Abstract
The US-Japan security relationship has been under sustained challenge since the end of the Cold War. First and foremost, its strategic relevance has been questioned by the decline in the Soviet threat. Other challenges have also emerged: from scholars who see Japan’s protectorate status as perpetuating a state of political underdevelopment which effectively prevents Japan from engaging in more equitable risk-sharing and who argue that the United States naively provides Japan with a cheap defence while it enriches itself in American export markets;2 from Japanese nationalists who view the terms and conditions of the US security guarantee as symbolising Japan’s subservience to the United States; from populist politicians who express the justified grievances of Japanese residents wanting to rid their neighbourhoods of American bases; from Japan’s economic ministries and business communities who seek greater independence from the United States in order to defy American trade pressures; from certain Asia-orientated sections of the Japanese establishment who see the US-Japan alliance as an impediment to their country’s freedom of diplomatic action in Asia; and from observers of American politics who constantly predict a new wave of isolationism about to prompt a US military withdrawal from East Asia.
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Notes
Chalmers Johnson and E.B. Keehn, ‘The Pentagon’s Ossified Strategy’, Foreign Affairs, July/August 1995.
Robert Manning, ‘Futureshock or Renewed Partnership? The US-Japan Alliance Facing the Millennium’, Washington Quarterly, Autumn 1995, p.96.
United States Department of Defense, East Asia Strategy Report, February 1995
Joseph S. Nye, Jr, ‘The Case for Deep Engagement’, Foreign Affairs, July/August 1995.
Norman Levin, ‘Prospects for US-Japanese Security Cooperation’, in Danny Unger and Paul Blackburn (eds), Japan’s Emerging Global Role, Boulder and London, Lynne Rienner, 1993, p. 82.
Far Eastern Economic Review, 10 October 1994. This is very similar to remarks made elsewhere, namely: ‘The US-Japan security arrangements add credibility, particularly in the eyes of Asian countries, to Japan’s policy of not becoming a big military power.’ Yukio Satoh, ‘The Japanese Role’ in T.B. Millar and James Walter (eds), Asian-Pacific Security after the Cold War, Allen & Unwin, 1993, p. 74.
See Yoshihide Soeya, ‘The Evolution of Japanese Thinking and Policies on Cooperative Security in the 1980s and 1990s’, paper presented to the Conference on Economic and Security Cooperation in the Asia-Pacific: Agendas for the 1990s, ANU, July 1993.
See also Hashimoto Motohide, ‘Security in Asia: Roles and Tasks for Japan and the United States’, IIPS Policy Paper 149E, March 1996, p.11.
Ibid. According to the official government interpretation of the Constitution in 1980, ‘if the mission of a “U.N. force” includes “the use of force,” the SDF is not constitutionally allowed to participate in it’. Akihito Tanaka, ‘Japan’s Security Policy in the 1990s’, in Yoichi Funabashi (ed.), Japan’s International Agenda, New York and London, New York University Press, 1994, p.48.
According to Ozawa Ichiro, during the Gulf War, the United States requested that Japan ‘deploy transport craft to carry military supplies. The Japanese government refused without giving the issue any serious thought, citing constitutional restraints. America then requested supply ships. Japan again said “No”. Next came military tankers. Again, “No”. … The same happened regarding cooperation in airlift efforts.’ Ichiro Ozawa, Blueprint for a New Japan: The Rethinking of a Nation, Tokyo, Kodansha International, 1994, p.37.
Ayako Doi, ‘The Korea Crisis and Japan: Politics as Usual’, The Japan Digest, 8 June 1994, p.5
quoted in Patrick Cronin, ‘The Future of the Japan-US Alliance’, Asia-Pacific Review, Vol. 2, No. 1, Spring 1995, p.41.
Reuter Textline, Reuter News Service — Far East, 26 November 1995.
Toshiyuki Shikata, ‘Japan’s Security Strategy: Meeting the Needs of a New Era’, IIPS Policy Paper 145E, November 1995, p.13. Retired Japanese Rear Admiral Sumihiko Kawamura, on the other hand, ‘calls for Japan to provide an oiler to deploy with and support the USS Independence (which is homeported in Japan). He makes several other proposals, including the use of Japanese minesweepers to fill the void in US Seventh Fleet capabilities throughout the Western Pacific.’
Ralph A. Cossa, ‘Northeast Asia Security Challenges: Looking Toward the 21st Century’, Korea and World Affairs, Spring 1994, p.55.
Peter Ennis and Takashi Sato, ‘Reading Between the Lines of Japan’s New National Defense Program Outline’, Tokyo Business Today, February 1996, p.21.
Hosokawa Morihiro, ‘Restructuring the Japan-US Alliance’, quoted on Internet, H-ASIA, 18 March 1996.
Reuter Textline, BBC Monitoring Service — Far East, 16 April 1996.
Reuter Textline, BBC Monitoring Service — Far East, 16 April 1996.
Reuter Textline, Reuter News Service — Far East, 17 April 1996.
Toshiyuki Shikata, ‘The Security Environment’, Paper presented to the Berlin Trilateral Conference on ‘Challenges of the 21st Century’, 11–13 June 1995, and reported in IIPS News, Vol. 6, No. 3, Summer 1995, p.2.
Glenn D. Hook, Militarization and Demilitarization in Contemporary Japan, London and New York, Routledge, 1996, p. 80.
Reuter Textline, Reuter News Service — Far East, 25 April 1996.
Makiko Ushijima, Japan’s Defense Policy-Making Process, Occasional Paper 95–10, Program on US-Japan Relations, Harvard University, 1995, p.7.
Peter Cowhey, ‘Domestic Institutions and the Credibility of International Commitments: Japan and the United States’, International Organization, Vol. 47, No. 2, Spring 1993, p.319.
This assurance was given by Winston Lord in his Briefing on Clinton trip to Japan and Korea. The White House, Office of the Press Secretary, ‘Press Briefing on the President’s Upcoming Trip to Asia’, US Wireless File, 11 April 1996.
On the eve of President Clinton’ s April visit to Japan, the United States agreed to shed seven military facilities, including Futenma air base, training grounds and communications centres, and cut back four more. One US defence spokesperson put the cost to the Japanese taxpayer at about US$1 billion. In total, the land returned in Okinawa will amount 4800 hectares out of the total 24500 hectares set aside for American bases and facilities, although actual numbers of US military personnel in Japan will not be reduced. The Australian, 12 and 15 April 1996; Nikkei Weekly 15 April 1996; Reuter Textline, Reuter News Service — Far East, 15 April 1996.
During President Clinton’s visit to Japan, Governor Ota said he was ‘grateful’ for the concessions offered by the American side, but stated that he wanted all Americans out by 2015, and that ‘Okinawans are still strongly dissatisfied with the conditions attached to the removal of the bases.’ Reuter Textline, Reuter News Service — Far East, 18 April 1996.
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Mulgan, A.G. (1997). The US-Japan Security Relationship in a New Era. In: Roy, D. (eds) The New Security Agenda in the Asia-Pacific Region. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-25701-0_10
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