12 Facts About Kazuo Aoki

Kazuo Aoki was a bureaucrat and cabinet minister in the Empire of Japan, serving as Minister of Finance, and Minister of Greater East Asia.

Kazuo Aoki followed up on this law with the Rice Control Act and the Petroleum Control Act, which set the stage for increasing state control over strategic sectors of the economy.

Kazuo Aoki was on the committee which drafted the National Service Draft Ordinance, which placed the Japanese economy on a war economy footing after the start of the Second Sino-Japanese War.

Prime Minister Fumimaro Konoe asked Kazuo Aoki to become deputy director of the Cabinet Planning Board in 1937, and he became its chairman in 1939.

Under Prime Minister Abe, Kazuo Aoki was Minister of Finance in 1939, while retaining his post as chairman of the Cabinet Planning Board.

Kazuo Aoki was recalled to Japan under the Tojo administration to the newly created cabinet post of Minister of Greater East Asia In November 1942, in which position he oversaw the Greater East Asia Conference.

Kazuo Aoki visited Japanese-occupied Batavia in May 1943, meeting with Mohammad Hatta, who as representative for the Indonesian nationalists, advised him that unless there was a shift in Japanese policy towards granting independence for Indonesia, it would be increasingly difficult to maintain popular support for Japan.

Kazuo Aoki promised to raise the issue with Tojo, who mentioned his intent to grant independence to Malaya, Sumatra, Java, Borneo and Sulawesi within a year in his June 1943 parliamentary speech.

Kazuo Aoki was reelected to the same seat three more times as a member of the Liberal Democratic Party.

Kazuo Aoki joined a right-wing faction within the LDP in 1960 which was adamantly opposed to Japan's normalization of relations with the People's Republic of China and supported Japan's continued recognition of the Republic of China on Taiwan.

Kazuo Aoki was a strong supporter of building a nationwide network of highways in Japan, especially the Chuo Expressway.

Kazuo Aoki published his memoirs in 1981, shortly before his death in 1982.