News

by Hidetoshi Arioka, Staff Writer

People involved with the “Hobbit,” a coffee shop in business for only four years in the 1970s in the vicinity of the Marine Corps Air Station Iwakuni, in Iwakuni City, have put together a book about a gathering held in 2022 on the 50th anniversary of the shop’s opening. The attendees of the gathering had a chance to reflect on the antiwar movement at a time when the Vietnam War had turned into a quagmire and on their own lives. “We want people to know there was a place where young people acted with peace in mind.”

Students from Kyoto and Fukuoka who had expressed their support for American soldiers opposed to the war opened the coffee shop in February 1972, and young people from throughout the country and young military personnel frequented the shop until it closed in January 1976. The shop would become a hub for the activities of the group known as “Beheiren” (short for Betonamu ni Heiwa wo! Shimin Rengo; in English, Citizen’s League for Peace in Vietnam) but, in May 1971, before the shop had opened its doors, young people were flying kites near the Iwakuni air base in an attempt to prevent U.S. aircraft from taking off the base’s runways.

The gathering that was the focus of the book was held in Iwakuni City in May 2022 and attended by about 30 former regular customers from all over Japan. They talked about their memories of the late Roppei Nakagawa, the first manager of the shop, and about the police raid on the shop three months after it had opened because of its suspected ties to radical groups. The self-published book includes all of the comments made by the attendees during the roughly three-and-a-half-hour gathering. The book is filled with the attendees’ thoughts about the city and the Marine Corps Air Station Iwakuni, where the number of fighter jets has now doubled with the relocation of roughly 60 U.S. aircraft-carrier jets to the base.

The book also includes photographs of a demonstration around the Iwakuni base the day after the gathering that featured participants holding banners reading “No War,” as well as messages from friends who were unable to attend the gathering.

Hiroaki Tomita, 75, is a resident of Iwakuni City who succeeded Mr. Nakagawa and served as manager of the shop until its closure. “With Japan’s defense capacity rapidly being strengthened, the 50th anniversary gathering was an opportunity to think about what we can do now.” Joko Iwase, 73, an author of children’s books from Iwakuni who had been a regular customer, said, “The book is a meaningful record of ordinary people’s antiwar activities and how they lived their lives over the next 50 years.”

The A5-sized book contains 117 pages and is priced at 2,000 yen. For more information, contact Masakazu Washino, a former Hobbit employee, at 090-1081-0437.

(Originally published on January 11, 2024)