Editing Reverse Course (section)

==Reverse Course policies==

As part of the Reverse Course, thousands of conservative and nationalist wartime leaders were de-[[purge (occupied Japan)|purged]] and allowed to reenter politics and government ministries.{{sfn|Kapur|2018|p=9}} In the industrial sector, plans for further antitrust actions against the remains of the old zaibatsu were scrapped, and some earlier antitrust policies were partially undone.{{sfn |Kapur|2018|p=9}} MacArthur had originally planned to break up 325 Japanese companies, but in the end only 11 companies were dissolved.<ref>{{cite book |last=Sugita |first=Yoneyuki |title=Pitfall or Panacea: The Irony of US Power in Occupied Japan, 1956–1952 |publisher=Routledge |year=2003 |isbn=978-0-41594752-7 |page =32}}</ref> In the realm of self defense, the United States began pressuring Japan to eliminate Article 9 and remilitarize.{{sfn|Kapur|2018|p=9}} To this end, SCAP established the [[National Police Reserve]] (NPR) in 1950 and the Coastal Safety Force (CSF) in 1952. They later became the ground and maritime branches of the [[Japan Self Defense Forces]] (JSDF) in 1954, respectively.<ref>{{Cite journal |title=Legal Restrictions on the Actions of the Japan Air Self Defense Force |last=Okamoto |first=Jun |volume=40 |number= 2 |date=2013 |url=https://www.afjag.af.mil/Portals/77/documents/AFD-131017-010.pdf |journal=The Reporter |publisher= [[United States Air Force Judge Advocate General's Corps]] |url-status=live |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20170611013327/http://www.afjag.af.mil/Portals/77/documents/AFD-131017-010.pdf |archive-date=11 June 2017 |pages =14–15 |df=dmy-all }}</ref> SCAP also attempted to weaken the labor unions they had recently empowered, most notably issuing an edict stripping public-sector workers of their right to go on strike.{{sfn|Kapur|2018|p=9}}

The climax of the Reverse course came in the so-called {{nihongo|"[[Red Purge]]"||reddo pāji}} of 1950. The victory of the communists in China in [[1949 in China |1949]] and the outbreak of the [[Korean War]] in 1950 had heightened conservative fears that communism was on the march in Asia. Against this backdrop Japanese government and business leaders, with the encouragement of SCAP, purged tens of thousands of communists, alleged communists, and other leftists from government posts, private sector jobs, and teaching positions at schools and universities.{{sfn|Kapur|2018|p=10}}

In many ways, the Reverse Course resembled the [[Marshall Plan]] in Europe, especially in that it prioritized economic reconstruction while attempting to limit the influence of communism.{{source?|date=August 2021}}