Back in April, Paul Kennedy, professor of history at Yale best known for his The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers, had an op-ed in the IHT in which he discussed the meaning of the growing naval arms race in Northeast Asia in terms of the center of balance of the international system, with …
Tag: East Asian international relations
The Bush administration has left the building (in Asia, anyway)
South Korea's Dong-A Ilbo reports that the Asia team for the denouement of the Bush administration is complete...Daniel Drezner could not have been more right when he said that the Bush administration is looking for "September call-ups" for its foreign policy team.Look at the roster provided by Dong-A. While some, including Dr. Paul Heer and …
Continue reading The Bush administration has left the building (in Asia, anyway)
"We would…help them"
Having previously written about the strategic and political questions surrounding China's rumored aircraft carrier program, I found this VOA article (hat tip: China Digital Times) on Admiral Keating's visit to China fascinating.VOA reports that Keating discussed the operational difficulties of deploying and maintaining aircraft carriers with Vice Admiral Wu Shengli of the PLAN — but …
Keating in China
Admiral Timothy Keating, newly minted chief of US Pacific Command, is currently visiting China to meet with PLA brass. As documented by Dana Priest and Robert Kaplan, among others, the heads of the US Military's unified combatant commands wield tremendous military power, of course, but also diplomatic power (America's "proconsuls," to use the imperial metaphor …
Pooling reserves in Asia
The Yomiuri Shimbun's lead editorial today focuses on an agreement reached at the annual meeting of the Asian Development Bank (ABD) to pool currency reserves among the ASEAN + 3 countries so to be able to provide liquidity in the event of a crisis.Building on the Chiang Mai Initiative, an earlier agreement in ASEAN + …
Asia’s shifting balance
The past week has brought a host of stories pointing to how the balance of power — both globally and in Asia — is shifting, suggesting that the assumptions made by each major regional power will have to change accordingly.First, Taiwan's place as the most likely cause of war between China and the US (with …
The end of the F-22 question?
Sharon Weinberger at the Danger Room notes that General Jeffrey Kohler, head of the Defense Cooperation Agency at the Department of Defense, quashed reports that the US is prepared to sell the F-22 to allies like Japan and Israel.The Chosun Ilbo, of course, reported this immediately.There may be the occasional report that appears to contradict …
Was Abe’s trip a success?
That's the argument made by an editorial in the Japan Times and Jun Okumura at GlobalTalk 21. The Yomiuri, meanwhile, was cautiously optimistic, suggesting that while there were positive results from the Bush-Abe summit, the future is unclear, and there is a greater need for better bilateral communication (a point I've stressed on a number …
Japan’s unchanging defense budget
Courtesy of Japan Probe, I came across this summary of Abe's interview with the Wall Street Journal, which seems to have focused more on defense matters than the Washington Post/Newsweek interview.Abe apparently told the WSJ that Japan does not plan to raise its defense spending to match China's growing defense expenditures, which, the article reports, …
A Korean admires Koizumi
This op-ed from the Chosun Ilbo by Tokyo correspondent Jong Son-U -- entitled "We Can Learn Much From Japanese Patriotism" -- provides yet another reminder of why it is unfair to view Japanese nationalism as a unique threat to the region.Jong writes of a visit to Yasukuni by Koizumi last year:I felt strangely envious at …
Tobias S. Harris 