Brighton Football Club's 'Japan WWII soldier' controversy slammed by China fan leader

Amid the controversy over Premier League side Brighton & Hove Albion releasing a social media image of a player holding an image of a Japanese World War II soldier, a leader of Brighton's Chinese fan club says the incident shows European lack of understanding of Asian history. 

Brighton's youth academy apologized Saturday after posting the image of Japanese first-team player Kaoru Mitoma, smiling with a youth-team player and a mocked-up football card featuring Hiroo Onoda, the last Japanese soldier to surrender in World War II. 

Millions of Chinese soliders and civilians were killed during the brutal fight against Japanese invasion army, whose record of massacre, rape and looting remains a painful memory of the Chinese, one that the Japanese government has yet to apologize for. 

"I almost couldn't believe it was real at first," Jack Forsdike – who operates on social media for the Official Brighton & Hove Albion FC Supporter Club in China – tells CGTN, adding that many people thought it had been "edited or Photoshopped, or it's AI or something." 

Harbin-based Forsdike immediately wrote an email to the club, "saying just how offensive this is – and just how serious it is to be platforming a fascist soldier." 

Although Brighton deleted the post and released a statement insisting "We hugely value our fans in China and had no intention of causing any offence," this didn't do much to quell the controversy – with commenters noting other Asian countries invaded by Japan hadn't received an apology either.

Forsdike notes Brighton "failed to address the fact that this sort of accidental post would offend all victims of fascism. In the apology, they only mention Chinese fans.

"But I think the issue was partly that the apology didn't actually address the fascist soldier that was mentioned in the photo. It didn't come out and state very clearly the club is anti-fascist and always will be, which I'm sure the club is. But it needs to reaffirm that stance."

A Brighton club spokesperson told CGTN Europe the now deleted post was a genuine mistake, but one the club has taken responsibility for.

Brighton has apologized for any offence the post has caused to anyone, in China, South East Asia or anywhere else in the world.

Brighton has a zero tolerance approach on discrimination and does not condone fascist or racist behavior in any way, the spokesperson added.

Historical understanding 

Born in northern England, Forsdike spent a year in Beijing while studying for a modern languages degree at the University of Manchester. He moved to China in 2022 to work in the video games industry. 

As such, he has more of an idea of the weight of history – not least via his wife Zhao Hengyi, whose grandfather grew up in Japanese-occupied Shenyang in northeast China's Liaoning Province.

"In Europe, our education focuses on the European part of World War II," Forsdike says. "In the UK, we do at least learn that Japan was part of the Axis Powers, but I think perhaps it's so far away that people understand this as an abstract concept. 

"They don't know some of the atrocities that Japan carried out during this period. That's honestly not that common knowledge in Europe."

Brighton said the picture of Mitoma was taken at an event leading up to the Premier League Christmas Truce Tournament, in which under-12 players from eight English clubs compete against European ones. 

The tournament is named for an impromptu December 25 truce in World War I, when British and German soldiers met in no-man's land, with some playing football together. 

The Premier League describes the competition as an event where youth players can gain "understanding of the historical events that shaped our world".

However, for Forsdike the Onoda picture evokes clearer comparison with World War II, and imagery that is still considered incredibly offensive – or illegal – in many countries. 

"There's been a lot of comments online comparing this to the club posting pictures of a Nazi soldier in uniform," he says. 

"In Europe, that is effectively the equivalent of a fascist country that inflicted a lot of horrible atrocities on the local population. That's something in Europe that we're incredibly sensitive about because it is history that is local to us – it can be a hate crime to dress up in Nazi uniform. 

"But unfortunately, they seem to think that posting a Japanese fascist soldier perhaps isn't as serious or perhaps they're not as aware of the history, so they don't realize that, in fact, the severity is on the same level here."

Cultural sensitivities 

As the controversy rumbled on, Forsdike noticed a reaction from some online commenters saying complaints were over-sensitive, which he would never agree.   

"I think you can guarantee that if it had been a Nazi soldier and then the Jewish fanbase were complaining, I'm sure that nobody would have been calling them over-sensitive," he says. "To a lot of people, this looks like the club was platforming fascism. I think that's quite a serious issue."

Brighton expressed to Forsdike a willingness to work with the Seagulls over China fan club closely to understand more about the region. 

"I think that would be a positive step to take because there's clearly some cultural sensitivities that they don't have the education of," he says. 

"I would love to live in a world where people in Europe can understand the fascist army in Japan in World War II and the role that it played is as serious as the role that Nazis played in Europe in World War II. I think if people could understand that, there would be a lot more respect for China and for the other Asian countries that suffered."