One would say that external constraints imposed upon a criminal, which often includes said criminal taking action to correct his mistake in whatever form the im

One would say that external constraints imposed upon a criminal, which often includes said criminal taking action to correct his mistake in whatever form the imposer deems appropriate, as the criminal "taking responsibility". Germany is in no way the only country which has taken responsibility for war atrocities, but it is AFAIK, the only country which repent voluntarily and willingly. You may want to keep this in mind next time you play with semantics. Only direct, total democracy leads to peace. There is no such government in place in the world right now. The US, though it has not formally declared war against other "democracies", it has in many instances, conducted clandestine subversive activities that one nation may use as the casus belli. For example, in 2001, Haiti democratically reelected a Catholic priest as president for the third time. In 2004, with the backing of the CIA, the president Jean-Bertrand Aristide was removed from office in a coup for reasons many accused as Aristide simply not being obedient to Western powers. The US has also openly supported many oppressive regimes in the past and present time. This is also one of the pretexts Al-Qaeda used as justifications of their attacks against the US. While Japan may not return to its imperial and militaristic roots in the past, it is perfect as a proxy vanguard against China and Russia. The US is good at proxy wars. As long as Japan is catering to the US's demands, the US may just turn a blind eye and condone Japan's rise as yet another aggressive nation in North East Asia. It only took Germany a decade to become Nazi Germany after all. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2004_Haitian_coup_d%27etat http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2004_Haitian_coup_d%27etat