Senko no Night Raid's Untelevised Episode

[GWOtaku]

I have yet to research Senko no Night Raid very much at all. However, multiple reports have noted that something unusual is happening with episode 7, Jihen. For those who may not know, Senko no Night Raid is a spring 2010 anime about spies in China during the 1930s. Jihen will stream online in Japan between May 18th and May 30th, but it's not going to air on television and is being replaced by a counterproductive clip show episode--the series is only 13 episodes long. At this early stage, one can only guess about its fate on series' future home video release.

Why is this happening? Jihen is said to be about the Mukden Incident, a sabotage of Japan's South Manchuria Railway. It was a pretext for Japan's invasion of Manchuria and the Second Sino-Japanese War. The episode is reported to look at the affair from the Japanese side.

This is a controversial topic because while the Chinese were blamed at first, the general historical consensus seems to be that Japanese did it. In fact, at the time the League of Nations' Lytton report rejected the idea that the Japanese response to the incident was legitimate self-defense. Neither the League nor the U.S. Government recognized the puppet state of Manchukuo that was established as a result of the conflict.

Getting back to the Mukden Incident specifically, historians appear to differ about the details. Wikipedia's article on the subject describes the controversy over responsibility for it thus:

Different opinions still exist as to who blew up the Japanese railroad at Mukden. Strong evidence points to young officers of the Japanese Kwantung Army having conspired to cause the blast, with or without direct orders from Tokyo. Post-war investigations also stated that the original bomb planted by the Japanese failed to explode and a replacement had to be planted. The resulting explosion enabled the Japanese Kwantung Army to accomplish their goal of invading Manchuria and the subsequent establishment of the puppet state of Manchukuo.

The "9.18 Incident Exhibition Museum" at Shenyang, opened by the People's Republic of China on September 18, 1991, takes the position that the explosives were planted by Japan. However, the Yūshūkan museum, neighboring Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo, places the blame on Chinese militias. Yūshūkan has been criticized for historical revisionism.

David Bergamini's book Japan's Imperial Conspiracy (1971) has a detailed chronology of events in both Manchuria and Tokyo surrounding the Mukden Incident. Bergamini concludes that the greatest deception was that the Mukden Incident and Japanese invasion were planned by junior or hot-headed officers, without formal approval by the Japanese government. Bergamini contends that Emperor Hirohito had approved the plan himself. However, historian James Weland has concluded that senior commanders had tacitly allowed field operatives to proceed on their own initiative, then endorsed the result.

In August 2006, the Yomiuri Shimbun, Japan's top-selling newspaper, published the results of a year-long research project into the general question of who is responsible for the "Showa war". With respect to the Manchurian Incident, the newspaper blamed ambitious Japanese militarists, as well as politicians who were impotent to rein them in.

Until it's public exactly what position the episode will take is unknown, nor the tone it will take. These strike me as the possibilities: The episode could fault China, it could fault Japan and portray it as planned from the top, or it could fault Japan and take the middle and plausible view that it was was the result of militarists having free and unaccountable reign to basically do what they wanted. I suppose it's also possible that it could reference the incident but only deal with the fallout from it, and/or claiming that responsibility is a mystery.

I am personally left wondering whether it was deemed too controversial for TV out of a concern about domestic controversy more than a concern about offending China. Time will undoubtedly shed more light on this issue in the days to come.

Is there anyone who's been following the series that can offer an educated guess on which way it might go?

[garfield15]

Well, the general consensus of the main characters in the show is that the way Japan is dealing with China is not right (In episode 4, Aoi remarks "Japan is not who should be in charge of this country" or something like that).

Anyway, this isn't exactly a "lost" episode is it? It's just being streamed online instead of broadcasted.

[GWOtaku]

Reasonable point, title changed. Your post makes me hopeful about the attitude this will take, although if episode 7 offers a critical or sorrowful view that makes it quite a shame that it's not being televised to the general audience. History isn't just the stuff you're proud of.