U.S. BLAMED IN RISE OF JAPANESE GANGS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000706940048-7
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: U
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: December 15, 2011
• Sequence Number: 48
• Publication Date: June 11, 1986
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Declassified and Approved For Release 2011/12/15 :CIA-RDP90-009658000706940048-7
'1 ~ AP '`1
WASHINGTON POST
11 June 1986
LACK ANDERSON and DALE YAN ATTA
U.S. Blamed in Rise of 1a anese
p Gangs
T he infiltration of Japanese gangsters into the
United States is a story we've been reporting
for two years. Their success in terrorizing
Japanese tourists and the Japanese-American
community is causing increased concern among
law-enforcement authorities.
Two veteran reporters associated with the
Center for Investigative Reporting, David Kaplan
and Alec Dubro, have now written a book
describing in ominous detail the origins and growth
of the Japanese criminal gangs-and the serious
threat they pose to our society. The book is titled
"Yakuza," the name given to the underworld gangs
from the simple card game they played to while
away the hours between missions of murder,
extortion and other crimes.
Our associate Donald Goldberg has reviewed an
advance copy of the book, which is based on the
largest file on Yakuza in this country. Here are
some revelations of particular concern to
Americans:
? After Japan's crushing defeat in World War tI,
the Yakuza gangs were in almost total disarray.
One develo merit that he{ ed them survive was
recruitment of aan~ members by intelli?encP
off-cers. The American authorities used Yakuza
members to sov on and disranr th t ~p ~sP,~l
leftist labor movement in Ja an.
evera mci ents traced to Yakuza thugs in the
pay of the U.S. government were aimed at union
members in Japan in the late 1940s and 1950s. In
one case, saboteurs derailed a Japanese National
Railways train, killing three people and injuring
scores. Twenty railway workers were convicted of
the crime, despite evidence that their prosecution
was a setup. They were finally exonerated in 1963.
^ Yakuza an sters workin for the CIA kidna d
a well-known leftist writer, who was a y t e
a enc or more t an a ear. ter mUrru ations of
t is sort are also escri in the book.
? Congress is indirectly responsible for the arming
of the Japanese underworld, by virtue of its relaxed
gun-control legislation. Until recently, Japan's strict
gun controls had made the country virtually free of
handguns and extremely low in the incidence of
shooting fatalities.
Recently, however, amultimillion-dollar gun
trade between the United States and Japan has
opened up, with thousands of American pistols
flooding into Japan. The Yakuza are understandably
in the vanguard of this lethal, lucrative and illegal
trade. Handguns that cost $100 in this country
fetch as much as $2,000 in Tokyo. The well-armed
Yakuza gangs have been indulging in some of the
bloodiest battles of their long history. Japanese
Yakuza leaders told the authors they can no longer
control their gang members.
^ Roughly half the Yakuza's enormous illicit
income is derived from drugs, with
methamphetamines, or "speed," the drug of choice.
Kaplan and Dubro conclude that the United
States must shoulder a large share of blame for the
resurrection of the Yakuza. The main responsibility
rests on shortsighted U.S. officials, who-like their
colleagues in postwar Germany-fancied they could
use the worst elements of the occupied nations'
society to bring stability and to combat
communism.
Declassified and Approved For Release 2011/12/15 :CIA-RDP90-009658000706940048-7