was a Japanese army officer and business leader.
Early life and military career
Sejima was born in
Toyama,
Japan
Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...
. His father, , was an officer in the
Imperial Japanese Army who served under General
Maresuke Nogi during the
Russo-Japanese War, and was later the mayor of the village of Matsuzawa in
Nishitonami District, Toyama.
Sejima graduated from in 1938. During the
Pacific War
The Pacific War, sometimes called the Asia–Pacific War, was the theater of World War II that was fought in Asia, the Pacific Ocean, the Indian Ocean, and Oceania. It was geographically the largest theater of the war, including the vast ...
, he was as a staff officer at the Imperial Headquarters. He instructed the
Guadalcanal
Guadalcanal (; indigenous name: ''Isatabu'') is the principal island in Guadalcanal Province of Solomon Islands, located in the south-western Pacific, northeast of Australia. It is the largest island in the Solomon Islands by area, and the seco ...
recovery strategy, New Guinea strategy, and in July 1945 moved out to the
Kwantung Army as a
staff officer, where he negotiated Japan's cease-fire with Soviet General
Aleksandr Vasilevsky.
He became a
prisoner of war alongside General
Otozō Yamada following Japan's surrender in 1945, and was detained for 11 years in
Siberia. He was briefly flown from Vladivostok to Tokyo in 1946 to testify at the
International Military Tribunal for the Far East
The International Military Tribunal for the Far East (IMTFE), also known as the Tokyo Trial or the Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal, was a military trial convened on April 29, 1946 to try leaders of the Empire of Japan for crimes against peace, conven ...
. Most of Sejima's 11 years in Siberia were spent in a prison in
Khabarovsk
Khabarovsk ( rus, Хабaровск, a=Хабаровск.ogg, r=Habárovsk, p=xɐˈbarəfsk) is the largest types of inhabited localities in Russia, city and the administrative centre of Khabarovsk Krai, Russia,Law #109 located from the China ...
; years later, Sejima inscribed a memorial stone at the Peace Park in the city.
Business and political career
Following his return from Siberia, Sejima joined C. Itoh & Co. (now
Itochu Corporation) in 1958, where he was initially engaged in its aircraft trading business. He became a director in 1962, just four years after joining the company.
Sejima led the corporate planning team at C. Itoh, where he implemented military-style reporting methods and formed a group of followers within the company known as the "Sejima machine." He took charge of Itoh's expansion into the oil industry and arranged an alliance between
General Motors
The General Motors Company (GM) is an American Multinational corporation, multinational Automotive industry, automotive manufacturing company headquartered in Detroit, Michigan, United States. It is the largest automaker in the United States and ...
and
Isuzu in 1971.
He was also one of three key men involved in Itoh's entry to the
People's Republic of China in 1972, making it one of the first Japanese companies to do business with the country. Sejima was also instrumental in Itoh's merger with
Ataka & Co. He was promoted to deputy president in 1972, deputy chairman in 1977 and chairman in 1978; he left the chairmanship in 1981 but remained an executive advisor to the company until 2000.
During the 1980s, he served as a member of the Ad Hoc Commission on Administrative Reform and as an advisor to Prime Minister
Yasuhiro Nakasone. In this capacity, he aided council chairman
Toshio Doko in the privatization of
NTT and the
Japanese National Railways. Sejima went on to advise Prime Ministers
Keizo Obuchi,
Kiichi Miyazawa and
Ryutaro Hashimoto.
He was a director of NTT from 1986 to 1999. In 1998, he was appointed to head a panel examining reform of the
Ministry of Finance. He was also chairman of the board of
Asia University and the
Chidorigafuchi National Cemetery.
Sejima also developed a close relationship with the military rulers of
South Korea during the 1980s.
Samsung founder
Lee Byung-chul invited Sejima to Korea in 1980 in order to advise
Chun Doo-hwan and
Roh Tae-woo "as a fellow man of the military." Sejima acted as a go-between for Nakasone in arranging an historic meeting with Chun in 1983.
A committee led by Sejima erected a monument to Indian judge
Radhabinod Pal at Tokyo's
Yasukuni Shrine in 1997. Pal had been the dissenting judge in the guilty verdict handed down by the Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal.
In media
Works by Sejima
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Works related to Sejima
The novel ''
Fumō Chitai'', which has been adapted as a film and as two television series, is said to be based on the life of Sejima, although the author stated that she only borrowed the main character's progression (from the military to a prison camp to the postwar corporate world) from Sejima's life story.
Sejima's role in Japan-Korea relations during the 1980s was depicted in the Korean television series ''
5th Republic''.
References
External links
Obituary in ''The Times'', 26 September 2007
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sejima, Ryuzo
1911 births
2007 deaths
People from Toyama Prefecture
Imperial Japanese Army officers
Imperial Japanese Army personnel of World War II
World War II prisoners of war held by the Soviet Union
Itochu people
Siberian internees
Japanese prisoners of war