Shigenori Togo (東郷茂徳 Tōgō Shigenori, 10 December 1882 - 23 July 1950) was Minister of Foreign Affairs for Japan at both the start and the end of World War II. He also served as Minister for Colonization in 1941, and assumed the same position, renamed the Minister for Greater East Asia, in 1945.
Throughout the war, Togo was among those who doubted that Japan could succeed in a war with the United States. Towards the end, he was one of the chief proponents for acceptance of the Potsdam Declaration which, he felt, contained the best conditions for peace Japan could hope to be offered. Up until the last, he hoped for favorable terms from the Soviet Union. At Togo's suggestion, no official response was made to the Declaration at first, though a censored version was released to the Japanese public, while Togo waited to hear from Moscow. Unfortunately, many Allied leaders interpreted this silence as a rejection of the Declaration, and so bombing was allowed to continue.
Togo was one of the Cabinet Ministers who advocated surrender in the summer of 1945, and several days after the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, this action was finally taken.
References
- "Foreign Office Files for Japan and the Far East". Adam Matthew Publications. Accessed 2 March 2005.
- Spector, Ronald (1985). Eagle Against the Sun. New York: Vintage Books.
See Also
- Documents and Speeches by Shigenori Togo at Wikisource
