5.3 Dissent Against the War/Introduces General Tojo

Slim Novel 5 - http://adventuresofkimi.blogspot.com - See Homepage


3. Last Intelligent Voice

When Tommy comes home one wintry eve, he is excited. After kissing him, hanging up coat, jacket and hat, and settling him in the reclining Morris chair, Kimi mixes his martini. According to Tommy’s Esquire Magazine, the American wife does that for husband after hard day at office. As top tart, Kimi learned to make martinis of vodka with dry vermouth and lemon-peel twist. After Tommy takes sip and pulls her onto lap she asks in her version of American “What up doc?”
   “Kimura got passes to the Diet! Not in order to lose weight as an American might guess from the usual meaning but to watch the political process. Tomorrow we see a debate on the military budget. Ought to be a show! Olga and Harumi will be along too.”

Next morning Kimura with Olga and Harumi await them in the imposing lobby of the Diet building.

   “Wow!” exclaims Tommy. “Looks like Buck Rogers’s 25^th century.”
   “More like Mussolini’s twentieth," remarks Kimura. I call it Classic Fascist style: solid massive concrete with pyramidal dome to remind the populace that they are slaves to their leader's insane beliefs and to awe them - You know! Frighten them into submission.”
   “Awing them here was never a problem, they were born awful,” quips Harumi. “It seems to me these slaves are more interested in protecting themselves from the hard rain, soon. It certainly will be good in an air raid.”
   “Let’s go inside, darlings, I can almost hear the drums; the show is about to glow,” says Olga who is dressed in Irish green suit-skirt with black wide-brimmed Paris hat from the Parisian Anatole via Hedy Yamamoto’s couteriere’s on Ginza.
   Olga as usual, thinks Kimi and, wanting to practice a French phrase she’d read in Tommy’s latest New Yorker Talk of the Town, says under her breath “Trop, tres trop.”

   Led by Kimura, they enter gallery and find seats.

   Below, the parliament Diet members are all in place, according to party, in identical chairs upholstered with yellow chrysanthemum design against purple felt background. Up front an Imperial Army general stands, arms extended, palms down and fingers spread on the mahogany table. He is starting a speech and the microphones carry his excited voice. Kimi listens as he extols the army’s past year exploits and declares an end of the great China venture is in sight. The coming success in China, he says, will mean a mighty victory for the Emperor, a great new living space for the people and expansion of markets for business. He ends by requesting the Diet to unanimously approve the military budget to demonstrate to enemies that the people and the army are one under His Imperial Majesty. 
   Kimura passes field glasses. “Get a good look; at the War Minister.”
   Focusing on the man now bowing to standing ovation of almost every Diet member shows a shaven head, a small mustache, black rim perfect circle glasses, and, on collar, the insignia of lieutenant general. Three chrysanthemum decorations glisten on left front. “Tojo, Hideki!” Kimi exclaims, thinking aloud.

   “Let me get a look,” says Tommy grabbing the glasses.

   “He’s cute,” quips Olga.
   “Oh, for a machine gun,” sighs Harumi.

   “Be quiet,” hisses Kimura glancing nervously over left shoulder.

Ovation is continuing past three minutes. One Diet member does not stand and cheer, a lone dissenter. As Tojo returns to his place and Diet members sit, the man gets up and signals to speak. Kimi looks through the glasses again and sees a man in late sixties with black hair combed straight back on right and parted to left. High cheekbones give face a sharpness, and a thin mustache hugs upper lip extending slightly beyond edges of mouth and peaking at center. Pinstripe dark gray suit with vest over white high-collar shirt and black tie give westernized look. On his left lapel, the small chrysanthemum decoration shows him a veteran of the Russo-Japanese War and across left lower vest hangs a gold key earned for excellence at Harvard University.

   “Baron Tokugawa Ichiro” says Kimura, “Grandson of the last Tokugawa shogun. A unique historical moment!”

   Baron Tokugawa begins: “Thank you General Tojo for telling us the army’s great success. We hear that every year at budget time. What did we pay for it this year: fifty thousand young men killed and countless wounded; rice rationed; prices of staple goods doubled? Our reputation as civilized nation sullied by the army’s disgraceful atrocities? Our economy sapped by the ever increasing demands of the militarists?”
   He pauses and pours water into glass while a shocked murmur sweeps the Diet, and Tojo speaks with his aides. Baron Tokugawa drinks, puts down the glass, and continues. Raising right hand he points finger at Tojo. “I accuse you General Tojo and your militarists of destroying our freedoms of which I am a last example. I accuse you General Tojo of using assassination as a political tool. I accuse you General Tojo of disgracing our heritage by being responsible for the war of aggression in China.”

   An excited member of Tojo’s party shouts, “Liar! Liar! You insult the emperor and the army; cut your belly in shame!”
   Baron Tokugawa looks coolly straight ahead. “Fool! Examine the record of my words. If anything I say is untrue I shall commit ritual suicide. If not, you should hara-kiri. The war in China is nothing but naked aggression cloaked in self-righteous language. If we miss a chance for peace, those like Tojo and the politicians who mindlessly follow him will bring on our people the greatest destruction the world has yet to see. And when it is over they will be unable to erase their crime even by suicide.”

   The Diet members are up and shouting. Cries of “Arrest the foreign spy!" The President Pro Tempore of the Diet calls for order: “Session adjourned, all spectators leave at once!”

   Kimura turns and whispers: “Intelligence adjourned.”
        To read on, now, click 5.4 Kimi & Tommy at Home, One Not Quite Winter Ni...