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- Honorary Aryan is a term from Nazi Germany. It was a status granted by the Nazi Bureau of Race Research to certain groups of people—who were not generally considered to be biologically part of the Aryan race—which certified them as being part of the Aryan race. The prevalent explanation as to why the status of "honorary Aryan" was bestowed by the Nazi's upon other non-White races is that the services of those races were deemed valuable to the German economy, or simply for other purely political reasons. However, in the case of the Japanese people, to whom Adolf Hitler bestowed the title following the Anti-Comintern Pact on Communism (signed in 1936), it seemed that they were granted the status more so because of their apparent racial integrity. In The Political Testament of Adolf Hitler, Hitler stated, "Pride in one's own race - and that does not imply contempt for other races - is also a normal and healthy sentiment. I have never regarded the Chinese or the Japanese as being inferior to ourselves. They belong to ancient civilizations, and I admit freely that their past history is superior to our own. They have the right to be proud of their past, just as we have the right to be proud of the civilization to which we belong. Indeed, I believe the more steadfast the Chinese and the Japanese remain in their pride of race, the easier I shall find it to get on with them. " Although of a different ethnicity, the Japanese were, in fact, considered by Nazi ideologists such as Heinrich Himmler, as having similar enough qualities with German-Nordic blood to warrant an alliance with them. Himmler, who possessed a great interest in and was influenced by the anthropology, philosophies and pantheistic religions of East Asia, mentioned how his friend Oshima, a Japanese military attaché in Berlin, believed that the the noble castes in Japan, the Daimyo and the Samurai, were descended from gods of celestial origin, which was similar to Himmler's own belief that "the Nordic race did not evolve, but came directly down from heaven to settle on the Atlantic continent. " Karl Haushofer, a German General, geographer, and geopolitician, whose ideas may have influenced the development of Adolf Hitler's expansionist strategies, saw Japan as the brother nation to Germany. In 1908, he was sent by the German army "to Tokyo to study the Japanese army and to advise it as an artillery instructor. The assignment changed the course of his life and marked the beginning of his love affair with the orient. During the next four years he traveled extensively in the Far East, adding Korean, Japanese, and Chinese to his repertoire of Russian, French, and English languages. Karl Haushofer had been a devout student of Schopenhauer, and during his stay in the Far East he was introduced to Oriental esoteric teachings. " It was based on such teachings that he came to make similar bestowals of his own upon the Japanese people, calling them the "Aryans of the East", and even the "Herrenvolk of the Orient" (i.e. the "Master race of the Orient"). As such, the approximately 10,000 Japanese nationals who resided in Germany during the World War II period, had enjoyed more privileges than any other "non-White" ethno-national group under their "honorary Aryan" citizenship.
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