Japan is weighing whether it needs to be a major military power in the Pacific again, 70 years after World War II.
Since the end of the war, Japan has interacted with its neighbors through the lens of a bilateral relationship with the US. Japanese domestic politics either benefited from the arrangement — through a lucrative domestic arms industry that caters to the US military — or were subservient to it (by providing military bases). However, a multipolar East Asia and new homeland pressures are challenging how Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe views his loyalty to the US.
Security issues loom over the US-Japan relationship, particularly each nation’s stance toward North Korea. The Japanese public believe that Japanese Cold War-era hostages are still alive in North Korea; returning them home is an emotional issue — think US prisoners of war “left-behind” in Vietnam — and has always moderated the nation’s stance toward Pyongyang.
Negotiations with North Korea on the issue have been troublesome for Abe, and he has already been pressed to loosen sanctions. The North Koreans are demanding that the ferry service between the two nations resume, after Tokyo shut it down in 2006, in part due to US pressure. Abe must contend with the US’ desire for harsher rhetoric against Pyongyang, and the threat of jeopardizing progress on the hostage issue.
The implicit understanding of the broader US-Japan security relationship has been that Japan’s “contribution” would be almost completely financial; Japan pays out billions of dollars to support, operate and maintain the US military bases on its own territory, in addition to land grants and sweetheart leases for military bases. In this context, Abe and his predecessors have for years managed domestic friction, particularly on Okinawa, over the expansion of US bases.
Washington now wants Abe to agree to a “collective defense” arrangement similar to NATO, which would see Japan strike back at an enemy that attacks the US. The inverse has been true for about seven decades. If Abe goes along with this arrangement, he would place Japan at even greater loggerheads with China and North Korea, making his own nation subject to retaliation in response to US military actions throughout the region.
Abe would also suffer domestically if he consented to US demands for collective defense. In mid-March Abe’s own Liberal Democratic Party convened a conference during which party members challenged the wisdom and constitutionality of the policy. Even Japanese conservatives who welcome US military support if China moves toward any of the disputed islands in the Pacific are wary of being drawn into some greater US-China regional tussle.
Japan’s economic priorities are also at stake. Abe must decide whether to join China’s Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB). The US has opposed the bank, arguing that it would undermine the World Bank and Asian Development Bank. However, the White House failed to keep allies South Korea, Taiwan and Australia from signing on. Only Japan has so far stood aside, at the cost of further weakening its relations with China.
Japan’s business community, seeking access to the funds and the Chinese markets that AIIB membership would provide, turned up the heat on Abe.
“The business community woke up late, but now they have mounted a big campaign for the AIIB which appears to be very effective,” Japanese Ambassador to China Masato Kitera told the Financial Times. Abe must choose between disappointing the US or his own business community.
Some Japanese media outlets are saying Japan “has not yet decided” whether or not to join the AIIB, as opposed to a common line just a few months ago that the nation gave a firm “no.”
There is speculation that Japan might announce its participation in the new bank as early as this summer.
The US-Japan relationship is also being tested over the Trans-Pacific Partnership, one of the biggest trade deals in history. The White House is pushing Japan to sign on; doing so would provide significantly higher gains for the US by busting open Asian markets, freeing about 40 percent of US imports and exports from tariff and non-tariff barriers, and thus weakening the economic power of China in the region. Abe is stuck between pressure to uphold the relationship, and angry opposition from Japanese farmers who enjoy high tariff protection and are desperate to keep the nation’s markets closed. Without opting out altogether, the only way for Abe to please his constituents is to carve out an exception for Japanese agriculture. This decision, however, would upset other signatories and chip away at the US desire to create a free-trade zone in the Pacific.
A departure from the bilateral relationship presents risks for Japan. Not getting along better with China has benefited Abe and his predecessors, and the dysfunctional nature of the relationship has been made easier by US support. For Tokyo, barely acknowledging hyper-sensitive issues involving other Asian nations — such as the the Nanjing Massacre in China, and the “comfort women” issue, felt particularly vehemently in South Korea — has helped keep a small, rotating group of Japanese political elites in power practically uninterrupted for 70 years.
Hyper-conservative voters are a mainstay of support for Abe and his party. These supporters see apologies for World War II crimes as pandering to the demands of Japan’s Asian neighbors. What outsiders might see as leftover issues from a distant war are red meat to Japan’s conservative voters, and to the powerful corporate heads who support them.
Japan has also benefited from the bilateral relationship by developing a lucrative domestic arms industry that caters to US needs. For example, Japan is building a US$1 billion facility for final assembly of Lockheed Martin’s F-35s, and is set to play a large role in the maintenance of the aircraft in Asia.
The US maintains significant military bases across the Japanese archipelago. These facilities served as staging areas during the Cold War, and today help the US counter China. Japan supports the US position in most international forums — Japan votes with the US at the UN about as often as most European allies, donates cash to development efforts in Afghanistan, and even sent a symbolic number of troops to Iraq in 2004.
Navigating these issues might force the US to accept less than it wants from Japan. Doing so would avoid putting Abe in so many no-win situations that he loses domestic support, and thus becomes ineffectual. US President Barack Obama would do well to understand this, and to carefully choose which issues to press.
What was once the US’ most stable relationship in Asia is moving into the category of “it’s complicated.”
Peter Van Buren served in the US Department of State for 24 years. The opinions expressed here are those of the author.
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