Actually a very good intro to Japan post WW2. It's all the basics. USA being in control. Communists in Japan grow stronger as they are given leeway. The country is starving and the population sees the American as liberators. They stop the war and force Japan to adopt a new constitution with a big focus on freedom of speech. Japanese are overeager and thankful. Douglas MacArthur is the dictator and he basically doesn't care about Japanese culture or society. Largely they try to avoid too much Japanese influence. MacArthur also wants to stop huge companies and give farmers their own land. Labour unions start mass protests as they are now allowed to do it which of course is a freedom worth trying out. But it becomes such a giant issue that MacArthur stops it. The communists don't really want farmers to own their own land or all those freedom and liberty laws. They want a strong state. They seemingly want an angry, sad, and poor population all together moving towards communism.
It's a weird conflict. The communists are more like the old war leadership in Japan than the new liberal one. With USSR and China becoming extremely dangerous communist regimes the Japanese themselves are angry at Americans for letting the communists in their country grow. They slam down on them. USA now sends a banker to lead the country and fix the recession.
The Korean war finally boosts the economy as USA starts buying weapons from them to defeat North Korea supported by Stalin as Stalin tries to wipe out South Korea. Already a few years into the US regime Japanese leaders furiously complain about USA and want full power. USA gives them full independence in return for being allowed to have military bases there. But even just post WW2 Japan protests this and want Americans fully gone. As stated, largely Japanese leaders wanted this. But today of course the civil population thinks in a similar way and also tries to forget their role in WW2 and fight the American bases and ideas. I guess the leadership and population developed similar ideas and morals after some years while post WW2 they had quite a few conflicts. They doc doesn't go into this civilian mindset. I also wonder if it focuses too much on conflict. Japanese communists are mentioned like 10 times yet they had meager influence in this story.
