Tokyo Underworld: The Fast Times and Hard Life of an American Gangster in Japan

This is the Japan your mother would have warned you to stay away from if she had known it existed. Most westerners don't. But journalist and long-time resident Robert Whiting peeks behind the shoji to show us a sleazeball world of crooks, both petty and big-time, operating hand in hand with Japan's pervasive government-industrial complex, often in cahoots with corporate America and the CIA. Tokyo Underworld opens right after the surrender, when a devastated nation, reeling from the shock of Hiroshima, clung precariously to life. Tokyo had been flattened by the bombing raids. Food was scarce, consumer goods nonexistent. In this barren soil a black market sprang to life within days of the surrender and was soon flourishing, trading in contraband wares smuggled in or diverted from the supply chains of the occupying forces.Enter Nick Zappetti, a small time hood from the Bronx, who remained in Japan after his discharge from the US Army. Operating on the principle that every calamity contains an opportunity, Zappetti made his first big score by smuggling a precious shipment of lighter flints into Japan.With Zappetti as the central figure, Whiting recounts the story of Japan's recovery and rise to superpower status, focusing on the netherworld of crime. Given his own background, growing up in the mean streets of the Bronx where mafia bosses were the most highly respected figures, it was only natural for Zappetti to forge links with shady characters. These included Rikidozan, the ex-sumo wrestler whose exploits as a professional wrestler made him a figure of mythic dimensions in postwar Japan. Rikidozan's staged triumphs over American adversaries helped, according to Whiting, a defeated and dishonored nation to recover its self-esteem, thus setting the stage for the economic boom of the 80s.Zappetti mixed out-and-out crime (he served prison time for armed robbery following an infamous diamond heist) with quasi-legitimate enterprises. The most noteworthy of these was Nicola's, a pizza restaurant in Toky's glitzy, cosmopolitan Roppongi district. At Nicola's, international film stars and the Crown Prince of Japan rubbed elbows with politicians and crooks. The intense and long-lasting popularity of Nicola's made Zappetti enormously rich and notorious, with a list of contacts ranging from gang bosses to members of the Japanese Diet.Other ventures didn't fare so well: a mink farm in Japan's northernmost island was a dismal failure. The reason? Japanese women didn't wear mink. Another farming venture ran aground. The same goes for Zappetti's marriages to Japanese wives. One of these, to a 19-year-old beauty queen, lasted only a few months and cost him ¥30 million in alimony.Whiting's previous books on Japanese baseball (one of which was named Sports Book of the Year by Time Magazine) are only superficially about baseball: they are insightful studies of Japanese society as seen through the window of the foreign game that verges on a national obsession. Whiting's analysis of how they have adapted the game shows us what makes the Japanese tick. The author brings the same bicultural sophistication and insider's insight to Tokyo Underworld as he does to baseball. His intimate relationship with Zappetti during the latter's last tell-all years adds a dimension rarely seen. No one but Whiting could have written this book, which makes it all the more valuable for its unique viewpoint. (Full disclosure: I was friends with Robert Whiting in the 70s in Japan before his first book earned him an international reputation).While Japan's criminal underworld may operate in the shadows, easily overlooked or ignored, it is impossible to underestimate its influence on the national life at every level--from sports, entertainment, and the mizu shobai world of bar hostesses and prostitutes, to government and big business. Politicians and businessmen with ties to the underworld were key players in the Lockheed scandal that rocked Japan in the 70s: Lockheed hired former drug smuggler, war criminal and underworld power broker Yoshio Kodama as a `consultant' to grease the wheels in a deal where Lockheed paid more than $3 million in bribes to Prime Minister Tanaka and other government officials to insure that its aircraft was chosen over its Boeing rival for All Nippon Airways.Tokyo Underworld is a fairly dense read, exhaustively researched (over 200 interviews) and packed with facts and information (Notes and Sources runs to 45 pages). Though it isn't always light reading, Tokyo Underworld provides a fascinating glimpse of the seamier side of Japanese society, along with a view of postwar US-Japan relations that won't be found in most histories of the period.

Robert Whiting is the king of writing about Japan! Fascinating historical accountof one of the most captivating characters of the post war era! Endless unbelievablestories and situations that just blow the mind and so entertaining!Waiting for the movie, but honestly it has to be a series. I do hope the producers and directorget it right with the casting which is so key! Joe Pesci was mentioned which would beperfect if it was 1995, but he's too old now. For directors you want someone who cantell a good story and keep it moving along - Danny Boyle could do it well - Look whathe did with Slumdog Millionaire.Tokyo Vice which I read and watched the series had epic casting with the yakuza types -bestever, but Rachel Keller the key gaijin hostess girl ruined it, just didn't have that "thing" thatscreen presence. And most of the show was generally just way too slow.Make this the king of all Japanese stories when it hits film!I've read Tokyo Junkie several weeks ago and that is one of my favorite books! Someof that could be made into a movie, Robert's post 60's - 70's and even 80's when hewas in New York for 3 years only to realize Tokyo was the place!Next on deck - pun intended is his pulitzer prize nominated book You Gotta Have Wa!

The author tells the story of Japan, particularly of Tokyo, post-WW2. He chooses to weave it around the life of an ex-Marine from East Harlem who was part of the U.S. occupational forces right after Japan surrendered. An interesting character who tried several varied business ventures, some legal, some not. He, Nicola Zappetti of Italian heritage, set up the first American pizza restaurant in Japan, in an area of Tokyo that became very upscale. He was so much into the Japanese lifestyle there at the time that he became a naturalization Japanese citizen and gave up his U.S. citizenship. He died in 1992, having suffered from poor health for years. The criminal file on him by the Tokyo metropolitan police department is the thickest they've ever had on an American. Zappetti made and lost more money in Japan than any American. He married and divorced more Japanese women than any American. He was involved in more civil lawsuits in Japan than any American. One of his wives became fabulously wealthy after divorcing him and acquiring many of his properties, including restaurants.The author delves into the shadow universe in Japan of an assortment of characters, including gangsters, corrupt entrepreneurs, seedy sports promoters, streetwise opportunists, intelligent agents, political fixers, financial manipulators. He discusses the postwar black market, the Wall Street cabal that subverted official U.S. policy in Japan, the professional wrestling boom promoted by political leaders and underworld bosses, a ruthless Korean gang chief vying for control of Tokyo in a secret connection with the CIA, a pro wrestler and jewel thief, nightclub hostesses trained in the art of international espionage, the Lockheed aircraft scandal, gold smugglers, assorted con men.Tokyo hosted the summer Olympics in 1964. That catapulted Japan into a global economic giant. Money flowed from West to East. Many years later the flow went the other way.The author graduated from Sophia University in Tokyo. He did extensive research for this book and conducted nearly 200 interviews.By the way, Zappetti's restaurant, Nicola's Pizza House, remained in business long after his death, though not as the fashionable place to dine for political and business and sports and even gangster elites. It drew the more common folks for its pizza and burgers. It got mixed reviews on TripAdvisor. It finally closed down for good in 2018.

Really interesting read. It traces origin of criminal underground from 1945 onward. It is a quick read.

Prompt delivery, used, good condition, as described.Looks interesting.

You couldn't make this up.

It was interesting after a while.

This is one of my favourite books, I've given copies to a number of friends and all have liked it, can't recommend it more highly.

A unique view from the eyes of a Italian-American mobster expat on the history of the Tokyo crime underworld. According to the book, he was important to the rise of the playgrounds of Ropponggi to its current state as well as post war rise of the Yakuza to its very influential impact on Japanese society and government which even became more pervasive post war.Excellent book!!!!!