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Crazy 1930s-40s Extremists Who Tried to Rewrite Japan’s History

Khalid Elhassan January 29, 2025 14 min

Japanese - League of Blood members await trial — League of Blood members await trial. Wikimedia

9. Denial of the Reality of Japan’s Surrender

Colonel Junji Kikawa in traditional ceremonial dress, left, and in military uniform, right. K-Pics

In 1942, violent clashes erupted between Japanese immigrants and local Brazilians. As a result, Colonel Kikawa decided to split from the innocent Pia and form the not-at-all innocent Shindo Renmei, which urged Japanese-Brazilians to engage in sabotage. That began a dive down a rabbit hole of crazy that terrified Kikawa’s fellow immigrants, and bewildered and alarmed Brazil and the Brazilian government. During WWII, Japan fought tooth and nail. Despite that, the conflict ended in abject defeat, with the country forced to throw in the towel and surrender in 1945. The shock of defeat sent many Japanese into paroxysms of grief, and quite a few around the bend and into denial and madness. For them – especially for those outside the country who did not get to see with their own eyes enemy troops occupying Japan – news of the surrender was “fake news”.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.