Yasukuni Shrine
Shinto memorial to war dead, its secretly enshrined war criminals still stirring diplomatic protest.
Location
About this audio guide
This guide to Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo turns on one night in October 1978, when a newly appointed head priest, Nagayoshi Matsudaira, performed a secret ceremony inside the honden to fold fourteen more souls into a shrine that already held nearly two and a half million war dead, including wartime prime minister Hideki Tojo. It traces why his predecessor had held the same request for nearly a decade and refused it, and the argument that decision still carries. Look up at the eighty-foot red torii gate you passed beneath to get here.
This audio guide was created using AI.
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