was a Japanese politician from

Yamaguchi Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Chūgoku region of Honshu. Yamaguchi Prefecture has a population of 1,377,631 (1 February 2018) and has a geographic area of 6,112 km2 (2,359 sq mi). Yamaguchi Prefecture borders Shimane Prefecture t ...

. He was a leading member of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). He served as foreign minister from 1982 to 1986. He was the father of former

Prime Minister A prime minister, premier or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. Under those systems, a prime minister i ...

Shinzo Abe Shinzo Abe ( ; ja, 安倍晋三, Hepburn: , ; 21 September 1954 – 8 July 2022) was a Japanese politician who served as Prime Minister of Japan and President of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) from 2006 to 2007 and again from 2012 to 20 ...

Early life and education

Abe was born on April 29, 1924, in

Tokyo Tokyo (; ja, 東京, , ), officially the Tokyo Metropolis ( ja, 東京都, label=none, ), is the capital and List of cities in Japan, largest city of Japan. Formerly known as Edo, its metropolitan area () is the most populous in the world, ...

, the eldest son of politician and member of Parliament Kan Abe. He was raised in his father's home prefecture of Yamaguchi from soon after his birth. His mother was an army general's daughter. Abe married , daughter of Prime Minister Nobusuke Kishi, in 1951. His second son,

, served as prime minister from 2006 to 2007 and from 2012 to 2020. His third son, Nobuo Kishi, was adopted by his brother-in-law shortly after birth, won a House of Representatives seat in 2012 and was appointed Minister of Defense in 2020.

Career

After graduating from high school in 1944 during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

, Abe entered a naval aviation school and volunteered to become a

kamikaze , officially , were a part of the Japanese Special Attack Units of military aviators who flew suicide attacks for the Empire of Japan against Allied naval vessels in the closing stages of the Pacific campaign of World War II, intending t ...

pilot. The war ended before he could undergo the required training. In 1949 he graduated from the Faculty of Law at the

University of Tokyo , abbreviated as or UTokyo, is a public research university located in Bunkyō, Tokyo, Japan. Established in 1877, the university was the first Imperial University and is currently a Top Type university of the Top Global University Project b ...

, Shintaro Abe began his career as a political reporter for ''

Mainichi Shimbun The is one of the major newspapers in Japan, published by In addition to the ''Mainichi Shimbun'', which is printed twice a day in several local editions, Mainichi also operates an English language news website called ''The Mainichi'' (previ ...

''. He became a politician in 1957, when he started working as a legislative aide of his father in-law, the then-prime minister Nobusuke Kishi. He won his father's seat in the House of Representatives in 1958. He led a major LDP faction, the conservative Seiwa Seisaku Kenkyūkai, whose reins he took from former Prime Minister

Takeo Fukuda was a Japanese politician who was Prime Minister of Japan from 1976 to 1978. Early life and education Fukuda was born in Gunma, capital of the Gunma Prefecture on 14 January 1905. He hailed from a former samurai family and his father was mayor ...

in July 1986, and held a variety of ministerial and party posts, the former of which included Minister of Agriculture and Forestry and Minister of International Trade and Industry. Abe was named as Minister of International Trade and Industry in the cabinet of the then prime minister

Zenkō Suzuki was a Japanese politician who was Prime Minister of Japan from 1980 to 1982. He was the last prime minister to have been born in the Meiji era. Early life and education Suzuki was born on 11 January 1911, Yamada, Iwate Prefecture, the eldest ...

on November 30, 1981. During this period, he was seen as a young leader groomed for the future prime ministry. In November 1982, he was appointed

Minister for Foreign Affairs A foreign affairs minister or minister of foreign affairs (less commonly minister for foreign affairs) is generally a cabinet minister in charge of a state's foreign policy and relations. The formal title of the top official varies between cou ...

in the cabinet of the then-prime minister

Yasuhiro Nakasone was a Japanese politician who served as Prime Minister of Japan and President of the Liberal Democratic Party from 1982 to 1987. He was a member of the House of Representatives for more than 50 years. He was best known for pushing through the ...

, replacing

Yoshio Sakurauchi was a Japanese politician and a significant member of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). He was speaker of the House of Representatives of which he was a member for 53 years. Early life and education Sakurauchi was born in Tokyo on 8 May 1912 ...

. His term lasted until 1986. Ronald Reagan and Shintaro Abe

Abe was a top contender to succeed Nakasone as prime minister in 1987, until he stepped aside for

Noboru Takeshita was a Japanese politician who served as Prime Minister of Japan from 1987 to 1989 during the bubble economy. Takeshita led the largest faction at the time in the Liberal Democratic Party, which he inherited from Kakuei Tanaka, from the 1980s ...

, head of a powerful rival faction. Then, he was given the post of secretary general of the party in 1987. In 1988, his chances of becoming prime minister some time in the near future were again thwarted when his name became associated with the Recruit-Cosmos insider-trading stock scandal, which brought down Takeshita and forced Abe to resign as the party's secretary general in December 1988.

Death

Shintaro Abe was hospitalized in January 1991. He died at

's Juntendo University Hospital on May 15, 1991, aged 67. The cause of death was not officially announced, although various reports point to cancer, liver failure, or heart failure.

Honours

''From the corresponding article in the Japanese Wikipedia'' *Grand Cordon of the Order of the Rising Sun with

Order of the Paulownia Flowers The is an order presented by the Japanese government. Established in 1888 during the Meiji Restoration as the highest award in the Order of the Rising Sun; however, since 2003 it has been an Order in its own right. The only grade of the order i ...

References

, - , - , - , - , - , - {{DEFAULTSORT:Abe Shintaro 1924 births 1991 deaths Foreign ministers of Japan Government ministers of Japan Members of the House of Representatives from Yamaguchi Prefecture University of Tokyo alumni Liberal Democratic Party (Japan) politicians Recipients of the Order of the Rising Sun with Paulownia Flowers Shinzo Abe Kamikaze pilots Parents of prime ministers of Japan