In 1944, Shintaro Abe completed his graduation and joined a naval aviation school, hoping to become a kamikaze pilot. But before he could complete his training, Japan had lost the war to America.
Over the next few years, Shintaro studied law at the University of Tokyo, tried his hand at journalism, married the daughter of a prominent politician, and slowly began to walk the corridors of power in Tokyo.
File photo of Shintaro Abe.
Shintaro’s stature in Japanese politics would increase in the coming decades. He would work closely with his father-in-law, Nobusuke Kishi, who became Prime Minister of Japan in 1957.
Shintaro became the Foreign Minister of Japan in 1982 and was tipped to become Prime Minister of Japan at some point in the future. However, destiny had other plans. Shintaro died in 1991 of heart failure (there were murmurs that he had cancer), leaving behind his wife and two sons, Hironobu and Shinzo.
File photo of Nobusuke Kishi.
While Hironobu chose to become an entrepreneur, Shinzo carried on his father’s legacy by engaging in politics and eventually achieving what his father could not and becoming Prime Minister of Japan. Along with his maternal grandfather, a former prime minister, and his father a veteran politician, Shinj inherited a strong family lineage in Japanese politics.
He was first elected to Parliament in 1993 in the seat of his father, who had passed away a few years earlier. In 2000, Shinzo Abe became deputy chief secretary of the Liberal Democratic Party. He traveled to North Korea with the then prime minister, Junichiro Koizumi, to negotiate the release of Japanese citizens kidnapped by Kim Jong Il’s regime.
Abe holds the record for being the longest serving Prime Minister of Japan. He served as the Prime Minister of Japan from 2006 to 2007 and again from 2012 to 2020. He has been victorious in six electoral contests since 2012.
Abe will be remembered for two major reform agendas that he pursued during his tenure. They were: a) restoring Japan’s militarism; and b) to revive the slowing economy of the country through policies which became popular as ‘Ebonomics’.
A conservative, Abe was not apologetic about Japan’s war history and wanted to modify the pacifist clause in the country’s constitution. But his efforts to create a more powerful army faced opposition from the Japanese population, who took to the streets in 2015. He opposed the law that allowed the Japanese military to fight alongside the Allies in overseas combat missions.
Abe failed to amend Article 9 of the Japanese Constitution, imposed by the US after World War II, which renounced the right to war and armed forces. But he secured a fair deal. He established Japan’s National Security Council (NSC) in 2013 and also passed a state secrecy law in 2014. He was also able to increase Japan’s defense budget and acquire destroyers equipped with F-35 fighter aircraft and Izumo-class helicopters.
Abe also led Japan’s recovery from the tragic 2011 earthquake and tsunami that killed nearly 20,000 people and caused the melting of the Fukushima nuclear reactors. But Abe’s nationalist position often invited international criticism. In 2013, he visited Tokyo’s Yasukuni Temple (a site with links to Japan’s war atrocities), which caused an uproar in China and South Korea.
On the economic front, ‘Abenomics’ became the talk of the town with the Abe government implementing a loose monetary policy, fiscal stimulus and structural economic reforms. The aim was to add a spark to the economic engine that had stalled for two decades. In addition to lowering corporate taxes, an incentive was given to expand an aging workforce with greater participation of women and immigrants.
In matters relating to international relations, Abe is credited with having a close relationship with Donald Trump, who maintained an aggressive and transactional approach with US allies. Abe also maintained strong ties with India, and with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, upgraded bilateral ties into a ‘Special Strategic and Global Partnership’.
India and Japan signed a civil nuclear deal in 2016 during Abe’s tenure. But his biggest contribution is the quad. He was the first to launch the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue in 2007, which brought together Australia, India, Japan and the US on a single platform against the backdrop of the growing Chinese threat.
Australia withdrew in 2008 and the Quad ceased to exist, but was revived almost ten years later in 2017. Again, Abe’s contribution was instrumental in bringing the four countries together. India acknowledged Abe’s contribution to relations between the two countries with the second highest civilian honour – the Padma Vibhushan in 2021. This was almost a year after he resigned.
Abe resigned as Prime Minister of Japan in September 2020, citing health problems. Abe’s popularity is believed to have been at an all-time low when he hung the boot. Japan had entered recession and was struggling to fight the Covid pandemic. Over the years, he continued to play an influential role in Japanese politics, until his life came to an abrupt end.
Read | Shinzo Abe: All you need to know about Japan’s longest-serving prime minister
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