1972 Habsburg Support For Kakuei Tanaka Profoundly Affected Japan

Tanaka seemed to be well aware of his position. Shigezo Hayasaka, who had been Tanaka's secretary for more than 20 years, recalled that the house in Niigata where Tanaka had been born and raised was full of flies and fleas, and cattle were kept on the earthen floor.

In his memoirs, Hayasaka had written:“So his greatest characteristic became his fighting spirit. He wouldn't lose, he wouldn't let himself be crushed. He wouldn't let higher-ups look down on him as if he were a pebble on the roadside. He had fighting spirit.”

Tanaka thought about approaching a certain person in order to become prime minister. With his endorsement, he might be able to defeat the elite Fukuda. That person was Henry Kissinger.

At the time, Kissinger was traveling around the world, handling all aspects of American diplomacy. Later he also had the post of the secretary of state and in 1973 was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to negotiate the withdrawal of American troops from the Vietnam War.

His achievements were widely known in Japan. When his VIP plane arrived at Haneda airport, a red carpet was laid out for him on the tarmac. For Japanese politicians, meeting him was a status symbol, the best way to boost their prestige.

Kissinger's one-on-one meeting with Tanaka when the national security advisor in June 1972 finally made his twice-postponed visit caused consternation in Japanese political circles.

The Asahi Shimbun reported at the time:“Initially, Kissinger's schedule for mid-April” – when the visit initially had been scheduled to take place –“only included a meeting with Foreign Minister Fukuda, but there was no one-on-one meeting with MITI Minister Tanaka. However, in this latest itinerary, both Fukuda and Tanaka were treated as equals. How did this come about?”

The person who arranged for the meeting between Tanaka and Kissinger was Archduke Otto, head of the House of Habsburg, one of Europe's most distinguished families.

Otto was born in 1912 as the last crown prince of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Following the collapse of the Habsburg dynasty and breakup of the empire at the end of World War I, he and his family went into exile. Before World War II, he was a strong opponent of the Nazi party and spoke out against Germany's annexation of Austria. Following the 1938 Anschluss, he was sentenced to death by the Nazis and fled Europe to the United States.

After the war, Otto promoted the liberation of Central and Eastern European nations from the influence of the Soviet Union and European integration. He maintained an international network of connections with royalty and politicians from various countries, and served as a member of the European Parliament from the late 1970s. One of his closest friends was Henry Kissinger.

On May 25, 1972, Otto sent Kissinger a letter, requesting that he meet Tanaka the next time he visited Japan:

Kissinger accepted the request, dramatically strengthening Tanaka's presence in Japanese politics as a result. When Tanaka went on to become president of the LDP and prime minister, the Japanese public enthusiastically supported him, calling him the“people's premier.”

The head of a prominent European family had extended a helping hand to the son of a poor farmer from snowy Niigata. When the Tanaka cabinet was formed, Otto sent a congratulatory telegram.

Here another question arises: why did Otto want Tanaka to become prime minister in the first place? Was it simply because he liked Tanaka's personality? In fact, a Japanese fixer was secretly working behind the scenes. He, too, was determined to see the birth of the Tanaka administration and influenced Otto. Seigen Tanaka , no relation to Kakuei, was known as the“Tiger of Tokyo.”

Seigen Tanaka had been a leader of the Japanese Communist Party in the early 20th century, but after World War II he reversed his political stance to become a right-wing fixer. He also became involved in the oil business, acquiring oil concessions in the Middle East and Indonesia.

Through these activities, Seigen Tanaka built up an extensive network of contacts overseas, one of whom was Otto. They had cooperated in worldwide anti-communist activities since the 1960s. While not a realtive of Kakuei Tanaka's, he was a close friend, and it was Seigen who introduced Kakuei to Otto.

During Otto's visit to Japan in the spring of 1972, he had lunch with Seigen at his home in the Izu Highlands of Shizuoka Prefecture, where they agreed to consummate the Tanaka government. One of their reasons was apparently their desire for normalization of relations between Japan and China.

Following the end of World War II and the 1949 communist takeover of the Chinese mainland, Japan continued to maintain diplomatic ties with the Republic of China in Taiwa rather than the People's Republic of China.

Tanaka, behind the scenes, was preparing to recognize the PRC if he became prime minister. In September 1972, two months after taking office, Tanaka visited Beijing and negotiated with Chairman Mao Zedong, Premier Zhou Enlai and other Chinese leaders, paving the way for the normalization of diplomatic relations. This also meant severing diplomatic relations with Taiwan, a development that would profoundly change Asian geopolitics amid the Cold War.

Before his visit to China, Otto, via Siegen Tanaka, provided Kakuei Tanaka with intelligence on the international situation via Seig. Afterward, in a letter to Otto, Seigen wrote:

Otto had once remarked:“There is no doubt that Taiwan is being treated unfairly; however, we must also be aware that, because of the threat from Russia, we need Communist China today more than ever.”

In this regard, if Japan, a key member of the Western bloc, were to normalize diplomatic relations with China, it could put pressure on Moscow. The Tanaka administration's policy of normalizing relations with Beijing was consistent with the House of Habsburg's Soviet strategy.

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Tanaka initially enjoyed widespread popularity, but his fortunes subsequently changed dramatically. Within two years, he had resigned as prime minister amid scrutiny over his questionable political fundraising activities, and in 1976 he was arrested on allegation of accepting bribes in connection with the purchase of aircraft from US manufacturer Lockheed. The so-called“Lockheed scandal” is still considered the biggest political scandal in postwar Japan.

Yet, even after his ignominious departure from the top job, Tanaka remained a kingmaker who headed the ruling LDP's largest faction. This is evident in the fact that former Tanaka faction members Noboru Takeshita, Ryutaro Hashimoto and Keizo Obuchi went on to become prime ministers. Japan's current premier, Shigeru Ishiba, was also persuaded by Tanaka to quit his job as a banker and enter politics in the 1980s. \

Otto's prediction that Tanaka would remain an important force in Japan for a long time proved correct. Indeed, if Otto von Habsburg had not introduced Tanaka to Kissinger, the Ishiba administration might not even exist.

The letters slumbering in the Budapest archives bear witness to changes in the history of Japan, Asia and the world.

Eiichiro Tokumoto is a writer living in Tokyo. This article was originally published by Number 1 Shimbun, the monthly magazine of the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan. It is republished with permission.

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