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February 18, 2005
The China Syndrome: A Contagious Bug?
This weekend will apparently mark a turning point in the U.S.-Japan security relationship, according to the Washington Post (Japan to Join U.S. Policy on Taiwan). Stretching back to the post-war occupation of Japan and grounded in the country's U.S.-written constitution, this relationship is frequently (and often breathlessly) declared the bedrock of East Asian security for the past 60 years. Now, it seems, Japan is feeling the dragon's breath, and for the first time will expressly cite Taiwan as a mutual security concern with the United States.
Japan is justified in its wariness toward China, as the article points out. China is large, rapidly growing, and has a voracious appetite for investment and natural resources. Historically, it also harbors substantial ill will toward Japan, not only due its bloody occupation/war in the early twentieth century but also to what it perceives as a lack of remorse by Japanese leaders for their country's past misdeeds even to this day. History aside, however, it is simply natural for the two largest economies of East Asia to view each other as adversaries.
So does this new security understanding with the United States shift the balance of power in East Asia? Hardly. China may remain nominally Communist and practically authoritarian, but today, its economic interests are largely one and the same as its strategic ones. Mainland Chinese leaders know that the perception of a threat is often as useful as an actual threat, and that at the current time, it would have a hard-time regaining Taiwan by force even if the United States and Japan stayed on the sidelines. In 10-20 years' time, the military calculation may be different. But today, China's leaders can make their point more efficiently through saber-rattling than through saber-using.
The new revisions to the U.S.-Japan security partnership may deter China from pursuing its efforts to change the military calculation. But do the changes add anything that is not already present? Japan is already a key strategic partner of the United States. In the event of Chinese military action across the Taiwan Straits, Japan might be hard-pressed to remain neutral. And Japan, despite the infamous war-denouncing Article 9 of its Constitution and its amicably-named "Self-Defense Forces," aleady possesses a very robust and modern defense capability. While it certainly enjoys having the United States in its corner, it is by no means solely dependent on U.S. force projection for its security.
So why, then, a redefinition of the security partnership? War, as Clausewitz said, is politics carried out by other means; so, too, are the strategic partnerships designed to deter war. Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi has gone against the grain of Japanese public opinion in sending Self-Defence Force units to Iraq. While acting against a perceived and growing threat from China may be a comparatively more popular move, it resembles Koizumi's Iraq decision in one key way: it is reactive to a U.S. initiative. One must wonder to which audience(s) Koizumi is directing this move, to what end, and most importantly, why. It is sure to annoy China, delight Taiwan, and enjoy mixed reaction among the Japanese. But much like his earier Iraq decision, Koizumi's move is guaranteed to please the Bush administration. Before September 11, 2001 and for much of the 1990s, the unspoken question in U.S. military circles was not if we would fight a war with China but when. Now, the "war on terror" necessarily takes strategic precendence. But there likely remains a strong constituency within the current U.S. administration that continues to see China as a long-term strategic adversary. Formalizing and redefining the security relationship with Japan makes good sense for such thinkers in the United States. The question is, after Koizumi's Iraq decision, does it make good sense for Japan?
Posted by Daniel Widome at 05:50 PM to Asia
