The motion picture 永遠のゼロ。(The eternal Zero) released in December 2013, was adapted from a novel about a young man searching for information about his grandfather’s WWII special forces duty. The ultraconservative author of the novel,  Naoki Hyakuta was recently appointed by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to the governing board of the public broadcasting network NHK.

Recent nationalistic remarks by the Japanese government have further increased tension between Japan and the USA.