PM Abe to Visit Pearl Harbor

On the eve of what some are predicting to be a series of troubling times ahead for the United States under the control of an unstable president-elect, a gesture of good will from Japan comes our way. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will visit Pearl Harbor making him the first Japanese PM to visit there. He will be joined by outgoing President Obama in what many are calling a great symbolic gesture on the part of Japan in recognition of it's wartime past so it never happens again. This announcement coincides with the 75 anniversary of the Japanese attack on the Naval Forces of the United States that took place there on December 7th, 1941 that led to an all out war between the United States and Japan. PM Abe is quoted as saying: ""I will visit Pearl Harbor with President Obama. This will be a visit to soothe the souls of the victims. "We should never repeat the ravages of the war." As we had earlier blogged last August 2016, Abe's wife Akie Abe had earlier made the trip to the Arizona Memorial and prayed for those lost on that day. Japan is our number one ally in Asia and the Pacific and such gestures of healing & reconciliation are as symbolic to how far we have come as they are meaningful. We at American Mishima appreciate this significant gesture.

For those who still can not let go or those who ask what difference that any of this makes, we defer this answer to the words humbly spoken by President Obama during his visit to the Hiroshima Memorial: "We come to mourn the dead. Their souls speak to us and ask us to look inward. To take stock of who we are and what we might become."