Mariko Okada-Collins

Mariko Okada-Collins (岡田コリンズまり子) is a Japanese language lecturer at Central Washington University and comfort women denier. In published statements, Okada-Collins disclosed that she lectures about modern Japanese history “exposing the lies” of comfort women and Nanking atrocities, which have led to her being negatively reviewed by students and reprimanded by the supervisor.

In Spring 2015, Okada-Collins invited Yujiro Taniyama from Japan to screen his comfort women denier film, “The Scottsboro Girls.” The campus community put on multiple public events on the actual history of comfort women in protest, which were attended by hundreds of students and community members. See a series of articles about these events in the June 1, 2015 issue of the Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus Newsletter.

In that Summer, Okada-Collins traveled to San Francisco to testify against the establishment of comfort women memorial there along with Koichi Mera, Yoshi Taguchi, and others.

As of the academic year 2018-2019 Okada-Collins is no longer employed at Central Washington University.

Yoshi Taguchi

Yoshi (Yoshiaki) Taguchi (田口義明) is a former San Francisco director and current New York director of Happy Science. Taguchi has organized followers of Happy Science in California and New Jersey/New York to mobilize against comfort women memorials. His past involvement includes: securing venues for comfort women denier events such as the Nadeshiko Action/Happy Science Events in California (2014), facilitating online petitions against comfort women orthodoxy, organizing members to attend hearings about comfort women, and speaking at such hearings himself.

During the 2016 U.S. Presidential Campaign, Taguchi brought Happy Science followers (who are also Himawari Japan members) to volunteer at the Donald Trump campaign headquarters in the Trump Tower. Happy Science openly supported Trump, calling him a reincarnation of George Washington.

Tony Marano

Tony Marano, a.k.a. “Texas Daddy,” is a retired salesperson, American YouTuber, and a comfort women denier. After posting videos criticizing environmental group Sea Shepherd’s campaign against Japanese whaling, Marano was recruited by Japanese businessman Shunichi Fujiki (a.k.a. “Shun Ferguson”) to be the American mouthpiece for Japanese ultra-nationalism, even though he does not speak Japanese. Marano has several books published in Japan (he does not seem to know some of what is being published under his name over there) and tours Japan regularly. Reuters describes Marano as a “right-wing darling in Japan.”

Fujiki operates publicity for Marano as the “Texas Daddy Japan Secretariat.”

This Is Texas Daddy

Global Alliance for Historical Truth

Global Alliance for Historical Truth (GAHT, 歴史の真実を求める世界連合会) is a Japanese comfort women denier group founded by Koichi Mera. There are branches in Japan and in the U.S.; Mera has stated that another branch in Brazil is being formed.

In 2014, GAHT filed a lawsuit (Gingery et al. v. City of Glendale) seeking the removal of a Comfort Women Memorial in Glendale in the federal court and then in the California state court, alleging that the City infringed on the federal government’s exclusive authority to conduct foreign affairs by enacting the memorial.

GAHT established the Princeton Institute for Asian Studies, a misleadingly named website in 2019 offering its far-right nationalist perspectives on the attack on Pearl Harbor (it was a conspiracy by FDR), comfort women (they were willing and well-paid prostitutes), Nanking massacre (all made up by the Chinese Communist Party), and the Tokyo Tribunal (racist and unfair).

GAHT leader Koichi Mera passed away in late 2019.

Board Members of GAHT-US (as of 2016)

  • Koichi Mera (目良浩一), President and Chair
  • Genki Fujii (藤井厳喜), Deputy Chair
  • Ichiro Mizushima (水島一郎), Treasurer
  • Mistsuo Takahashi (高橋光郎), Secretary
  • Kiyoshi Hosoya (細谷清), Public Relations / Newsletter Editor

Board Members of GAHT-Japan (as of 2020)

  • Kazumi Koba (木庭一三), President
  • Genki Fujii (藤井厳喜), Co-Chair
  • Kiyoshi Hosoya (細谷清), Vice Chair
  • Kumiko Mera (目良久美子)
  • Yumiko Yamamoto (山本優美子)
  • Miyuki Noguchi (野口深雪)
  • Hiroshi Horino (堀野浩史), Auditor

Board Members of GAHT-US (as of 2016)

  • Koichi Mera (目良浩一), President and Chair
  • Genki Fujii (藤井厳喜), Deputy Chair
  • Ichiro Mizushima (水島一郎), Treasurer
  • Mistsuo Takahashi (高橋光郎), Secretary
  • Kiyoshi Hosoya (細谷清), Public Relations / Newsletter Editor

Website: https://gahtjp.org (Japanese)
Website: http://gaht.jp (English)

Koichi Mera

Koichi Mera (目良浩一) is a comfort women denier and the founder and president of Global Alliance for Historical Truth (GAHT).

Mera was born in 1933 in Seoul, Korea, which was under Japanese rule at the time. He received his bachelor’s degree in engineering/architecture from University of Tokyo and Ph.D from Harvard University (urban planning) which he attended as a Fulbright scholar. He has since worked for the World Bank, University of Tsukuba, Tokyo International University, and University of Southern California. He retired from USC in 2008.

In 2006 Mera founded the Study Group for Japan’s Rebirth (日本再生研究会), a monthly Japanese-language study group on modern Japanese history for Japanese residents in Southern California. Members of the study group protested the 2013 establishment of a comfort women memorial in Glendale, California. In 2014 Mera founded GAHT to sue the City of Glendale in federal district court.

After moving to the East Coast, Mera founded “Princeton Institute for Asian Studies” to promote revisionist historical views about comfort women, Nanking massacre, as well as Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor. The “institute” was immediately rebuked by Princeton University, which it has no affiliation with, and renamed “Pacific Institute for Asian Studies.”

Mera passed away in December 2019.

Selected Publications

  • マッカーサーの呪いから目覚めよ日本人! (Wake up from MacArthur’s Curse, Japanese People!). 2012. Co-authored with Yasuo Inoue (井上雍雄) and Sadao Imamori (今森貞夫)
  • Comfort Women not “Sex Slaves” (2015). Self-published.