An elegantly written and comprehensive treatment of the prosecution of Japanese war crimes after the Second World War ... Though Bass’s book does not stint on historical analysis, it is written with the panache of a journalist who knows how to pace a scene ... Dramatic.
Bass begins his massive, magisterial account of the Tokyo War Crimes Trials with American military police arriving to arrest former Japanese prime minister Tojo Hideki at his home on September 11, 1945 ... Bass is a marvelous writer. He has a sharp, clear eye for telling detail. He may tell readers more than they care to know about the Tokyo war trials over the course of 692 pages, but the book, as he puts it, is history 'in the round.' Readers will learn a great deal about a fascinating time that saw the collapse of Western empire in the Far East, the rise of Communist China, and the astonishing birth of a modern, peaceful, democratic Japan from the ashes of a war-mongering, semi-feudal society run by militarists with a death wish.
[A] comprehensive, landmark and riveting book, which is both a sickening record of atrocities and a legal, hairsplitting analysis, as the judges argued over natural law, aggressive war, chain of command and more ... Bass employs the complexities of the trial as a fulcrum to sketch a wide canvas.
Exhaustive and fascinating ... Bass is especially good on Mei, the Chinese judge, to whom too little attention has been paid in other books on the Tokyo trial.
Impressive ... Bass astounds with his ability to tie so many complex narratives together. This is a clear-eyed look at a pivotal period in world history.
Authoritative ... Bass consistently demonstrates how the trial reflected the tenor of the postwar geopolitical theater, from the imminent victory of communists in China, to the entrenchment of Cold War thinking. A towering work of research resurrects a pivotal moment in history.
