Japan: Dark Day for the Shadow Shogun

"Guilty, "say the judges, but Tanaka refuses to step down

The trial had plodded on for so long that when the verdict finally arrived last week, the Japanese paid almost as much attention to it as they would have to the real Judgment Day. But then, the seven-year court battle did star Kakuei Tanaka, the former Prime Minister who still reigns as the country's shrewdest powerbroker. As the dark blue Chrysler sedan wheeled Tanaka from his palatine compound on the fringes of Tokyo to the courthouse downtown, a swarm of 17 helicopters loaded...