The legendary Sonny Onoo recently joined Busted Open Radio to discuss the life of NJPW founder, 12-time world champion, and former Japanese politician Antonio Inoki, who passed away over the weekend at 79.
During the interview, Onoo recalled the lead-up to the famous WCW Collision in North Korea show, an event that was covered on the latest season of Dark Side of the Ring due to its controversial setting. Check out his full thoughts on that show in the highlights below.
On Eric Bischoff helping facilitate a reunion with Muhammad Ali and Antonio Inoki prior to Collision In Korea:
“Because of Antonio Inoki and his relationship with Eric, we got to go to North Korea. That came about because Inoki had reached out to Eric, actually, Masa Saito did. Masa Saito reached out to Eric because we had such a great relationship and were great friends, actually. That led to Eric mentioning that he had a contact with Muhammad Ali. Of course, Inoki was working out with Kim Jong-il, the North Korean leader to go to North Korea for a pro wrestling show. Despite being told, ‘Don’t go there, you may not come back.’ But we were young, we said, ‘When’s a chance we’re going to get to go to North Korea?’ We went and got Muhammad Ali involved.”
How Bischoff helped set up the meeting:
“Eric set up a meeting in Denver with Mr. Inoki and his entourage and Ali’s entourage. We met and that’s when Mr. Inoki invited Muhammad Ali, who was also kind of using his sports figure and position to create friendlier relationships with some of our political adversaries. Mr. Ali said, ‘Yeah, North Korea, I’m in.’ The rest is history, really,” Onoo said.
Says the U.S. government and Japanese government both contacted him telling him they could not guarantee his safety:
“When you have the US government and Japanese government calling me up and saying, ‘Hey, we cannot protect your safety. We don’t recommend you go in the strongest terms.’ That’s how they put it. For me, you know, I’ve been to South Africa during apartheid, it was an experience. My thought was, ‘When am I going to get an opportunity to go?’ Never. But with Mr. Inoki inviting us, they printed his money while we were there. They had his picture on their currency. That’s how much clout he had. There was a stamp over there with his picture. You really got to do something to mess up.”
(H/T and transcribed by Fightful)
