An extract from my father Norman Macrae's obituary writer for The Economist for Emperor Hirohito- more at EconomistJapan
Few would have forecast in 1901 that a prince, who was told at birth that he was the direct descendant of a Storm God and a Sun Goddess, would prove to be a bravely ordinary man who would affect uniquely for good the second half of the new century. That is the Emperor Hirohito's legacy
At his accession in 1926, Japan's military advance could not have been checked by any sort of monarch. Had Emperor Hirohito tried, he would have been pushed aside. Japan's entry into world war in 1941 was particularly popular with many Japanese and hundreds of millions of Asians who saw it as likely to end Asia's hated subjection to European colonialism, which it actually did. The Emperor's great service to this century came in 1945, when he claimed it was the consensus of the Japanese that they should unconditionally surrender, which it actually wasn't
Without the Emperor's decisiveness, the war would have continued for a time. At least a dozen nuclear bombs would have been dropped on Japan, at a time when most of the scientists who invented them had no inkling of how far fatal radiation sickness from them could spread ; they do not really know even now. Soviet troops as senior partners to Chinese communists would have swarmed into Asia, imposing a clamp on much of East Asia, just as it was imposed on East Europe.
In April 2019 the Hirohito's grandson succeeded- the first year of Japan's Reiwa aer looks like the most exciting ever led out of one nation -
it ends with a tranafolmration of the olympics
it begins by hosting g20 in osaka - for this interested in SDG economics Japan is meeting all African leaders at ticad yokohama aug 2019 and taking views to UN sdg summit in september
the emperor has also invited pope francis to host a week of faith dialogues and has asked which of 196 nations leaders would like to attend a joint celebration of uniting youth and futures that are happy and free- i have little doubt that Japan's people deserve and will be as happy as free as any on earth but there remains a lot of work so that the two thirds of people who are asian can humanise artificial intelligences so all the worlds daughters and sons can be free and happy
if you nof a two percent of peoplws who are trying harder to humanise tech for everyone would love to be beamed in -chris.macrae@yahoo.co.uk
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