One Alarmed at Pearl Harbor Attack
Almost all the citizens of the Empire of Japan were excited in great delight when they heard news that the Imperial Navy successfully attacked US naval bases in the Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, in the early morning of December 8, 1941, Japan Time.
But one noble-class woman got shocked and depressed. Motoko Tokugawa thought the Empire could not win this war against the US.
She was born in 1907 in a family of the Japanese noble class. Then she married a son of one of Tokugawa families who were once close relatives of the family of Tokugawa shogun, the ruler of Japan from the early 17th century to the middle of the 19th century.
Before WWII, she traveled Europe and the US to watch industrial development of Western society. So, she could not believe that the Empire of Japan could compete with the US in terms of industrial output in making weapons.
Her husband also did not feel easy when he heard the news of the Pearl Harbor as he was then officer of the Imperial Navy. He worried that if the US had taken Saipan the Empire would be fatally troubled.
But more interestingly the father of Motoko Tokugawa was a chamberlain for the crown prince of Taisho Emperor. The crown prince later became Showa Emperor (Emperor Hirohito) who reigned the Empire from 1926 to 1989. They once swam together in the sea around Tokyo. The crown prince was proud that he could swim well than his guard, the father of Motoko Tokugawa.
Anyway, it is very rare to find a record that somebody in Japan felt so alarmed when he or she heard the news of the Pearl Harbor attack, since most of the Japanese people had not been so well informed of the industrial potential of the United States in 1941.
Maybe the Emperor himself did not well comprehend the gap in industrial and scientific potential between the Empire of Japan and the US before WWII, since it was 1971 that the Emperor touched at Alaska and 1975 that he visited the White House.
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Mat 6:16 Moreover when ye fast, be not, as the hypocrites, of a sad countenance: for they disfigure their faces, that they may appear unto men to fast. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward.
Mat 6:17 But thou, when thou fastest, anoint thine head, and wash thy face;
Mat 6:18 That thou appear not unto men to fast, but unto thy Father which is in secret: and thy Father, which seeth in secret, shall reward thee openly.