Word: toyama
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...decade, one or another of these blood brotherhoods was behind the assassination of Premiers Hamaguchi and Inukai, onetime Finance Ministers Inouye and Takahashi, Generals Watanabe and Nagata, Admiral Saito, Financier Baron Dan-men who seemed to the superpatriots to have betrayed Japan's divine mission to dominate Asia. Toyama personally had a hand in promoting the acquisition of Korea and in starting the Russo-Japanese war, and through the incredible Major Dohihara and a ruffian named Komei precipitated the Manchurian incident...
...Toyama has never been implicated in any of these crimes; it is doubtful whether there is any authority, except perhaps the Emperor, which would dare punish...
...Japanese superstition holds that toads wield a dangerous hypnotic magnetism over humans, and Japanese say that like a toad Toyama pulls and pushes young men into these plots and assassinations. Born in a frenzy-inclined community on Kyushu Island, he was raised in the "school of heroes" of Miss Takaba, a unique female warrior who wore two swords and swung two hot little fists. In his youth Toyama evaded and broke successive apprentice ships, embarked on a self-righteous outlawry something like Robin Hood's, and about 1894 established the foundations of the Black Dragon Society...
...exploits are legendary. It is said that he once entered the headquarters of a robber chief, sat down and simply glared at the chief until he bowed, apologized and handed the loot to Toyama, who returned it to the owners. He made a fortune by borrowing huge sums and then paid his debts by selling coal mines he had acquired by political wangling-all to prove how easy it was to acquire riches. He then retired to poverty and his small wooden house...
Stalling of the war in China gave Toyama and his henchmen a chance for a comeback. They indirectly allied themselves with Premier Prince Fumimaro Konoye's drive to abolish political parties and set up a totalitarian State. By last week their operations had become considerably more open...