[MUSIC] Another critical relationship in East Asia that has enormous implications for peace and security in the region is really Japan and China's relationship. Now from a strategic perspective, Asia has never faced a period where both China and Japan are strong. And this really fires up the nationalism in both countries due to very deep mistrust, and both see each other as a major threat. And Japan is actually giving trouble to China by donating ships to India, Vietnam, the Philippines, states with whom China is having its confrontation, and this is a way to make trouble for China. The Japanese Defense Agency in December 2004 did scenarios for war with China, publicized them. And one of them was, in fact, based on a resource conflict in the East China Sea. Which we will talk about in a minute. Now again, Yan Xuetong of Tsinghua University says that China's rapid rise has given Japanese very little time to adjust mentally to the loss of status as the major power of East Asia. If we look at bureaucratic politics, China has several coastal forces such as the Coast Guard, the Customs. They have smaller navy's and for a period of time, they were regularly going out and giving problems to the Japanese defense forces around the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands, Xi has now pulled those people under control. Another bureaucratic agency that has a lot of problems with China is the Ministry of Education, which is very conservative. And while most of the books that are used, vast majority of books used in Japanese classrooms are factual and really state what Japan did during the war. There are some books that significantly downplay Japan's really terrible behavior in China during World War II. Still, the Japanese like the Americans, wanting to speak to the Chinese military. The Japanese Defense Force holds regular meetings with the Chinese when relationships are pretty good. Leadership is a bigger problem, I think in some ways. Now, in Japan you have Prime Minister Abe who is very nationalistic and he in some ways really wants Japan to maintain it's position as number one in East Asia. And cannot accept this power transition where China is actually surpassing Japan as we saw that in the indicators of comprehensive national power. The China threat, though, is very good for Abe because he wants to spend more on defense, and he wants to introduce a new bill, a new law, that will allow Japan to send out military forces. Currently, Japan is not allowed to do that because of what's called Article 9, signed way back in its constitution back in 1940, I think it's about 1946. But he wants to end those years, and he wants to be able to send military force beyond China's beyond Japan's borders, even as peacekeepers. Now, there's a very strong mistrust between China and Japan, largely because of the Yasakuni Shrine. Japanese leaders continue to visit the Yasakuni Shrine, where there are 12 Class A war criminals who their spirits are supposed to be in this shrine, and the Japanese leaders still feel an obligation to pray at that shrine. And that just gets everybody really angry, both in China and in Korea. When Xi and Abe actually met for the first time, almost two years after not speaking to each other for about two years, they had a terrible handshake. And it's what's known as the cold handshake. And so if you can go and Google online you will see this really incredibly unfriendly, friendly gesture. Now, one of the big problems in this relationship is really a lot about history. China teaches, in my view, China effectively teaches hostilities towards Japan from generation to generation. So every generation of Chinese still don't like the Japanese, right? But in Japan's own interpretation of history and its nuanced expressions of regret for World War II war crimes actually complicates Sino-Japanese relations. And as I said, the Yasakuni Shrine in Tokyo, which is a private institution, so the Japanese government says it can't do anything about it. But it presents World War II as Japan's effort to drive Western colonialism out of East Asia and to liberate the countries of East Asia. I recently visited there and they have even film footage. I was shocked that they even have film footage of Japan's attack on Shanghai, at which time Japan used poison gas. So I think that it is quite surprising and in fact quite insensitive that the Japanese would show that kind of film footage. Interestingly, while Chinese regularly accuse Japanese of being anti-China and hardline, 45% of Japanese opposed Prime Minister Koizumi's visits to the Yasukuni Shrine. Now, the truth though is that Japanese have apologized. The Chinese complain that Japan has never fully apologized but, in fact, Japan has apologized over 20 times. And a reasonably nationalistic Prime Minister, Koizumi, in 2001 commenting on the comfort women issue said, as Prime Minister of Japan, I extend anew my most sincere apologies and remorse to all the women who underwent immeasurable and painful experiences, right? And we should not evade our responsibilities for the future. In August 1995, then Prime Minister Murayama, who is a socialist, from the socialist party, not from the ruling Liberal Democratic party. But he was prime minister for about two years. In a speech, he said that Japan through its colonial rule and aggression, caused tremendous damage and suffering to the people of many countries, particularly those of Asia. I regard in a spirit of humanity, these irrefutable facts of history. So he says they can't be denied, right? And express here, once again, my feelings of deep remorse, and state my heartfelt apology. The problem though, is that no, Koizumi made those comments. I believe it was in Indonesia. And as I said, Murayama was a Socialist Prime Minister for a short period of time. And still, no sitting liberal democratic party Prime Minister has ever made a full apology on Japanese soil. And in 2007, 44% of Japanese felt Japan had not apologized enough. Now in terms of domestic politics, it's a very complicated and a very interesting situation. Japanese business community was strongly pro China, and has strongly opposed visits to the Yasakuni Shrine by Japanese Prime Ministers. Largely because when those visits happen, the summit diplomacy, the discussions between the top leaders don't meet, and if they don't meet Japanese have a hard time cutting business deals. Now in fact within the liberal democratic party there is not the same kind of strong pro-China lobby that there was in the 1970's and 1980's and that lobby in those days really pushed hard for normalization of relations. Again, according to Pew, only 7% right? Only 7% of Japanese have a favorable view of China and only 8% of Chinese have a favorable view of Japan. That doesn't make for very good friendship. 68% of Japanese see China as their biggest threat. That's, again, a problem. Chinese citizens are easily mobilized to go out and protest against Japan when Japan does anything that seem to harm Chinese feelings, Chinese national interests, Chinese core interests, and we've seen massive riots in the streets in China. The Chinese government constantly raises fears of this resurgence of Japanese militarism. That somehow the military will come back, and Japan will become militaristic and go and take over and start a war in East Asia. But, in fact the number of people who support that view in Japan is quite small. It's very important to remember that Japan is the only country in the world that has ever suffered from a nuclear attack. So many people would say pacifism is a very strong feeling within Japan. Nevertheless, there are serious energy conflicts in the East China Sea, due to competing interpretations of where they draw the line for the boundary. Because within that line you have a 200 mile exclusive economic zone under the United Nation convention on the law of the sea. And so there's a disagreement where that line is. I can show you here. So here we have a red line, which is the exclusive economic border claimed by China. Right? So they should be able to drill within this area back here. And this is the Japanese exclusive, the yellow line is the exclusive economic zone claimed by Japan, so they should be able to drill over to this area. So there's this area in here that both sides are claiming. But in fact, the Chinese have been drilling in their own EEZed, there's no doubt about that. But the Japanese are worried that as they suck gas out of the ocean floor here, they're actually taking gas from the Japanese side of this border. Now on sovereignty, we've got a serious problem here too. Because the islands are very sensitive for both sides. And, particularly for China, they're really very sensitive about it. So, in fact in 2012 when a Chinese ship captain rammed a Japanese naval patrol in waters claimed by both states and was arrested, the Japanese decision to try him in Japanese domestic court, then said that the Japanese were claiming that those waters were Japanese waters and that triggered major protests in China. And then there's the mayor of Tokyo who just likes to make trouble, doesn't like China. And so he at one point threatened to buy the Senkaku Diaoyu Islands. And the Japanese government to stop that then said that they would nationalize the islands and that really got the Chinese upset who saw it very much as a provocation.
