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Parent | Tells Court Jap Cabinet Had No Rule Over Army News Article |
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Date | |
Language | English |
Collection | C.W.J. Phelps Collection |
Box | Box 1 |
Folder | First Phelps Scrap Book |
Repository | University of Virginia Law Library |
Tells Court Jap Cabinet Had No Rule Over Army
TOKYO, June 28 (AP) – The premier who was in power when Japan seized Manchuria, testified today that the Japanese army plunged ahead over the protests of the imperial government. “The government did not even know who was responsible for the army’s action,” Reijiro Wakatsuki, premier in 1931, told the war crimes tribunal. Wakatsuki said the cabinet could not even inquire into the army’s action.
Earlier Tribunal President William Webb sought to determine whether Emperor Hirohito had any war responsibility by questioning a prosecution witness. Webb asked Ken Inukai, son of the slain premier who succeed Wakatsuki, to tell what happened when his father asked the emperor to end the Manchurian incident.
Inukai, who testified yesterday his father had appealed to the emperor in vain to withdraw imperial troops from Manchuria, tempered his previous testimony by saying he was uncertain whether his father appealed directly to the emperor or had talked with the lord keeper of the privy seal.