サ斗 (sato)

the fact that vasily kept making art inspired in ogata for over 30 years is so interesting to me. we don't know much about vasily, we assume his motive for following ogata was revenge for fucking up his face and killing his comrades. but ogata's death didnt solve any of this. ogata was not a target, he was a muse. rather than anger, it was fascination. one of the most interesting aspects about vasily is that basically the only character trait we know about him is his obsessive nature, he's infatuated with ogata, even beyond death. and although of course, ogata marked him mentally and physically; vasily's art doesn't come from a place of victimhood. i think that if vasily's art was about trauma and victimhood, he'd portray scenes where he reclaims power over his victimizer, his art maybe would carry a more somber tone, maybe grief. but no. his art doesn't come from a place of anger or pain. it's fascination. i don't think he hates ogata. his infatuation with ogata seems more about a curiousity that he can't shake off. he could've gone home. he could've found peace. he could've grieved. but he chose to cross to another country, so far from home. with people who speak a language he doesn't know. why would someone go through all that hassle? it wasn't about ogata dying. it wasn't about closure.

ogata is not his model. he is his muse, he is the embodiment of something that only vasily knows. the embodiment of something vasily sees worthy of being made into art. vasily dedicated his life to ogata. he directed all his creative energy to ogata. it was tribute. he dedicated his work to ogata, the fact that he portrayed ogata in metaphorical ideas. that's not resentment.

in his sketches, ogata is never portrayed in a negative light. he is portrayed smiling, doing human things. vasily saw him more than just a sniper, more than just an opponent. there was something about ogata's (imagined) humanity that captivated vasily. that's another thing, the fact that vasily didn't know ANYTHING about ogata. he couldn't even know why they hated ogata, any anecdote about him, not even something about his personality. anything. ogata existed in vasily's world as a concept, a sacred image he could mold into whatever he sees or wants ogata to be. vasily only knew ogata for his skills. he didn't know ogata. but the manga makes the effort to make it seem like he did. their imagined connection, it's more than just parallelisms, is the delusion of a connection, of knowing him and his thoughts. it's parasocial.

ogata only saw vasily for his skills. purely technical. nothing so deep to the soul. just because vasily can't talk, and we kind of see him as a sort of chill boy tagging along, doesn't mean he's objectively weird, an obsessed freak. it's creepy in a way.

in the anime, the added dialogue was an interesting choice. "i crossed the sea just for you", it sounds almost romanticized, as if there was some poetic beauty in his journey to find him. his remarks aren't violent. they aren't vengeful. ogata is vasily's golden kamui.

when he says "my wildcat". it's not about revenge, it's the feeling of ogata belonging to him. vasily didn't want to let go of his painting, not until he passed away. ogata is a piece of art that belongs to him.

it almost reminds me of this trope of the explorer trying to find an animal or a treasure, and for comedic value, the explorer refers to the thing he looks for as his. because there's some sense of accomplishment in finding their treasure, an accomplishment that belongs to him, in an almost personified way.

and at the end of the day, we will never know what made vasily be so obsessed, what touched exactly about ogata touched his soul at this level. what did vasily look for in ogata. what did he wanted ogata to be. it's the mystery that makes it so intriguing.

this is written very messily, this is more of a stream of consciousness type of thing, im just rambling.

it's very interesting the way tsurumi can control men with the same injustice their military perpetrates. the military uses men as pawns for a cause and then don't compensate them fairly, and it keeps them in the military with the promise to compensate them fairly. it almost doesn't make sense, but that's the point of it, it's nonsensical and it keeps the men stuck serving a master who doesn't feed them, with the hope someday the master will feed them. a cycle of blind trust. that's what propaganda, brainwashing, and manipulation is.

i find it interesting the stark contrast with the way some men viewed the war after it ended. the ones who stayed under tsurumi still hope for their fair compensation, again, a naive hope based on their frustration, which tsurumi feeds into. but then we get soldiers like sugimoto, who after the war understood that this war was never for the soldiers to gain anything, but for the rich to profit from. (i believe this is why he almost killed that officer, he didn't care about the reward because we understood there was probably no reward worth it enough, but that's just a theory). also soldiers like tanigaki, who can see through the lies and doesn't cling to the hope of compensation, and makes peace with his life, desiring some sense of normalcy the war and the military took from him. he can't waste his entire life pissing and whining over a compensation that he knows won't be happening, he will never benefit from this waste of time - might as well live a life worth living, a more meaningful one.

Part 1: Setting the stage: The war as the base for Golden Kamuy —& Tsurumi's Ambitions. (Important historical key points you might've missed when reading the manga.)

The russo-japanese war is sometimes referred to world war zero by some historians, arguing its impact on how wars were perceived at the time. although when the war first started, it almost seemed as an isolated incident between a small asian nation and a big European imperial power, this war set the new stage for what wars would become and the new status of Japan as a imperial power equal to the europoean empires of the time. this meant a newfound confidence within the japanese imperialists in their power and militaristic strength, a confidence that made them broaden their expansionist ambitions. in the manga, this confidence can be seen in characters like Lt. Tsurumi, that not long after the russo-japanese war was over, he already wanted to start another war, with his main goal being Manchuria, a region Japan was actually trying to colonize at the time. knowing this information is useful when understanding one of the many anti-war messages of the manga, Lt. Tsurumi as one of the main antagonist of the story quite literally being the representation of Japan's imperial and expansionist ambitions. He's a war addict, in Tsukishima's own words in chapter 94. Though the manga takes place in 1907 and ends (around) before 1910, the war this manga is centered around impacts the story, the characters' ambitions and their behavior.

the Russo-Japanese War, as mentioned before, is often thought of world war zero by some, or at least, a foundation to what modern warfare would become. a decade after the war ended, the first world war would break out, redefining imperial power and borders forever, and allowing Japan to position itself as a rising prominent power among nations. this war was a turning point for 20th century warfare, with the new industrialization, came a more brutal war never seen before. this state of almost "total war" brought a new era of industrial revolution and advancements in weaponry creation, weapons never used before in the battlefield. and this is where i want to talk about the impact of this military conflict in society's perception of war and the impact on soldiers, more specifically the psyche of the characters in the manga and how this is shown throughout the story.

Part 2. Post-War Society & Their Perception of Japanese Victory. (—and how it influences Sugimoto's Political Position)

We need to understand the state of mind in meiji japanese society. the imperial army had adopted its own version of bushidō, a philosophical code originating in feudal times among the samurai class. The new understanding of bushidō impacted the way soldiers and civilians saw conflicts; from the individualistic perspective of bushidō to a more nationalistic one during the meiji era. in other words, their understanding of bushidō was used a tool of propaganda, to create a unified sense of "japanese-ness", therefore seeing the conflicts of the time and japanese expansion as "necessary", that these wars were a means to protect japanese society and its power in the global stage.

the soldiers saw this self sacrifice as something done for a greater good, to serve the emperor, or whatever they loved. this strong sense of sacrifice and love is what the manga, again, criticizes through Lt. Tsurumi. Tsurumi uses this same propaganda, the human vulnerability and sense of duty of the men to serve his own interests, which at the same time, to an extent, serve the interests of the imperial expansionism.

In the 3rd chapter of the manga, there's a scene at the onsen where Sugimoto is talking to a civilian, and the civilian thanks him for his service, seeing Sugimoto's scarred body as an act of self sacrifice for the greater good, for the perceived safety and stability of their society. This scene is no random scene, but the main stance of what the war means to the author. Sugimoto's response to the man is "the merchants are only ones getting rich". Although Sugimoto is mostly perceived as an apolitical character by many fans, at the beginning of the manga, his statements are very political, and could perceived to be against the government's war policies (that a great part of the society supported at the time). His involvement when stationed at Port Arthur and his brutal experience in the battlefield marking his opinions throughout the manga. Sugimoto's opinions about the war in the first few chapters set the political and anti-war tones of the story. We could also argue and theorize that his ambiguous comment about attacking one of his officers who "pissed him off" could've been caused by his shift in opinion about the war, since this attack also caused him to lose the order of the golden kite, a very high award of the time that could've made him live in a comfortable economical position for the rest of his life. Sugimoto is fully aware that his attack on the officer made him lose such an important award, which makes me think that his opinion against the war was strong enough for him to sacrifice this award. (But this is just my personal opinion when reading the panel.) Regardless, Sugimoto is clearly against the war or dissatisfied with the goverment and outcomes of the war, despite the japanese victory over the russians.

Sugimoto doesn't perceive himself as a war hero, despite being recognized as such by civilians and fellow soldiers alike. As shown in chapter 48 when speaking to Kiroranke, a fellow veteran, he says "I'm not a hero, I'm just a soldier who didn't die". It's just another of the many examples of the anti-war messages of the manga and Sugimoto's political position.

But when speaking about the characters' political positions, we also have to talk about the psychological effects of this war on their opinions, personalities and mental health.

Part 3. Understanding Trauma and Guilt in a Primitive Era of Psychotraumatology. (—& Military Programming)

Although Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) has become a widely recognized term in modern times, this was not always the case. PTSD was recognized with this name in the 1980s, a while after the Vietnam War. Although throughout history there has been a vague understanding of soldier's trauma after the war, during the russo-japanese war, this was a hardly understood concept still. it wasn't until the first world war that the term "Shell Shock" was starting to be more widely recognized and a bigger problem society and medical fields had to address. But what was the understanding of war trauma during the russo-japanese war?

This is another reason why i think the author's choice of setting the story during the russo-japanese is brilliant is because it was in this war that post-battle psychiatric symptoms were first started to be recognized. The story starting in 1907 is an interesting choice, since it was in 1907 that psychiatrist first coined the term "War Neurosis" and linked it to other cases of trauma. this is where our understanding of PTSD starts taking its primitive shape —in 1907.

Golden Kamuy's story explores "war neurosis" through many characters, especially through the main character, Sugimoto, who repeatedly shows symptoms of what we now understand as PTSD. Although "war neurosis" was starting to be discussed among psychiatrists at the time, especially in Europe, this doesn't mean that society at large understood what war neurosis or trauma even was. On the contrary, we can see throughout the manga how people treat Sugimoto and the other veterans and soldiers as war heroes. They see Sugimoto's scars as a sign of sacrifice, valourous, the sign of the strength of their nation, completely disregarding whatever trauma the man might be suffering from the war, who he has lost, or even his opinions on the matter.

We also need to talk about military programming and the way Golden Kamuy showcases the negative impact of it on its charactes. In chapter 100, Sugimoto describes to Asirpa how he was programmed. "During the war, I believed the russians died without suffering as much as we japanese. In war, we had to become someone else or we wouldn't be able to fight. That was the only way we could survive".

Soldiers are programmed to let go of society's core values such as "killing is bad". (we can also add to this the dehumanization of other people, as Sugimoto's statement for his own comfort is dehumanizing and racist in itself, a racism product of the time [see cited]). Killing is a necessary experience for a soldier, it's their job, and the military cannot afford to take into consideration the psychological impact of it. But as society, we know that killing is bad, and so do soldiers when they come back from war. And it's this awareness that brings feelings of guilt. Today, in many countries there are therapies and resources (though very limited even in our times) to help veterans reintegration into society, dealing with trauma and guilt, readjusting their values to fit back into civilian life. The military functions similarly to a cult, where soldiers are indoctrinated and programmed. So imagine all of this during the early 20th century, where there was barely any understanding of all of this. This is what made a lot of the characters in the manga vulnerable to the allure of Lt. Tsurumi, whose figure can resemble in personality to one of a cult leader, the embodiment of propaganda. This I think is the most complete explanation of the way each character explores their trauma in their own way, most not being able go back to civilian life, preferring to stay in the military, projecting their guilt into others, and their terrible ways of coping with all the baggage.

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i don't want this analysis to be seen as an excuse or justification to the actions of any real soldier, or the characters' motives and actions in the manga, rather this essay be an explanation of their behavior as a product of their time.

i want this analysis to offer a historical and psychological perspective when reading the manga, i think this information can be helpful when understanding the manga and central themes of the story.

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for further reading about the topics that i discussed here, you can check this link where i provide all the sources for this information.

so as i was reading lolita by vladimir nabokov, i read the part at the beginning in which humbert has a past love with a girl named annabel, but his love is unfulfilled by her premature death, which then causes him to later be infatuated with young girls.

it made me think of the way that sugimoto is obsessed with asirpa, and slowly trying to get over umeko. his romance with umeko is interrupted by a tragic death, and while umeko isn't the one to die, their love abruptly does. and then sugimoto has to mourn a love that couldn't be. the love of his youth, the last time he felt innocent, through that innocent teenage love. he tries to move on from umeko, being happy that she grew up to become the wife of a dear friend, a mother, grow up to be a woman. yet he still seems to mourn, not her, but their innocent love.

when he found asirpa, he found that innocent love again. the way he looks at her, sees the shine in her eyes, the way he vows to protect her innocence. he becomes obsessed with her, not being able to be away from her. protecting their partnership. in a way, i think he found ume-chan in asirpa. the love of his teenage years that was interrupted, taken away from him, being able to flourish again through a teenage girl. his love for asirpa is an extension of what he once felt for ume-chan.

by this, i am not implying any romantic feelings towards asirpa. i personally don't interpret sugimoto's love for asirpa in any romantic way, and i don't think noda-sensei intended it this way at all either. he himself has said that he chose to make asirpa a little girl so the audience could understand that their relationship was just platonic. i think that what im trying to say here is more about the concept of innocence and innocent love, not touching on romance or sexuality, in this case.