A Mixed Image Of Hirohito: Hero, Warmonger Or Blameless

TOKYO - Ten years after his death, Emperor Hirohito is a fading memory for many Japanese. But in former soldier Hakudo Nagatomi's mind, his image is clear: a false god in whose name he became a murderer.

As a Japanese spy and later a fighter in the 1930s and '40s in China, Nagatomi, now 82, killed freely - never once doubting that he was fighting on behalf of a deity.

A decade after Hirohito died on Jan. 7, 1989, the emperor who reigned over Japan for 63 years remains an ambiguous figure. He is a warmonger to some, a hero to others, a powerless - and blameless - monarch to many.

Officials marked Hirohito's death at imperial tombs on the outskirts of Tokyo today, but there were few other signs of mourning in Japan this week.

Hirohito easily could be considered the pivotal Japanese figure of the 20th century.

He assumed the throne in 1926 and reigned over a Japan that grew increasingly nationalistic and aggressive, gobbling up chunks of Asia in the 1930s and '40s and making war on the United States in 1941.

It was during this era that Nagatomi and millions of other Japanese revered Hirohito as a deity in whose name they killed and were killed.

"My feeling was to be absolutely loyal to the emperor and to die for the emperor," said Nagatomi, who stayed in China after the war to fight the communists. "Now I think it was completely wrong."

Nagatomi's conversion came when Chinese authorities arrested him and forced him to confess his atrocities.

He returned to Japan in 1963, and a few years later he began to lecture and write about his wartime experiences. He has been a vocal proponent of a more forceful apology from Japan for its wartime actions.

"The emperor cannot escape responsibility for committing great sins against the Chinese and Japanese people," Nagatomi said. "He cannot be forgiven."

Hirohito was also a central figure at the end of the war, announcing Japan's surrender in the first broadcast of an emperor's voice and renouncing his divinity.

The U.S. decision not to prosecute the emperor for the war and his high-profile role in remaking Japan into a pacifist state have left his wartime role and his responsibility a matter of historical debate.

Yoichi Kibata, a historian at the University of Tokyo, said Hirohito never said much about the war, but evidence indicates he was pleased with the military successes early on.

"He was at the top of the Japanese ruling system, and very serious and important information reached him," said Kibata, adding that Hirohito was in favor of Japan's military advances.

But for younger Japanese, who were barely teenagers when he died, Hirohito is a hazy figure.

"He was the man who caused and ended the war, right?" said Kenta Yuzawa, 19, when asked about Hirohito on a Tokyo street yesterday.

"I don't really have much of an impression about him," said a friend, Yoshie Matsuda, 21.