On December 27, 1951, Prime Minister Yoshida Shigeru sent John F. Dulles a letter that explained “Counter infiltration” against China. Yoshida thought the best way to wean Chinese from the Communist regime was by sending people into China through trade activities and encouraging an anticommunist movement in China. He believed that Japan could have a major role in such an operation. The purpose of this paper is to examine Yoshida's “Counter infiltration” plan against China from the standpoint of intelligence. Yoshida, taking a special interest in intelligence, established intelligence organs such as the Public Security Intelligence Agency and the Cabinet Research Chamber (CRC) in quick succession soon after the San Francisco Peace Treaty went into effect in April 1952. Worried about indirect aggression from communist countries, Yoshida concentrated his efforts on developing an interior intelligence framework. At the same time, he tried to foster the growth of a Japanese intelligence organization that could gather information and perform covert operations it Mainland China.
This study shows that Yoshida proactively tried to strengthen intelligence cooperation with governments of both Taiwan and the United States. Yoshida appointed Ogata Taketora Chief Cabinet Secretary and made him supervisor of Japanese intelligence organs. Ogata urged the Nationalist government on Taiwan to cooperate in establishing a Communist information exchange organ, and asked the U. S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) for assistance in creating a Japanese CIA. On the other hand, Yoshida let retired lieutenant General Tatsumi Eiichi recruit ex-military personnel for service in the CRC. With the assistance of Tatsumi, the CRC started actual intelligence activity against China after January 1953. The CRC interrogated repatriates from China, and proposed a joint operation with the CIA to use Japanese agents. Thus Yoshida tried to establish a Japanese intelligence system and backed U. S. strategy against China in the intelligence field.
Yoshida's idea, however, was frustrated by rapid changes at home and abroad. After the Peace Treaty came into force, Yoshida couldn't maintain a firm hold on power. Not only the opposition parties but also the media criticized Ogata's plan to launch a Japanese CIA. In the end, Ogata had no choice but to downscale his ambitious plans, and eliminate overseas covert operations. Moreover, Yoshida's confrontational approach against the Chinese government was criticized for being behind the times after the Indochina armistice in 1954. In the last days of his ministry, Yoshida encouraged both Britain and U. S. to set up a “high command” on China in Singapore. His aim was to use overseas Chinese based in Southeast Asia to infiltrate Mainland China, but his idea wasn't put into practice because he was unable to gain the support of either Britain and the United States or even his own entourage.

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The purpose of this paper is to summarize and reexamine journalist Ryu Shintaro and his works. He wrote the bestseller, “Reformation of the Economy in Japan (Nihonkeizai no saihennsei)” in Prince Konoe's new order while he was a journalist and part of the brain trust of the New Economic Order in 1940. After the war, “Mono no mikata ni tsuite”, which had strong influence on the defeated mind of the Japanese people, and “Hanamizake no Keizai”, which warned of rapid economic growth, also became bestsellers.

This article examines how his books became bestsellers from the prewar to the postwar period with the social context in Japan. There existed social change and the popularization of mass society. In 1960 comparing the history of publishing with that of mass media, this study points out both separate and continuous components in modern history in Japan.

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The host of Japanese “peace-feelers” who tried to contact the Chinese side in order to bring about peace between the two warring nations in the period 1937-1941 may be regarded as “informal contact-makers” in the context of state-to-state negotiations. Depending on whether contact-makers have official credentials or not and whether their contacts are pre-announced (namely, announced to the public in advance) or not, informal contact-makers are of three types: those with unofficial capacity seeking pre-announced contacts; those with official capacity seeking secret contacts; and those with unofficial capacity seeking secret contacts.
A detailed analysis of the binational contacts of this period reveals that no peace-feelers belonged to the first type mentioned above, while there were some peace-feelers such as diplomats who, in their official capacity, sought secret contacts. Apart from those diplomats who participated in the peace efforts, however, it is difficult to identify other peace-feelers who could belong to this second type, mainly because of the ambiguity of the definition of “official capacity.”
The third type of informal contact-makers became active after Japan denied the the legitimacy of the Chinese Nationalist government in January 1938, thus prompting a breaking off of relations. Peace-feelers of this kind in this study included (1) a diplomat who contacted the Chinese at his discretion without advance official approval (2) military officers who without official credentials joined the search for peace; and, most significantly, (3) those private individuals who had no official capacity but who voluntarily sought opportunities for peace, utilizing their own personal ties with the Chinese and other influentials. Typically, they were Matsumoto Shigeharu (a journalist working in Shanghai for Domei News Agency and one of the entourage of Konoe Funimaro), Kayano Nagatomo (a “comrade” of the Chinese Revolution and a friend of Sun Yat-sen), and Nishi Yoshiaki (an official of the South Manchurian Railway Co.).
The active presence of peace-feelers may be explained by the close, if not friendly, historical contacts between the two peoples and also by the relatively short distance between the two countries and the existence of neutral zones such as Hong Kong, Macao, and the Settlements in Shanghai, which made it easy for the informal contact-makers to operate. Another contributing factor may be the diffuseness of the Japanese (and perhaps Chinese, too) policy-making structures.

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It is said that Japan did not approach her enemies to end the hostilities until the last stage of the Pacific War. But she tried repeatedly to negotiate a cease-fire between herself and Nationalist China (Chungking) during the war. What made Japan consider a separate peace only with China? How did she intend to make peace with China? This paper aims to analyze the objectives of Japan's approach to China and to make clear the circumstances of her peace efforts toward Chungking.
At first Japan contemplated making peace with China as a part of the plan to weaken the will of the United States to continue the war. As the tide of war turned unfavorably to her, Japan wanted to move her troops stationed in China to the other fronts by making a cease-fire with Chungking. In the last stage of the war, some of the Japanese leaders hoped that China would act as an intermediary between Japan and the United Nations to obtain less severe peace terms than unconditional surrender.
Japan, however, did not negotiate directly with China. The approaches in the early stage of the war were limited to gathering intelligence about Chinese tendency to make peace. Japanese were afraid that they would betray their weakness if they made overtures to China. Japan relied on the Wang Ching-wei Government (Nanking) to make contact with Chungking. Nanking government leaders, especially Chou Fo-hai, opened and maintained various routes of contact with Chungking through liaison agents. But they used the routes as a means to pursue their own purposes other than making peace overtures.
Japan did not regard China as a full-fledged member of the United Nations. So she expected that she would be able to exploit the differences between Chungking and its allies and to make a separate peace with it. But China would not show any attitude to accept Japan's overtures. Japan had few resources or means to induce China to consider making a separate peace.

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