To the resigned exasperation of the friends of Japan who were also its victims, who are friends of its neighbours, too, and who wish for the issue finally to fade from the front line of international relations, the weekend saw no relief.
Australia, the US and most of the countries of Southeast Asia awaited, with little optimism, the words that would come from Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe - its most powerful and in many ways also most accomplished leader for decades - to mark the 70th anniversary of the cataclysmic ending of World War II following the holocausts of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Abe's numerous critics were watching especially closely to compare his words with the "heartfelt apology" of then prime minister Tomiichi Murayama on the 50th anniversary of the ending of the war, in 1995.
The war finally ended - following a failed coup by staff officers of the War Ministry and the Imperial Guard - with the unique "Jewel Voice Broadcast" radio speech by Emperor Hirohito at noon, August 15, announcing Japan's surrender, the first time the Japanese people had heard his voice.
Japan's diplomatic relationships, its national education system, its capacity even now, 70 years later, to graduate into a "normal" country, remain haunted by the war.
The nation's regional relationships continue to be filtered through the intersections of realpolitik, patriotism, guilt, opportunism and ancient hostilities that run through the continuing debates over the wording of remorse and apologies.
Japan occupied, for some years, much of east Asia, as it established its Co-Prosperity Sphere, and helped hasten the demise of European colonialism there - as well as the end of the Kuomintang, or Nationalist, government in China that, exhausted by fighting Japan, was then defeated by the fresh, Soviet-armed communist force.
Japan's relations with its closest neighbours, South Korea and China, in particular, remain especially fraught.
The intensity of this issue for Abe personally, as well as for his nation, is hard to underestimate.
Abe is the grandson, through his mother, of Nobusuke Kishi, who was prime minister of Japan from 1957 to 1960, and was a member of the Tojo cabinet during World War II.
He has pursued assiduously, in the face of street protests and of popular opposition indicated by polls, legislation to reinterpret Japan's pacifist constitution to allow the country's military to be deployed overseas, if specified conditions are met.
Addressing the crowd at Hiroshima on the 70th anniversary of the dropping of the atom bomb there, a week before the surrender, he said "we have to continue our effort to achieve a world without nuclear weapons, it is our responsibility and it is our duty".
Abe said at the weekend: "We must learn from the lessons of history the wisdom for our future. Japan built a constitutional government earlier than any other nation in Asia.
"The country preserved its independence throughout."
After World War I, "Japan took the wrong course and advanced along the road to war. And, 70 years ago, Japan was defeated.
"I bow my head deeply before the souls of all those who perished both at home and abroad. I express my feelings of profound grief and my eternal, sincere condolences," Abe said.
"In countries that fought against Japan, countless lives were lost among young people with promising futures ... We must never forget that there were women behind the battlefields whose honour and dignity were severely injured.
"Each and every one of them had his or her life, dream and beloved family. When I squarely contemplate this obvious fact, even now, I find myself speechless and my heart is rent with the utmost grief.
"Incident, aggression, war - we shall never again resort to any form of the threat or use of force as a means of settling international disputes. We shall abandon colonial rule forever and respect the right of self-determination of all peoples throughout the world.
"With deep repentance for the war, Japan made that pledge. Upon it, we have created a free and democratic country, abided by the rule of law, and consistently upheld that pledge never to wage a war again. We remain determined never to deviate from this steadfast course.
"How much emotional struggle must have existed and what great efforts must have been necessary for the Chinese people who underwent all the sufferings of the war?"
But now, he said, "we must not let our children, grandchildren, and even further generations to come, who have nothing to do with that war, be predestined to apologise. Still, even so, we Japanese, across generations, must squarely face the history of the past".
Emperor Akihito, aged 81, succeeded his father, the wartime emperor Hirohito, in 1989. Like his father, Emperor Akihito ceased visiting the controversial Yasukuni Shrine after it enshrined Class A Japanese war criminals.
"I express my deep condolences for those who fell in battle and in the ravages of war, and pray for world peace and the further prosperity of our country," he said.
But the Japanese speeches were to no avail.
South Korean President Park Geun-hye said Abe's speech contained "regrettable elements".
China's state-run news agency Xinhua accused Abe of performing "linguistic tricks".
"Instead of offering an unambiguous apology, Abe's statement is rife with rhetorical twists like ‘maintain our position of apology'," it said.
