William Faulkner, among the most decorated writers in American literature with the 1949 Nobel Prize for Literature, the Pulitzer Prize…
Beginning of a Beautiful Friendship: The 1951 Treaty of Peace with Japan
The San Francisco Peace Treaty, signed by 48 nations on September 8, 1951, officially ended Japan’s position as an imperial power,…
Observing the Fiftieth Anniversary of VJ-Day in Japan
How to commemorate an important anniversary of the country in which you’re posted when it marks a low point in…
The U.S. Returns Okinawa to Japan, 1971
In 1945, towards the end of World War II, the U.S. Army and Marine Corps invaded Okinawa with 185,000 troops; a third of the…
Escape from Japanese Internment in China
In June of 1937, Beijing became one of the first cities to fall as Japanese forces began their conquest of…
Douglas MacArthur, America’s Emperor of Japan
He was a general’s general, tough, unrelenting, a man who embraced the role history thrust on him. He was also…
The Tumultuous Economy of 1990s Japan
The Lost Decade marked a tumultuous time in Japan’s economic history, as corporations and banking systems played fast and loose…
Life as a POW in the Japanese-Occupied Philippines
Ten hours after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Japanese forces successfully invaded the Philippines. Those Americans and Filipinos who did not…
The Dramatic Hostage Crisis and Daring Rescue at the Japanese Embassy in Peru
It sounds like something out of a novel: a group of rebels, helped by an American, seize an embassy in…
The Failed Attempt to Avert War with Japan, 1941
The attack by the Imperial Japanese Army against the Naval Base at Pearl Harbor catapulted the United States into World…