The Battle Front for the Liberation of Japan (Summer in Sanrizuka / Nihon Kaiho sensen: Sanrizuka no natsu)

Produced by OGAWA PRODUCTIONS

Suddenly in July, 1967,

the government decided to build an airport in Narita.

In October, 1967 the Airport Corporation began pile driving

backed by 2000 mobile riot policemen.

In March, 1968, the Corporation began land surveys

of land belonging to pro-airport farmers.

The cast of this film consists of a coalition of anti-airport farmers,

students, nationwide anti-war groups, Ogawa Productions,

Airport Corporation workers and riot police flying squads.

You've ruined my watermelons!

What are you going to do?

You bastards!

Can't you control them?

How dare you!

Tell your men to stop it!

First remove the barricades.

It's an illegal obstruction, you are breaking the law!

Remove the barricade immediately.

You riot cops!

You're the ones who're trampling our fields. It's just more of your lies.

And you won't even take responsibility!

You lie and you break your own damn laws!

No one's throwing stones.

Yes, you did.

I'm not that sort of man.

You're the ones trespassing.

And you just destroyed a field of our watermelons.

You've gone and totally ruined the crop.

We have a designated spokesman.

Address your complaints to him.

Hwy. 51 reports a 150 member flying squad of riot police.

They are accompanied by

Corporation workers and plain-clothes detectives.

The protesters are heading for Suzuki's place.

There are five rows of them.

The leader is agitating from a moving vehicle.

Three-five to patrol.

Hello, 3-5, this is 6-5, over.

Loud and clear. Go ahead, over.

The truck bound riot troups are heading for Narita.

But we've missed them.

They're probably moving around behind you. Over.

The Corporation men are moving away,

and they're now passing the fields, over.

They're issuing a warning.

They're demanding that we clear the area of any and all traffic.

Our side is chanting in protest.

Our command car is in front of the flying squad, and is leading the demonstration.

The cops are spreading nets. Better stop throwing stones.

The lead police car has approached our position.

It's stopped about 50 cm from our first line.

They're saying that if we do not

clear the road they have the right to arrest us.

We've managed to stop the police.

It's a face-off and no one is moving.

Including this vehicle...

Tomura is protesting to the police from the car.

All the police units have started to move.

We are unable to proceed...

SUMMER IN SANRIZUKA

Directed by Shinsuke OGAWA

Filmed by Koshiro OTSU Masaki TAMURA

Produced by Hideko KOBAYASHI Hiroo FUSEYA and Takatsugu ICHIYAMA

This is agitation vehicle #1, over.

Corporation workers are approaching.

About thirty of them, all wearing yellow helmets,

heading for Watanabe's place.

This is the anti-airport agi-prop car.

You airport-farmers please listen.

You have allowed corporation workers onto your land.

We interpret this to mean you are in favor

of construction of a 4000 meter runway.

Regardless of your capitulation,

we will resort to violence to stop them.

If you continue to cooperate with the government...

...if you allow them to carry out their survey,

we have no choice but to protest against you, too.

They're sending riot troops against us.

You don't care, do you?

Get out of here!

What's your name Got one, haven't you?

What you're doing is against all moral laws.

Are you a civil servant? Take off your glasses.

You're just bringing hardships to the farmers.

In the long run, you'll pay for this.

They're just farmers, you know.

Get the hell out!

You're only bringing pain!

We'll fight against you to the very end.

You'll never build your damn airport!

Stop your survey and get out now.

We know you're just doing your job.

But with the rain and your survey,

we're unable to tend to the crops in our fields.

This is the worst season for us.

It's really unfair that you come here now.

It's like you're tormenting us.

As long as some of us still opose your airport,

stop your survey and leave us alone.

We don't want your damn airport!

Unless you immediately disband...

you will all be arrested.

You're exposing you fellows to risk of injury.

Can you sanction that?

Attention riot police!

The Emperor Meiji envisioned a cattle ranch right here.

Now you want to bulldoze it all away!

On His behalf we'll shower you with cow-shit!

Is this how you fight? Against women?

You filthy wretches! Get out!

Why are you armed?

If you injure our people, you'll never be forgiven.

Get out of here!

We're farmers. We're not armed and trained fighters!

What do you know of us?

Will you beat farmers and women with your billy-clubs?

Shame on you! You're despicable!

Please conduct your protest properly.

We'd like you to stop your illegal acts.

In the Vietnam War, a peasant base

was pitted against the hi-tech American military.

The Vietnamese weapons were vastly inferior.

Almost no comparison.

How did they resist the world's greatest military power

for seven years, and then go on to defeat it?

The answer is the spirit and the purity of the peasant.

Our fight against the forces of government

should mimic that of the Vietnamese farmers.

We are small in number and we're unarmed.

No match for their armoured cars and water cannons.

Their hi-tech, extendible billy-clubs,

their semi-armoured uniforms, and their guns.

We have none of these and we are weak.

But it's been two years since we started fighting.

What has kept us going is our spirit.

Not like those who folded and accepted their terms.

The government is afraid of us.

We have rejected their offers to talk about this airport.

We've been fighting against the government.

To them we farmers are a nuisance.

But they must get rid of us.

So the resort to violence.

But this has only increased our fighting spirit.

Why, you ask?

Let's consider the power of us as individuals.

That power belongs to nobody.

It is the collective power of the farmers on the land.

That power gives us our fighting spirit.

Even if injured, the power to fight remains.

If we follow the 'acceptable' means of protest,

there'll be no resolution in our favor.

We must fight face to face with them.

By doing so, we can win.

I remind you that we bear no arms to fight with.

Even in the face of the riot police,

we're limited to simple farming implements.

We must use our farming tools to defend ourselves.

That is what we must do.

Ours is different from historical peasant uprisings.

Ours is a liberal war,

a revolution of farmers.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

have been exploited by

and forced to obey the government.

Now those farmers have risen to their feet

and here have begun to fight the national power.

We should not be afraid of the flying squad riot police.

We should not be afraid of death and restraints.

This fight should be fought to the limit.

To the extend where one or two of them loses their head.

We should be prepared to go that far.

Pull back! We're spraying gas!

We're spraying gas!

They're coming up this way, so stop them here.

Not from over there.

That'll only cut off our escape route.

There's no need to escape.

One day the Narita headquarters was attacked,

by protesters excluding the farmers.

The protesters became angry at the farmers.

We won something today.

You should offer some help with our retreat.

The location is bad. The fields would be destroyed.

There is no way to retreat.

It's not as if we're going suddenly start winning.

Who asked these kids her, anyway?

Forget that. What we need is a victory.

Get ready with your clubs.

Next time attack with your clubs.

Be wraned! We're using tear gas.

WE DON'T WANT YOUR AIRPORT

We can't escape.

If we had some way of retreat it would be okay.

But here we're sandwiched from both sides.

It's like they done this on purpose.

If you really want to leave us like this,

we can't fight together. And I'll do it my way.

The background to the Narita dispute

is very complicated.