Shintaro Ishihara

Ishihara in 2006 Emergency Drill

In the 1999 Tokyo gubernatorial election, he ran on an independent platform and was elected as Governor of Tokyo. Among Ishihara's moves as governor, he:

• Cut metropolitan spending projects, including plans for a new Toei Subway line, and proposed the sale or leasing out of many metropolitan facilities.[16]
• Imposed a new tax on banks' gross profits (rather than net profits).[25]
• Imposed a new hotel tax based on occupancy.[26]
• Imposed restrictions on the operation of diesel-powered vehicles, following a highly publicized event where he held up a bottle of diesel soot before cameras and reporters.[27]
• Imposed cap and trade energy tax.[28]
• Proposed opening casinos in the Odaiba district.[16]
• Declared in 2005 that Tokyo would bid for the 2016 Summer Olympics, which discouraged a bid by Fukuoka.[29] Tokyo's bid lost to that of Rio de Janeiro.
• Set up the ShinGinko Tokyo bank to lend to SMEs (small medium enterprises) in Tokyo. The project came under criticism- according to The Times, the bank had lost approximately 1 billion dollars worth of taxpayers' money through inadequate customer risk assessments.[30]
• Served as Chairman of Tokyo's successful bid to host the 2020 Summer Olympics.[31]
• Generated controversy from PETA for the culling of the 37,000 crows that populated Tokyo.[32]

He won re-election in 2003 with 70.2% of the vote, and re-election in 2007 with 50.52% of the vote. In the 2011 gubernatorial election, his share of the vote dipped to 43.4% against challenges by comedian Hideo Higashikokubaru and entrepreneur Miki Watanabe.

On 25 October 2012, Ishihara announced he would resign as Governor of Tokyo to form a new political party in preparation for upcoming national elections.[33] Following his announcement, the Tokyo Metropolitan Assembly approved his resignation on 31 October 2012, officially ending his tenure as Governor of Tokyo for 4,941 days, the second-longest term after Shunichi Suzuki.

Ishihara's new national party was expected to be formed with members of the right-wing Sunrise Party of Japan, which he had helped to set up in 2010.[21] When announced by co-leaders Ishihara and SPJ chief Takeo Hiranuma on 13 November 2012, Sunrise Party incorporated all five members of SPJ. SP would look to form a coalition with other small parties including Osaka Mayor Toru Hashimoto's Japan Restoration Party (Nippon Ishin no Kai).[34]

In November 2012, Ishihara and his co-leader Hiranuma said that the Sunrise Party would pursue "establishment of an independent Constitution, beefing up of Japan's defense capabilities, and fundamental reform of fiscal management and tax systems to make them more transparent". The future of nuclear power and the upcoming consumption tax hike were issues it would have to address with potential coalition partners.[34]

Only four days after the Sunrise Party was launched, on 17 November 2012, Ishihara and Tōru Hashimoto, leader of the Japan Restoration Party (JRP), decided to merge their parties, with Ishihara becoming the head of the JRP. Your Party would not join the party, nor would Genzei Nippon, as the latter party's anti-consumption tax increase policy did not match the JRP's pro-consumption tax policy.[35]

Reporting on a poll in early December 2012, Asahi Shimbun characterized the merger with Japan Restoration Party as the latter having "swallowed up" Sunrise. The poll, in advance of the 16 December Lower House elections, also said the association with SP could hurt JRP's chances of forming a ruling coalition even though JRP was showing strength relative to the ruling DPJ.[36]

In the December 2014 general elections he was a candidate for the Party for Future Generations, an extreme right-wing party, but was defeated.[4] Following this, he retired from politics.

Ishihara was a long-term friend of the prominent Aquino family in the Philippines. He is credited with having been the first person to inform future President Corazon Aquino about the assassination of her husband Senator Benigno Aquino Jr. on 21 August 1983.[42]

Ishihara was often critical of Japan's foreign policy as being non-assertive. Regarding Japan's relationship with the U.S., he stated that "The country I dislike most in terms of U.S.–Japan ties is Japan, because it's a country that can't assert itself."[22] As part of the criticism, Ishihara published a book co-authored with the then Prime minister of Malaysia, Mahathir Mohamad, titled "No" to ieru Ajia – tai Oubei e no hōsaku in 1994.[43]

Ishihara was also long critical of the government of the People's Republic of China. He invited the Dalai Lama and the President of the Republic of China Lee Teng-hui to Tokyo.[16]

Ishihara was deeply interested in the North Korean abduction issue, and called for economic sanctions against North Korea.[44] Following Ishihara's campaign to bid Tokyo for the 2016 Summer Olympics, he eased his criticism of the PRC government. He accepted an invitation to attend the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, and was selected as a torch-bearer for the Japan leg of the 2008 Olympic Torch Relay.[45]

On 9 April 2000, in a speech before a Self-Defense Forces group, Ishihara said crimes were repeatedly committed by illegally entered people, using the pejorative term sangokujin, and foreigners. He also speculated that in the event a natural disaster struck the Tokyo area, they would be likely to cause civil disorder.[46][47] His comment invoked calls for his resignation, demands for an apology and fears among residents of Korean descent in Japan,[16] as well as being criticised by the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination.[48][49]

Regarding this statement, Ishihara later said:

I referred to the "many sangokujin who entered Japan illegally." I thought some people would not know that word so I paraphrased it and used gaikokujin, or foreigners. But it was a newspaper holiday so the news agencies consciously picked up the sangokujin part, causing the problem.

... After World War II, when Japan lost, the Chinese of Taiwanese origin and people from the Korean Peninsula persecuted, robbed and sometimes beat up Japanese. It's at that time the word was used, so it was not derogatory. Rather we were afraid of them.

... There's no need for an apology. I was surprised that there was a big reaction to my speech. In order not to cause any misunderstanding, I decided I will no longer use that word. It is regrettable that the word was interpreted in the way it was.[22]

On 20 February 2006, Ishihara also said: "Roppongi is now virtually a foreign neighborhood. Africans—I don't mean African-Americans—who don't speak English are there doing who knows what. This is leading to new forms of crime such as car theft. We should be letting in people who are intelligent."[50]

On 17 April 2010, Ishihara said "many veteran lawmakers in the ruling-coalition parties are naturalized or the offspring of people naturalized in Japan".[51]

In 1990, Ishihara said in a Playboy interview that the Rape of Nanking was a fiction, claiming, "People say that the Japanese made a holocaust but that is not true. It is a story made up by the Chinese. It has tarnished the image of Japan, but it is a lie."[52][8] He continued to defend this statement in the uproar that ensued.[53] He also backed the film The Truth about Nanjing, a Japanese film that denies the atrocity, framing it as Chinese propaganda.[54]

In 2000, Ishihara, one of the eight judges for a literary prize, commented that homosexuality is abnormal, which caused an outrage in the gay community in Japan.[55]

In a 2001 interview with women's magazine Shukan Josei, Ishihara said that he believed "old women who live after they have lost their reproductive function are useless and are committing a sin," adding that he "couldn't say this as a politician." He was criticized in the Tokyo Metropolitan Assembly for these comments, but responded that the criticism was driven by "tyrant… old women."[56]

During an inauguration of a university building in 2004, Ishihara stated that French is unqualified as an international language because it is "a language in which nobody can count", referring to the counting system in French, which is based on units of twenty for numbers from 70 to 99 rather than ten (as is the case in Japanese and English). The statement led to a lawsuit from several language schools in 2005. Ishihara subsequently responded to comments that he did not disrespect French culture by professing his love of French literature on Japanese TV news.[57]

At a Tokyo IOC press briefing in 2009, Governor Ishihara dismissed a letter sent by environmentalist Paul Coleman regarding the contradiction of his promoting the Tokyo Olympic 2016 bid as 'the greenest ever' while destroying the forested mountain of Minamiyama, the closest 'Satoyama' to the centre of Tokyo, by angrily stating Coleman was 'Just a foreigner, it does not matter'. Then, on continued questioning by investigative journalist Hajime Yokota, he stated 'Minamiyama is a Devil's Mountain that eats children.' Then he went on to explain how unmanaged forests 'eat children' and implied that Yokota, a Japanese national, was betraying his nation by saying 'What nationality are you anyway?' This was recorded on film[58] and turned into a video that was sent around the world as the Save Minamiyama Movement[59]

In 2010, Ishihara claimed that Korea under Japanese rule was absolutely justified due to historical pressures from Qing dynasty and Imperial Russia.[60]

In reference to the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami and the subsequent Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster, Ishihara said "that the triple disaster was 'punishment from heaven' because Japanese have become greedy".[61][62][63]

America's identity is freedom. France's identity is freedom, equality and fraternity. Japan has no sense of that. Only greed. Material greed, monetary greed.[64]

This greed bounds with populism. These things need to be washed away with the Tsunami. For many years the heart of Japanese always bounded with devil.[65]

Japanese's identity is greed. We should avail of this tsunami to wash away this greed. I think this is a divine punishment.[66]

— Ishihara Shintaro

However, he also commented that the victims of triple disaster in whole country were pitiable.[67]

This speech quickly caused many controversies and critical responses from the public opinion, both inside and outside Japan. The governor of Miyagi expressed displeasure about Ishihara's speech, claimed that Ishihara should have considered the victims of the disaster. Ishihara then had to apologize for his comments.[68]

During the 2012 Summer Olympics, Ishihara stated that "Westerners practicing judo resembles beasts fighting. Internationalized judo has lost its appeal." He added, "In Brazil they put chocolate in norimaki, but I wouldn't call it sushi. Judo has gone the same way."[69]

Ishihara has said that Japan ought to have nuclear weapons.[70]

On 15 April 2012, Ishihara made a speech in Washington, D.C., publicly stating his desire for Tokyo to purchase the Senkaku Islands, called the Diaoyu Islands by mainland China, on behalf of Japan in an attempt to end the territorial dispute between China and Japan, causing uproars in Chinese society and increasing tension between the governments of China and Japan.[71][72] The government of Japan bought the islands in an effort to preempt the provocative bid, although the Chinese side viewed the purchase as an effort by Japan to bring the islands under Japanese sovereignty.[73]

• Robert Ringer: Winning Through Intimidation, 1978

• The Japan That Can Say No (in collaboration with Akio Morita), Simon & Schuster, 1991, ISBN 0-671-72686-2. Touchstone Books, 1992, ISBN 0-671-75853-5. Cassette version ISBN 0-671-73571-3. Disk version, 1993, ISBN 1-882690-23-0.