New Books on Japan: "Inglorious, Illegal Bastards: Japan's Self-Defense Force during the Cold War"

February 8, 2023 | 7:00PM-8:30 PM EST | REGISTER FOR ZOOM

Inglorious, Illegal Bastards: Japan's Self-Defense Force during the Cold War (Cornell University Press, 2022)

Author: Aaron Skabelund, Associate Professor of History, Brigham Young University

Discussant: Yoshikuni Igarashi, Professor of History, Vanderbilt University

The Modern Japan History Association invites the wider community to a conversation with Aaron Skabelund (Associate Professor of History, Brigham Young University). Professor Skabelund will be speaking about his new book, Inglorious, Illegal Bastards: Japan's Self-Defense Force during the Cold War (Cornell University Press, 2022). Inglorious, Illegal Bastards explores how a variety of efforts by Japan's Self Defense Forces to gain legitimacy achieved some success and influenced the public over time, but also transformed the force itself, as it assumed new priorities and traditions and contributed to the making of a Cold War defense identity, which came to be shared by wider society in Japan. As Professor Skabelund demonstrates, this identity endures today, several decades after the end of the Cold War. Yoshikuni Igarashi (Professor of History, Vanderbilt University) will serve as discussant.