Introduction

In shaping national memories, war-heritage sites potentially function as reminders of the past that can point the way to a better future (Ryan, 2007). Visiting these “dark sites” – former battlefields, war museums, and other places which witnessed death and suffering – has been conceptualised in tourism research as “dark tourism” (Lennon & Foley, 2000). Once dark sites emerge as tourist destinations, death, tragedy, trauma, and pain become part of their brand image. However, the promotional materials that narrate the destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and portray the Japanese as victims of the Second World War have not gone uncontested (Siegenthaler, 2002). Debates both inside and outside Japan concerning the country's historical actions and their consequences in the Asia Pacific region generate the need for a re-examination of how Japan's war-related memory is presented. To the outside world, Japan projects the image of a country coming to terms with its recent past. Internally, however, rewriting the constitution to allow a “self-defence” force to be transformed into a mainstream military machine has raised public concern about the nation's unresolved attitudes towards its past military actions (Cooper, 2007). At the same time, Japan has implemented a policy to boost international tourism that raises the issue of how Japan's wartime experience is to be presented to tourists.