With this week devoted to meetings running up to the weekend's APEC summit (I'm curious about what leaders will wear for the Australian "national costume" photo), there is lots of talk about the shape of US Asia policy as the Bush administration comes to a close.Kim Beazley, a former leader of Australia's Labor Party, writes …
Tag: East Asian international relations
In Asia’s future, flexibility first
In the week since Prime Minister Abe called for an organization of democracies that would implicitly encircle China, his proposal has been met with deafening silence from the capitals of the countries that would be involved, illustrating just how out of touch with new realities the prime minister's foreign policy thinking is.As I've argued before, …
Who is missing from this group?
In Abe's Magical Democracy tour, there was lots of talk about cooperation between Japan, India, the US, and Australia — glorious Pacific-spanning cooperation among democracies.But what about South Korea, which last time I checked was a vibrant democracy whose people struggled to achieve it after decades of authoritarian rule?It seems that any organization of democracies …
Does an "Asian NATO" serve US interests?
Prime Minister Abe has made his speech in New Delhi, visited the descendants of Subhas Chandra Bose and Radhabinod Pal (the judge who criticized the Tokyo tribunal from before it began, making him a favorite of Japan's right), and is now off to Malaysia on the last leg of his Asian tour.But what of the …
Mr. Abe’s half-baked scheme
As expected, Mr. Abe went to Indian Parliament on Wednesday and called for "a 'broader Asia' partnership of democracies that would include India, the United States and Australia but leave out the region's superpower, China." (Reuters)At an earlier point in my intellectual development, I might have praised Japan's pushing for an organization of Asian democracies, …
What does Abe’s trip mean for Japan and Asia?
Much is being made of Prime Minister Abe's trip to India, where he is scheduled to address India's parliament today.The trip will likely feature lots of talk of the values shared by Japan and India, naturally to contrast both Asian powers with China.I remain less than convinced that Japan and India will be able to …
Continue reading What does Abe’s trip mean for Japan and Asia?
Sankei pays tribute to the war dead by calling for a more activist Japan
In honor of the day of memorial for the end of the war on August 15, each of Japan's dailies has published an editorial marking the occasion.They are, in general, fairly innocuous: Yomiuri's discusses history and Yasukuni Shrine, Asahi's looks at relations with Asian neighbors. Sankei's editorial, however, single-handedly illustrates the fundamental incoherence of the …
Continue reading Sankei pays tribute to the war dead by calling for a more activist Japan
F-22 as a totem for China hawks
The F-22 issue continues to smolder, it seems, as Japan eyes the next-generation stealth fighter hungrily.The US Congress, however, has just passed the 2008 defense budget, which retains the Obey Amendment's prohibition on the export of the F-22.Will this be the end of Tokyo's lobbying to get the prohibition lifted in time for Japan to …
Brave old world
Robert Kagan has come out with a new essay that is decidedly less revolutionary than his earlier "Of Power and Paradise," which captured the mood of the 2003 transatlantic feud.In this new essay in Policy Review, Kagan comes to a realization about the nature of American power and world order that others have been arguing …
The trouble with collective self-defense
Yomiuri ran an editorial on reviewing the prohibition on the right of collective self-defense today, arguing that debate "ought to deepen."The occasion for this editorial is the government panel's recommendation that MSDF vessels be permitted to counterattack if, when sailing with US warships, the US vessels come under attack. In this case and the case …
Tobias S. Harris 