---
title: "Hirohito"
chunk: 11/16
source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hirohito"
category: "reference"
tags: "science, encyclopedia"
date_saved: "2026-05-05T04:06:28.660739+00:00"
instance: "kb-cron"
---

Historians who point to a higher degree of the Emperor's involvement in the war have stated that Hirohito was directly responsible for the atrocities committed by the imperial forces in the Second Sino-Japanese War and in World War II. They have said that he and some members of the imperial family, such as his brother Prince Chichibu, his cousins the princes Takeda and Fushimi, and his uncles the princes Kan'in, Asaka, and Higashikuni, should have been tried for war crimes. In a study published in 1996, historian Mitsuyoshi Himeta said that the Three Alls policy (Sankō Sakusen), a Japanese scorched earth policy adopted in China and sanctioned by Emperor Hirohito himself, was both directly and indirectly responsible for the deaths of "more than 2.7 million" Chinese civilians. In Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan, Herbert P. Bix said the Sankō Sakusen far surpassed Nanking Massacre not only in terms of numbers, but in brutality. According to Bix, "[t]hese military operations caused death and suffering on a scale incomparably greater than the totally unplanned orgy of killing in Nanking, which later came to symbolize the war". While the Nanking Massacre was unplanned, Bix said "Hirohito knew of and approved annihilation campaigns in China that included burning villages thought to harbor guerrillas." Likewise,  in August 2000, the Los Angeles Times reported that top U.S. government officials were fully aware of the emperor's intimate role during the war.
According to Yuki Tanaka, Emeritus Research Professor of History at Hiroshima City University, the war records at the Defense Agency National Institute provide evidence that Hirohito was heavily involved in creating war policies. He further stated that Japanese statesmen Kido Kōichi's wartime journal undeniably proves that Hirohito had a crucial role in the final decision to wage a war against the Allied nations in December 1941.
According to Francis Pike, Hirohito was deeply engaged in military operations and commissioned a war room beneath the Tokyo Imperial Palace to closely monitor Japan's military activities. Pike further noted that the extensive resources required for regular updates to the Emperor often drew complaints from military officials. To celebrate significant military victories, he rode his white horse in parades in front of the Imperial Palace.
According to Peter Wetzler, he was actively involved in the decision to launch the war as well as in other political and military decisions.
Poison gas weapons, such as phosgene, were produced by Unit 731 and authorized by specific orders given by Hirohito himself, transmitted by the chief of staff of the army. Hirohito authorized the use of chemical weapons 375 times during the Battle of Wuhan from August to October 1938. He rewarded Shirō Ishii, who was the head of the medical experimentation unit and Unit 731, with a special service medal.
Prince Mikasa, the younger brother of Hirohito, informed the Yomiuri Shimbun that during 1944, he compiled a thorough report detailing the wartime atrocities perpetrated by Japanese soldiers in China. He clarified that he didn't directly discuss the report with Hirohito; however, he added that "when I met with him, I did report on the China situation in bits and pieces."  Additionally, he recalled showing Hirohito a Chinese-produced film depicting Japanese atrocities.
Officially, the imperial constitution, adopted under Emperor Meiji, gave full power to the Emperor. Article 4 prescribed that, "The Emperor is the head of the Empire, combining in Himself the rights of sovereignty, and exercises them, according to the provisions of the present Constitution." Likewise, according to article 6, "The Emperor gives sanction to laws and orders them to be promulgated and executed," and article 11, "The Emperor has the supreme command of the Army and the Navy." The Emperor was thus the leader of the Imperial General Headquarters.
According to Bob Tadashi Wakabayashi of York University, Hirohito's authority up to 1945 depended on three elements:

 First, he was a constitutional monarch subject to legal restrictions and binding conventions, as he has so often stressed. Second, he was supreme commander of Japanese armed forces, though his orders were often ignored and sometimes defied. Third, he wielded absolute moral authority in Japan by granting imperial honors that conveyed incontestable prestige and by issuing imperial rescripts that had coercive power greater than law. [¶] In the postwar era, the Japanese Government, some Japanese historians, and Hirohito himself have downplayed or ignored these second and third elements, where were strongest up to 1945; and they have overemphasized the first, which was weakest. Hirohito was no despot. But he did retain 'absolute' power in the sense of ultimate and final authority to sanction a particular policy decision by agreeing with it, or to force its reformulation or abandonment by disagreeing with it. When he really wanted to put his foot down, he did –– even to the army."
Wakabayashi further adds: