Noun compounds: J2

This Year and 60 Years Ago

(Economic Weather Station)

What kind of year will this year be? What will be recorded in future generations' chronological history tables in the column for the year 1994?

This can't be thought of as too scientific, but as one clue, I read the items in a chronological table I have handy for the last kanjutsu year which is the same as this year, in other words, 60 years ago in 1934. The first thing which leapt to my eyes was a passage about a very bad rice harvest, due to frost damage. Since it said that the bad harvest would continue for 2 years, I continued reading, thinking that it was a possible story. As a countermeasure to surplus equipment capacity, the former Nippon Steel was born by means of a large merger of the Government Steel Works at Yawata with Kamaishi Steel, Wanishi Steel, Mitsubishi Steel, Kyushu Steel and Fuji Steel. This year, too, in addition to the birth of Mitsubishi Chemical, which has already been announced, other rather large-scale mergers may continue, and be recorded as a "year of mergers."

1934 was a year in which Japan showed real recovery, outrunning Europe and the U.S., which were worried about the slowness of recovery from the financial panic. Nevertheless, it was a year of deepening international isolation, with Japan being criticized for forcibly establishing Manchukuo and for producing exports armed with low wages ("social dumping").

What I do not want to follow is the advance of international dictators and fascists. In 1934, Hitler became F�Erer and strengthened imperialism, a right-wing regime was formed in Spain, and dictatorial regimes were born of coups d'état and other events in Estonia, Latvia and Bulgaria. In Japan too, a coup d'état plot by young military officers (the Military Academy incident) was discovered.

On the industrial front, the sprouts of a new era began to be seen, with the beginning of mass production of Nissan Automobile's small-sized automobile (Datsun) and the founding of Fuji Film. On the other hand, there was a conspicuous strengthening of bureaucratic control, with the proclamation of the obsolete Petroleum Industry Law.

It is impossible for history to repeat itself unchanged. Yet somehow it is possible that this year will see trends similar to the previous kanjutsu year. That is to say, this was my impression when I dallied with the chronological table.

This Year and 60 Years Ago

(Economic Weather Station)

What kind of year will this year be? What will be recorded in future generations' chronological history tables in the column for the year 1994?

This can't be thought of as too scientific, but as one clue, I read the items in a chronological table I have handy for the last kanjutsu year which is the same as this year, in other words, 60 years ago in 1934. The first thing which leapt to my eyes was a passage about a very bad rice harvest, due to frost damage. Since it said that the bad harvest would continue for 2 years, I continued reading, thinking that it was a possible story. As a countermeasure to surplus equipment capacity, the former Nippon Steel was born by means of a large merger of the Government Steel Works at Yawata with Kamaishi Steel, Wanishi Steel, Mitsubishi Steel, Kyushu Steel and Fuji Steel. This year, too, in addition to the birth of Mitsubishi Chemical, which has already been announced, other rather large-scale mergers may continue, and be recorded as a "year of mergers."

1934 was a year in which Japan showed real recovery, outrunning Europe and the U.S., which were worried about the slowness of recovery from the financial panic. Nevertheless, it was a year of deepening international isolation, with Japan being criticized for forcibly establishing Manchukuo and for producing exports armed with low wages ("social dumping").

What I do not want to follow is the advance of international dictators and fascists. In 1934, Hitler became F�Erer and strengthened imperialism, a right-wing regime was formed in Spain, and dictatorial regimes were born of coups d'état and other events in Estonia, Latvia and Bulgaria. In Japan too, a coup d'état plot by young military officers (the Military Academy incident) was discovered.

On the industrial front, the sprouts of a new era began to be seen, with the beginning of mass production of Nissan Automobile's small-sized automobile (Datsun) and the founding of Fuji Film. On the other hand, there was a conspicuous strengthening of bureaucratic control, with the proclamation of the obsolete Petroleum Industry Law.

It is impossible for history to repeat itself unchanged. Yet somehow it is possible that this year will see trends similar to the previous kanjutsu year. That is to say, this was my impression when I dallied with the chronological table.