Listen to Episode

Read Episode Transcript

Hello, I'm Erica Kelly from the podcast Southern Fried True crime, and if you want to go from podcast fan to podcast host, do what I did and check out spreaker from iheart. I was working in accounting and hating it. Then after just 18 months of podcasting with Spreaker, I was able to quit my day job. Follow your podcasting dreams, let's break or handle the hosting, creation, distribution, and monetization of your podcast. Go to spreaker.com. That's spreaker.com. Wanna say I don't know less? Listen to stuff you should know more. Join host Josh and Chuck on the podcast packed with fascinating discussions about science, history, pop culture and more episodes. Dive into topics like was the lost, city of Atlantis Real? And how does pizza work? Say goodbye to I don't know. Because after listening to stuff you should know you will listen to stuff you should know on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Sisters of the Underground is a podcast about fearless Dominican women who stood up against the brutal dictator Kapal Trujillo. He needs to be stopped. We've been silent and complacent for far too long. I am Daniel Ramirez, and as a Dominicana myself, I am proud to be narrating this true story that is often left out of the history books through your husband, blood on his hands. Listen to sisters of the underground wherever you get your podcasts. What? Well, you know, the important thing about growing older and getting wiser is learning when you shouldn't make a what's exing my wise joke about a series of profoundly horrific crimes against humanity. And yeah, I I've grown as a person, so we're just gonna go into the episode and not think at all about what it is I was going to say before I stopped myself and narrowly avoided cancellation. This is behind the ********. A podcast about the worst people in all of history, of whom I would have been one had I completed the sentence that this introduction was meant to be initially as it was originally planned. But I didn't. So you ************* can't cancel me. That's right. I'm going to go. Fortunately, unfortunately, this also means that you will never be installed as as as as the leader of a country by the CIA. I don't. Don't say never. Don't say never. You never like what? What do you what do you? What do you? What do you? What do you? I mean, anybody. Look, a man can dream. Christopher, we're talking more about Manchuria today. We just went through a lot of war crimes. Where are where we where we where what what do you what do you what do you what do you what do you where? What do you wear? Where, what? Where? What is it? Time. Where what is it time for the reckoning, as you title it is the reckoning. **** yeah, let's go. Yeah. So we we are back in Japan. We are back in 1945. And. We are back in. Well, I guess we are back in, we are back in the US occupation. And OK, now I think a pretty natural reaction. To to seeing the the words a U.S. military occupation is to assume that's going to go badly, and it is. But it actually didn't start out that way. And it didn't start out that way because the first phase of of the sort of Japanese occupation by the US is run by a bunch of new dealers. And these guys looked Japan and we're like, OK, So what if instead of fascism we did the new deal? And so they do a bunch of stuff that's like really leftist, like, like, for example, the the big one that you could never do in the US. Like they do this huge land reform package where they force all the landlords to own a certain amount of land to like sell it to their tenants. And, you know, they're, they're there. There's like there's like 2 years, you know, nine, 45947 where, you know, the US like is actually kind of trying to make Japan like better and more democratic and less ****. But all of that comes to an end in 1947, basically as a result of the Cold War. And this, this is called the reverse course and signifies basically what American business interests. Take control of of of Japan and you know, like in 1950 they they do this thing called the Red Purge where they they like they just they just do they use mass firing of like suspected communists and just like, yeah. And anyone who sort of like vaguely associated with leftist get fired from their jobs both in the government and private sector. This is this is coordinated, like, and if I'm not mistaken, this is kind of around the time when there's also a lot of protests against the American occupiers because a bunch of GI's are are ****** ladies. Yeah, that's just like another major thing. That's that. That drives a lot of like the the, the, the early protests. Yeah, post war in Japan. Yeah. They're also just like shooting people and we'll we'll get more into soldiers just randomly murdering people. Excellent. But you know, I guess actually Speaking of soldiers randomly murdering people, so one of the reasons why fascism is never really sort of like crushed in Japan. Is that the head of, UH, G2, which the Army intelligence section is also a fascist and you know this. This is no way. Yeah. And also, like, this is not me calling Charles A Willerby a fascist. Like, this guy is going to go on to become, like, Franco's promoter in Europe. Like McArthur calls him a fascist. Wow. MacArthur. The guy who suggested nuking cities in China to win the Korean War. If that dude calls you a fascist. You're probably pretty ******* fashion, you know, and and and this is a big issue because Willoughby's job, like the the actual job he is there to do is to like just completely obliterate the rest of jet, the Japanese fascist organizations and Japanese fascist societies. And what he does instead is he used the G2 counter Intelligence Corps to do union busting and staging false flag attacks and blaming them on the Socialist Party. And he does. He does one other thing that's both incredibly important to this story and important the Japanese history. He decides he wants to start negotiating with the Yakuza in order to sort of like use them as a weapon. That's left. And in order to do this, yeah, it's great. It's great. You can see where this is going. He, he, he he goes. Versions of this happen in Italy with the mafia too, right? Yeah. And I think. Yeah, I, I, you know, the Italian office is interesting because every once in a while they like will back a leftist. Like that's like how the sort of weird red brigade stuff happens. But like, right, the yakuza, they're just fascists. Like, there's no, that's good. Yeah. Yeah, it's it's it's great. And yeah. And so so will there be goes to prison, which is like the this is, this is the giant war criminal prison where the US is holding all the war criminals. And he meets with Kishi cellmate. Now, Kishi cellmate is a guy named Kodama Yoshio, who is he's like a giant yakuza boss. He's involved in the drug trade. He was also arrested for his plot, his part in the incredibly named League of Blood Incident. In 1932, which is his giant like Fascist plot. So just assassinate a bunch of business owners, liberal politicians and you know so he gets arrested for this is 1932, he gets arrested and he gets released and then you know because again the Japanese Empire is a giant cartel with like a state attached to it. He spends the entire war as Japans like procurement guy, which means that he's running around like basically trading heroin for like tungsten, radium guns and like other stuff to fight the war. And so will there be meets with this guy because he also you know he still has a mustache connections and he has like $175 million. It made from the war just like on him. And so willerby cuts a deal with Kodama, that's like, OK, I'll get you out of war crimes jail if you become an American intelligence asset. And Kodama is like, this is just all wins. And so he could almost like immediately like basically reforms this like I don't even, I guess you could like the United fronts of like crime and fascism. It's like it's it's this group, it's this association of like 400 right wing like fascists and criminal organizations that Kodama just like runs. And you know, he he's gonna spend the next 30 years basically just running Japanese politics from the from the shadows and being basically like the yakuza politics guy now Kishi. How Kishi escaped the noose in 1948 is a subject of some debate. Like, so the US doesn't charge him with the sex slavery crimes, or like the the forced labor crimes. What he's charged with is violating like, crimes against the peace, which is like starting an offensive war. But like, even that, even if you just stick to that, like he is the guiltiest man in human history. Like he signed the Declaration of War against the US. Like, cool his conviction ever. Like, yeah, that really also ought to like, just as a rule if you're like. Someone else who lives in that country. And a guy is like, hey, I wanna continue being influential. You know me, I'm the guy who helped declare war in the US. You would think that, like, everyone would be like, well, we shouldn't be listening to anything you say? Yeah, that didn't go very well. I would think, and you know, I I I've seen some stories that talk about like some sort of like group of American businessmen interceded on his behalf. I don't know how reliable that is. The other explanation, and this this is true regardless of exactly what happened to Kishi, is that? Like the Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal just kind of gave up, like trying to actually prosecute people because it was too much work and it was like the Cold War was happening and they just didn't care anymore. And so they do just like a bunch of absolutely **** ***** proceedings and you know, they they rush like Tojo to the gallows and people, the people that wanted to kill and then everyone else just goes free. And so on Christmas Eve, 1948, nobody seikishi, the man who enslaved Manchurian, ran the fascist war machine, walked out of prison. And because his growth, because his brother, future Prime Minister Ito Eisaku Sato Isaku, is the cabinet chief secretary. Kishi is immediately driven to the Prime Minister's house. Where he good? Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's immediately driven Prime Minister's house, where he trained his trains his prison oranges for a business suit and utters the immortal words, quote, well, I guess we're all Democrats. Now, oh God. Oh, gross. Yeah, not good bad. Not good for good. Ohio and and thus. And thus, never seikishi arch fascist bureaucrat entered the new world of electoral politics. Oh, God, that you love to see it. Yeah. It's like if Verner von Braun had run for Congress. Yeah. Yeah. As opposed to just running NASA. Yeah. And you know. OK. So initially he starts putting together basically like the old fascist base. So, like, he gets some small business owners, he gets some like old school 1931, like fascist terrorists. He gets, he gets. His friends at Nissan are like, yeah, we loved. Make sure you **** like we're giving him all of her money and the other you know. One of the the other like very disturbing things about what happened after the war is that so you know, I talked to the last episode, Kishi. Kishi found this thing called the Ministry munitions, which is just like the Super it looks Super 8 like ministry, that's all. Does all this planning stuff and basically all of his old like fascist reform bureaucrat buddies who in the ministry munitions keep their jobs and that whole the ministry just turned into the Ministry of International Trade and Industry. And you know, and MIDI is that's called MIDI. MIDI is the core of Japanese post war developments and it's, you know, it's it's all the old fascist **** that keep that Kishi was doing before. Except the difference is that it's it's now being used to sort of like it's being used to to, to fuel the American war machine in Korea and Vietnam instead of feeling Japanese war machine also in Korea and Vietnam. So, yeah, this is purging. The fascist is going well. And when I say going well, I mean in 1952, the US just, like, gave up any semblance of trying to get rid of fascism and just unperfect everyone they'd purged. We pardoned a lot of them. We gave the others jobs. Yep, Yep. Yeah. Yeah. And and you know the interesting with Kisha so so the the Prime Minister at the time is Yoshida Shigeru who was like this is not a good guy like he was also a fascist for the war. But he tells the Americans do not on purge this guy like do not undergo Kishi. And it's extremely funny because you know as I mentioned last episode like Yoshida is is like is related to Kishi like you remember that uncle that Kishi really liked who like raised him for a little bit. Yeah for yeah. So that guy's daughter like is Yoshida's wife like they know each other like ** *** knows this guy's family and she's still. Just, like, do not do this. Do not let this guy come back into politics. And the US is just like, no, **** it. Well, he's back. He's back. He fine. Yeah. And, you know, so she you may not have heard of us. We're the United States. Yeah. We don't think things through. You would say this this works out great for the US. Ohh good. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And, you know, and Kishi. So Kishi runs this this electoral federation thing in 1952 and it just gets like destroyed. Like, because 1952 everyone's like, we don't like this guy. And he's like, he has a lot of money. He's like hundreds of millions of yen. So they get, like, whacked. And so Kishi starts like Wheeling around the political scene going on like what can I latch on to? And like he, he almost joins the right wing of the Socialist Party, which would have been the single weirdest plate of it I've ever seen in my life. But his brother convinced him to join this the the ruling sort of center right Liberal Party instead and you know like this is Yoshida's party and Yoshida like doesn't like Kishi. But the Liberal Party is also falling apart. So he's like OK, we need Kishi support and so in 1953 Kishi joins the party part joint joins the party and wins the seat in the Diet. Now Yoshida she is getting help from a lot of places in that election because 93 is the first post war election after the American occupation and and if you know anything about elections that happened. In fascist countries immediately after the end of World War Two, you know that Yoshida is being backed by the CIA. Yeah. Like, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. If, you know, anything that happened about elections that happened in these countries after World War Two, you know that they didn't. Yeah. Well, you know, yeah. This is interesting because it's like, I think this story is weirder than than, like, the Italian story is like, you know, and this is, you know, I guess so. So the way this is funded is that at the beginning of the Korean War, like, the US needed a bunch of tungsten. And American intelligence basically was like, we need to keep the Socialist Party from literally ever taking power, like at all costs. And so they talked to podamos that that yakuza guy from before the war who willerby had, like broken out of jail. And they get him to smuggle a bunch of tungsten that had been left over from Japan's World War Two stockpiles to the US and then they like, they pay him $10 million and the CIA throws in $2.8 million of their own. And that money is like that. That that money is how liberal the Liberal Party, like wins 1953 elections. Cool. It's great. It's great. I mean, it's going to get. Just fine. I bet we did good stuff with all that tungsten. Yeah, we absolutely bombed the **** but it it didn't get fired into multiple countries worth of civilian. It's great. OK, anyway, we all. Yeah, yeah, so so you know Keisha. Keisha gets elected as part of Liberal Party. But, you know, Keisha is a backstabbing *** ** * ***** and he immediately turns into a sheet and, like, starts denouncing him. She kicks him out of the party, but she's able to get this, like, breakaway faction to join him, and he formed something called the Democratic Party. And through a lot of incredibly complicated electoral ******** like they're able to out you sheet as Prime Minister. And then Kishi has this giant plan to, like, reunify the two wings of the the like. Basically, we unify the two wings of the of the right. There's like his wing as Democratic Party and there's a Liberal Party and he has to reunify them. And the reason he wants to do this because he wants to control it. But the other reason that the reason it actually happens is that the Socialist Party had split in like 1948 or something in 1955 they come back together and that just like, freaks all the Conservatives out. And they're like. OK. OK, fine. Like we'll we'll we'll we'll join this new party. And this new party they form is called the Liberal Democratic Party. Now, this is important. The reason I spent so much time talking about this is that the LDP is the single most important party in Japanese politics. And in the 66 years since they were founded in 1955, the LDP has been out of power for six. They were in power for the others. Jesus Christ. Yeah. This is the Japan is Japan is almost a record of state. Yeah. Yeah. It's it's unbelievable. And, you know, and this is this is Keisha's party like. He is the guy who single handedly built this party. This party would not exist if Kishi had not gone into the Liberal Party like tore them apart and then forced them to join his breakaway faction. And you know, like, he's the reason why it exists. And this this party, like this is the party that's the basis of the entire modern Japanese political system. Cool. Yeah, it's great. Kishi. You know, he makes himself the general secretary of of of the of the party and wins, you know and in his first election he wins an absolute majority in the diet for the LDP. But you know instead of becoming Prime Minister himself he spends his time sort of biting like sort of building up American support for him. Now, you know we talked about this, the CDP mean the CIA had been having involved the party and they've been heavily involved with Liberal Democratic party like from the starts I mean this, this is from the New York Times article. We financed them, said Alfred C Plummer junior, who ran the CIA's Far East operations from 1955 to 1958. We depended on the LDP for information. He said the CIA had used the payments both to support the party and recruit informants from it from its earliest days. And so the CIA, like they're working with the LDP on like a candidate by candidate basis, like they like the the CIA has their own electoral guys and the electoral guys will like, go to a candidate and go. We need you to win this seat and they'll like hand, like, personally. Hand them money. And so, you know, this is, this is, this is where you get the first of the Dulles brothers entering, entering the sort of political arena. Hell yeah. She and then the. And then it like, actually I saw you before 1955. You also get the second dullest Brother, Secretary of State John Foster Dulles, who like basically just straight up. Yeah. Like he just like straight up. My 55 is like the liberal, like he's like tells the Japanese, like, the Liberal Party will unify with the Democratic Party and like, if you don't like. Vague threat, insert here. And so John Foster Dulles directly responsible. In many ways, both the doors are responsible for keishi like forming the most important political party in in in the history of Japan. And all of this ends with Kishi becoming Prime Minister and 57 and he he just immediately starts doing crime. So he he and what else are you gonna do for sure. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you know like this she's she's like a she's an incredible money launderer from his time in Manchuria like you know, and and and he he devises a scheme. To like, make some money off of the reparations payments such Japan had to pay to like the countries that invaded after the war. And so he basically what he does is he negotiates to have these reparations payments like paid in Japanese goods and services. And so he buys those Japanese goods and services with state money from his own corporate political allies. And then yeah, he turns, yeah, it's great. It's great. He's using the reparations payment to like pay off his like fascist buddies. And then he does the exact same thing to like the the Japanese foreign aid, like projects. It's also all just. Species like buddies paying themselves. And you know, Kishi, he also like, he develops this system of like, so she like constantly rotates the cabinets in the time that he's like constantly. And and the reason he's doing this is because he's basically a way to buy off his political allies. So like, you know, you you you give an ally a cabinet minister and they get allude a bunch of money. And then once they've taken enough money, you put in the next person, you put in the next person to put the next person. And you know, he he's also just like he's not only doing this with, with like sort of politicians and like businessman, he's doing this with the yakuza. So what if the the, you know, he he makes like like a sworn yak is a guy like his Ministry of Agriculture. And then there's the wonderfully named Bambuco Ono, who kisha is like, cool name. Yeah, it's amazing. Kishi makes this guy the Secretary General of Liberal Democratic Party and he's and he stays in that position until Ohno dies in 1965. And Ono is wonderful because he he gives a speech to 2000 yakuza members in the 60s where like she just straight up says like, yeah I'm yakuza but I do it by being a politician instead of being a criminal and it's like it rules. And so and you know everything is happening is that she's she's still you know Keisha's connected to sort of Kodama and kodamas like whole like yakuza. American intelligence network. And so when when Lockheed Martin is trying to get the Japanese defense force to buy their like F-104 Starfighter over Northrop Grumman's F11F, their guy in Japan who just happens to be an old G2 intelligence guy is like, I know a guy. And the guy that he knows is Kodama. Who he pays like millions of dollars in bribes to is like they give him like a $600,000 Commission on every plane they sell to get this sold to the to the Japanese government. And so kardama goes to his yakuza. Connections in the government, which is, you know, because yakuza buddy and nearly mentioned LDP Secretary General Bamako Ono and his good friend Nobusuke Kishi and Kishi buys the Starfighter and Lockheed just like keeps Kodama on retainer for like the next 30 years. And you know, I want to give people a sense of like how embedded this, like intelligence fascist yakuza network is in the LDP because it's it's not like this is a thing that's only Keisha and it goes away like. Like in in the 1970s, Codoma gets hired again by Lucky to do exactly the same thing, and he pays out like several $1,000,000 in bribes like he bribes the Prime Minister. Again. And this time he gets caught and he, you know, he he he took so much money from like the Americans browsing people that like. She managed to **** *** both the far right and the far left. And so, you know, they they start protesting his house. And on, on, on May 23rd, 1976, a fascist **** star named Missoula Maneo, who'd been a huge, gadama fanboy. Red boy, that shouldn't exist. Oh yeah. Yeah. It's great. It's great. It's better. Yes. He rents a plane. He, like, circles Kodama's house, like shouting Pro Imperial slogan until microphone. And then, like, he screams bonsai and flies the plane into his house like, this is this is in 19. 76 Kodama's house is kind of rad, to be honest. That's that's you know what? You gotta give it up sometimes. That critical support. Very cool. Undeniably rad move. Kodama lives through this. Mm-hmm. Yeah. But does he guy Comikaze this house in 1970s like a fascist **** star? Comikaze his house and he lived through it. He's just. Yeah. I mean that is basically the end of him in politics, but it's like, it's it's great. It's great. Yeah, that's that is a flex. Yeah, it's it's a this is. Yeah, this is a this is a profoundly fascist party, profoundly fascist people in it. And yeah, so yeah, so, so back it back in 1957. ** ***** dealing with like his first real political scandal, which is that a on January 3 of 1957, a U.S. soldier named Gerard, like basically just for fun, shot an empty grenade cartridge out of a grenade launcher at a Japanese woman who was like collecting shell casings and military based off of scrap. And she dies. Oh God, yeah. And you know, and this, this ****** off everyone in Japan and you know, I mean especially like she's revealed later, she's a mother of six and everyone just loses their mind and Eisen and you know, and and. There's a huge fight over it and Eisenhower wants to like try him in an American court. And Eisenhower, like his forces is like literally forced to like, try him in a Japanese court because like if if if he tried to do it in American court, like, people would have literally like brick by brick dismantled every mill can like American military base in the in the islands. And so. Keisha's main concern here is that this is gonna, like, **** ** his political stuff. And so he, he, he, he develops this plan and where, where he's going to go to to Eisenhower and make a bunch of bands about this US Japan Security Treaty and this thing. This is like one of the other things been causing protests is that this treaty is like Sunday 1951 originally. And it's it's really weird. Like it lets the US, like send troops into Japan to put down, quote, internal riots or disturbances, which is, yeah, there's and there's like in terms of like a peace treaty. And the other thing is lesson, lesson. What's the US involve itself in civil wars? And like, you know, a bunch of Japanese companies. But like, there's like no precedent for this. Like, there's never been a peace treaty that, like, between two free nations that allows this. So, you know, you get these massive protests. Like people, people, people like build giant wooden fortresses and man them for like 40 years in the middle of American artillery ranges. Like, there's all of this stuff and you know, Eisenhower. Meets with Kishi and is like and Kishi just goes look like you have to revise this tree and Eisenhower is like OK. And so Kishi like steaks basically his entire political career on on on revising this the US Japan Security Treaty, which comes known as ANPO. And, you know, like, it really looks like he's going to, like, pull this off. He's gonna get treated revisions, he's gonna be incredibly popular. And tell Kishi just like. Kishi just she's got like that extra bit too. Fascist. And the extra bit too fascist was he he tried to pass something called the police duties Execution Law, which is like, sound good? Yeah, like, that's that just already seems like we're on a bad start. Yeah. Yeah. Like, like this. This is a police law so fascist that, like, his other fascist hardliner buddies like in the LDP are like, we won't let you pass this because you'll get, you'll get eaten alive. Yeah. Basically like what it does is it. It lets it lets the Japanese. It would have let the Japanese police do warn warrantless searches and seizures. Oh, cool. Yeah. And, you know. And everyone's like so this is just like this is this, this is, this is pre war fascism again. So you know. And, you know, you know, and I think, I think he thinks he can get away with this. He's done a bunch of other like Fascist culture war sort of stuff. Like he he, he does this thing where he, he makes everyone take these like moral lessons and like all these students take moral lessons and has these like evaluations of teachers because he thinks there's like they're two communists. And once fashion propaganda, like taught instead. And, you know, I want to make it clear there is no parallel. Between this and anything that is happening in the US right now, go back to sleep. There's nothing here. Everything's gonna be fine. Just like. Yeah, no, no, no one in the US is raging bunch of political campaigns about what teachers are teaching in schools. I think it's too leftist. No, that has not happened. But you know what does happen in the US? And services. That's right. That's that's God willing, the only thing that will ever happen in this country in the future, going forward. Because when you get right down to it, what else do we need but products? Services. And of course the blissful gooey moist. Sticky what come drenched products of products and services? What? OK, well, let's just go to ads. Mint Mobile offers premium wireless starting at just 15 bucks a month. And now for the plot twist. Nope, there isn't one. Mint Mobile just has premium wireless from 15 bucks a month. There's no trapping you into a two year contract. You're opening the bill to find all these nuts fees. There's no luring you in with free subscriptions or streaming services that you'll forget to cancel and then be charged full price for none of that. For anyone who hates their phone Bill, Mint Mobile offers premium wireless for just $15.00 a month. Mint Mobile will give you the best rate whether you're buying one or for a family and at Mint. Family start at 2 lines. All plans come with unlimited talk and text, plus high speed data delivered on the nation's largest 5G network. You can use your own phone with any mint mobile plan and keep your same phone number along with all your existing contacts. Just switch to Mint mobile and get premium wireless service starting at 15 bucks a month. Get premium wireless service from just $15.00 a month and no one expected plot twist at mintmobile.com/behind. That's mintmobile.com/behind. Seriously, you'll make your wallet very happy at Mint Mobile. Com slash behind. So by now we imagine that you've seen the theories on Tiktok. You maybe even heard the rumors from your friends and loved ones. But are any of the stories about government conspiracies and cover ups actually true? The answer is surprisingly or unsurprisingly, yes. For more than a decade we here at stuff they don't want you to know have been seeking answers to these questions. Sometimes there are answers that people would rather us not explore. Now we're sharing this research with you for the first time ever in a book format, you can pre-order stuff they don't want you to know now. It's the new book from us, the creators of the podcast and video series. You can turn back now or read the stuff they don't want you to know. Available for pre-order now, it's stuff you should read books.com or wherever you find your favorite books. My name is Erica Kelly and I am the host and creator of Southern Freight true crime. There are so many people that just have no idea about some injustices in the world, and if you can give a voice to them, you can create change. To be able to do it within podcasting is just such a gift. I believe it was 18 months after I got on with Spreaker that I was making enough that I could quit my day job. It was incredible. I always feel like an ambassador for speaker. But that's because I'm passionate about podcasting. It's really easy to use. I always tell people I am so not tech. Took me 5 minutes to get comfortable with spreaker, and when I find a new friend that has an incredible show, I want them to make money. I want them to be able to do what I did. Follow your podcasting dreams. Let's break your handle the hosting, creation, distribution, and monetization of your podcast. Go to spreaker.com. That's spreaker.com. Get paid to talk about the things you love. Spreaker from iheart. Ah, we're back. OK, Chris, please continue. Yes, Chris, please continue. Sophie's angry at me because she doesn't like it when I say come drenched while leading into an ad. Not at all. I don't think anybody enjoyed that. And if you did, please don't tell us. I think our sponsors enjoy it, Sophie. Ohh no alright. I mean it could be Nissan. We we we could convince Nissan this episode. Yeah, could be, yeah. Absolutely inappropriate. Hmm. So kishi. Yeah. So Kisha Kisha's gotten a bit too fast. And he also, he does this thing where so, so the way that, like the norms, the Japanese political system worked, was that, like, you're supposed to be before you pass a bill, you're supposed to talk to the opposition about it. And then there supposed to be a debate. And he's just like, yeah, **** that. Like, he's just like SNAP introduces it without like, he basically he takes a snap vote to extend the diet and just like snap forces everyone to try to vote on it. And this is like maximally bad politics by Kishi. Like, you know, this is like the the norms. Of democracy or like actually important to Japan. And they're important because this is this is a country that was a decade and 1/2 ago, literally fascist. And Casey's trying to pass this bill that is bringing fascism back. And so, you know, everyone gets ****** *** like three of his cabinet ministers resign, and this also pulls the whole left together and they formed something called the People's Council and they start a general strike. Drop the bill and Kishi anyone, and they win. And Kishi forced to pull the bill and it, you know, it makes it way weaker politically and when. When he tries to get his security like up on Poe, the Security Treaty ratified by by the diet, those same groups form this even larger group called the People's Council for Preventing Revision to Security Treaty. And this thing is massive. It's got a it's 134 different organizations in it, you know the the biggest of them of the Japanese Socialist Party, the, the General Council of Trade Unions in Japan who are very powerful trade union federation. And then there's Zango Karen, which is the the the Japanese radical student movement who we will, we will talk more about in a little bit. Yeah, that was communist parties also sort of involved in this. But, like, they don't wanna let them join for political reasons initially. But you know, the other thing about this, like, it's not just like leftist orgs like Japan's Professional Association Association for like Thespians is in this coalition. Like, yeah, there's, you know, there's a lot of people who are, like, there's a lot of groups that are like, not inherently political groups that are in this. And interesting. Yeah. Yeah. And and it's, you know, this, this is basically, this is the product of, like, all the stuff that has been doing for the past basically since the war. Like ended. And so, you know, and and these guys point out that, you know, so she is able to get the clause out about the US interfering to suppress riots and civil wars. But there's still a clause that says the US allowed to send troops to deal with, quote, all threats to Japan's peace and security. Which, you know. Yeah. Threats to peace and security. Like people doing politics we don't agree with. Yep. Yep. Yeah. OK. Yeah. This is gonna end well. Sure. Yeah. It's yeah. So People's Council staging, he's, like, enormous. Protests and, you know, they go on for a few months. It doesn't really do anything until Zingo Karen, who's the the, the, the radical student organization goes rogue. And the important thing is that, like, so, a, they're not directly tied to any of the parties and B, they are like way more willing to fight the cops than anyone else here. And so the People's Council is planning is like masses. Here is a protest. But they go, Karen looks at like, you know, this is like their 8th giant protest and Zuckerman goes, OK, well, those did nothing. So this was like, do anything either. So they form a plan to storm the Japanese parliament building. And, you know, the People's Council, like, finds out about this plan and they're like trying to stop to go come in from doing it. But like, go around like, negotiates with like the Tokyo's, like trade unions and they're able to just do it anyways. So, you know, 500,000 people across Japan and like 80,000 people in Tokyo show up to this protests and like in the middle of the March. So go run just like charges the police barricades, beats back the police and like forces their way into the diet and takes control of it. And, you know, they hold it for like a day and they leave. And people, people do not like this. Like the the, you know, like, even like the Socialist and Japanese part Communist Party, like condemned them for it. And, you know, public opinion turns against them and there's this whole, like, disaster and, you know, and so Karen gets like a lot of **** for this because, you know, like they they stormed the, they stormed the diet building. But, you know, it's worth remembering that, like everyone else, like everything else the more moderate faction was doing just like didn't work. And what's going on did here was drew an enormous amount of attention to the movement. And this is it. And, you know, that's actually that's a vital part of, like, what happens next. And what happens next is that the Socialist Party, the Socialist Party, does like, I think, like the funniest set of political tricks I've ever seen in my life where, you know, like they have, they had this thing they want to do. They just like trying to delay the vote. Because I think if they delay the vote fast enough, like long enough kashid, we'll just, like, get like, kicked out of ministership by his own party. And, you know, and this they're able to drag this on until like 19, like 1960 and Kishi, like, you know, like kishi's own party won't let him do a floor vote on the bill. Because like, they're mad at him. And so on April 4th, 1970 he creates the on post special retail Special Measures Committee from loyal LDP members, which was called the nickname the Onpro Kamikaze squad, which is, you know, this is his attempt to try to figure out like how to like get through all of like get, get, get this like treaty through before support collapse and like the diet session ends and like literally the day the session is going to end and he's going to lose the opportunity to force his vote through, he, he starts doing his plan and that's the Socialist Party, like know something bad is going to happen so that they hire a bunch of like. But UN quote secretaries who they they they they hire them and they bring them in the building and they they barricade the office of the Speaker of the lower house to to keep him from leaving his office. Where something like, I wish like our politicians were like, man, our our politics is like our Parliament so boring, like nobody, nobody's barricading the speaker of the house like in their office. It's very, very sad, you know, and and this and the speaker, like tells them to move and they don't. And so he calls the police to remove the socialist. Numbers by force. And this is a huge deal like this is this is the second time ever that the police have ever entered the diet chamber. And this is the only time before since they've ever like physically removed diet members. And so, you know, this whole thing is being, being, being like broadcasting live TV. And there's there's the police just like dragging these like Parliament members out of this building like kicking and screaming and like, you know, and and they they they catch like the speaker, like fighting his way to the rostrum and he calls a vote to extend the diet session like 2 minutes before it's supposed to end and like he wins the vote. And there's the camera. The camera is like it's showing. It pans, it shows all the LDP like ministers clapping, and then it it it pans and it pans to the other half of the diet and the other half of the diet. Every single person in the opposition is gone. There's none of them are there. And because the opposition is completely gone, Kishi makes this like, unexpected snap vote to force the tree through with no debate. And, you know, and because of some like legal ******** he's able to figure out a way that, like the Treaty, will still go into effect even without the upper house approving it, as long as they just stay in session. And the Japanese public, like, just they're unbelievably ****** ***. Like even the Pro Treaty people look at, like the ex fascist guy, like removing the opposition party by force and holding a previously unknown, snapping right debate. Yeah, they're like, like, like, like they they watch like all of this. It's just on TV and it like. It sets off 3 general strikes and you know at this point that the protests basically become an anti keishing movements. And like everyone in the country like including like the conservative newspapers are calling for him to resign because the business leaders turn on him to the point where like they start fundings and go children. Like they start funding the the the Communist student movement through like weird organized crime people because they're like saying go Karens mainstream faction is anti is anti Kishi. Like, yeah, that's how like wild this. And you know and like the other thing is like other like ordinary people just like start showing up to protest and so like like 30 million people, which is like 1/3 of the total population shows up to like an anti protest between 19591960. Jesus Christ. Yeah. It's like it, it ****** off. And this is this is like, this is the defining event of like the sort of like the immediate post war generation. Like this is the thing they remember. Like. So we'll get to this in a little bit. But Shinzo Abe. Who was the longest serving Japanese Prime Minister? He he became out of office like last year. So he's Keisha's grandson, and he talks about like, how, yeah, he learned politics. Like, like, well, he was on Keisha's knee, and Kishi was telling him about what was happening in the streets. Was fine. Yeah. It's yeah. It's not great. And yeah, you know, this part though is extremely funny. Like there's there's a great story about just like this kindergartener like on the street who asked the famous political scientist she Takashi why doesn't Kishi just resign already like he's lost questioned your gardeners. Yeah. Yeah. And you know, the other thing the other thing that's happening with this is that so Eisenhower was supposed to show up in Japan on the 19th so he could be there for the for the 21st, which is. Supposed he's coming to this giant visit that's also like the 100th anniversary of diplomatic relations between the US and Japan. And this is also the treaty goes into effect. And so, you know, you on June 4th, there's the largest general strike in Japanese history. And then on the 15th, there's another general strike that is 6.4 million people in it. And and at this strike, you know, a bunch of, like, street performers, artists and writers like go to, like, give a petition to the, to the, to Parliament. And they all get attacked by this, like, giant fascist mob with, like, wooden poles with nails in them. And the mobs is changing. Easy will kill you and beat and beat them dead. Jesus. Yeah. Like 80 people are injured again. Like, these are like, these are like, like theater actresses. Classic fascism stuff. It's like, Oh yes, we will beat these theater actresses and poets and this, this, this, this, this will make us strong. Yeah. That scans. Yeah. And so 11 people are injured and 11. And so 80 people were injured, 11 people get hospitalized. And meanwhile they go, Karen is like, we're going to storm the diet again. And, you know, it worked the last time. Yeah. Well, but The funny thing is this time it does work and it works because. So they fight the cops for a long time, and it's kind of a stalemate. And the cops do this kind of attack. But in this kind of attack, they they trample a Tokyo University undergrad named Kamico to death. And that, yeah, that causes the crowd to just, like, go wild because, you know, the police just trampled a child to death. Yeah. And so 4000 students stormed the diet, and they hold it until 1:00 AM in these, like, running St Battles with the police. And this is where, like, like, everyone turns on Kishi. Like, you know, the combination of the cops, like, murdered a girl and they beat up a bunch of theater actresses. It's just too much. And at this point, it becomes clear that. You know, if Eisenhower comes to Japan, they won't be able to keep him safe because they can't hold the. Yeah, that that could be a little bit of a faux pas for Japan. You know and and you know and Kishi Kishi like really wants this to happen because like I the Eisenhower visit in the Treaty like this is this is like all this is like this is this is everything he's been working for since he became Prime Minister. And so he has this plan to like mobilize the self-defense forces, which is what the Japanese army is called because euphemisms. Yeah. But she. So he tries to like, he has his plan to like mobilize an entire division of like the Army and marched them through the streets to clear the streets and get Eisenhower in. And even, like, he's like his defense chief and the head of the national police is like, you can't do this. Like there will literally be an uprising. And so Keisha's like Kishi, undeterred, is like, OK, I'm going to, I'm going to go to my yakuza contacts. So it goes to Kodama, and he has he has his plan to get 18,000. Like Yuck is a hardliners like 10,000 guys who work for Yonkers, like street vendors and 10,000. Veterans. Right wing Cult members to clear the streets and like, there's going to give them like the government is going to give them like trucks and like food and first aid teams and like command post and $2.3 million and like airplanes and helicopters that couldn't end badly. Sure. Yeah, well, even his cabinet is like Kishi. You can't do this. Like you're gonna start a civil war again. And a lot of fascists being like, boy. Seems like that's too much fascism. Yeah. Yeah. Keisha. Keisha is like, yeah. Maybe she is the fascist that other fascists are. Like, whoa, hey now, like, this is too much fascism. But you know what's not too much fascism, Chris? Unless it's a black rifle coffee ad. Then. Unless it's another black rifle coffee head or an Exxon mobile ad or one of those weird Christian cult ads we've been kind of getting. Oh yeah, those those question healthcare things and literal ad for the California Highway Patrol. Yeah, definitely an ad for chips. That's. Fascism. So, I don't know. There could be some loss, but it's not. I've. I've lost the point that I was trying to make here fascist ads. But it's time for ads, and we're sorry if it's something random we didn't select and it's horrifying. We do apologize. We live in an engine of pain. Here's some ads. Mint Mobile offers premium wireless starting at just 15 bucks a month. And now for the plot twist. Nope, there isn't one. Mint Mobile just has premium wireless from 15 bucks a month. There's no trapping you into a two year contract. You're opening the bill to find all these nuts fees. There's no luring you in with free subscriptions or streaming services that you'll forget to cancel and then be charged full price for none of that. For anyone who hates their phone Bill, Mint Mobile offers premium wireless for just $15.00 a month. Mint Mobile will give you the best rate whether you're buying one or for a family and at Mint. And we start at 2 lines. All plans come with unlimited talk and text, plus high speed data delivered on the nation's largest 5G network. You can use your own phone with any mint mobile plan and keep your same phone number along with all your existing contacts. Just switch to Mint mobile and get premium wireless service starting at 15 bucks a month. Get premium wireless service from just $15.00 a month. And no one expected plot twist at mintmobile.com/behind. That's mintmobile.com/behind. Seriously, you'll make your wallet very happy at Mint Mobile. Com slash behind. So by now we imagine that you've seen the theories on tick tock. You maybe even heard the rumors, your friends and loved ones. But are any of the stories about government conspiracies and cover ups actually true? The answer is surprisingly or unsurprisingly, yes. For more than a decade, we here at stuff they don't want you to know have been seeking answers to these questions, sometimes their answers that people would rather us not explore. Now we're sharing this research with you for the first time ever in a book format, you can pre-order stuff they don't want you to know now. It's the new book from us, the creators of the podcast and video series. You can turn back now or read the stuff they don't want you to know. Available for pre-order now, it's stuff you should read books.com or wherever you find your favorite books. My name is Erica Kelly and I am the host and creator of Southern Freight true crime. There are so many people that just have no idea about some injustices in the world and if you can give a voice to them you can create change. To be able to do it within podcasting is just such a gift. I believe it was 18 months after I got on with speaker that I was making enough that I could quit my day job. It was incredible. I always felt like an ambassador for speaker. But that's because I'm passionate about podcasting. It's really easy to use. I always tell people I am so not tech. Took me 5 minutes to get comfortable with spreaker, and when I find a new friend that has an incredible show, I want them to make money. I want them to be able to do what I did. Follow your podcasting dreams. Let's break your handle the hosting, creation, distribution, and monetization of your podcast. Go to spreaker.com. That's spreaker.com. Get paid to talk about the things you love. Spreaker from iheart. Ah, good stuff. Well, we had some ads. Alright, I want to hear how this all gets resolved now that this guy's been like, what have we what if we what if we what if we twist that fascism dial up to 11 and all of his friends were like that? That kind of seems a little bit high because it seems like we've ****** everybody off with all of the violence we've been doing. Yeah, yeah, you know, it ends. I'm not gonna say well, but, you know, Kishi eventually backs down and is just like, OK, Eisenhower, like, if you come, we can't protect you. And so Eisenhower, Kansas visit. And on the day of the tree supposed to be ratified, 300,000 people show up around the diet of Tokyo. But, you know, they they can't actually stop the treaty from being ratified. And so, you know, the trees being ratified automatically, there's nothing they can do. And so they sort of they stand there and, you know, it's just very sort of grim scene. Everyone's wearing black arm bands like black bandanas to celebrate, you know, to sort of mourn. Like the death of a protester. But, you know, there's nothing they can really do. Like the the next day there's this general strike and there's like some more protests the day after. But she, she she she has the final document he needs to sign, like smuggled to him in a candy box so it couldn't be stolen by protesters. Nice. Yeah. And so she signs it. And, you know, like the next month on on July 15th, Kishi is forced to resign and the movement just collapses. So, you know, it's it's it's a mixed bag. Like on the one hand they got. She this is. This is the only consequence that Kishi is ever going to face in his entire life. That's not quite true. It's one of exactly 2 consequences ever going to face in his entire life. And he survives both of them. And but, you know, on the other hand, like this treaty still went through and, you know, the the the sort of left that had built up the stop disk becomes incredibly demoralized. And this Britain, they splinter and fragments and. Yeah. And Keisha, you know, OK. So this is the end of keyshia's like mainstream political career. But you know, he he doesn't go away. He still she sort of stays around behind the scenes as this like. That's great. It's kind of like this fixer and, you know, and he he does he does a few more things at the end of the war's end of the, he sounds like he's kind of Nixon and a little bit where he's, he's he's got some, he's got some soft influence. But also nobody wants to really be seen in public with the guy. Yeah. Well, OK. I will say there are few people who do want to be be seen in public with this guy. And the the biggest of those is called the Unification Church, which is just like, oh **** yeah. Yeah. Thematically anti communist religious rates. Yeah, that that allegedly kidnaps and brainwashes children. Allegedly. Allegedly. Yeah. And kishi. Like so Kishi, Kishi is the guy responsible for bringing these people, like into the LDP's base. And like like the head of the head of this guy, this party got named Moon and he like, yeah, she gets evicted, like convicted of tax fraud in like the 90s or the 80s and 90s. But you know, there's a thing in Japan by the in the US affected the US and there's a thing in Japanese law where like if you've been convicted of a crime. Can't enter the country now. Hmm. So this should have stopped moon from coming to Japan. But like, the vice president that, you know, even, like, even even in the 90s, like the moonies are are still, like, so firmly embedded in the LDP that even in the 90s, like, like the vice, the vice President of Japan personally intercedes and allows them to enter the country illegally. And it's yeah, it's great. This is, this is this is what she's doing. And it's sort of like last days. Yeah. And, you know, one other thing. One very weird thing happens at the very end of this, which is that the day before he resigns, he's at this like dinner gala and this dude stabs him like 6 times and then he gives this extremely weird quote. That was like, like, it's something. It's something like, well, yeah, I stabbed him six times, but if I was trying to kill him, he would be dead and there's all this, and nobody actually knows why he tried to assassinate Kishi, or didn't try to assassinate him and said just stabbed him six times. There there's a lot of theories, like the guy was like an old fascist from like the 30s. He was like 60 at this point. And you know, his stated response was that he talked to the family of like the the the girl that had died. But it doesn't make any sense because, like, this guy's a fascist. And there's another theory that, like, this is a yakuza hit. Because Bamako, Ono like, was ****** *** that Kishi wouldn't help him be Prime Minister. So he was just like, OK, I'll, I'll send the guy to stab you. I don't know. Yeah, it's there's a lot of very weird theories about this, but, you know, it's sort of unclear what happens. And, you know, Keisha, Keisha survives this. And. You know, even even though the LDP, like, is now keishi list, quote UN quote, the structures and political organizations that he put in place are, you know, they're they're still here to this day. And that brings us to Keisha's grandson, Shinzo Abe, the longest serving Prime Minister in Japanese history, who finally left office last year because of an ulcer in his ******. Which you know. Critical support for his ****** ulcer. Oh gosh. Now Abby, it's not good when I laugh in unison with Robert. Yeah, sometimes good things happen to good people. Yeah, fair enough. Now. I mean, I mean is a member of a group called Nippon Kaigai, which is a fascist group that according to a US congressional report, believes that, quote, Japan should be applauded for liberating much of East Asia from Western colonial powers. That the 1946 and 1948 Tokyo War crimes tribunals were illegitimate and that the killings by Japanese troops in the 1937 Nanjing massacre were exaggerated or fabricated and they also openly. All for restoration of the monarchy and institution of Shinto as a state religion. And and Abe himself has, like, repeatedly stated that Japanese military sex slaves, he used the term comfort woman because, you know, the euphemisms helped denialism. But he, you know, he, he, like, has said on multiple occasions that these sex slaves were never forced to be raped. Ohg good. Yeah. Yeah. OK cool dude. Yeah. No bad guy. Yeah. You know. And he's also, he's also a big champion. He's like the, like, the champion of, like, so one of the key. She's like. Other signature issue when he was a politician was rearming Japan because he was ****** *** that, like, Japan couldn't still be a. When I said you told me defense, like, he wants, like he wants Japan. He wants Japan to have an effective military that can invade ****. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it was. It was. He wants to be an empire again. And Arby's also like a giant rearmament person. Sure. And ABR baby. And he also, he visits something called there's a shrine called the Yasukuni Shrine, which is this. Brian, just like soldiers who died serving the Japanese emperor and you know this, this shrine has this, this thing called the Book of Souls, which like has the name of like everyone who died like starting for the emperor or whatever, like killing people on it. Now in this book are 1068 people who were convicted of war crimes and also the 14 Class A war criminals who died and were executed who are also considered murderers and that this includes Tojo. And it's it's. Yeah. And, you know, for for very obvious reasons, China and Korea and both the Koreas, this is like one of the few things both Koreas like really completely agree on is that they get absolutely ****** *** about Prime Minister's visiting the shrine, visiting, you know, a shrine to the people who enslaved, raped and murdered 10s of billions of their people. But you know, all they did it anyways because modern Japan is Kishi. Japan, despite the protests, despite the strikes, despite 1/3 of the country taking to the streets he won. The only thing he didn't get was the armament and so, you know, the mass. Groups in Korea and Vietnam will be left to the Americans, not the Japanese. But we all now live in the world that Kishi created. Cool. Yeah. Alright. Rhonda, happy story you told us. Yeah, I you know, I promised at the at, at at at the beginning of this episode that at the end of the episodes. I I would ask you is, is this the worst rehabilitation of a fascist war criminal in terms of like the actual amount of power he got? Probably, yeah, I think. I think probably. Because yeah, you've got like guys like von Braun, but like, von Braun was bad and it's ****** ** that he got rehabilitated, but the thing he went on to do wasn't bad. It was putting helping to put a man on the moon, which is like, fine. And you've got, I don't know, there's that Nazi general who the CIA used to set up a spy ring and he did some ****** ** stuff, but I think had a certainly had less geopolitical influence than this guy. Yeah, I think this this is definitely, I'm racking my brain, but I'm not coming up with, with one to top it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Should have started this episode with what's rehabilitating my fascists. That would have been better. That would have been a probe. And it turns out the what is my government? You love to see it. Yeah, you love to see it. Well, Chris, is that is that the entire thing? What are you? What are you? What are you, Chris? What are you good about that? To be honest, what do you? Do you? What do you what do you? What do you what do you think Nicolas Cage's hair smells like Nicolas Cage's hair? Yeah, what do you think his hair smells like? I've been looking at a picture of him for the last three hours. That explains this so much. Chris, do you have? I have, I have. I guess I don't. I don't. I don't think it smells very good because, like, you know, isn't Nicholas smells good? We well, cause isn't he constantly, like, doing bad movies because it needs money for his? Like, is it like an elephant to happen? He's like some weird. No, he's he's addicted to buying dinosaur skull dinosaurs. Yeah, that's what it is. Yeah. Yeah. OK. I think his hair smells like nail Polish remover with a hint of poop. See, I was going to say fake apples. But, like the kind, the specific fake apple smell that they put in, like agricultural products, like medicine for horses, like ivermectin. Fake apples? That's fair. Hint of poop? I don't know. We'll see if you've smelled Nicolas Cage. Hit us up on social media. Let us know. Tell us who's right. One of us has to be. You might be right, though. I think it might smell like that. Really bad Apple flavoured like alcohol also. Yeah, a little bit of that. A little bit of that of poop. Well, we'll see. We'll see. Someone out there has smelled Nicolas Cage's hair, and they'll let us know who's right. The snow let us know that's really, really what we're that way. We're not just. We're not just staring at a photo of Nicolas Cage for three hours. Let's get back to that, because it was. It's been a long day, Sophie. Everybody needs something to, you know, perk him up. Six hours at the halfway point. Look at the midway point of the day, some people have another cup of coffee. Some people stare wordlessly at a photograph of Nicolas Cage. Well, their friend talks about war crimes for three hours. Chris, where can people follow you? Yeah, you, you. You can follow me being extremely depressed about this. At it. Me, Chr 3 on Twitter. If you want to read a slightly less depressing thing that I wrote, I, I wrote a piece for Lao Song that's like about Tiananmen, which I swear is less depressing than this, if only sort of marginally. Yeah, yeah. I also, I, I work. I work for cool zone now, so I'm on. A lot of other things, yeah, you can't get rid of me now, so have a good day. And remember, tell us what Nicolas Cage's hair smells like. Hello, I'm Erica Kelly from the podcast Southern Fried True crime, and if you want to go from podcast fan to podcast host, do what I did and check out spreaker from iheart. I was working in accounting and hating it. Then after just 18 months of podcasting with Spreaker, I was able to quit my day job. Follow your podcasting dreams. Let's break your handle the hosting, creation, distribution, and monetization of your podcast. Go to spreaker.com. That's SPREA. Ker.com. If you could completely remove one phrase from your vocabulary, which phrase would you choose? I don't know. Correct answer. No, I meant I don't know which phrase, and the best way to banish I don't know from your life is by cramming your brain full of stuff you should know. Join your host, Josh and Chuck on the Super Popular podcast packed with fascinating discussions on science, history, pop culture and more episodes that ask, was the lost city of Atlantis Real? I don't know. Is birth order important? I don't know. How does pizza work? Well, I do know. Bit about that see? You can know even more, because stuff you should know has over 1500 immensely interesting episodes for your brain to feast on. So what do you say? I don't want to miss the stuff you should know. Podcast you're learning already. Listen to stuff you should know on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Sisters of the Underground is a podcast about fearless Dominican women who stood up against the brutal dictator. He needs to be stopped. We've been silent and complacent for far too long. I am Daniel Ramirez, and as a Dominicana myself, I am proud to be narrating this true story that is often left out of the history books through your has blood on his hands. Listen to sisters of the underground wherever you get your podcasts.