SNA (Tokyo) — From 1936-1937, diplomat Koki Hirota was appointed prime minister. At this juncture, however, the office had become weaker than ever, and Hirota could do little more than be the public face of policies designed by the Imperial Japanese Army.

Transcript

On March 9, 1936, Koki Hirota became prime minister of Japan.

Hirota was a career diplomat, and thus the first civilian bureaucrat to be appointed premier since Keigo Kiyoura twelve years earlier.

By this point, the military’s political leverage over Cabinets had become quite strong, and the position of prime minister was weaker than ever before. Indeed, three of the last five prime ministers had been assassinated. Intimidation had become the norm, and there was even some gallows humor about Hirota’s chances to remain alive after he agreed to become premier.

Hirota’s authority as the supposed leader was not helped by the fact that he had no strong political constituency of his own.

Even in the selection of Cabinet members, the Imperial Army effectively had a veto, and the number of elected politicians given posts was rolled back.

But the army did become more effective at this juncture in cracking down on its own internal factions, and making clear that no more military coups would be tolerated.

Not surprisingly, the main foreign policy accomplishment of the Hirota government was an Army initiative. This is was signing of the Anti-Comintern Pact, which edged close to being a military alliance between Imperial Japan and Nazi Germany, and directed against the Soviet Union.

Not everyone was supportive of aligning with Nazi Germany—the Imperial Navy in particular found the pact to be of dubious benefit to its own strategies—but it did mean that Japan’s diplomatic isolation from all the other Great Powers had been broken.

Much of Hirota’s own policy attention was focused on trying to improve government administration and to centralize bureaucratic power. He launched a number of initiatives along these lines.

In November 1936, Hirota had the honor of presiding over the opening of the massive new National Diet Building, which had been under construction since 1920.

But early the next year, Hirota’s time suddenly ran out, once again due to the Imperial Army.

In debate on the floor of the House of Representatives, Army Minister Hisaichi Terauchi was directly challenged by an anti-militarist lawmaker. The exchange ended with Terauchi feeling insulted, glaring in hatred across the parliamentary floor at the man.

Afterward, Terauchi demanded that the prime minister dissolve the Diet, aiming to punish it for what he regarded as its failure to comprehend the depth of the international crisis which Japan was facing. If his demand wasn’t met, Terauchi threatened to resign.

Hirota and others tried to talk Terauchi out of his demand, but to no avail.

Taking responsibility for disunity within the Cabinet, Koki Hirota stepped down as prime minister on February 2, 1937. His term in office had lasted 331 days.

Hirota never returned to office as prime minister, but would serve again as Foreign Minister and in other capacities.

After the Pacific War had concluded with Japan’s defeat, Hirota was charged and convicted as a Class A War Criminal. In spite of being a civilian and not particularly pro-militarist in sympathies, nor personally responsible for Japan’s drive to war, he was nevertheless executed by hanging on December 23, 1948.

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