a tool of the bureaucracy to establish a dictatorship over the people and that it was unrepresentative of popular will. He also labelled Tōjō as a despot. Among the reasons for Nakano's anger at Tōjō were the harsh regime of economic controls led by the bureaucracy and Japan's decreasing fortunes in the Pacific War. Prior to the attack on Pearl Harbor, Nakano had been a strong advocate of expansion into the colonial territories of Southeast Asia, which, as their European masters were either occupied by the Germans in the cases of France and the Netherlands or held down by the conflict with Germany, in the case of Britain, they would be easily occupied and liberated by Japan. The bringing in of the United States into the conflict, however, worried Nakano. At Waseda University, Nakano gave a speech entitled "The World Prospers through the Individual" (Tenka Ichinin o Motte Okoru). In it, he criticized Kishi Nobusuke and the bureaucracy, going over Japan's recent history. He also praised Itagaki Taisuke, a well known Japanese liberal, as well as Japanese liberalism in a broad sense, contrasting it with Anglo-American liberalism. Such criticism brought only greater government pressure upon him. Nakano was forbidden to publish articles or make public speeches. In June 1943, Nakano resigned from the Yokusan Seijikai over the expulsion of a diet member. In the final months of his life, Nakano attempted to aid in overthrowing the Tōjō cabinet. He reached out to men such as Konoe Fumimaro, Tanabe Tadao, who was an officer on the Planning Board, Matsumae Shigeyoshi, Hatoyama Ichirō, and Prince Higashikuni. Ultimately, Nakano planned to convince the senior statesmen to remove Tōjō and have him replaced by General Ugaki Kazushige. Tōjō loyalists would then be purged from the Army and government while the economy would be rationalized to turn the tide of the war and force the United States into peace talks. Hoping to have Nakano removed from the diet when the Tōjō cabinet presented a plan for greater economic controls, on October 21, Nakano and 100 other were arrested by the police. While in confinement, Nakano confessed to spreading harmful rumours about the government. As this confession was not enough to legally confine him and prevent from attending the October 26th diet session however, Nakano was made to sign an agreement not to attend the diet the next day and released on the 25th. However, he