewpoint on history and foreign policy.

First, the US foreign policy is based on the maintenance of its comprehensive leading position globally to curb the rise of any power or force that can jeopardize the American interest. The United States is unwilling to see any source of a strong authority emerging on one hand and, on the other hand, it also does not want to see "overstrained relations between states and even the outbreak of clashes in a region for the fear of being bogged down in the conflicts, since that does not accord with its national interest. Some US statesmen hold that symptoms of an "overstrained development" trend can possibly lead to a loss of balance, which does not facilitate the U.S.' strategic consideration on the settlement of the Korean Peninsula nuclear issue and other related matters, and so there is indeed a need to enlighten it and impose pressures on Japan.

Secondly, With regard to the issue of Japan's erroneous, historical views, the United States has been directly involved in historic incidents, and so it cannot be a sheer onlooker itself. The right-wing forces in Japan advocated reversing the historical verdict of aggression, the Pacific War and Tokyo Trial, which will eventually spearheaded to the U.S., let alone the U.S. dropping atom bombs onto the Japanese soil during WWII. The United States can hardly avoid suffering once the national sentiments of the Japanese right-wing forces are over-spilled.

The United States has felt agonized with Japan's right-winged nationalism in history, and its statesmen are still fresh with sense of history in this regard. Besides, most of the Americans have paid close attention to the Yasukuni Shrine homage trips with a critical approach toward the erroneous Japanese views on history, according to a recent opinion poll. The US media, too, have started to denounce the Japanese practice of reversing the "while and black" and confusing the right and wrong during WWII.

Thirdly, The views of the right-wing Japanese forces cannot be accepted or acknowledged by the Unite States. For instance, Japan's inhuman atrocities occurred in China and on battlefields of the Pacific War during WW II. And the issue on "comfort women" involving towering crimes cannot be accepted by American society and the entire world as well. Even if the US executive authorities forebear from speaking out, the US House of representatives voiced its indignation and resentment to these crimes with relatively diversified remarks.

When redoubling its effort to charge ahead southward to the Pacific and Indian Ocean when it runs into trouble in northeast Asia, Japan has now taken the "going southward" foreign policy, to which the U.S is somewhat reserved and vigilant. The hearing of the US House of Representatives is precisely a political forewarning to Japan.

By People's Daily Online