Over the last few decades in Asia, August has been dominated by the anniversary of the tragic nuclear devastation of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, on the 6th and 9th days of the month. This year, however, being the 70th anniversary of the ending of the Second World War, people have recalled the havoc that war brought to so many in the region and discussed the ways that the protracted, bitter conflict, which arguably began with Japan’s invasion of China in 1937, left its mark not only on the post-war relations between Japan and the different countries in the region but on the relations among social classes within these countries.