Kakuei Tanaka

Kakuei Tanaka (田中 角栄, Tanaka Kakuei, 4 May 1918 – 16 December 1993) was a Japanese politician who served as Prime Minister of Japan from 1972 to 1974. He served in the House of Representatives from 1947 to 1990. As prime minister, Tanaka advocated large-scale infrastructure development and oversaw the normalization diplomatic relations with China. Afterwards he was arrested in connection to the Lockheed bribery scandals, but nevertheless exercised a dominant influence on Japanese politics until suffering a stroke in 1985.

Born in rural Niigata Prefecture, Tanaka grew up under poor circumstances and received little formal education. As a young man he worked in the construction industry, becoming the president of his own construction company at a young age. He made a fortune from military contracts during the Pacific War. After the war, Tanaka went into politics and became noted for his earthy and tenacious political style. Becoming a member of the Liberal Democratic Party when it was founded in 1955, Tanaka successively served as minister of posts and telecommunications, chairman of the LDP Policy Research Council, minister of finance, secretary general of the LDP and minister of international trade and industry.

After a power struggle with Takeo Fukuda, he became prime minister in 1972. Diplomatically, he pursued negotiations leading to the Japan–China Joint Communiqué. Domestically he pursued his "Plan to Remodel the Japanese Archipelago," an infrastructure development program, but his standing was hurt by the 1973 oil crisis. He resigned amidst allegations of corruption in 1974. Two year later Tanaka was implicated in the Lockheed bribery scandals, which led to his arrest and trial; he was found guilty by two lower courts, but his case remained open before the Supreme Court until his death. Throughout his legal problems, he maintained influence through his faction, the largest faction in the LDP, and was able to serve as kingmaker for subsequent prime ministers, which led to him being called "Shadow Shōgun" (闇将軍, Yami-shōgun). A debilitating stroke he suffered in 1985 led to the collapse of his political faction, with most members regrouping under the leadership of Noboru Takeshita in 1987.

He was nicknamed Kaku-san (角さん, Mr. Kaku) and was known as the "ima taiko" (今太閤, modern taiko) and "Shadow Shōgun" (闇将軍, Yami-shōgun). His politico-economic direction is called the construction state (土建国家, Doken Kokka). He was strongly identified with the construction industry but never served as construction minister. His daughter Makiko Tanaka and son-in-law Naoki Tanaka were also prominent politicians.