"You Can Imagine--"

The trials of Japanese war criminals were scheduled to open in January. Bluff, tough ex-Gangbuster Joseph Berry Keenan had arrived in Tokyo as U.S. chief prosecutor. Warrants for the arrests of more & more suspects (286 to date) poured from U.S. Army desks. Japan's entire ruling class--diplomats, businessmen, journalists, educators--had the jitters. But when anyone mentioned the words senso hanzaisha (war criminal), they kept their faces straight and bland.

Most prominent innocents last week:

P:Prince Fumimaro Konoye, thrice Premier of Japan, and Tojo's predecessor. He had been working ostentatiously on a new, liberal constitution for Japan. Last week, friends reported him "lost in meditation" at his villa in fashionable Karuizawa.

P: Marquis Koichi Kido, Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal and Emperor Hirohito's closest adviser. Also waiting at his villa, he said: "I mean only to read books in my leisure. I have nothing else in my mind."

P: Prince Morimasa Nashimoto, 71, Supreme War Councilor (since 1923), Field Marshal, and Lord Custodian of the Shinto Shrines. Standing in the bomb-charred ruins of his mansion, he told newsmen: "I had nothing whatsoever to do with the war. ... I didn't actively oppose it, but you can imagine how I felt. ... I was only an honorary chairman [of military societies]. . . . Let's see what else I have done." He paused, looked up solemnly, added: "Nothing."

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