the United States, restoration of the emperor to his prewar, divine status, and repudiation of Article 9. Many, if not most, right-wingers had intimate connections with Japan's gangster underground, the yakuza. Japanese right-wing extremists (Uyoku dantai) are notable for their use of black buses, which often carry loudspeakers broadcasting nationalistic slogans. The ritual suicide of one of Japan's most prominent novelists, Yukio Mishima, following a failed attempt to initiate a rebellion among Self-Defense Forces units in November 1970, shocked and fascinated the public. Mishima and his small private army, the Shield Society (Tatenokai), hoped that a rising of the Self-Defense Forces would inspire a nationwide affirmation of the old values and put an end to the postwar "age of languid peace." Although a rightist were also responsible for the assassination of socialist leader Inejiro Asanuma in 1960 and an attempt on the life of former prime minister Masayoshi Ōhira in 1978, most of them, unlike their prewar counterparts, largely kept to noisy street demonstrations, especially harassment campaigns aimed at conventions of the leftist Japan Teachers Union. In the early 1990s, however, there was evidence that a "new right" was becoming more violent. In May 1987, a reporter working for the liberal Asahi Shimbun was killed by a gunman belonging to the Sekihotai (Blood Revenge Corps). The Sekihotai also threatened to assassinate former Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone for giving in to foreign pressure on such issues as the revision of textbook accounts of Japan's war record. In January 1990, a member of the Seikijuku (translatable as the (Sane Thinkers) School) shot and seriously wounded Nagasaki mayor Hitoshi Motoshima. The attack may have been provoked by the mayor's critical remarks concerning Emperor Hirohito. That attack came two days after the left-wing Chukakuha (Middle Core Faction), opposed to the imperial system, claimed responsibility for firing a rocket onto the grounds of the residence of the late emperor's brother and a day before the government announced the events leading to the enthronement of Emperor Akihito in November 1990. The enthronement ceremonies were considered likely targets for extremist groups on the left and the right who saw the mysticism surrounding the emperor as being overemphasized or excessively reduced respectively, but no serious incidents took place. More recently, the Zaitokukai have been focusing their attention on anti-Korean demonstrations. References - Japan See also Uyoku dantai Reverse course Hantenren Politics of Japan Japanese nationalism Far-left politics in