Abe's neo-statism

This week Prime Minister Abe Shinzō criticized right-wing demonstrations in Koreatowns in Tokyo and Osaka, stating, “The Japanese way of thinking is to behave politely and to be generous and modest at any time.” While it is, of course, good that Abe made a point of criticizing hate speech, it's important to recognize that Abe is pursuing a different program than some of the cruder conservative revisionists in his own party, the conservative media, or the right-wing demonstrators who terrorize the ears of Tokyoites with their sound trucks. The problem with the word "nationalist" is that it obscures more than it reveals.

In an astute article about Abe's program, the FT's David Pilling notes Abe's agenda can rightly be summarized using the Meiji slogan, Fukoku-kyohei (rich nation, strong army). What I wonder, though, is whether it is best to think of Abe as a nationalist or whether it is more appropriate to think of him as a statist, not unlike his Meiji forebears. The distinction is important. The right-wing demonstrators criticized by Abe are little more than chauvinistic ethnic nationalists, intent on showing the superiority of the Japanese people. Abe is interested in the survival of the Japanese nation in international competition, with the state as a kind of avatar of the Japanese people. His way of thinking is steeped in Hobbesian and social Darwinist conceptions of the state, in which the state and people exist in a sort of organic solidarity and in which the state is focused largely on protecting lives and property from enemies foreign and domestic. To compete with other nation-states, the state must be capable of organizing and drawing upon the country's resources and the people's energy in order to compete.

Accordingly, when Abe talks of breaking free of the postwar regime or creating a normal nation, it is with this idea in mind. Nationalism is a means to the end of strengthening the state. Encouraging national pride is useful to the extent that it makes Japanese citizens more amenable to constitution revision, more supportive of an assertive Japanese military, and more eager to stand up to provocation by China or North Korea, just as revitalizing Japan's economy is useful to the extent that it improves the state's fiscal position, swells its coffers, and bolsters national confidence.

The question is whether Abe's neo-statism poses risks to peace and security in East Asia. On the one hand, China arguably views the world along similarly social Darwinist lines, and one can therefore make the case that national survival for Japan depends on embracing a similar way of thinking, making Japan less vulnerable to bullying by China. However, the danger of Japan's embracing a social Darwinist conception of international competition is that it would make every problem between Japan and its neighbors harder to resolve, because every issue would become a question of status in the international hierarchy. When combined with fewer restraints on the use of force by Japan, the risk of outright war would surely increase.

There are still a number of hurdles Abe must overcome before he can remake Japan according to his neo-statist vision — and he must still convince the Japanese people of its wisdom, especially as far as constitution revision goes. But it is important to understand just what kind of nationalist Abe is, and to be aware that whatever short-term tactical concessions he makes, he has a long-term vision of where he wants to take his country.

The end of the "strategic, reciprocal" relationship?

Since Abe Shinzō succeeded Koizumi Junichirō in 2006, the focus of Japan's China policy has been the promotion of what has been called in official documents as a "strategic, reciprocal relationship" between Japan and China. Acknowledging the importance of the bilateral relationship for peace and stability in East Asia, the two countries agreed to build a political relationship based on mutual trust, increase cultural and educational exchange, bolster economic cooperation, and collaborate to build an East Asian order founded on openness, transparency, and inclusiveness.

As the showdown between Japan and China over the fate of the Chinese fisherman now in Japanese custody intensifies, it is worth asking what the process of "unfreezing" the Sino-Japanese relationship since 2006 has accomplished, and whether that process will survive this dispute — or whether this standoff marks the beginning of a new, uncertain period in the relationship.

With each passing day it becomes clearer that the answer to the first question is "not much." The two countries' leaders have talked more frequently and exchanged state visits. Japanese leaders have avoided the deliberately provocative actions regarding wartime history that led to the deep freeze in the first place. Chinese leaders have at various times acknowledged and praised Japan for its peaceful development during the postwar period. But arguably no progress has been made to defuse the truly potent issues in the relationship, starting with the Senkakus.

This dispute was a hard test for the "new" Sino-Japanese relationship, as it concerns important symbolic issues — sovereignty over the Senkakus and the incarceration by Japan of a Chinese national, an "abduction" of sorts in Chinese eyes — and is therefore precisely the kind of issue that appeals to Chinese insecurity about its regional and international status, making unlikely to be resolved by Tokyo's appeals to handle the issue calmly and without resorting to nationalistic posturing. Of course the strategic, reciprocal relationship failed the test. China has steadily applied pressure on Japan, canceling cultural and political exchanges and possibly banning the export of rare earth elements (although for the record, the Japanese government has not confirmed whether there is in fact an export ban and the Chinese government has denied that there is any such ban).

As important as the resumption of normal relations between Tokyo and Beijing has been, it is worth asking whether the "strategic, reciprocal" relationship agenda will ever result in the kind of bilateral relationship rooted in trust that would limit the ability of this kind of issue from escalating into a more serious crisis. As long as anti-Japanese sentiment remains widespread, making a hard line towards Japan in disputes politically expedient, as China's policymaking process remains opaque, making it difficult to know how or why decisions are made, and as China remains acutely sensitive to insults to its national pride, it seems unlikely that the underlying dynamics of the political relationship will change. The economic relationship will undoubtedly remain important, but it is unlikely that economic interdependence will spill over into the political relationship — in either country. While Bruce Einhorn argues at Business Week that Japan "can't afford" a fight with China, Daniel Drezner suggests that attempts by China to use economic links to exert pressure on Japan could very well backfire and lead Tokyo to dig in its heels. Contrary to Einhorn's presumption, the impact of economic interdependence on Sino-Japanese political ties is arguably negligible. If anything the impact has been negative, leading China to believe that it has more leverage over Japan than it might otherwise have.

What about the Kan government's response to this dispute? Peter Ennis notes that there has been no sign of disagreement between Kan, Chief Cabinet Secretary Sengoku Yoshito, and the new Foreign Minister Maehara Seiji, all of whom have not responded to Chinese pressure by upping the rhetorical ante or responding in kind. This stance suggests that far from hearing the "wake-up call" that Dan Twining believes China is sending to Japan, the Kan government remains committed to the "strategic, reciprocal" program, persisting in the belief that forbearance by Japan will bear fruit over the long term if it leads China to learn to trust its neighbors.

In other words, in the aftermath of this dispute the Kan government will likely recommit to the pursuit of constructive cooperation with China, however unlikely it is that this approach will produce tangible results in the short run. The DPJ will be criticized by people like Abe for being "not understanding international politics," but it is unlikely that it will change course in foreign policy, and certainly not in the direction favored by hawks in Washington. When considering Japan's approach to China it is necessary to note that while the Japanese public wants their government to stand up for Japan in disputes with China, Japanese citizens are not clamoring for defense spending increases to match China's military modernization program or more assertive diplomacy to contain China's growing influence. As such, the Kan government's response to China's posturing may not be herald a "new realism" in the DPJ's foreign policy thinking but is instead perfectly consistent with its approach since taking power last year. (I've argued repeatedly that, Hatoyama's woolly-headed rhetoric notwithstanding, the DPJ has been remarkably realist in its diplomatic maneuverings since the beginning of its tenure.)

In doing so, the Kan government will be gambling that over the long term engagement will work. Given how little has been accomplished since 2006, it is an unappealing gamble — but the alternatives are worse. Economic interdependence may not make political cooperation inevitable, but it means that the Japanese government has an interest in talking with China regularly. The approach pursued by Japanese governments since 2006 essentially means keeping the Sino-Japanese relationship in a holding pattern, finding areas to cooperate while maintaining the status quo over issues like the East China Sea, perhaps in the hope that over time China will become more satisfied and less predisposed to forcing changes in the status quo. It may be a foolish gamble, but the alternative, the creation of a de facto Asian NATO, would be far worse, providing hardliners in Beijing with signs of encirclement and virtually guaranteeing that China will not limit itself to small maritime "provocations." It would be a fine example of what Bismarck said of preventive war, "committing suicide for fear of death."

Despite being an unsatisfactory option, the "strategic, reciprocal" relationship may well here to stay.

Hatoyama accommodates the US on Futenma

It may have taken a few months longer than I expected, but it appears that the Hatoyama government may have finally accommodated itself to the 2006 agreement on the realignment of US forces. The US and Japanese governments have reached an understanding regarding the future of Futenma following Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's visit to Tokyo.

The latest bilateral agreement largely reaffirms the 2006 roadmap: the Hatoyama government has agreed to the construction of a new runway somewhere in the vicinity of Camp Schwab at Henoko Bay, with the details regarding the precise location and the method of construction to be decided by President Obama's visit to Japan in autumn. The US, meanwhile, agreed to disperse some training activities from Okinawa to elsewhere in Japan. The Hatoyama government has also stated that it will campaign for the inclusion in the Two-Plus-Two statement due 28 May a pledge to return bases in Okinawa to Japanese ownership within ten to fifteen years.

The Hatoyama government's work is by no means complete. Not only will it have to coax prefectural and local officials in Okinawa into not making too much of a fuss, but the government will also have to work to preserve the governing coalition. Fukushima Mizuho, Social Democratic Party chief and consumer affairs minister, replied to the news by asking why the prime minister went ahead with talks with the US without securing the support of the Okinawan people and his own coalition. Whether Fukushima's remarks are the prelude to the SDPJ's pulling out of the coalition remains to be seen. Even more troublesome for the prime minister could be the opposition of Ozawa Ichiro, the secretary-general of his own party. Despite his professions to having no role in policymaking, Ozawa has not refrained from taking a hard line in calling for relocation of Futenma outside of Okinawa entirely. Responding to the latest agreement, Ozawa said it would be "difficult" to secure the acquiescence of the Okinawan people (which, one would think, would be at least partly Ozawa's job as secretary-general).

It is tempting to criticize the Hatoyama government for its supposed "about face" on Futenma. However, from the beginning of this dispute the government has repeatedly stressed that it was keeping all options on the table, including the reaffirmation of the 2006 agreement as it stands. As I've said before, the Hatoyama government was acting in good faith. It genuinely wanted to review the 2006 agreement in the hope of finding something better. Had the US government not reacted so harshly to the Hatoyama government's fairly modest request, and perhaps even signaled its willingness to offer concessions early on this dispute could very well have been contained and even resolved months ago. As it stands, prolonged public exposure gave the Okinawan public time to mobilize, making it that much harder for the Hatoyama government to secure domestic approval for a slightly revised agreement.

While the Hatoyama government may have been genuinely open to the 2006 agreement from the start, one cannot rule out the possibility that Hatoyama has genuinely come to believe that the 2006 agreement is by and large the best option. Given that the prime minister has been rather guarded about his preferences, it is difficult to say. However, Hatoyama has certainly made more frequent use of phrases like "national interest" in recent weeks than he did a mere nine months ago. As the dispute wore on, he became noticeably more inclined to speak of US bases in terms of regional security and deterrence (something Martin Frid noticed). Presumably Hatoyama will be expected to give an honest account of his reasoning to his own party, his party's coalition partners, and local officials in the days to come.

The damage to his government has, of course, already been done, because the damage to the government's reputation had less to do with the substance of the realignment plan — about which the public is divided — than with the government's gross incompetence in its handling of the issue. Despite its persistent efforts to remind the public that all options were on the table, I wonder whether the public will see the government's actions as anything but capitulation after months of dithering. At the very least the government has removed the issue from the front burner, freeing it to direct its (and the public's) attention to other matters before the upper house election expected to be held in July.

What of the US-Japan alliance? Despite the warnings from Washington of the damage that Hatoyama was doing to the alliance by asking for time to consider whether there might be a plan that would satisfy all parties, the reality is that the alliance is more durable than the Cassandras thought. That is at least in part thanks to China's latest maritime mischief and North Korea's torpedoing of the Cheonan. The idea of a desire on the part of the Hatoyama government to replace the US-Japan alliance with a Sino-Japanese entente was always far-fetched, but it seemed more plausible among some in the shadow of the Futenma. 

Indeed, in retrospect the reaction of US officials and commentators to the Hatoyama government's request seems even more overblown given the lack of histrionics in Washington in response to Britain's new coalition government, given that both Prime Minister David Cameron and Deputy Prime Minister Nicholas Clegg have questioned the US-UK "special relationship" in terms not altogether different from the DPJ. (Stephen Walt puts the attitudes of both governments in wider context here.) The difference, of course, is that whereas Britain has to find the right balance between its ties between the US and the European Union, Japan has to navigate between the US and China. It goes without saying that London's relations with Brussels do not cause nearly as much anxiety in Washington as Tokyo's with Beijing. But recognizing the difference does not excuse the overreaction. The Hatoyama government was not the first and will not be the last government of a US ally in Asia to argue with the US while trying to maintain a constructive relationship with China. The sooner Washington recognizes that the better it will be for both the US and its allies.

Meanwhile, this new agreement does not mean that the DPJ is abandoning its belief in a balanced, Asia-centered foreign policy in which the alliance is important but not all-consuming. "Resolving" Futenma is a necessary first step to actually discussing what the alliance should look like as the DPJ continues to pursue closer bilateral ties throughout Asia — and not just or primarily with China.

The DPJ's unheralded realism

In the latest stop in his regional tour, Foreign Minister Okada Katsuya visited Australia for talks with Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and Foreign Minister Stephen Smith.

Most of the headlines have focused on the exchange of words over whaling — the polite phrasing seems to be that Okada and Rudd had a "frank discussion", and Rudd has threatened to sue Japan if it does not halt whaling by November — but more important in the long term may be the agreement reached between the two governments to sign an Acquisition and Cross-Servicing Agreement (ACSA) in March, which would enable mutual logistical support on peacekeeping and disaster relief missions. The ACSA will be another small step in building an Australia-Japan security relationship following the joint security declaration signed in 2007 back when Abe Shinzo was prime minister.

Writing at The Interpreter (and from the Australian perspective), Graeme Dobell writes of Australia's hedging by building up its relationship with Japan over the span of a decade, noting that "It is not grand enough to be called a strategy. It does not yet have the status or coherence of a policy. Yet it is much more than an inclination or intention. Call it low-level hedging." One could very well say the same of Japan.

Despite the impression in some circles that the Hatoyama government is naive (due perhaps in part to Hatoyama's talk of an East Asian community) — and the irritating habit that some analysts have of dichotomizing Japan's foreign policy choice as being either alliance with the US or partnership with China — the Hatoyama government is deliberately working to improve Japan's bilateral ties throughout the region. In the span of weeks, Prime Minister Hatoyama has visited India to, among others, agree to regular bilateral security talks and Okada has visited South Korea and Australia to discuss how to bolster Japan's relationships with both countries. What was notable about both Okada trips is that he did not hesitate to acknowledge the obstacles to closer bilateral ties even as he expressed his beliefs that the obstacles can be overcome. Before he had his discussion about whaling in Australia, on his visit to South Korea Okada acknowledged in strong terms Japan's wrongdoing when it colonized Korea 1910-1945. In both cases, Okada is clearly trying to address the obstacles forthrightly while remaining focused on the goals of closer bilateral cooperation.

In bilateral relations with India, South Korea, and Australia (not to mention China), the Hatoyama government is building on the work of its LDP predecessors. What's different, however, is that the Hatoyama government is for the most part building its new grand strategy on the sly. Unlike say the Abe government, which used grandiloquent rhetoric about democracy and shared values to announce its bilateral initiatives with Australia and India (and was none too subtle about the links between among these three democracies and the US), the Hatoyama government has been workmanlike in its efforts to improve Japan's bilateral ties. There are few hints that it wants to link its bilateral ties with countries like Australia to its alliance with the US, which would in turn prompt talk of a grand alliance aimed at containing China. Instead, the Hatoyama government may be focusing on new bilateral relations as a hedge against the US. In the event that the US were to turn inward and weaken its commitment to Asia, Japan could use other friends in the region. Even with the US committed to the region, Japan's interests are served by better bilateral ties, which have been underdeveloped for too long.

That there are significant obstacles — Australia's threat of a lawsuit, for one — to overcome in nearly all of Japan's bilateral relationships in the region should not detract from appreciation of the Hatoyama government's efforts to overcome those obstacles. Its foreign policy initiatives may be quiet, but they will have implications for Japan's position in the region for years to come.

Lest we forget

The US-Japan alliance turned fifty this week, and the allies celebrated by steering the conversation away from Futenma and releasing a 2 + 2 joint statement that reiterated why the alliance matters in the first place.

Kurt Campbell, the assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific Affairs, also gave a press conference Tuesday that makes for interesting reading when it comes to thinking about the challenges the alliance faces going forward.

Campbell stressed that 2010 will be year for discussions within and between the two governments on the future of the alliance. He voiced a greater degree of understanding that the DPJ's early initiatives within the context of the US-Japan relationship are understandable given democratic politics than I think the Obama administration had done previously.

But while Campbell discussed areas of cooperation and the importance of deeper security cooperation, he did not say the US government hopes the outcome of bilateral consultations on security over the coming year will produce. To a certain extent, the US position is the same as it has been for decades and can be summarized in a single word: more. As a superpower that is facing burdens and challenges that will increasingly overwhelm its capabilities, the US needs allies like Japan to share the load now more than yesterday, and tomorrow more than today. More can be greater military spending or new military capabilities, constitution revision or reinterpretation, higher levels of foreign aid, or greater involvement in peacekeeping.

The problem, however, is that, as Brad Glosserman and Robert Madsen note in a Pacific Forum CSIS paper (not yet online), Japan may not be able to provide much more for years to come, if ever. Without substantial economic reform Japan may not be able to commit the material resources the US would prefer — and without serious economic reform the Japanese people will continue to have little or no interest in constitution revision.

In other words, despite the desire on the part of US officials from both parties to "strengthen" the alliance, the Yoshida consensus may continue to hold, in that Japan will continue to provide less security cooperation than the US prefers because its government is focused almost exclusively on economic challenges at home. The difference, however, will be that Japan's economic resources will likely continue to decline; withholding resources from the SDF today is for the sake of directing them into social security (above all) instead of using them to promote economic development as in the 1950s and 1960s. The question is whether the US will be able to live with a Japan that is, as Glosserman and Madsen note, more dependent on the US even as it is able to provide relatively less towards both its own defense and alliance cooperation.

As I've already written, fiscal constraints at home will not be the only factors preventing the realization of an "ever closer" US-Japan alliance. Whatever the latest headlines are concerning China's behavior, the lesson of the Koizumi years is that the Japanese people do not support a policy of unremittingly cold political relations with Beijing — and the lack of support for more military spending suggests that there is little stomach for an arms race. Japan is going to learn to live with a stronger, more confident China, and it will do so in part through closer relations with other countries in Asia.

Finally, while I am confident that the alliance will continue to exist in some form, it is worth considering ("lest we forget") how difficult it is to preserve an alliance aimed at an external enemy to an alliance that is, in Campbell's words, "basically aimed at no specific or particular nation." While some would off record that it is aimed at China, that would entail a discussion of what it means for an alliance to be "aimed" at a country. Given that we do not even know what Japan would do in the event of a war over Taiwan, it is hard to say that US-Japan alliance is "aimed" at China. Instead the alliance is chasing monsters of a smaller, more amorphous nature. Is there an alliance in history that has successfully transitioned from being aimed at some country or coalition to being aimed at "uncertainty" or instead of being against an enemy being for public goods? That's not to say it's impossible, but the Obama and Hatoyama governments have a difficult year ahead of them.

Here's hoping that the two governments approach the task realistically, acknowledge the limits of each country's commitment, and shape their future expectations accordingly. Perhaps it is fitting that the year began with Japan's ordering its refueling ships home from the Indian Ocean, an appropriate reminder of the continuing political and economic limits on Japan's contributions.

Obama pays a visit to his country's banker

I think Saturday Night Live captures the worst fears of many Japanese elites in this sketch.

But, then again, as John Maynard Keynes is supposed to have said, "If you owe your bank a hundred pounds, you have a problem. But if you owe a million, it has."

Time for the US to accept new realities

According to Helene Cooper of the New York Times, "President Obama will arrive in Tokyo on Friday, at a time when America’s relations with Japan are at their most contentious since the trade wars of the 1990s."

Cooper then proceeds to list the ways in which the transition to the DPJ has made for a "more contentious relationship."

The bill of particulars includes the Hatoyama government's decision to withdraw MSDF refueling ships from the Indian Ocean, the decision to revisit the roadmap on the realignment of US forces in Japan, the loss of "shyness about publicly sparring with American officials," and plans to revisit the bilateral Status-of-Forces agreement (SOFA). In addition to all that, she implicitly criticizes Prime Minister Hatoyama for failing at his "kiss-and-make-up session" while visiting New York and Pittsburgh, when he "responded with the usual diplomatic niceties" but was the last to arrive at a dinner for G20 leaders in Pittsburgh.

Reading this article one gets the impression that the US-Japan alliance was in perfect shape right up until the DPJ took power in September. The onus is apparently entirely on the DPJ for being disagreeable and contentious, for sparring with American officials when they try to dictate what the Japanese government should and should not be doing. The article only hints that there might be structural forces tugging at the alliance beyond the drama involving the senior officials of both countries, beyond Hatoyama's late arrival or Gates's "snubbing" the defense ministry when in Tokyo.

The current tension — if tension is the right word for it — is the product of structural change in two areas, neither of which works in favor of the US.

First, that the DPJ is in power is alone an indicator of profound changes occurring within Japan. For all the speculation by analysts about whether the public favors this proposal or that proposal in the DPJ's manifesto and about whether the public actually expects the Hatoyama government to be able to deliver, the DPJ's victory spelled the end of the old system of government. While the new system is still coalescing, I think it is already safe to say that there will be no going back to the old regime of cozy ties among LDP backbenchers and bureaucrats. The old system meant that the alliance rested in the hands of a small number of LDP alliance managers and MOFA and more recently JDA/MOD officials. As analysts like the Washington Post's Jim Hoagland, who rushed to the defense of Japan's bureaucrats after the August election, realized, the US benefited greatly from this system. Alliance cooperation was predictable, even if the US government would have preferred that Japan contribute more.

This system, however, made it difficult for the Japanese government to secure the approval of the Japanese people when it came to things like sweeping changes in the configuration of US forces in Japan. Indeed, after the fiasco of the 1960 treaty revision, the Japanese people and their representatives were rarely consulted when it came to alliance cooperation with the US. And the US government had little reason to object to this — indeed, while the Obama administration may have forgotten or may not appreciate the role the US played in propping up the LDP and its 1955 system, the DPJ and the Japanese public has not.

The old system was also poorly configured for introducing sweeping changes into the nature of the alliance. The alliance managers on both sides certainly tried after 1996, when they thought they could turn the alliance into a global security partnership without having to consult with the Japanese people about whether they wanted their Self-Defense forces participating in US-led wars far from Japanese shores. When the people were finally consulted, it turns out that they had no interest in the "Japan as the Britain of Asia" model. The public had no interest in a robust military bolstered by bigger defense budgets, or in constitution revision, which some officials on both sides thought would be the inevitable product of greater US-Japan defense cooperation. It turns out that if given a choice between maintaining the constitution and cooperating with the US abroad, the Japanese people would prefer the former. The DPJ's victory, while not directly a result of foreign policy, was a product of public dissatisfaction of the LDP's government behind closed doors in which the Japanese people were consulted as an afterthought — including and especially on the alliance.

With the option of a more robust global security partnership foreclosed, the discussion is now turning to what the alliance should be instead, a discussion that is long overdue and might have happened sooner if the two governments had been more honest with each other. What Cooper sees as the signs of tension stemming from the DPJ's coming to power I see as the first stirrings of an honest dialogue between the two governments. Okinawa is just one manifestation of this process. The US was the beneficiary of an arrangement by which the LDP made its life easier politically by foisting the bulk of US forces in Japan to distant Okinawa. It is now paying the price, as the DPJ tries to get the best deal possible for the people of Okinawa.

Of course, that the DPJ wants to reconsider the alliance with the US is shaped by another structural change, the transformation of East Asia. To a certain extent the 1996 vision of the alliance was undone precisely because the two governments were unable to decide what role the alliance could and should play in a region in which growing Chinese influence (and interdependence) was an inescapable fact. The answer provided by the Bush administration and the Koizumi and Abe governments was "shared values" and cooperation among democracies, an approach that did not survive the Abe government. And values diplomacy notwithstanding, even Abe Shinzo recognized that jabbing the Yasukuni stick in China's eye was a poor substitute for a China policy. Arguably Japan was already shifting in the direction of an Asia-centered foreign policy after Koizumi, but — with the notable exception of Fukuda Yasuo — its prime ministers were less explicit about the changes underfoot. They dutifully recited the mantras while reorienting Japan away from a security-centered US-Japan alliance. As I've argued previously, what's changed with the Hatoyama government is that it has for the most part discarded with the alliance boilerplate and is actually trying to articulate what Japanese foreign policy should look like in an age characterized by a rising China, a still strong but struggling US, and a region populated with countries facing the same dilemma as Japan.

As Hatoyama's frenetic Asia diplomacy suggests, his government is obsessed with carving out a leadership role for Japan. Devin Stewart is right to suggest that Japan cannot neglect the US dimension of its new realism. But I think Stewart is mistaken when he suggests "the path toward a more 'independent' foreign policy for Japan is not by weakening its alliance with the world's strongest military power." On the contrary, I think Japan's credibility as a leader in the region is enhanced to the extent to which the Hatoyama government is able to show that its foreign policy is not dominated by its alliance with the world's strongest military power. Which is precisely what Fukuda tried to achieve when he stressed that security cooperation would take a back seat — and what some in the US are coming to appreciate. The DPJ still has work to do answering the question of precisely what kind of security relationship it wants with the US, of course, which is why it is good that the Hatoyama government decided not to rush the National Defense Program Guidelines that were originally supposed to be issued in December. Instead the US and Japan will be conducting a bilateral review of the alliance at the same time that the DPJ-led government is conducting an internal review of defense policy going forward.

Meanwhile the Japanese people are sensitive to the need for an Asia-centered approach in Japanese foreign policy. The public had little interest in Koizumi's approach to China. Whatever concerns Japanese citizens have about China, they have little interest in policies in provoking China. Indeed, the remarkable thing is that despite, in Stewart's words, a "bellicose North Korea and an increasingly powerful China," the public does not support a dramatic increase in Japan's military capabilities, an expansion of the roles open to the JSDF, and ever closer defense cooperation with the US. At the same time there is little support for ending the alliance entirely.

Both the US and Japan have considerable room for maneuver within these structural constraints. Indeed, the US is by no means powerless in the face of Japan's push to reorient its foreign policy. For starters, the Obama administration can reverse course on trade policy in Asia, a region which Daniel Drezner contends "has simply bypassed Washington." Instead of viewing the DPJ's initiatives in the region as leaving the US behind, the Obama administration should view it as a spur to join the game.

Moreover, the Obama administration ought to reconcile itself to the DPJ's message. Thus far Washington has mishandled the transition to the DPJ, in what arguably counts as an open-source intelligence failure. Washington did not take the DPJ seriously until far too late, and even when analysts in Washington began listening to the DPJ they still thought that the DPJ was bluffing — or was trying to appease its left-wing members and the Social Democrats — when it talked about the alliance and Okinawa. The DPJ means exactly what it says. Of the examples cited by Cooper, all were articulated by the DPJ well before it won the August election, and articulated not because of the DPJ's left but because there is a broad consensus within the party on the need to reconsider the alliance and recenter Japanese foreign policy on Asia.

It is unlikely that President Obama will use this weekend to begin engineering a shift in how the US responds to the structural forces that have brought the US-Japan relationship to this juncture. As Michael Cucek trenchantly observes, there will be altogether too much left unsaid when Hatoyama and Obama meet Friday evening. But it is time for the administration to realize that the current difficulties are not simply the product of the DPJ, its leaders, and its coalition partners, and that it is not too late for the US to revitalize its Asia policy and its alliance with Japan.

Middle-power diplomacy in New York

It may be too early to declare that the Obama administration and the Hatoyama cabinet have successfully managed the transition from LDP to DPJ, but this week was clearly a step in the right direction.

At the start of the week, Foreign Minister Okada Katsuya and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton met in New York City, which, at least according to this Asahi report, entailed a frank and open discussion of the two most pressing issues for the alliance, Japan's refueling mission in support of coalition activities in Afghanistan and the Futenma question. Okada described Clinton as "not obstinate" when it came to hearing the DPJ government's concerns. Okada also told reporters Thursday that the government would begin its own review of plans for replacing Futenma with a facility within Okinawa.

The bigger meeting — bigger in terms of symbolism if not substance — was between Hatoyama Yukio and Barack Obama Wednesday. Obama singled out Hatoyama for praise for "running an extraordinary campaign and his party leading dramatic change in Japan." He also exhibited his ability to empathize, linking his own experiences in office to the DPJ, saying, "I know how it feels to have just been elected and form a government and suddenly you have to appear at a range of international summits; I went through this nine months ago. But I'm very confident that not only will the Prime Minister succeed in his efforts and his campaign commitments, but that this will give us an opportunity to strengthen and renew a U.S.-Japan alliance that will be as strong in the 21st century as it was in the latter half of the 20th century." In contrast to some commentators in Washington, Obama delivered an unambiguous message to the DPJ: he recognizes the DPJ's victory as significant and historic, and will not react with panic just because they have some concerns about the alliance. Not the days of George and Junichiro or Ron and Yasu, but so much the better for the relationship — a much more businesslike partnership. As I've argued about Obama in the past, his administration's focus is on solving problems, whether the problems are within the bilateral relationship or whether it is a matter of what role Japan can play in solving global problems. His administration will listen, it may well yield, but it seems unlikely that the US government will accept the use of the traditional mantras to paper over problems in the relationship.

Sankei suggests that the Obama-Hatoyama meeting was precisely that, papering over problems: the joint statement made no mention, after all, of the problems discussed by Clinton and Okada. This is a silly complaint. When have two leaders at a summit actually used the joint press conference to discuss an unresolved issue that the two governments are in the process of hammering out? And as far as the Japanese government is concerned, the heavy lifting will be done by Okada. No, the summit seems to have went as well as a photo-op summit could go.

But what I find more interesting than the Hatoyama government's efforts to get the new US-Japan relationship off to a good start is what the Hatoyama government sought to achieve in its Asia policy in New York.

Revealingly, it was not Obama and Hatoyama who referred to each other by their first names but Hatoyama and Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd. The two met for forty minutes, and apparently Hatoyama was deeply impressed with Rudd's knowledge of "regime change" in Japan. While conservatives railed against Hatoyama's discussions with Chinese President Hu Jintao of an East Asian community, the real story is not the distant dream of an East Asia integrated like the EU but the prospects for partnership between Hatoyama and the leaders of East Asia's other middle powers, symbolized by the exchange between Hatoyama and Rudd. In the past I noted the affinities between Rudd's vision for Asia and former Prime Minister Fukuda Yasuo's. I have also noted the affinities between Fukuda and Hatoyama when it comes to Asia. The point is that greater links among the governments of Japan, Australia, South Korea, and the ASEAN member states are to be expected. These are not the links envisioned by Abe, Bush, and Howard administrations back in 2007, the defunct quadrilateral that included India but not South Korea and that emphasized shared values, democracy, and security cooperation. It is too early to say what precisely will come of greater cooperation among these countries, but given their shared concerns, the relationships will continue to deepen.

Accordingly, there seems to be a tendency among some in Japan to assume that when DPJ officials refer to an "Asia-centered" foreign policy, Asia is a code word for China. But while the Hatoyama government wants a constructive relationship with China — much like its predecessors did — there is clearly more to Asia than China, and more to cooperation in Asia than cooperation with China. Despite Komori Yoshihisa's alarmism about how an East Asian community will mean the dissolution of Japan, the reality is that an East Asian community that includes all the countries that participate in the East Asian Summit would be a means of "enmeshing" China, much as the ASEAN countries have found ways to cooperate with China while quietly increasing security ties with the US. (See this monograph by Evelyn Goh for more on how Southeast Asian states have maneuvered between the US and China.)

The coming DPJ tsunami?

Daniel Twining, writing at Shadow Government, Foreign Policy's blog for Republicans in exile from government in Washington, argues that the advent of a DPJ government could represent a "tsunami" for the US and Japan.

Twining offers the standard Washington perspective on the DPJ: Japan has lots of problems, but who knows whether the DPJ can actually fix them.

Indeed, there is very little in this post that hasn't been said before — and which I argued against in this post.

But I want to respond to Twining's argument about how the DPJ "will pull its foreign and security policy further to the left — and further away from the broad consensus that has defined the U.S.-Japan alliance for three generations."

What is this consensus, you ask? Twining notes "the deference with which generations of LDP leaders treated Washington and the alliance framework that has made possible Japan's postwar prosperity and security." The use of the word deference is revealing. In short, the alliance has been unequal and should continue to be so: "expanding Japan's alliance roles and responsibilities to make that country a global security leader" but always remaining subordinate to the US, host to US forces, cooperating in US-led operations abroad, and altering its forces to conform to US wishes.

There are several problems with Twining's argument. First, before even looking at the merits of the DPJ position, it is worth mentioning that despite the fears of Twining and others in Washington, the most likely outcome of a DPJ government for the foreseeable future is the maintenance of the status quo. The DPJ has said that it wants to renegotiate the 2006 roadmap on the realignment of US forces and the status of US forces in Japan more generally. True, but will these be high priorities for a DPJ government? Any democratic government has only so much political capital to spend, and it is unlikely that a DPJ-led government will devote serious attention to Okinawa in the early years of its government. Okinawa is a low priority for voters outside of Okinawa prefecture, and will take a back seat to administrative reform, pensions, health care, and the economy. Beyond these specific issues, it is a mistake to anticipate radical chance on the alliance for precisely the same reason. Of course there are socialists in the DPJ, and the SDPJ will likely be included in a DPJ-led coalition. But as Twining himself notes, there are those "who support a more hawkish Japanese security policy."

The result will be equilibrium in favor of the status quo. Neither the left nor the right will be able to achieve radical changes in Japanese security policy. Any changes to Japan's foreign and security policy will be the result of top-down incremental changes — and the DPJ's leaders tend to fall somewhere between the two extremes. After flirting with "petite" nationalism earlier in his career, Hatoyama Yukio's foreign policy views are fairly pedestrian. Ozawa Ichiro is perhaps more controversial, but at the same time few Japanese politicians have been more misunderstood than Ozawa. (See my explanation of his "Seventh Fleet" comments here, here, and here, and discussions of Ozawa's thinking on foreign policy here, here, and here.) Okada Katsuya is also pedestrian in his security policy views, and recently echoed the Obama administration's rhetoric when he stressed the importance of US-Japan cooperation in areas other than security (discussed here). Incidentally, the advent of the Obama administration has arguably forced the DPJ to soften its rhetoric on the US: it was a lot easier to criticize Washington under the Bush administration. With the Obama's administration's having made a point of not treating Japan with a heavy hand in its first months (what I've called benign neglect), the DPJ has changed its tone on the alliance, and will undoubtedly continue to do so should it win next month.

The DPJ's leaders are hardly radicals. At the very least, the US-Japan alliance will remain an indispensable pillar for the indefinite future, especially because a DPJ government will be no more inclined than an LDP government to spend more on defense. The presence of hawks within the DPJ will probably ensure that defense spending does not fall further than it already has under the LDP, but a DPJ-led Japan will not be gearing up for the development of serious autonomous capabilities. But beyond that, it does seem to be contradictory for Twining to question the DPJ's ability to address "structural conundrums" but then blithely assert that the DPJ will single-handedly threaten the institution that has been the centerpiece of Japanese security policy for nearly sixty years.

Where does this conclusion leave us? Will the DPJ ask questions of the US that the "deferential" LDP (I think Twining and Ozawa would agree on this point) has not asked of Japan's ally? Of course. Will it be less inclined to support the US in wars far from Japan's shores, especially without UN approval? Surely. Will it look to deepen its cooperation with other Asian countries independent of the US? Absolutely. But these positions hardly constitute radical change, and it is hard to see why the Obama administration should anticipate an impending "tsunami" for these reasons.

Incidentally, what Twining fails to realize is that creating some distance between the US and Japan (or "making the alliance equal") is perhaps the lowest common denominator in the DPJ. Even the DPJ's conservatives don't want Japan to be too locked in to the alliance framework.

Which leads to the bigger question: is the DPJ's position actually bad for the US? It may be bad for the US-Japan establishment, which depends on the idea that the alliance is "intrinsically important." But what would the US lose if a DPJ government says no from time to time, or if it seeks an international role in regional or international fora that might involve staking out positions at odds with the US? Twining says that the Bush administration sought a Japan that would be a "global security leader," but in reality it seems that Twining wants a militarily capable Japan subservient to Japan, a vassal not an ally. It seems that it is impossible for the US to have a Japanese ally that is both a "global security leader" and deferential to the United States. If Japan is going to be a more capable global leader, it will from time to time disagree with the US.

As noted previously, the harder edges of the DPJ's position on the alliance have softened since Barack Obama came into office — and they will likely soften further once the DPJ is faced with governing. The result will be a Japan still allied with the US and still a "pillar" of US policy in East Asia, but reluctant to support security cooperation far from Japanese shores and largely uninterested in values promotion or a crypto-containment policy for China. Japan has already moved in this direction in the years since the fall of Abe Shinzo. Notice, for example, how little the prime minister has discussed his "arc of freedom and prosperity." Japan has not moved any closer to "remilitarization" under Fukuda or Asō. It has been slow to move on the 2006 road map. It continued to support the token refueling mission in the Indian Ocean, but offered nothing more in either Iraq or Afghanistan. It did send ships to Somalia, but only after China did, and even then its commitment was presented as being in Japan's national interest.

Twining, of course, believes otherwise: he tells us that Koizumi's successors "have been good men, and several, including Shinzo Abe and Taro Aso, have possessed a clear vision for Japan in the world." Why he says several when the only prime minister not included on that list is Fukuda is beyond me. (And this is particularly insulting, because I think of the three, Fukuda had the most realistic assessment of the problems facing Japan and had the most clearly articulated vision for overcoming said challenges. See here and here.)

The era of Japan's becoming a deputy to the US sheriff in East Asia has passed, and the sooner that both Republicans and Democrats come to recognize this, the better it will be for the alliance.

A reply to Randy Waterhouse on balancing

Randy Waterhouse graciously addressed some points I raised in response to his discussion of Japanese balancing behavior, and I would like to respond in turn.

Although before I do, I must add that I like the Stephensonian moniker.

1 and 2) I think what we're dealing with here is the difference between balancing as a description of behavior intended to counter or neutralize visible threats to a state's security and balancing as the process by which the structure of international system changes. Japan may be engaged in the former in regard to North Korea and the latter in regard to China. There may be some overlap, but perhaps not as much as meets the eye. (Although any legal or constitutional changes that grow out of the North Korean threat would undoubtedly influence balancing against China.) For example, Japan has little reason to ramp up military spending to neutralize the threat posed by North Korea. The debate is over whether passive or deterrent defense is adequate to meet the threat posed by North Korea's missile and nuclear programs, or whether Japan needs to consider preemptive defense. Arguably meeting the North Korea challenge does not require all-out mobilization, a comprehensive change in how Japan mobilizes national resources in response to external threats. The debate over how to deal with the North Korean threat is obviously connected with the debate over how to deal with a rising China, but the question is how these two debates are connected.

One connection is simply that Japanese hawks are not making clear distinctions between North Korea and China when making their case. I figured that Waterhouse and I agree on the importance of China for Japanese balancing behavior over the long term, but my point was that China may play a more prominent role in Japanese debates about balancing in the near term than I read his post as arguing. After all, Waterhouse wrote of "the lack of bold, provocative military signals from China of late," which may be true in an objective sense, but from the perspective of Japanese elites arguing for balancing behavior of one form or another, China has done plenty to merit more balancing on Japan's part, whether by spending more on its military or by sending the PLA Navy to waters ever further from China (and by acting with greater assertiveness closer to China). Arguments about China may carry less weight than arguments rooted in meeting the North Korean threat, but some elites are making arguments about the China threat. It may not be easy to separate the two: national security hawks are trying to create a climate of uncertainty in order to sell their policies, and they are willing to use any external threat at hand to make their case. North Korea may provide a particular perturbation — but the sensitivity of elites and public to a perturbation may have as much to do with worrying signals from China as with North Korean behavior.

3) Just to build on a point here, there are a number of different ways to think about post-cold war changes to the US-Japan alliance. External balancing against a long-term threat may be the most likely explanation, but there are other plausible explanations, whether domestic politics or a structural explanation rooted less in preparations for a rising China than in the impact of unipolarity of the US alliances that were the legacy of the cold war. It is entirely possible that we may be entering a period in which Japan chafes at a security policy overly centered on the alliance and instead opts for Samuels's "Goldilocks consensus," a grand strategy that features a more even mix of external and internal balancing, maximizing Japan's options in a changing regional security environment. (Of course, if US power declines markedly relative to China's, structural realism would presumably predict greater incentives for external balancing by both the US and Japan and more internal balancing by Japan to compensate for US relative decline.)

Separated by a common enemy

Already under consideration before North Korea's nuclear test last week, the LDP's push to include plans for an indigenous capability to strike North Korea to preempt an attack on Japan has picked up speed over the past week. On May 26th, Prime Minister Aso Taro reminded reporters that since 1955 preemptive self-defense has been considered legal. The same day a subcommittee of the defense division of the LDP's Policy Research Council approved a draft of proposals to include in this year's National Defense Program Guidelines (NDPG) that calls for preemptive strike capabilities, especially sea-launched cruise missiles. On the 28th, the prime minister once again asserted the legality of preemptive strikes, this time in proceedings in the Upper House Budget Committee.

In the midst of this debate, Mainichi called for a less passionate debate that acknowledges the risks associated with this step, including the feasibility of preemptive strikes against North Korea, the consequences for the US-Japan alliance, and the dangers of arms racing and security dilemmas in East Asia. I second Mainichi's concerns: there are a number of questions that advocates of preemptive strike capabilities have yet to answer, most notably the question of what independent Japanese strike capabilities add to US capabilities.

It now appears that the US government may be contributing to the debate over Japanese preemptive strike capabilities.

Speaking at the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore on Saturday, US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates delivered a message to Japanese and South Korean elites worried about the sturdiness of the US commitment to its East Asian allies:

The Republic of Korea and Japan have since become economic powerhouses with modern, well-trained and equipped armed forces. They are more willing and able to take responsibility for their own defense and assume responsibility for collective security beyond their shores. As a result, we are making adjustments in each country to maintain a posture that is more appropriate to that of a partner, as opposed to a patron. Still, though, a partner fully prepared and able to carry out all – I repeat, all – of our alliance obligations.

This message is ambiguous, welcoming greater allied contributions while reaffirming the US role in defending its allies, especially via extended nuclear deterrence, but Sankei's Komori Yoshisa believes that there is more to the story. The Obama administration, he writes in an ecstatic post at his blog (if two exclamation points are any indication), has signed off on preemptive strike capabilities. His evidence is derived from interviews of Gates and Wallace Gregson, assistant secretary of defense for Asian-Pacific affairs by Asahi's Washington correspondent Kato Yoichi in which both officials appear to accept Japan's having the ability to strike at threats outside its borders. Gates's statement is vague, premised on the notion of "If Japan decides" to acquire more offensive capabilities, i.e. practicing what he has preached about the US being a partner instead of a patron. Gregson, while also reluctant to comment on what is a domestic matter for Japan, was open to a new division of labor between the US and Japan.

I appreciate that the US officials are refraining from overt interference in Japan's internal political discussions, but I think that the US has reasons to be concerned about this shift. (I also think that Komori is fishing for US support for his position. But a pair of quotes in an Asahi article do not a new policy make.)

Apart from the aforementioned reasons for skepticism about Japan's acquiring autonomous strike capabilities, there is another reason why the US should be concerned about this debate in Japan.

Arguably one reason for the difference in US and Japanese approaches to North Korea — apart from geography, the abductees, and domestic politics — is the US alliance with South Korea. Japan's North Korea policy can be conceived solely in terms of Japanese national interests, defending Japanese lives and property from the rogue state next door. The US approach to North Korea is broader. Not only is the US concerned about the threat posed to the US by the possibility of the transfer of nuclear materials, but it is worried to a lesser extent about the durability of the global non-proliferation regime. And it is not only concerned about the threat to Japanese security, but South Korean security as well.

The conflicting demands of the US-South Korea and US-Japan alliances are a source of turbulence in the US-Japan alliance. The US, legally committed to the defense of South Korea, has to think carefully about its words and actions vis-à-vis North Korea — indeed, the US is deterred from launching a preventive and perhaps a preemptive war against North Korea due to the threat posed by North Korean conventional capabilities to Seoul. This lends an air of restraint to US pronouncements on North Korea. As Sam Roggeveen writes, it is possible to read Gates's speech in Singapore as outlining a containment policy in recognition of the considerable obstacles in the way of denuclearization. It also bears recalling the decision by the US government ruling out in advance an attempt to shoot down North Korea's test rocket. That decision has been interpreted by Japanese elites as evidence of the shakiness of the US defense commitment. Maybe so, but it may be more appropriate to view the US not as lacking commitment to Japan's defense but having concerns greater than Japan's defense.

Which is why the US (and South Korea) should be concerned about Japan's acquiring independent preemptive strike capabilities. Japan, not having any alliance relationship with South Korea, will have no reason to take South Korea's security into consideration in confronting North Korea. If the Japanese government detects an imminent launch — with the autonomous surveillance capabilities that conservatives also wanted included in the NDPG — it will be able to act solely on the basis of the direct threat posed by North Korea's missiles to the Japanese homeland. It will not have to consider whether launching a preemptive strike will lead North Korea, fearing a mortal threat to the DPRK regime or perhaps not being able to identify the source of an attack, to lash out against South Korea. Unconstrained by broader regional commitments, Japan could use its new capabilities for "offensive defense" and in the process trigger a broader regional crisis — not out of a lust for conquest, but simply out of a desire to defend itself from an external threat.

This may be an unlikely scenario: after all, it is not clear that the NDPG will include plans for preemptive capabilities, and even if strike capabilities make their way into Japan's defense plans, they may amount to nothing more than a token force. And Japan may not be able to gather the necessary intelligence for attacks against North Korea's mobile launchers.

However unlikely, South Korea ought to reach out to Japan in order to close the gap, in effect forcing Japan to think about broader regional security when it considers the threat posed by North Korea. In other words, it is necessary for South Korea (and the US) to undo the damage done when the Japanese government decided to make recovering the abductees the central goal of Japan's North Korea policy. That decision produced a Japan solipsistic in its approach to North Korea, inclined to view North Korea through its distinct lens, barely considering the perspectives from which other countries have struggled to manage North Korea.

It is encouraging that the US, Japan, and South Korea had their first ever defense ministerial meeting in Singapore Friday. If Japan is to acquire its own strike capabilities, it has to be prepared to wield them responsibly, considering the consequences that saber rattling, to say nothing of preemptive strikes could have for other countries in the region. Regional security and stability is a Japanese national interest, even without formal alliance commitments in East Asia. Realizing that, perhaps Japan's leaders will become more appreciative of US efforts to uphold regional security — especially the defense of South Korea —and less unnerved by US restraint, in turn lessening the need for independent capabilities.

The emergence of Middle Power Asia

Over the past week, we have seen more signs of the shape that international relations in East Asia will take over the coming decades.

I've written before about the role that middle powers — most notably Japan, Australia, South Korea, ASEAN acting as a bloc, and to a lesser extent India — will play in the East Asia balance, maneuvering between the US and China, the region's two giants as they attempt to enmesh China in regional institutions and profit economically from its rise while cooperating with the US to hedge against a violent turn in China's rise and to ensure that they have strategic flexibility more generally.

Prime Minister Aso Taro visited China to meet Chinese President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao, renewing their commitment to building a "strategic, reciprocal relationship" and discussing a number of urgent problems, most notably the global spread of swine flu, the ongoing global economic crisis, and North Korea's latest turn to intransigence. The deep freeze of the Koizumi years is increasingly distant, and these Sino-Japanese summits are becoming so routine in their agendas as to be boring. But in this relationship, boring is positive. Despite Chinese anxiety about the gift sent by Aso to Yasukuni Shrine for the Spring Festival prior to his trip to China (and the expected Chinese netizen protests about welcoming Aso to China after his gift), Wen and Hu mentioned the history problem but did not harp on it, just as Aso expressed his hope for Chinese participation in nuclear disarmament. Both sides seem content to accentuate the positive in their meetings, and — aside from Wen's cautionary note — the Basil Fawlty line remains in effect: don't mention the war.

In fact, looking at the post in which I first mentioned the Basil Fawlty line, Aso has proved me wrong. Last May I wrote, "Mr. Aso and his comrades will most likely not embrace the Fawlty line." However, it appears that the structural factors that draw Japan and China to one another have tamed another Japanese conservative politician. In fact, in a speech in Beijing Thursday, Aso alluded to the possibility of an economic partnership agreement between Japan and China; the obstacles to such an agreement are high, certainly as high or higher than the obstacles facing an EPA or trade agreement between Japan and the US, but as symbolism goes it is significant that Aso mentioned the possibility of institutionalizing the Sino-Japanese economic relationship. In the meantime, Japan and China outlined the three pillars of their relationship going forward: economic cooperation (Japan will host a senior-level economic dialogue in June); environmental and technology cooperation; and cultural and educational exchanges. The beginnings of perpetual peace? Hardly: there is still much work to do, whether on the Senkakus, North Korea, the history problem (how sustainable is the Fawlty line after all?), or Chinese military transparency. But by acknowledging that there are areas on which they can cooperate and that there is value to meeting even without perfect harmony in their positions, Japan and China are making Northeast Asia ever so slightly more stable.

At the same time, even as Aso parlayed with China's senior leaders in Beijing, Hamada Yasukazu, his defense minister, prepared for a Golden Week visit to Washington where he would be meeting with Robert Gates, his US counterpart. Gates and Hamada met Friday morning, and central to the discussion was Hamada's practically begging Gates for the right to purchase F-22s from the US as Japan considers its next-generation fighter. "Even just a few," Hamada said. Of course, it is not in Gates's power to permit Japan to buy the F-22; as mentioned in this post, its sale abroad is prohibited by the Obey Amendment, meaning that the Japanese government should be making its case to Congress. (I am certain that if it isn't doing so already, the Japanese government will be lobbying representatives and senators from the forty-four states involved in the production of the F-22. Sakurai Yoshiko tellingly included this detail in the articles mentioned in this post.) No word on how Gates received Hamada's petition, but the Gates-Hamada meeting reveals the other side of Middle Power Asia. With one hand, Japan is reaching out to China, with the other it is balancing by constantly working to strengthen the US-Japan alliance. Gates and Hamada discussed coordinating as the US prepares its next Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) and Japan prepares its next National Defense Program Outline for later this year. They also talked about further strengthening missile defense cooperation and devoting sufficient attention to the realignment of US forces in Japan.

Australia, as I've written before, faces the same strategic imperatives, a fact thrown into relief by events this week. As it was characterized in the Economist's Banyan column this week, "On the one hand, Australia’s crackerjack fit with the Chinese economy is reshaping Australia’s trade and investment flows, drawing the country into a China-centred Asian orbit. On the other, Australia’s security hangs on America’s continued presence in the western Pacific." One can easily substitute Japan for Australia without skipping a beat. This week Australia has been feeling the tension growing out of its economic relationship, due to an investment bid by Chinalco in Rio Tinto. In a speech at the Lowy Institute, Malcolm Turnbull, leader of the opposition, called on the government to reject the bid, which, regardless of the outcome of the bid, has brought concerns about the Sino-Australian relationship to the fore — anticipating, in a sense, the Rudd government's defense white paper.

Much as Japan is looking to hedge against China, so too is Australia: reports suggest that the white paper will lavish Australia's navy with new resources.

Rory Medcalf at the Interpreter writes that Japanese and South Korean analysts look favorably upon Australia's plans, although he suggests that the Rudd government's plans could spark a spate of middle power arms building. But regardless of what other middle powers do, the Rudd program and Japan's desperate pursuit of the F-22 suggest that the middle powers will not feel secure simply by pursuing external balancing (tighter alliances with the US and other countries in the region). Particularly as the US looks to deepen its cooperation with China across a range of issues — whether or not it is appropriate to refer to Sino-US cooperation as a G2 — the middle powers will likely rely more on internal balancing, concluding that while their alliances with the US are fine, perhaps an additional guarantee of security is worth the investment. They may look to each other for security too, although as I argued when Australia and Japan issued a joint security declaration, it is unclear what Japan and Australia can do for each other.

In any case, there are limits to how far the middle powers can and will go in their hedging against China. They will continue to work on their economic relationships with China, they will continue to look for opportunities to bind China through regional institutions, and, especially in the case of Japan, they will face fiscal constraints in maintaining capabilities adequate to defend themselves without the US. Despite concerns about the Gates defense budget, the US is not going anywhere — and it is as imperative for the middle powers to ensure that that remains the case as it is for them to ensure that the US does not go overboard with containing China. For the foreseeable future, this is the delicate balance facing the middle powers.

A future for values diplomacy?

Daniel Twining, currently a senior fellow at the German Marshall Fund and formerly an Asia policy staffer at the State Department's policy planning staff and an adviser to John McCain, offers his recommendations to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton at Shadow Government, a new blog at Foreign Policy featuring the writing of conservative and Republican foreign policy analysts.

Twining is a dedicated believer in the idea of "values diplomacy," that catch phrase of the Abe government — with Aso Taro as foreign minister — that placed "universal values," at the center of Japan's foreign policy, at least rhetorically.

The US, Japan, and other democracies of East Asia, according to this view (common in neoconservative circles in Washington, see this post for example), must cooperate to promote the spread of democracy in the region. Accordingly, for Twining the first two goals for US strategy in Asia must be "Accelerate the rise of democratic great powers in Asia that are increasingly willing to help police the region" and "Encourage strategic cooperation among Asia-Pacific democracies." Democracy reappears in point eight, "Promote democracy." The contrast with Secretary Clinton's vision of US East Asia strategy could not be more pronounced. Recall that in her first statement on Asia policy, Mrs. Clinton barely mentioned cooperation among democracies and democracy promotion as important US goals in the region.

And yet Twining thinks that no goal is more important than binding the region's democracies closer together. Twining celebrates what he sees as a "trend" of "Asian nations...leading the effort to form democratic security concerts, a trend Washington should enthusiastically nurture."

There are several problems with Twining's proposal.

First, it is not clear that the trend he sees is actually a trend. He cites the "quad," the strategic partnership among the US, Australia, Japan, and India, as a leading example of this trend. Except that it appears that the quad barely survived the Abe government that spearheaded its creation. Similarly, while the Australia-Japan and India-Japan security agreements are unprecedented in Japanese foreign policy, it is still unclear what substance lies behind the agreements. The democracies may be talking to each other more, but it is too early to declare that Asian democracies have deepened their strategic cooperation in any substantial way to the point of promoting "regional peace and prosperity."

However, if we grant that Twining's assessment of the state of cooperation among Asian democracies is correct, he still makes what I think is an overly optimistic assessment of the gains from said cooperation. Twining concludes that strong, democratic states on the Asian littoral — the same democratic states who he believes are deepening cooperation amongst themselves — "could deter Chinese adventurism and help ensure its peaceful rise."

Does Twining really believe that, that China will somehow be so impressed by the strength of its neighbors that it will simply accept what is tantamount to encirclement, cease enhancing its military power, and trust the US and the other democracies on its periphery to keep the sea lines carrying vital resources to China open at all times? If China is, in Twining's words, "a prickly, insecure giant," why would it feel any less insecure in these circumstances? It does not take a considerable leap of imagination to wonder whether this view might be a bit fanciful. Why is Twining so sure that deepening security ties among democracies (and non- or semi-democracies, in the case of Vietnam and Singapore) arrayed around China's borders while trigger such a benign response from China? This isn't simply a matter of Chinese paranoia. Is there a country in the world that would respond benignly to the formation of ever closer security ties among surrounding countries that also stress the illegitimacy of the surrounded country's government?

In short, the policy proposed by Twining here and by US and Japanese officials at various points in time would amount to encirclement, whether intentionally or not. As Joseph Nye has said, "If we treat China as an enemy now, we’re guaranteeing an enemy for the future."

But it is unlikely that this scenario will come to pass, for another reason ignored by Twining. Even if the Asian democracies are talking more with each other, they are also talking more with China, because, much like the US, none of them can afford to let relations with China deteriorate. South Korea, a strong Asian democracy that barely figures in the flurry of strategic cooperation mentioned by Twining except in regard to NATO-South Korea ties, is often written off as destined for the Chinese sphere of influence if and when reunification occurs. Australia has worked to avoid giving the impression that new security talks with Japan are aimed at China. India certainly looks warily across the Himalayas and now out into the Indian Ocean at China, but that does not make India a reliable junior partner for the US in a league of Asian democracies.

As I've argued before, to understand the future of East Asia it is essential to look at the role of middle powers, the powers forced to maneuver between China and the US, working to minimize antagonism while preventing the two from reaching agreements prejudicial to their interests. The firm ties rooted in shared values envisioned by Twining make it more difficult to pursue the flexible diplomacy required by life as a middle power, and I do not expect we'll see substantial progress in security cooperation among the democracies qua democracies. Twining comes close to recognizing this: "They are less likely to fall under the sway of their giant neighbors when they have options for partnership with a benign, distant partner. America's staying power at a time of dramatic strategic change gives smaller Asian countries geopolitical options they would not otherwise have." But while small (and not-so-small) Asian countries are in no hurry to see the US leave Asia, they also do not want the kind of universal relationships envisioned by Twining. They want the US as an option: a hedge against Chinese expansionism, a market for their goods, and perhaps as a source for investment. But that does not mean that they support active containment of China or making democracy a top priority for the region. The desire of middle powers for an active US presence in the region is an asset for the US only insofar as the US doesn't overreach in its zeal to promote democracy and bend regional institutions to its ends.

Twining further calls for fostering a "pluralistic regional order" in East Asia but the reality is that East Asia is already pluralistic, checkered with a growing array of bilateral, mini-lateral, regional, and trans-Pacific organizations, in addition to the network of US bilateral alliances. These organizations are based not on shared values, as they feature ties between democracies and non-democracies, but shared interests, and one interest in particular: stability in East Asia. The US should be engaged as much as possible in these organizations, but it should also be willing to accept that there is not a seat for the US at every table, at least not if the US wants to dominate the discussion and, as Mrs. Clinton said Friday referring to past US governments, act "reflexively before considering available facts and evidence, or hearing the perspectives of others." While he recognizes the importance of "talking economics," it seems for the most part US engagement in the region would involve more talking — about democracy and security — than listening.

Meanwhile, given the existence of a pluralistic regional order, the US should not fear the creation of what Michael Green calls institutions based on "preserving Asian exceptionalism." Asian exceptionalism sounds like another way of saying, Asian countries working together to solve Asian problems without the US at the table. Is that such a terrible thing? If there are, as Twining says, so many burgeoning and established democracies in the region, why should the US fear organizations from which it is absent?

Finally, on the very question of democracy promotion, Twining includes it as a goal but does nothing to explain how to go about it except to say that democracy is on the march in the region and China is on the wrong side of history. (Sounds awfully Marxist, doesn't it?) How does Twining propose to make China (or Vietnam or Burma or North Korea) democratic? How does Twining propose for the US and other regional democracies to keep existing democracies from lapsing, as in the case of Thailand?

Meanwhile, there is also a bit of irony in Twining's enthusiasm for democracy promotion, in that the more developed the democracy, the greater the popular ambivalence regarding the country's ties with the US. For example, while Japan's leaders talk of the strength of the alliance — perhaps for want of anything else to say — the Japanese public is increasingly doubtful about the alliance after years of an approach to the alliance that dovetailed with Twining's vision. Skepticism regarding ties with the US in countries like Japan and Australia does not necessarily mean that the Japanese and Australian peoples are more trusting of China, it means they are moving in the direction of a middle-power foreign policy that looks at both regional powers with a certain degree of distrust, wary of Chinese intentions while concerned about US overzealousness that would entrap their countries in wars not of their choosing.

In sum, the emphasis on democracy is misguided, not just because there is little the US can do — and little US allies want to do — to promote democracy in the region, but because it assumes that the region can be neatly divided into democracies and non-democracies, which in turn risks alienating China and sending it down a more assertive and unilateralist path, the very future Twining says he wants to prevent.

An open letter to Ambassador-designate Nye

Dear Professor Nye:

Congratulations on your appointment to the position of United States Ambassador to Japan.

Your arrival comes at an auspicious time. It appears exceedingly likely that during your ambassadorship the Liberal Democratic Party will be bounced from power and replaced most likely by the Democratic Party of Japan, although possibly a ragtag coalition as in 1993-1994.

Between "change you can believe in" in Washington and incipient political change in Japan, now is the perfect time for a new approach for the US-Japan alliance, and I think you may be the perfect agent to deliver change.

To senior politicians in the LDP, you are remembered for your work as assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs, in particular the "Nye Initiative" which resulted in the reaffirmation of the US-Japan alliance after the trade skirmishes of the early 1990s. Nakagawa Hidenao, former LDP secretary-general, calls you a "one of the strongest advocates throughout the Democratic and Republican parties for the US-Japan alliance."

I expect he's right. But as you prepare for your move to Akasaka, it is worth asking what it means to be an advocate for the alliance today.

As Richard Samuels and James Schoff make clear in the International Herald Tribune, the alliance is in desperate need of attention. "We have allowed alliance symbols," they write, "like the nuclear umbrella and common democratic values, to stand as a surrogate for alliance value and a clear division of responsibilities."

But clarifying the goals and roles of the alliance should not involve your telling Japan what to do, although nor should it mean telling Japanese leaders what they want to hear. Japan's lingering reluctance to bear a greater burden is frustrating, particularly when it involves something like fighting pirates in the Gulf of Aden, something so innocuous and so obviously in both Japan's national interest and the interest of the international community. But Japan should not be shamed or pressured into playing a greater global role. No matter how many times your predecessor as ambassador told Japan that it should permit collective self-defense, Japan barely budged in the direction of a new interpretation. If Japan's leaders or the Japanese public are unwilling to do it themselves, no amount of pressure from the US will force their hand — and such pressure could very easily sour America's image in Japan. It is little wonder that the DPJ is criticizing the LDP for being too interested in pleasing the US while ignoring the public; the opposition party has a point.

I hope, Professor, that as ambassador you will say what you mean. The US, in pushing for Japan to be more active globally and more active in the alliance, has without question associated the two ideas in the mind of the Japanese people. These should be two different discussions. The idea of a global alliance was far-fetched and doomed to fail, in part because the Bush administration raised the prospect of entrapment in American wars to unacceptable levels. The transition to the Obama administration will diminish the fears of entrapment somewhat, but Japan's half-hearted contributions to US campaigns in Afghanistan and Iraq show that Japan's tolerance for serious involvement in US military campaigns is limited. The costs of cooperation in terms of expectations (in that Japanese leaders came to expect reciprocity in North Korea) and in heightened fears of entrapment are not worth the marginal benefits of Japanese cooperation (despite the rhetoric heaped upon Japanese contributions in the Indian Ocean and Iraq, it is hard to see them as anything but marginal).

But there is still work to be done in Asia. The US-Japan alliance is an Asian alliance, a pillar of stability in the region, not least because it ensures the US forward presence in East Asia. This role is crucial, both in terms of deterring aggression and in providing public goods, most notably open sea lanes. But can the alliance be more than a hedge against a bad turn in China's development? Can the alliance play a role in reducing the possibility of a bad turn? Better coordination in relation to China is essential, without making such coordination appear as the US and Japan ganging up on China.

In a 2006 article in the Boston Globe, you described Asia policy during your time at the Pentagon as follows:

We knew that hawks who called for containment of China would not be able to rally other countries to that cause. We also knew that if we treated China as an enemy, we were ensuring future enmity. While we could not be sure how China would evolve, it made no sense to foreclose the prospect of a better future. Our response combined balance of power with liberal integration. We reinforced the US-Japan alliance so that China could not play a ''Japan card" against us, while inviting China to join the World Trade Organization. In a rare case of bipartisan comity, the Bush administration has continued that strategy.

That is where we stand today, only more so. Except that it is time to focus less on the balance of power and more on the liberal integration. The US shouldn't neglect the security relationship. It should try to guarantee the timely completion of the realignment of US forces in Japan (and be willing to reconsider portions of that agreement if doing so hastens the process). It should look to improve interoperability between US and Japanese forces.

But it is time to deemphasize the security relationship. By focusing on the security relationship to the exclusion of much else during the past decade, the US finds itself not allied with Japan, but with a narrow, increasingly powerless segment of the Japanese elite. This is not the basis for a durable alliance.

As I've argued previously, "The challenge for the Obama administration is to present a vision for the alliance that does more than prepare for the worst-case scenario with China, a vision focused on more than security cooperation. The security relationship is important, but it cannot be the whole of the U.S.-Japan relationship." The US and Japan need better coordination regarding the future of the Korean Peninsula, which necessarily means better coordination with China. It means getting Japan to focus on matters other than the fate of Japanese abductees in North Korea. It means better coordination on how to incorporate China as a regional power, and better coordination on economic regionalism in East Asia. Japan needs to be more capable of forging an independent leadership role for itself in Asia, a role which it finds difficult to play given the perception of a US veto over Japanese foreign policy.

Japan, in short, needs to be given room to forge an independent role between the US and China. This is the reality of the region: Japan, like other middle-sized powers in the region, finds itself needing to maintain good relations with both the US and China, while ensuring that the US-China relationship is neither too warm nor too hostile. Yes, the alliance could be more reciprocal, with Japan's committing to the defense of the US (in practice, committing to shooting down US missiles). Yes, Japan take on greater responsibilities within the alliance. But those changes will not come overnight, and they will not come about through US cajoling, certainly not if LDP rule gives way to a DPJ-led government.

Japan stands on the brink of an important moment in its political history. Rather than worrying about whether the DPJ will be as good as the LDP on security or whether the DPJ will trash the alliance, the Obama administration — and naturally you as its designated representative in Japan — should be prepared to celebrate the DPJ's victory and find ways to work with a possible DPJ administration along terms acceptable to the Japanese people as whole and not just a narrow segment of Japan's elite. There is no question that Japan needs to have a debate on its foreign policy, and more broadly its place in Asia and the world. But that debate will not occur immediately, and its outcome is intrinsically connected to broader political changes.

I have high hopes for your ability to strike the right tone as the ambassador in Tokyo. I believe that you recognize that there is more to the US-Japan relationship that cooperation between the US Military and Japan's Self-Defense Forces. I believe that you will respect that the Japanese people need to make decisions about their security for themselves, that while you will make the US government's positions known, you will not be overbearing in doing so. And I believe that based on your work as an academic and a government official you are the right man at the right time.

I wish you nothing but the best of luck as you embark on the next phase of your journey as a public intellectual in the service of the United States.

Cordially,
Tobias Harris