Masanosuke Ikeda

After working as an editorial writer for the Yomiuri Shimbun, he gained the acquaintance of Bukichi Miki, and would join the Hochi Shimbun. After serving in management roles inside the newspaper, he became Director of the Federated News Agency.^[2] He also served as secretary to Suehiko Shiono during his stint as Minister of Justice.

He was first elected to the National Diet in the 1942 election, and, towards the end of the war, joined the National Defense Brotherhood, a group of politicians centered around Nobusuke Kishi which planned to force the resignation of the Kantarō Suzuki Cabinet for its unwillingness to commit to war on the mainland.^[2] After the war, he served as a founding member of the Japan Cooperative Party along with other past members of the National Defense Brotherhood.^[3]

He ran again for the Diet in 1949, and won election as a member of the Democratic Liberal Party. After Bukichi Miki was allowed to take office again after being unpurged by American authorities, he worked with Miki and Ichirō Hatoyama's group to form the Japan Democratic Party. He was then named as Secretary-General of the party.^[2]

Following the merger of conservative groups into the Liberal Democratic Party, he joined the new organization. Within the party, he was a member of the Sunada group [ja], Kishi faction, and the Seiwa Seisaku Kenkyūkai. He joined the Second Ikeda Cabinet as Director of the Science and Technology Agency [ja] and Japanese Atomic Energy Commission, and served in the roles until the first reshuffle in July 1961.^[2] He continued to serve as an LDP backbencher afterwards. He was charged with bribery and sentenced to house arrest in relation to the Nippon Express Incident [ja] in 1968. In 1977, the Supreme Court of Japan sentenced him to a year and a half of prison, on top of a three million yen fine for the corruption scandal. While he was eventually spared from prison due to his health, he retired from politics.^[2] During investigation into the case, a dinner between Ikeda, Takeo Fukuda, and Prosecutor General Daikichi Imoto [ja] had a dinner together which was soon viewed as problematic for Imoto.^[4]

During his time in office, he worked hard for trade negotiations with China, even before the normalization of relations.^[5] After 1953, he traveled several times to China in an attempt to work out a solution, and helped negotiate the Fourth Trade Agreement in 1958.^[2]

He died on March 27, 1986, at a hospital in Tokyo due to renal failure. He was 88.^[6]

He had a short build and rough nose, but was considered to have been strong-willed. When he joined the Japan Liberal Party instead of Shigeru Yoshida's own party, it was alleged he got into a fight with Ichirō Kōno. A similar incident occurred when he got into a fight with party comrade Masuo Araki and called him an "idiot", and was alleged to have gotten into a physical confrontation with Kakuei Tanaka in which Tanaka taunted him.^[2]