Rethinking the San Francisco System in Indo-Pacific Security: Enduring Legacies, Structural Contradictions and Geopolitical Rivalry 9811912300, 9789811912306

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Rethinking the San Francisco System in Indo-Pacific Security Enduring Legacies, Structural Contradictions and Geopolitical Rivalry

Edited by Yoneyuki Sugita · Victor Teo

Rethinking the San Francisco System in Indo-Pacific Security “This clear, coherent, and engaging volume offers important insights into the historical legacy, contemporary importance, and future salience of the San Francisco Peace Treaty and the US-Japan Security Treaty of 1951. It provides a wealth of novel assessments on key issues that continue to shape the contours of the regional security order, such as the hub-and-spokes system, Japan’s foreign policy, bilateral and multilateral relations, alliances and strategic partnerships, and territorial disputes. Now that the global economic weight and political power are increasingly shifting to the Indo-Pacific and great-power competition is intensifying, the chapters in this book present a timely and critical portrait of the challenges faced by the San Francisco System. This empirically rich volume is essential reading for students, academics, policymakers and anyone with an interest in the evolving security dynamics of the region.” —Bart Gaens, Leading Research Fellow, Finnish Institute of International Affairs and Adjunct Professor, University of Helsinki “The historic 1951 San Francisco Peace Treaty signed between Japan and the Allied Powers, led by the United States set the course for Japan’s postwar politics and foreign policy for decades to follow. Yoneyuki Sugita and Victor Teo have ably put together a collection of thirteen excellent chapters covering wide-ranging topics that examine the continuing impact of that treaty signed seventy years ago. For anyone interested in Japan’s society, politics and foreign policy, this volume is highly recommended to get a historic insight into Japan’s contemporary affairs.” —Purnendra Jain, Emeritus Professor Japanese Studies, The University of Adelaide

Yoneyuki Sugita · Victor Teo Editors

Rethinking the San Francisco System in Indo-Pacific Security Enduring Legacies, Structural Contradictions and Geopolitical Rivalry

Editors Yoneyuki Sugita Kobe Women’s Junior College Osaka University Kobe, Hyogo, Japan

Victor Teo Center for Research in Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities (CRASSH) University of Cambridge Cambridge, UK

ISBN 978-981-19-1230-6 ISBN 978-981-19-1231-3 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-1231-3 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2022 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. The registered company address is: 152 Beach Road, #21-01/04 Gateway East, Singapore 189721, Singapore

Acknowledgements

The editors thankfully acknowledge the assistance of the colleagues who have made this book possible. A great debt is owed to the respective colleagues at the Osaka University and University of Cambridge for making the logistical and academic resources available for this project. We are also grateful to the administrative team in Osaka University for the support of a workshop that enabled the authors to come together during this pandemic to meet and discuss the papers. The editors are also tremendously grateful to the IT team in Osaka University for all their assistance in the organization of this online workshop hosted at Osaka. We would also like to express our thanks to the various scholars and colleagues who have read or commented on various chapters of the book, including the referees whose comments we found invaluable. We would also like to give our sincere appreciation to the learned scholars who have taken the time and effort to undertake the many revisions required as well as their forbearance in waiting for this book to materialize. We would also like to convey our sincere gratitude to the editors and staff at Palgrave Macmillan, particularly Dr. Hua Bai, Miss Connie Li, Miss Coral Zhou and Mr. Arun Kumar Ambalagan for their guidance and assistance in making this volume possible. The editors are also grateful for the allowance given by the Kobe Women’s Junior College and CRASSH, University of Cambridge for the supportive environment and intellectual space so that they were able to work and bring the project to completion. Lastly, Dr. Victor Teo v

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

would like to gratefully acknowledge the support of the Academy of Korean Studies (AKS-2016-LAB-2250005) for the Cold War Fellowship at the University of Cambridge which made his participation and work in volume possible. Needless to say, the errors within the book are all ours. Yoneyuki Sugita Victor Teo

Contents

The 1951 San Francisco Peace Treaty at Seventy: Legacies, Challenges and the Future of the Asian Regional Order Yoneyuki Sugita and Victor Teo

1

The San Francisco Treaty’s Impact on Elementary English School Education in Okinawa Keiko Yonaha

17

The Demise of the Rearmament Movement in the Aftermath of the San Francisco Peace Conference Ryutaro Yoshida

41

The Contribution of the United States to the Yoshida Doctrine in Japan Yoneyuki Sugita

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Japan’s Early Diplomacy with the Nonaligned World and the Communist Yugoslavia Ljiljana Markovic

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The San Francisco System in Southeast Asia and Japan’s Search for a Regional Order in the 1950s Heiko Lang

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CONTENTS

Bilateral Issues with Multilateral Origins: The Case of Korea and Japan Seung Mo Kang An Uneasy Marriage Between Territorial Sovereignty and the Cold War: Unconditional Surrender and Japan’s Search for a Uniform Perception of the San Francisco Peace Treaty Kyuhyun Jo

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Implications of the San Francisco Treaty on Paracel and Spratly Disputes: A Vietnamese Perspective Hai Dang Vu

181

U.S. Bilateral Alliances in the San Francisco System: Going Strong at Seventy Jocelyn D. Roberts and Scott A. Wicker

209

Reshaping the San Francisco System Through Alignment Cooperation: Japan’s Security Partnerships in the Asia-Indo-Pacific Elena Atanassova-Cornelis

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Preventing the Philippines from Pivoting Toward China: The Role of the U.S.–Japan Security Alliance Renato Cruz De Castro

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The Vexing China Question in Today’s San Francisco System: Moving Beyond the Cold War Framework Victor Teo

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Index

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Notes on Contributors

Elena Atanassova-Cornelis is a Senior Lecturer in International Relations of East Asia. She teaches at the Department of Politics, University of Antwerp (UA), and the School of Political and Social Sciences, Université Catholique de Louvain (UCL), both in Belgium. She is concurrently a Visiting Professor at the Brussels School of International Studies (BSIS) of the University of Kent, as well as an Associate Fellow, Global Fellowship Initiative, at the Geneva Centre for Security Policy (GCSP) in Switzerland. Her research interests and expertise include international relations in the Asia-Pacific region with an emphasis on security. She focuses, in particular, on Japanese foreign and security policy; alignments and major power relations in the Asia-Pacific region; security and geopolitics of the Taiwan Strait and the Korean Peninsula, as well as regional security cooperation in Asia and EU–Asia relations. Dr. Atanassova-Cornelis has authored more than 60 academic articles, book chapters, briefing papers and reports covering various topics related to Asian-Pacific politics and security, and Asia–Europe relations. She has delivered more than 100 lectures and presentations at conferences, high-level expert meetings, and universities in both Europe and Asia. Renato Cruz De Castro is a distinguished professor at the Department of International Studies, De La Salle University, Manila, and holds the Dr. Aurelio Calderon Chair in Philippines–American Relation. He was a visiting fellow in the National Institute for Defense Studies (NIDS) of the Japanese Ministry of Defense in the summer of 2018. He was ix

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based in Japan Institute of International Affairs (JIIA) from June to August 2017 as a visiting researcher. From September to December 2016, he was based in East–West Center in Washington D.C. as the U.S.ASEAN Fulbright Initiative Researcher from the Philippines. He is an alumnus of the Daniel Inouye Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies in Hawaii, U.S.A. In 2009, Dr. De Castro became the U.S. State Department ASEAN Research Fellow from the Philippines and was based in the Political Science Department of Arizona State University. Professor De Castro served as a consultant to the National Security Adviser (NSA), Secretary Caesar Garcia, of the National Security Council (NSC) during the Aquino Administration (2010–2016). He conducts several professional courses on International Relations, Strategic and Security Studies in the National Defense College (NDCP), Special Intelligence Training School (SITS) of the Intelligence Service of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (ISAFP), General Staff College of the Philippines, and the Foreign Service Institute (FSI). As a member of the Board of Trustees of the Albert Del Rosario Institute of Strategic and International Studies (ADRI), he writes monthly opinion columns for the Philippine Star and Business World. He has written over 100 articles on international relations and security that have been published in a number of scholarly journals and edited works in the Philippines, Japan, South Korea, Canada, Malaysia, France, Singapore, Taiwan, Germany, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Australia, and the United States. In 2019, the Board of Trustee of the Philippine Political Science Association (PPSA) announced that Professor De Castro is the most prolific Political Scientist in terms of scholarly publication, and one of the top 10 Filipino Political Scientists in terms of number of citations. He earned his Ph.D. from the Government and International Studies Department of the University of South Carolina as a Fulbright Scholar in 2001, and obtained his B.A. and two master’s degrees from the University of the Philippines. Kyuhyun Jo received his Ph.D. in Modern Korean and East Asian History from the University of Chicago in June 2019. Dr. Jo’s research interests are in Korea–US relations, US–East Asia relations, the Cold War, decolonization and the Korean War. He is also interested in using social science theories for historical analysis. He is currently a lecturer in Political Science at Yonsei University, where he teaches East Asian International Relations and its connection to Korea.

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Seung Mo Kang is a research fellow at the Korea Institute for Maritime Strategy. He obtained his Ph.D. from the London School of Economics, where he examined the process of how the Treaty of Peace with Japan was made between 1945 and 1951. Dr. Kang is currently working on his first monograph The Crafting of the Postwar Peace Treaty with Japan, 1945– 51, which is scheduled to be published by Routledge in late 2023. His research interest includes the history of the Cold War, US foreign policy, treaties, Japan, Korea and naval/maritime policies. Heiko Lang studied Political Science, International Law, and Japanese Studies at the Ludwig-Maximilians University of Munich, Germany, with a focus on Japan’s modern politics and regional and international relations from 2003 to 2009. He obtained his M.A. in Political Science (with honors ) in 2009 with a thesis on Japan’s claim to regional leadership in Southeast Asia. In 2012, he entered the Ph.D. program of International Relations at the University of Tokyo, Japan, and in parallel pursued his doctoral studies at the University of Munich. He obtained his Ph.D. (summa cum laude) in Japanese Studies from the University of Munich in 2018. Dr. Lang’s dissertation dealt with the public discourse on Japan’s Southeast Asia policy from 1938 to 1959. His field of interest includes Japan’s modern diplomatic history, Japan’s diplomatic thought, and regional relations in Asia. An expert on the history of Japan’s diplomatic thought in relation to Southeast Asia, Heiko Lang has researched extensively Japan’s strategies and the national strategic debate in both the pre-war and the post-war period. Heiko Lang has held several teaching positions at universities in Germany and Japan. From 2015 to 2017, he was academic assistant at the Japan Center of the University of Munich and responsible for teaching Japanese politics and international relations. His courses dealt with Japan’s contemporary relations with Asia, Japan’s modern foreign policy, and Japan’s political system. As an expert on Japan’s politics and foreign relations, Heiko Lang is also frequently invited as a guest lecturer; most recently, he accepted to give an advanced course on contemporary Japanese politics in the Winter Semester of 2020 at the University of Hamburg, Germany. In Japan, Heiko Lang has held teaching posts at Rikky¯ o University, H¯osei University and Hitotsubashi University. Heiko Lang has presented papers at academic workshops and conferences in Japan, Germany and Great Britain. His research has been supported by scholarships from the Japan Student Services Organization (2006–2007), the German Academic Exchange Service (2011–2012),

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and the Japanese Ministry of Education (2011–2015). His recent book “Competing Visions of Japan’s Relations with Southeast Asia, 19381960: Identity, Asianism, and the Search for a Regional Role” was published in 2020. In it, Heiko Lang offers the first comprehensive and systematic analysis of the Japanese public discourse on the nation’s Southeast Asia strategy before and after the Asia-Pacific War. Currently, Heiko Lang teaches International Relations and Japan’s Foreign Policy at H¯ osei University, Tokyo. Ljiljana Markovic is Advisor to the President, MB University, Belgrade. Professor Markovi´c is also Advisor to the Rector, Megatrend University, Belgrade and Full Professor in Japanese Studies and Associate Professor in Economics. Professor Markovi´c was educated at Cambridge University and Chuo University. She was awarded the Minister of Foreign Affairs Prize in 2010 by the Government of Japan (Gaimu Daijin Sho), for a special contribution to development of Japanese Studies as an academic discipline and furthering of cultural ties between Japan and Serbia. The President of Serbia awarded her The Golden Medal of Merit in 2019. In the course of forty four years of working at the Faculty of Philology, University of Belgrade (1976–2020), Professor Markovic educated over 700 Japanese Studies Major students, 57 Magisters and Masters in Japanese Studies in the field of Language, Literature and Culture, as well as mentored 14 successful PhDs in Japanese Studies, and 5 Doctoral Students in Economics. Served as the Dean, Faculty of Philology, University of Belgrade, Management Faculty, BK University, and The Diplomacy and Security Academy, Belgrade, and Visiting Professor of Gabrielle d’Anunzio University, Italy and Osaka University, Japan. She is a full member of The Serbian Royal Academy of Scientists and Artists, as well as of The Euro Mediterranean Academy of Arts and Sciences. She is Chair of The International Symposium of Silk Road Academic Studies, held annually by a prestigious Consortium of universities (ISSRAS) and President of The International Committee of Slavists’ Section The Slavic World and Silk Road Civilisations, and a speaker and Key Note Speaker at numerous conferences. She is author to a large number of academic publications in the field of different aspects of Japan’s civilization and Culture Studies. Jocelyn D. Roberts serves as the liaison to the US International Development Finance Corporation (DFC) for the US Department of State

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in the Office of Development Finance, Bureau of Economic and Business Affairs. She is responsible for managing the State-DFC relationship, leading joint efforts on policy coordination and project development. Previously, she led the Mekong Affairs Unit in the Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs for 9 years, leading US multilateral engagement with Mekong countries through the Lower Mekong Initiative, and won numerous awards for her work. As a Mansfield Fellow from 2016 to 2017, Ms. Roberts served in the Government of Japan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Finance, and the Cabinet Fiscal and Economic Policy Committee. For five years, she led development projects in disaster response (health), climate finance, and renewable energy technology in Southeast Asia. Ms. Roberts has a B.A. in Asian Studies from the University of Puget Sound. She holds an M.A. in International Affairs and International Economics concentrating on Japan and Southeast Asia Studies and specializing in Development Economics from the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies. She is a Miki Takeo International Memorial Foundation Scholar (1999–2000), Freeman Foundation Fellow (2002–2004), Tanaka Scholarship Recipient (2003–2004), David L. Boren Fellow (2004), and a Maureen and Mike Mansfield Foundation Fellow (2016–2017). Yoneyuki Sugita is a professor at Kobe Women’s Junior College. He earned his Ph.D. at University of Wisconsin-Madison. He has published numerous articles, chapters, and books on Japanese politics and international relations especially in relation to security and politics in the Asia-Pacific region. He is the author of Japan’s Shifting Status in the World and the Development of Japan’s Health Insurance Systems (Springer, 2019) and Pitfall or Panacea: The Irony of US Power in Occupied Japan 1945–1952 (Routledge, 2003). He is the editor of Japan Viewed from Interdisciplinary Perspectives: History and Prospects (Lexington Books, 2015), and co-editor of Democracy in Occupied Japan (Routledge, 2007) and Trans-Pacific Relations (New York: Praeger, January 2003). His most recent work is “A Paradox: the Red Purge Has Made Japan a LawAbiding Nation.” East Asia (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12140021-09365-y. He is now working on AI and Society 5.0 in Japanese healthcare as well as international relations in the Asia-Pacific region.

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Victor Teo is Research Fellow associated with the Beyond the Cold War Project based at the University of Cambridge and Seoul National University. A Political Scientist by training, he graduated with a Ph.D. in International Relations (2007) from the London School of Economics and Political Science after being called to the Bar of England and Wales (2004) by Middle Temple UK. His research interest is in the International Relations of the Indo-Pacific. Before his stint as a faculty member at the University of Hong Kong (2007–2020), Dr. Teo was LSE Fellow in China in Comparative Perspective Program at the LSE Anthropology Department, and concurrently Editor-in-Chief of Studies and Ethnicity and Nationalism (Wiley-Blackwell) based at LSE’s Government Department. Victor has held several research fellowships in his career. Most recently he held the Wang Gungwu Visiting Senior Fellowship at Yusof-Ishak Institute (formerly Institute of Southeast Asian Studies) Singapore; Harvard Yenching Fellowship at Harvard Law School and Harvard University’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences; Academic Research Associateship at the Harvard Program on US–Japan Relations; Doris Zimmern CambridgeHughes Hall Visiting Fellowship at the University of Cambridge’s POLIS Department; Japan Foundation Fellowship at University of Kyoto’s CSEAS; Visiting Fellowship at the University of Oxford’s Department of Politics and International Relations. He also held an appointment as Visiting Professor at Pyongyang University of Foreign Studies and the DPRK Academy of Social Sciences. He is the author and contributing editor of seven peer-reviewed books on Japan’s and China’s foreign relations and international affairs. He has been interviewed and cited by BCC, CNN, CNBC, Reuters, Bloomberg, CBS, ABC (US), CCTV/CGTN, China Daily, The Straits Times (Singapore), SCMP (HK), ITV (UK), Channel 5 (UK), Australia Broadcasting Corporation, Phoenix TV, Radio HK, Radio Sputnik, HK Economic Journal, NowTV (HK), Yomiuri Shimbun, Manichi Shimbun, The Japan Times, AlJazeera, TRT, AFP, Czech TV, Kyodo News Agency, Iran TV, Afghanistan International TV, Mediacorp (Singapore) among others on regional developments. Hai Dang Vu is an Ocean Law and Policy Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for International Law—National University of Singapore. His area of expertise includes international law, law of the sea, international environmental law and protection of the marine environment. He has written extensively on Southeast Asia, ASEAN and the South China Sea. Dang holds a JSD in international marine environmental law from Dalhousie

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University and a Master in international trade law from the University of Paris V. He has experience working in the fields of legal service, civil servant, diplomacy and academics. Scott A. Wicker is an Associate Professor of Chemistry and former Interim Chair of the School of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (SoSTEM) at Kentucky State University. Dr. Wicker is also a Center for the Advancement of STEM Leadership Fellow, National Academy of Science’s Jefferson Science Fellow, President of the Kentucky Chapter of the American Physiological Society, a committee member on the Envisioning the Future of NSF EPSCoR, and consultant for the US Department of State. In addition, he works collaboratively with stakeholders to advance Kentucky State University and Kentucky Academy of Science’s mission to broaden faculty and student participation in STEMrelated research and career opportunities. A native of Zachary, Louisiana, Dr. Wicker earned honors distinction with his Bachelor of Science degree in Wildlife Biology from Grambling State University, a doctorate in Environmental Toxicology, and post-doctoral researcher in Environmental Chemistry from Southern University and A & M College. He currently facilitates General and Inorganic Chemistry courses at Kentucky State University and research interests in low-temperature synthesis methods for metal oxides used in energy storage devices and international policies for e-cycling solar panels. Keiko Yonaha is a retired Professor of Language Education in Okinawa. She is currently engaged in adjunct teaching interpretation, debating and instructing “English language teaching methodology” while working as an interpreter. Keiko’s publications include “Anger of Okinawa” (collection of essays) “What We See from Okinawa” (collection of poems, awarded the 33rd prize of “Kaneko sho”) and “Small World.” (English translation of Maya Inoue’s poems) Papers are mainly on English Language Teaching, Comparative Study of Elementary School English Education between South Korea and Japan, and Elementary School English Education in Okinawa under Early US Occupation. She is also a Ph.D. candidate at Osaka University. Ryutaro Yoshida is an associate lecturer of the history of Japanese politics in the department of political studies at Keio University, Tokyo. His research interests include historical and normative analysis on the political and diplomatic thoughts of the modern and contemporary Japanese

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politicians and policymakers as well as the activists and thinkers, with particular interest in the modern liberalists, focusing on their socioeconomic thoughts, arguments on the party system, and perspectives on the Asia-pacific nations. He earned his LL.B., B.A. in Politics, M.A. and Ph.D. in Politics from Keio University, Tokyo. While seeking doctorate, he was a Research Associate of Japanese Politics in the Graduate School of Law and Politics at Keio University. His peer-reviewed articles include “The Unfixed Border between the Socialists and the Conservatives in the 1950s” in the Japanese Review of Political Society (No. 6). He also co-authored the biography of Ichiro Hatoyama (1883–1957), the most famous but disputable “liberal” politician in modern Japan. In addition, he co-edited the autobiography of Ichitaro Ide (1912–1996), the cooperatist politician in post-war Japan.

List of Figures

The 1951 San Francisco Peace Treaty at Seventy: Legacies, Challenges and the Future of the Asian Regional Order Fig. 1

GDP per capita 1960–2020 (2022 US$) of selected countries (Data drawn from World Bank and OECD Accounts under License: CC BY-4.0)

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U.S. Bilateral Alliances in the San Francisco System: Going Strong at Seventy Fig. 1

Fig. 2

The U.S.-Japan trade relationship fostered Japan’s development in the 1980s and 1990s. Japan’s trade with the PRC developed slowly after normalization of relations, surpassed exports to the United States shortly after PRC’s accession to the WTO in 2001 and grew exponentially. Data from IMF Direction of Trade Statistics (DOTS) with the author’s calculations Japan, Singapore, and PRC outward FDI positions in the United States from 2009 to 2020. Japan’s investment has been significant, and far larger than the PRC’s, which barely outpaces Singapore’s investment from 2016 to 2020. Data are from the IMF CDIS database with the author’s calculations

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LIST OF FIGURES

Fig. 3

Fig. 4

Fig. 5

Fig. 6

Fig. 7 Fig. 8 Fig. 9 Fig. 10 Fig. 11

Fig. 12

United States, Singapore, and PRC outward FDI positions in Japan from 2009 to 2020. The United States far outpaces PRC investment, which does not reach even $5 billion annually by 2020. Singapore’s investment grew in 2019 and 2020. Data are from the IMF CDIS database with the author’s calculations Japan, Singapore, and U.S. outward FDI positions in the PRC over the period from 2009 to 2020. This graph shows the United States and Japan’s significant contributions to the PRC’s economy through FDI. FDI positions of all three countries had nominal changes from 2017 to 2018, dipped in 2019, and grew substantially in 2020. Data are from the IMF CDIS database with the author’s calculations Japan leading the PRC in holdings of U.S. Treasury securities from 2020 to 2021. Data are from the U.S. Department of the Treasury with the author’s calculations The PRC was the top exporter of goods to ASEAN from 2017 to 2020, the United States eroded the PRC lead over that period. Data from ASEANStatsDataPortal with the author’s own calculations Imports (CIF) and exports (FOB) of goods from the IMF DOTS database with the author’s calculations Imports (CIF) and exports (FOB) of goods from the IMF DOTS database with the author’s calculations Imports (CIF) and exports (FOB) of goods from the IMF DOTS database with the author’s calculations Imports (CIF) and exports (FOB) of goods from the IMF DOTS database with the author’s calculations U.S. outward FDI position in ASEAN nations dominates contributions from Japan and the PRC. The chart shows the years comparable data for the PRC are available. Looking farther back in history, the U.S. outward FDI position in ASEAN only grows. Data are from the IMF CDIS database with the author’s calculations Total historical provision of overseas development assistance (ODA) and other official flows (OOF) from Japan and the United States to most ASEAN member states and the PRC for the period 1970–2019. Data is from OECD. Stat with the author’s calculations

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219 219 220 221 221

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LIST OF FIGURES

Fig. 13

Fig. 14

Current account balances for the United States, Japan, and the PRC as a percentage of gross domestic product from 1996 to 2020. Data is from OECD.stat with the author’s calculations The significant decline in U.S. imports from the PRC starting in early 2018 and persisting until May 2020. Data are from IMF DOTS database with the author’s calculations

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List of Tables

The San Francisco Treaty’s Impact on Elementary English School Education in Okinawa Table 1 Table 2

Number of hours of English per week for elementary school students Elementary school course of study, 1953 and 1954

32 33

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The 1951 San Francisco Peace Treaty at Seventy: Legacies, Challenges and the Future of the Asian Regional Order Yoneyuki Sugita and Victor Teo

In September 2021, the world witnessed the 70th anniversary of the San Francisco Treaty (サンフランシスコ講和条約) which the United States, on behalf of the Allied Nations, signed in 1951 with Japan. This Treaty, also known as The Treaty of Peace with Japan (日本国との平和条約) officially ended the state of war, restored full sovereignty and thereby accorded Tokyo the privileges of diplomacy accorded to all normal nationstates. The San Francisco Treaty was an important milestone not only for Japan, for US–Japan relations, but also for the community in the wider Asia-Pacific region. Contemporaneously to this Peace Treaty, the United States and Japan also concluded their bilateral 1951 Security

Y. Sugita (B) Kobe Women’s Junior College, Kobe, Hyogo, Japan e-mail: [email protected] V. Teo Center for Research in Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities (CRASSH), University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK e-mail: [email protected]; [email protected]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2022 Y. Sugita and V. Teo (eds.), Rethinking the San Francisco System in Indo-Pacific Security, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-1231-3_1

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Treaty (precursor to the revised 1960 Treaty of Mutual Cooperation and Security that is still in effect today). For the United States, the decision to restore independence to Japan then comes after six years of Occupation and marked a significant step in her global and regional strategy. The Occupation is the second time in her modern history where the United States has directly occupied and established official presence in East Asia. Like her earlier colonial experience in the Philippines, the American presence in Japan came about as a result of American participation in an armed conflict. However, unlike the earlier Spanish-American war, the United States directly occupied Tokyo not to take control of a colonial possession but rather came with an intent to rid Japan of her war-making potential, punish those responsible for the war and rehabilitate the Japanese nation. Beyond taking control of the Japanese colonial territories, the Americans were intent on revamping Japan’s political system and imbuing the Japanese people with liberal democratic values. The emerging Cold War then mandated a rethinking in Washington about the plans they had for Japan at the end of the Pacific War. By the latter half of 1950, Washington was determined to backstop the North Korean threat and contain the spread of Communism. The Truman administration decided then that it was perhaps best for the Japanese to rearm (under the auspices of the Self Defence Forces) in order to aid the American effort to confront the rapidly expanding Soviet threat. The institution of the arrangements at San Francisco was therefore undertaken under such strategic circumstances. As an occupied nation that underwent substantial trauma, systemic rebuilding and political reorientation, the San Francisco Treaty represents the first of a series of significant steps in the construction of a modern liberal democratic Japan. Beyond the Peace Treaty, the other related significant development that took place in San Francisco in 1951 was the contemporaneous signing of the Security Treaty between the United States and Japan. Although essentially bilateral in nature (as opposed to the San Francisco Treaty of Peace), this Treaty would come to define not only the nature and character of the US–Japan alliance, but also shaped the regional order over the next seven decades. The 1951 Security Treaty essentially stipulated the price for the restoration of Japan’s sovereignty: the basing the US military’s forward presence. This 1951 Security Treaty was replaced in the 1960s by the Treaty of Mutual Cooperation and Security

THE 1951 SAN FRANCISCO PEACE TREATY AT SEVENTY …

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between the United States and Japan (日本国とアメリカ合衆国との間の 相互協力及び安全保障条約). The 1960 Treaty enhanced the mutuality between US and Japan by requiring that the US consult Tokyo before the military forces stationed in Japan was being deployed. The Treaty also prescribed mutual obligations for defence, and curtailed US intervention in Japanese domestic politics. The US–Japan bilateral alliance underpins in what is now known as the San Francisco System (Beazley 2003; Buszynski 2011; Dower 2014) in reference to the web of bilateral alliances in the region that the United States had built and maintained in the Asia-Pacific since the 1950s. This system has become central to the architecture of the region’s security and is widely credited for underpinning its peace and prosperity today (Calder 2010). There is, however, also a recognition that the Treaty also effectively crystallized many disputes that could and should have been resolved right after the war. Some scholars have argued that the institutionalization of the San Francisco Treaty meant that these disagreements were allowed to fester and ferment into some of the region’s most intractable territorial disputes and geopolitical flashpoints today. In order to celebrate the 70th anniversary of the arrangements at San Francisco, a workshop was convened to discuss and celebrate the achievements of these monumental events and celebrate the peace, progress and prosperity the region has made over the last seven decades. Drawing from the expertise of scholars and practitioners who participated in the workshop, the papers were subsequently peer-reviewed and revised for this volume. Participants had interesting and often divergent perspectives of what the Treaties signed in 1951 have brought to the region. The general consensus is that despite the difficulties and challenges the San Francisco arrangements brought for Japan, the United States and the larger AsiaPacific region, the benefits outweighed the costs for the United States and her allies and partners in the region. Be that as it may, the region still faces the prospects of the challenges brought about by the legacies of the San Francisco arrangements, and the implications this have for the future of the regional order in Asia-Pacific.

Unprecedented Stability and Economic Prosperity The first and most obvious benefit is that the San Francisco system is the security assurances that the San Francisco system has brought for most of the countries during the Cold War. By curbing the spread of

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Communism beyond Indochina to Southeast Asia, and securing South Korea and Japan, the San Francisco system allowed allied countries and partners to rebuild their countries and prosper economically. After the raproachment with the PRC and détente with the Soviets, the countries in the region were left to grow and prosper. For most of the countries in the region, their relationship with the United States, Japan and other allies in the San Francisco system meant that they were able to access to capital, technology and trading opportunities that saw an uplifting of the country’s infrastructure, economy and ultimately living standards for their people. The USSR, China and Vietnam too embarked on their own journey to reform their economies by introducing market reforms from the late 1970s onwards. The data from World Bank in Fig. 1 clearly shows that GDP per capital from countries associated with the San Francisco system had benefited from the open and free economic trading system the United States had established in the region. Even Communist countries such as Vietnam and China who had undertaken market reforms enjoyed too.

Fig. 1 GDP per capita 1960–2020 (2022 US$) of selected countries (Data drawn from World Bank and OECD Accounts under License: CC BY-4.0)

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Legacies and Challenges This peace and prosperity of the region have achieved should not be taken for granted. The fact remains that it was the determination that the US, China and USSR made to co-exist that gave the region a respite from the large scale warfare the region saw in the first two decades of the Cold War that made this economic prosperity viable. Many esteemed scholars have pointed out that the San Francisco arrangements are far from perfect. Whether writing in commemoration of the 50th anniversary (Hara 2001) or 60th anniversary (Bong 2011) of the San Francisco Treaty, the same issues that plagued the region’s international relations and/or Japan’s foreign relations remain. The volume contributes to this important dialogue by further engaging these issues against the latest empirical developments in the region. The first section of this volume presents three unique chapters that examine the immediate impact of the San Francisco Peace Conference on the domestic politics and policies of Japan. Within Japan, particularly from Okinawa, there are often dissenting or ambivalent views about the usefulness or the positive impact of the San Francisco arrangements (Hara 2015; McCormack 2007; McCormack and Norimatsu 2012). The people on this island have always argued that their lives have been put in jeopardy and disproportionately burdened as they bore costs of hosting the perpetual presence of the US forward presence. In Chapter 2, Keiko Yonaha presents an interesting case of how the San Francisco Treaty have both enhanced and detracted to the nationalistic cause and daily lives of Okinawa islanders through its impact on its education system. In putting forth a short history of how the English language education was forcibly introduced for eight years (1945–1953) and subsequently removed, Yonaha demonstrates the political factors related to the San Francisco has a direct impact on daily lives in Ryukyu Islands more than commonly assumed. The short history is a microscopic mirror of the larger issues at stake facing the people there. For Yonaha, the history of Okinawa under U.S. occupation is a showcase of the weak being trifled by the strong. Okinawa people had little say with regards to the military bases regardless of whether the shots were being called by elites in Washington or Tokyo. National decisions were made were never equitable, but skewed in favour of Tokyo and Washington all the time. Okinawa in the post-San Francisco Treaty period became a place filled with bases of both the United States and SDF, where the voices and consequently

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the interests were drowned out. Against the context of the heated rivalry between China and the United States, Okinawa is yet again being thrust into the frontline of war. Against such a context, the chapter raises an all-important question: “Did the San Francisco Peace Treaty bring peace in the region?”. The chapter hinted at an Okinawa answer that could well be very different from those given by the elites in Tokyo. Chapter 3 continues to examine how the San Francisco arrangements affected the agenda and dynamics of those competing in electoral politics in Japan in the early postwar years. Like the previous chapter, one important but unstated theme in this chapter is the power asymmetry between the elites in Washington and in Tokyo. The San Francisco conference arrangements were instituted so that Japan would come to play a central role in US Strategic policy in the Asia-Pacific. Based on a close analysis of the historical developments, Ryutaro Yoshida’s case study demonstrates that the institutionalization of the San Francisco System did not necessarily lead to Japan’s official rearmament, much to the dismay of the American elites. As the advocates of the rearmament movement failed to get the support of party colleagues, intellectuals and the public at large, the rearmament movement became a minority compared to other parties advocating pacifist sentiments. The reaction of the rearmament advocates themselves though is interesting, as these politicians sought to self-restrict, compromise and coexist with others, even those who were against their own agenda. The dominance of Pacifism in post-War Japan is the single most powerful testimony of the impact of the San Francisco Treaty on the Japanese nation at the grassroots level. Without question, pacifism provided the most powerful ideational framework by which the Japanese people viewed their role in the world post-1951. Be that as it may, the Japanese elites cannot navigate without due considerations of power politics. Correspondingly, the elder statesmen and post war Prime Minister Shigeru Yoshida, crafted the Yoshida Doctrine that stipulated Japan would follow the lead of the United States in all foreign and strategic matters, and refocus on her energy in domestic economic reconstruction. This became the central pillar in Japan’s foreign relations even till today. Yoneyuki Sugita’s Chapter 4 provides an incisive look at how the Yoshida Doctrine was able to become so successful. The chapter raises two important questions: (1) how US policies tolerated and enabled a weakened, vanquished Japan to establish the Yoshida Doctrine, and (2) what the consequences of its establishment of this doctrine were. Sugita contends

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that the Yoshida Doctrine was able to succeed only because it coincided with the interests of the United States and because Washington gave it at least tacit approval. Tokyo, taking advantage of US anxieties about Japan, set its own goals while Japan ensured its security without wasting scarce resources on defence or undermining the US–Japan alliance. In other words, Japan exploited the hegemon’s Achilles heel to draw an evergreater commitment from the United States to maintain Japan’s security and economic recovery. As a feeble ally in an unstable area surrounded by two giant Communist countries, Japan transformed its weakness into an asset in dealing with the United States. If anything, Japan deftly deployed power politics and shrewd bargaining in its relationship with the United States, even if only within the bounds established and approved of by the occupying power—this was the essence of the Yoshida Doctrine. To that end, Sugita’s research demonstrates that the Yoshida is not only a masterful doctrine that derived its pacifist spirit from the Treaty of San Francisco, but also a realist statement that allowed Japan to maximize its own interests under those particular circumstances with great diplomatic and political dexterity. The flexibility and strength of the Yoshida Doctrine is reflected in at least three ways. First, it allowed the Kantei to be able to secure US protection against the Soviet threat at low costs, obtained US assistance for economic reconstruction as well as secure American acquiescence to help mend Tokyo’s relations with the international community and Asian neighbours. Second, the Yoshida Doctrine is often used as useful shield to deflect American pressure for Japan to do more strategically (or rearm or participate more actively in a conflict) at least in the earlier part of the Cold War. Third, it provided Japan a unique way to participate in International Relations without causing worry to the United States or the countries Japan engages, even if these countries are not part of the San Francisco system. Chapter 5 is an excellent study of how Japan was able to reach out to two important groups of countries that exist outside of the San Francisco system in the early Cold War years—that of the non-aligned movement countries, and those that were affiliated with the Soviet bloc. Japan’s peace orientation and foreign policy enabled Tokyo to conduct diplomacy often without hindrance from Washington. Ljiljana Markovic puts forth an interesting case of the diplomatic intercourse between Japan and Yugoslavia. After the San Francisco Peace Treaty was signed, Japan became the easternmost terminus of the US containment policy. A year

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later in 1952, Yugoslavia subsequently signed a Peace Treaty with Japan and established diplomatic relations with Tokyo. Markovi´c argues that Yugoslavia became the first communist country to do so, and ironically making it the westernmost gate in Eastern Europe for the US containment policy. Yugoslavia was one of the founders of and played an active role in the “Non-Aligned Movement”, which was valuable to Japan’s efforts in implementing independence and national authenticity in the post-San Francisco Treaty world. Contrary to commonly assumed, Japan did have a fair amount of latitude that came with the signing of the San Francisco Treaty politically than assumed. Chapter 6 explores Japan’s role in cultivating a multi-faceted strategy to establish and strengthen ties with her Southeast Asian neighbours. In this chapter, Heiko Lang demonstrates the nuances of Japan’s Yoshida Doctrine in the actual operations in her backyard region of Southeast Asia. Lang argues that Japan sought to re-define its role in Southeast Asia in the 1950s in apolitical terms, through a series of political initiatives that ran counter to the American regional economic strategy. In the process, Japan redefined its role in such terms that would help to re-conceptualize the US–Japan alliance and establish a regional order of economic integration under Japanese leadership. While Japan’s efforts aimed for the modification of the regional order’s economic structure, they ultimately worked to stabilize the San Francisco System in Southeast Asia. The chapter argues that while Japan supported the anti-communist political agenda pursued by the US Asia strategy, it did not uncritically accept key premises of the emerging economic order in Southeast Asia but sought to modify them. The remarkable success story of the San Francisco System (in terms of stability) cannot be explained without these early postwar attempts by Japan to shape the System according to its strategic interests, which ultimately led to the increased regional acceptance by the Southeast Asian nations. In some ways, this suggests that Japan plays an ameliorating role in making the San Francisco system more palatable to the rest of the Southeast Asia. The arrangements made at the 1951 San Francisco conference however brought its own unique challenges and opportunities insofar as its Asian strategy is concerned. The primary challenges came from Japan’s closest two neighbours—China and the Koreas (after 1953). Given the stated rationale of the Treaty was to make peace between Japan and countries she had fought during the Second World War, the question of who attended and partook in the ceremony is not just one of form,

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but critical substance. The Soviet Union had opposed the Treaty then and did not attend the signing ceremony. While some Asian countries such as Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, Indonesia and the Philippines were invited to the signing, India, China and Korea were not represented. The absence of representation from Korea and China were particularly problematic. Mao’s People’s Republic of China, having finally defeated Chiang Kaishek’s Kuomintang forces after three decades of warfare in 1949, fought American-led UN and South Korean forces bitterly in the Korean War. Over the summer of 1951, the United States, China and North Korea were embroiled in Armistice talks in Kaesong. It came as no surprise that London’s proposal to include Beijing in the San Francisco Treaty arrangements were vetoed by Washington as the American elites were fervent in their support for Chiang Kaishek’s KMT regime in Taiwan. The final compromise was that no Chinese representation was invited. Naturally, the ongoing war in the Korean peninsula also meant that representatives from the North and South Korean regimes were excluded. The non-participation of the Korean and the Chinese nations then therefore engendered seeds of difficulties in Japan’s relationship with her neighbours. Chapter 7, Seung Mo Kang focuses on these particular two aspects of the San Francisco Peace Treaty that have had deep impact upon post-war Korea-Japan relations: the exclusion of South Korea from the treaty and the formulation of reparations terms (article 14). The chapter argues that this exclusion had deprived Seoul’s legal entitlement to reparations and significantly disadvantaged that government’s ability to obtain compensation from Japan in subsequent years. Seung argues in both cases, multiple countries played a role, whether directly or indirectly. This means that simply blaming Japan for Korea’s grievances is an oversimplified reading of history. The controversy regarding Japan’s wartime past is not merely a “bilateral” problem between Seoul and Tokyo, but rather “multilateral”, involving numerous other countries. But more importantly, it builds on these findings to highlight the fact that what may appear to be “bilateral” problems between Korea and Japan might actually be more “multilateral” than hitherto thought. This is an aspect of postwar Korea–Japan relations, which scholars have tacitly acknowledged but have not sufficiently vocalized. The questions of reparations (Trefalt 2007), apologies and wartime responsibility that plague Japan’s relations with her closest East Asian neighbours are today loosely termed collectively as the “burden of

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history”. Scholars have long acknowledged that these issues lie at the centre of the lack of reconciliation (Braddick 2003; Hara 1999, 2007; Shin 2010) between the nations in East Asia, and for much of the distrust that belies the region (Rozman 2004). At the behest of the Americans, Chiang Kaishek’s Taiwan reached a settlement with Japan by concluding the 1952 Japan–Taiwan Peace Treaty. Even though Chiang had his reservations regarding the terms of the settlement, the Cold War exigencies and his concerns regarding his arch-enemy Mao induced Chiang to hastily accept the terms offered by Japan (which Chiang had personally considered unsatisfactory). Likewise, Mao also was induced to accept the same terms that were offered to Taiwan two decades later when China and Japan were negotiating to establish diplomatic relations. This type of “top-down” decision-making is extremely problematic as the leaders’ decisions were made with little consultation with the aggrieved nation. The idea that top-down political (or legal) decisions could eradicate or put to rest actual grievances at grassroots levels is simply just wishful thinking and short-sighted politics. Yet it is this sort of presumptuous behaviour that has now created now an extremely difficult impediment for the healthy development of East Asia international relations. The San Francisco also created legacy issues with regards to territorial settlements, and this has had an extensive impact for Japan’s foreign relations and for the international relations of the region (Bong 2011; McCormack and Norimatsu 2012; Hara 2001, 2004, 2006, 2007; Dudden 2017). Japan today claims Takeshima (Dokdo) islands (Hara 2016; Schwartz and Yoo 2019) controlled by the Republic of Korea. Tokyo is also in dispute with Russia (Hara 1998) over the Kurile islands (controlled by Russia Federation), and expands much energy defending the Senkaku islands (Diaoyu) which she administers from both the People’s Republic of China and Republic of China (Hook 2014; Manyin 2021). From Tokyo’s perspective, Japan’s sovereignty over the Senkaku islands is undisputed. Yet, insofar as the San Francisco arrangements are concerned, the basis for the problem lies in how the control of the islands were transferred to Japan by the United States (with the reversion of Okinawa). The United States professes to be neutral over the question of sovereignty of the Senkaku (Diaoyu) islands, but nonetheless to this day insists that the defence of the islands are covered by Article 5 of the US–Japan Security Treaty (Manyin 2021). The next two chapters in the volume builds on the literature in this area by examining two cases of territorial disputes that traces their roots to the San Francisco arrangements.

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In Chapter 8, Kyuhyun Jo asserts that Japan’s ambiguous use of the San Francisco Peace Treaty in claiming sovereignty over Dokdo and the Kurile Islands is rooted in the lack of a precise definition of “unconditional surrender”. While the ambiguity may have served as a useful expedient for America to turn Japan into an anti-Communist bastion in the Pacific and gain a solid national security policy, it also created the problem of repudiating the San Francisco Peace Treaty’s original commitment to demanding “unconditional surrender” through America’s offer of “residual sovereignty” to Japan over Okinawa and the Senkaku Islands. Jo’s chapter suggests that although there have been several suggestions about “unconditional surrender” being a device prepared by the United States to prevent any discussions about territorial disputes and being a device to force Japan to focus on its primary geopolitical role as a bulwark against Soviet and Chinese designs on East Asia, the primary challenge which confronts Japan is to ascribe a unique definition to “unconditional surrender” itself so Japan could prepare a common venue through which it could foster a dialogue amongst its neighbours. In Chapter 9, Hai Dang Vu examines the case of Spratly and Paracel Islands in the South China Sea. Article 2 of the San Francisco Peace Treaty stipulates that Japan renounces all right, title and claim to, among others, the Spratly and Paracel Islands. This renouncement has important implications on the sovereignty dispute relating to these two groups of islands. Vu ascertains the impacts of the Treaty, in particular the legal impact on these islands from a Vietnamese perspective. The chapter first provides a historical background on the dispute relating to the sovereignty over these islands, and subsequently analyses the Treaty’s legal consequences. Finally, the chapter discusses Viet Nam’s claim of sovereignty after the Treaty’s establishment. Vu’s chapter contributes by clarifying the implications of this Treaty as well as relevant events like the Cairo Communiqué, 1943, Potsdam Declaration, 1945 and Treaty of Taipei, 1952 with regards to the sovereignty dispute over the Paracels and Spratlys. Vu argues there are two misunderstandings with regards to this Treaty in relation to the archipelagos in question. The first misunderstanding was that the Treaty would recognize the sovereignty over or “return” these territories to a particular claimant. The second misunderstanding was that the Treaty would have the effect to make the Spratlys Trusted Territories. In so doing, the chapter advocates for the resolution of the sovereignty dispute over the Paracels and Spratlys in a peaceful manner consistent with international law.

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Regionalism Versus Hegemonic Struggles: The San Francisco System and the Future of the Regional Order After analysing the impacts of the San Francisco System on economic relationships among Treaty signatories and non-signatories during the post-Cold War period (in particular the United States, Japan, Southeast Asian nations, and the People’s Republic of China [PRC]), Jocelyn D. Roberts and Scott A. Wicker conclude in Chapter 10 that as of the 70th anniversary of the San Francisco Treaty, the San Francisco System of security and economic alliances centred on the US–Japan bilateral alliance remains strong, the rise of the PRC notwithstanding. She argues that despite the PRC’s economic progress, it has not eclipsed the US or Japan’s influence in Southeast Asia. This is true, particularly in the case of Japan. Owning to the US War on Terror in the Middle East and Afghanistan since 2001, Washington has largely relied on Japan to hold the “strategic fort” in Asia. From 2004 with the election of Prime Minister Koizumi in Japan, the Japanese nation underwent a period of intense strategic debate and self-reflection as they strove to become a “normal” nation (Pyle 2007; Smith 2015; Teo 2019). The rise of China and the possibility of US strategic retrenchment pushed Tokyo to become even more pro-active and global in her diplomacy and strategic policy. In neo-classical Japanese style, Tokyo worked stealthily and steadily to revamp and reinvigorate her diplomacy, and in intensifying linkages to regional actors such as India, the European Union and Southeast Asia to build new multilateral linkages and enhance existing regional institutions. At the same time, Tokyo sought to undertake a series of political and legal maneuvers to strengthen the US–Japan alliance, riding on this seventy-year-old institution to globalize the diplomatic and strategic reach of Japan. All these are done to ensure that Japan’s vision of a free and open Indo-Pacific will be realized. The importance of San Francisco system as a component of the regional order therefore becomes even more important for Japan’s foreign policy. The importance of the longevity (Tow and Kasim 2020) and the evolvement of this US institution (Bong 2010; Schmidt 2014; Kuchins 2018) is now a critical issue of research for many scholars. The final chapters of this book deal with the evolving San Francisco system in relation to the future of the regional order. In Chapter 11, Elena Atanassova-Cornelis examines the transformation of the San Francisco System by applying the concept of “strategic

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alignment” to Japan’s Indo-Pacific security partnerships with intraregional players (namely Australia and India) and extra-regional European players (namely France, the UK and the EU). Through a comparative analysis of the various alignments, Atanassova-Cornelis also demonstrates the reconceptualization of the regional order from “Asia-Pacific” to “Indo-Pacific”, and Japan’s leading role in this process. According to this analysis, Japan’s ability to implement its Indo-Pacific vision is likely to be a critical factor in determining the future contours of the regional order. Chapter 12 focuses in-depth examination of the San Francisco system in relation to the Philippines. Renato Cruz De Castro’s chapter details how the United States, with the Philippines (in tandem with the US– Japan treaty) eventually became part of the San Francisco hub-and-spokes system of bilateral alliances. This system also includes the discrete pacts with the Republic of Korea, the Republic of China (Taiwan), Australia, and New Zealand. Each spoke was tightly linked to the US hub separate from the other spokes in the perimeter. When President Rodrigo Roa Duterte distanced the Philippines from its long-time treaty ally and gravitated towards China, both the United States and Japan tried hard to prevent the Philippines from being pulled into China’s orbit. Using this event as an example, Renato Cruz De Castro concludes that the San Francisco Peace Treaty not only established a series of alliances in Asia but also laid down the foundation for regional order and security which has outlived the Cold War. Acknowledging that the San Francisco System has brought about much peace and prosperity for the United States and its allies since its inception, Victor Teo maintains in Chapter 13 that the system has not come without costs for the region. Teo contends that while there is absolutely no incentive on the part of the United States (or arguably, on the part of Japan) to make modifications to the San Francisco System other than to strengthen their own positions, an honest conversation must be had regarding the role of China within the system in order to prevent its further disintegration. China can no longer be regarded as the “external” enemy if the system is to be preserved due to her deep economic integration with regional countries, particularly with those in the San Francisco system. Instead, regional countries should work towards resolving the legacy problems left behind by the San Francisco arrangement, seek out a new balance in their dealings with the United States and China in order to constrain their hegemonic competition and strive towards building a more inclusive and forward-looking region.

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Bibliography Beazley, Kim. 2003. ‘Whither the San Francisco Alliance System?’, Australian Journal of International Affairs, 57(2): 325–338. https://doi.org/10.1080/ 10357710301741. Bong, Youngshik Daniel. 2010. ‘Past Is Still Present: The San Francisco and a Multilateral Security Regime in East Asia’, Korea Observer, 41(3): 471–495. ———. 2011. ‘Sixty Years After the San Francisco Treaty: Its Legacy on Territorial and Security Issues in East Asia’, Asian Perspective, 35(3): 309–334. https://doi.org/10.1353/apr.2011.0000. Braddick, C. W. 2003. ‘Foreword: A “One-Sided Peace”? New Perspectives on the San Francisco Treaties’, Japan Forum, 15(3): 361–364. https://doi.org/ 10.1080/0955580032000124754. Buszynski, Leszek. 2011. ‘The San Francisco System: Contemporary Meaning and Challenges’, Asian Perspective, 35(3): 315–335. https://doi.org/10. 1353/apr.2011.0001. Calder, Kent. 2010. ‘Securing Security through Prosperity: The San Francisco System in Comparative Perspective’, The Pacific Review, 17(1): 135–157. https://doi.org/10.1080/0951274042000182447. Dower, John W. 2014. ‘The San Francisco System: Past, Present, Future in U.S.– Japan–China Relations’, The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus, 12(8), No. 2, Article ID 4079. https://apjjf.org/2014/12/8/John-W.-Dower/4079/ article.html. Dudden, Alexis. 2017. ‘Thinking about Japan’s Territorial Disputes’, Sungkyun Journal of East Asian Studies, 17(2): 149–162. https://doi.org/10.21866/ ESJEAS.2017.17.2.002. Hara, Kimie. 1998. Japanese-Soviet/Russian Relations Since 1945: A Difficult Peace. New York: Routledge. ———. 1999. ‘Rethinking the “Cold War” in the Asia-Pacific’, The Pacific Review, 12(4): 515–536. https://doi.org/10.1080/09512749908719304. ———. 2001. ‘50 Years from San Francisco: Re-examining the Peace Treaty and Japan’s Territorial Problems’, Pacific Affairs, 74(3): 361–382. https://doi. org/10.2307/3557753. ———. 2004. ‘The Post-War Japanese Peace Treaties and the China’s Ocean Frontier Problems’, American Journal of Chinese Studies, 11(1): 1–24. https://www.jstor.org/stable/44288750. ———. 2006. ‘Antarctica in the San Francisco Peace Treaty’, Japanese Studies, 26(1): 87–97. https://doi.org/10.1080/10371390600636281. ———. 2007. Cold War Frontiers in the Asia-Pacific. New York and Abindgon: Routledge. ———. 2015. ‘Okinawa, Taiwan, and the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands in United States–Japan–China Relations’, The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus, 13(28), Article ID 4341. https://apjjf.org/2015/13/28/Kimie-Hara/4341.html.

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———. 2016. ‘Takeshima/Dokdo Problem in the San Francisco System’, The Korean Journal of International and Comparative Law, 4(1): 22–42. https:// doi.org/10.1163/22134484-12340067. Hook, Glenn D. 2014. ‘Japan’s Risky Frontiers: Territorial Sovereignty and Governance of the Senkaku Islands’, Japanese Studies, 34(1): 1–23. https:// doi.org/10.1080/10371397.2014.893809. Kuchins, Andrew C. 2018. ‘What Is Eurasia to US (the U.S.)?’, Journal of Eurasian Studies, 9(2): 125–133. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.euras.2018. 07.001. Manyin, Mark E. 2021. ‘The Senkakus (Diaoyu/Diaoyutai) Dispute: US Treaty Obligations’, Congressional Research Service, CRS Report Number R4761. https://sgp.fas.org/crs/row/R42761.pdf. McCormack, Gavan. 2007. Client State: Japan in the American Embrace. London and New York: Verso. McCormack, Gavan, and Satoko Oka Norimatsu. 2012. Resistant Islands: Okinawa Confronts Japan and the United States. Plymouth: Rowman & Littlefield. Pyle, Kenneth. 2007. Japan Rising: The Resurgence of Japanese Power and Purpose. New York: Public Affairs Book. Rozman, Gilbert. 2004. Northeast Asia’s Stunted Regionalism: Bilateral Distrust in the Shadow of Globalisation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Schmidt, Sebastian. 2014. ‘Foreign Military Presence and the Changing Practice of Sovereignty: A Pragmatist Explanation of Norm Change’, American Political Science Review, 108(4): 13, 817–829. https://doi.org/10.1017/S00030 55414000434. Schwartz, Thomas, and John Yoo. 2019. ‘Asian Territorial Disputes and the 1951 San Francisco Peace Treaty: The Case of Dokdo’, Chinese Journal of International Law, 18(3): 503–550. https://doi.org/10.1093/chinesejil/ jmz017. Shin, Gi-Wook. 2010. ‘Historical Disputes and Reconciliation in Northeast Asia: The US Role’, Pacific Affairs, 83(4): 663–673. http://www.jstor.org/stable/ 25766477. Smith, Sheila. 2015. Intimate Rivals Japanese Domestic Politics and a Rising China. New York: Columbia University Press. Teo, Victor. 2019. Japan’s Arduous Rejuvenation as a Global Power: Democratic Resilience and the US–China Challenge. Singapore: Palgrave Macmillan. https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-981-13-6190-6. Tow, William T., and Zaidul Anwar Hj Kasim. 2020. ‘Why Has the San Francisco System Survived? Historical and Theoretical Perspectives’, Asian Politics & Policy, 12(1): 8–26. https://doi.org/10.1111/aspp.12515.

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Trefalt, Beatrice. 2007. ‘A Peace Worth Having: Delayed Repatriations and Domestic Debate over the San Francisco Peace Treaty’, Japanese Studies, 27(2): 173–187. https://doi.org/10.1080/10371390701494176.

The San Francisco Treaty’s Impact on Elementary English School Education in Okinawa Keiko Yonaha

Introduction In U.S.-occupied Okinawa, schooling in the refugee camps began following the instructions from the military government in May 1945, just after the U.S. military landed on the island (Watkins 1945). These directives led to English being taught at the elementary school level. However, compulsory English language education continued for only eight years and was removed from the 1954 curriculum. Why was this the case? Seeking to address this question, I have identified five contributing factors: four environmental factors (lack of textbooks, Okinawan teachers, educational experts in the U.S. military, and Okinawan people’s identity consciousness), as well as one decisive factor: the result of U.S. policy toward Japan and Okinawa that culminated in the San Francisco Peace Treaty. This chapter focuses on the last decisive factor, how the San Francisco Peace Treaty influenced elementary school English language

K. Yonaha (B) Naha, Okinawa, Japan e-mail: [email protected]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2022 Y. Sugita and V. Teo (eds.), Rethinking the San Francisco System in Indo-Pacific Security, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-1231-3_2

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education in Okinawa. This research examines how U.S. policies toward Japan and Okinawa influenced educational policies for Okinawa and how these policies were reflected in compulsory elementary school English language education. Evidence shows that the San Francisco Peace Treaty clarified the political status of Okinawa, and this status was the reason for the end of compulsory English language education in elementary schools. Regarding the U.S. governance of Okinawa, the department of the army had two responsible parties in Washington: The deputy undersecretary of the army for the civil service and the deputy chief of affairs and military government for military service. In this study, both “Ryukyu” and “Okinawa” are used; they are referred to as the islands of the Ryukyus, including the main island of Okinawa.1 U.S. Policy Toward Japan and Okinawa In April 1943, the Ryukyu Islands were not strategically important for the United States. This was the case when an adequate base was developed in Formosa.2 Ryukyu may not have become a U.S. military base in Asia if the U.S. Army had landed on Formosa; however, it landed on Okinawa to fight the Japanese army stationed there on March 26, 1945. Organized battles against the Japanese army ended on June 23, 1945, with Commander Ushijima Mitsuru’s suicide, and on July 2, 1945, the U.S. military declared the end of the battle of Okinawa (U.S. Department of the Army 1997). At the time, there was no decisive U.S. policy regarding the future disposition of the Ryukyu Islands. The Department 1 Geographically, “Ryukyu” usually refers to all the islands—the main island of Okinawa, plus Miyako, and Yaeyama, including other small islets. “Okinawa” usually refers to the main island of Okinawa; however, it is also used in place of “the Ryukyus.” “Ryukyu” was used as the name of all the islands including mainland Okinawa before the Meiji era, and then became “Okinawa Prefecture.” However, “Ryukyu” was favorably used in place of “Okinawa” during the U.S. occupation by the U.S. military government and the United States Civil Administration of the Ryukyus (USCAR). 2 059—00, 673—00011—002, I—7: Riuchius, Code No. 0000105471, Series No. 0000003795, RG 59 Records of the Office of Assistant Secretary and Under Secretary of State Dean Acheson, 1941–48, 50, NARA (NND 957300). The view was expressed by a member of the Security Subcommittee that the Riuchiu (Ryukyu) islands will be of no great importance strategically to the United States or the United Nations if an adequate base is developed at some point on Formasa. Several members emphasized the importance of disarming Japan rather than separating outlying island areas from Japanese rule (August 21, 1942).

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of State, the war Department, and the navy department had made no joint recommendations regarding the matter (OPA, 0000073428, NARA). Regarding U.S. policy toward Japan, the State–War–Navy Coordinating Committee (SWNCC) policy 150/4/A, U.S. Initial PostSurrender Policy for Japan (September 21, 1945), drawn up by the State Department, was issued on September 6 (SWNCC150/4/A), The ultimate objectives of the United States with regard to Japan were to ensure that Japan would not become a menace to the United States or the world again, and to bring about the eventual establishment of a peaceful and responsible government that respects the rights of other states and supports the objectives of the United States. In line with the objective of monitoring and controlling Japan, it stated the major key policies as demilitarization, punishment of war criminals, and promotion of individual freedom and democracy, as outlined earlier in the Potsdam Declaration (U.S. State Department Records Decimal File 1945). At this stage, the construction of international order was based on U.S.–Soviet cooperation. In October 1945, the “Overall Examination of U.S. requirements for Military Base and Rights” was approved by the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) resolution 570/40, and Ryukyu was regarded as an important military base (Over-All Examination of U.S. Requirements for Military Bases and Rights 1945). Because the idea of JCS1619/15 to secure the military base against the Soviet Union was before the establishment of the Cold War regime, Robert D. Eldridge (Eldridge 2001) seems to question the idea that the Okinawan issue was a product of the Cold War regime, which began to appear in 1948 (2001). If we accept his view, it can be understood that the Cold War regime was used as an excuse for the idea in JCS 570/40 that the U.S. should gain strategic control over the region. In contrast to JCS 570/40, the initial policy toward Okinawa as of June 1946 (SWNCC59/1) was that “the Ryukyu Islands should be regarded as minor islands to be retained by Japan and demilitarized” by admitting their close relations with Japan. The U.S. establishment of a permanent base in Okinawa or elsewhere in the Ryukyu Islands would have likely provoked serious international repercussions from other global leaders, including China and the Soviet Union, and therefore, they were politically objectionable. It also expressed concerns regarding practicality: control of the Ryukyus would require considerable financial outlay by

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the United States for the support and development of governing threequarters of a million people with a totally alien culture and outlook. (Truman 1946; OPA, 0000073423, 00119–001) However, JCS 1619/8 (Sep. 27, 1946) was forwarded to the Statistical and Reports sections. Describing the threat of the USSR, Okinawa was designated as the only base area from which U.S. forces could be projected into that area since Okinawa covered the area of the Pacific between the Aleutians, the Philippines, and west of the Marianas. It also noted that the control of Okinawa as a key base in Asia would make the United States dominate the northwestern Pacific and the lines of communication to China, as well as make it a major element in the defense of the Philippines (OPA U900379B, JCS 1619/8). As disagreement between the JCS and the State Department continued, the policy toward Okinawa remained undecided in 1947. Although the post-war economy was in rehabilitation, it was difficult to plan a long-range program with the future international status of the islands still undetermined. On February 22, 1946, George Frost Kennan, the then deputy ambassador to the Soviet Union, sent a telegram to the Department of the State insisting that the United States should take a firm attitude toward the USSR (Gaddis 2011). On March 12, 1947, U.S. President Harry S. Truman issued the Truman Doctrine, under which he reoriented U.S. foreign policy away from its usual stance of withdrawal from regional conflicts to one allowing interventions in foreign conflicts (Office of the Historian). On June 5, 1947, the Marshall Plan was clarified, and Kennan’s paper, “The Sources of Soviet Conduct” published in June 1947, became the theoretical foundation of the “policy of containment” in dealing with the USSR.3 Thus, after the Cold War structure was constructed, in a letter from President Harry S. Truman to George Atcheson Jr. (United States political adviser for Japan), dated July 10, 1947, the president acknowledged a request from Japan’s new foreign minister, Ashida, for the return of the Southern Kuriles and Okinawa, and Atcheson’s recommendation to maintain U.S. control of Okinawa as a keystone for Western Pacific Air Force Defense.4 The policy planning staff (PPS) of the State Department wrote of the Ryukyus in a

3 “The Sources of Soviet Conduct,” Foreign Affairs, 25 (July 1947): 566–82. 4 Documentary History of the Truman Presidency, University Publications of America,

OPA, 0000073433, an imprint of CIS, Document 33.

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forty-page draft, that the minimum objectives were “the neutralization of Japan through the maintenance of powerful U.S. bases in the Ryukyus, Bonins (Ogasawara), Volcano Islands (Io retto), and Marcus (Minami Tori shima).” Although it was said that the U.S. military bases in the Ryukyus would be necessary for the neutralization of Japan (National Archives and Records Administration), this idea was still fluid owing to the governing ability problem of the United States. The State Department consistently disagreed with the service department regarding the strategic trusteeship over the Ryukyus. Upon request of the JCS, the secretaries of the army, navy, and air force dispatched a joint letter to the secretary of state, endorsing the JCS position. The letter commented on the emperor’s message as follows: He (the Japanese emperor) recommends that the U.S. obtain such base rights as may be necessary in the Ryukyus through a long-term lease arrangement with Japan to be provided for by a separate bilateral treaty with Japan after the peace settlement. (NARA, NND959297)

PPS10/1 recommended the emperor’s message that suggested a longterm lease of the Ryukyus as an idea to solve the conflict between the JCS and the State Department. As read, a separate bilateral treaty with Japan, the Japan–U.S. Security Treaty, was a necessity accompanied by the Peace Treaty. This is proof that the emperor was involved in the foreign policymaking process. On August 5, 1948, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) issued a report on the significance of the Ryukyu Islands, and the intelligence organizations of the department of state, army, navy, and air force concurred in the report. According to the report, the Ryukyu Islands, especially Okinawa, would provide: (a) an advantage in either defensive or offensive operations in Asia; (b) a watch post to guard the sea approaches to Central and North China and Korea; and (c) a base for air surveillance over a wide area. Therefore, U.S. control of the Ryukyu Islands would: (a) give the United States a position from which to operate in defense of an unarmed post-treaty Japan and U.S. bases in the Philippines and other Pacific Islands; (b) obviate the possibility of the Ryukyus falling under the control of a potential enemy; (c) neutralize, to some extent, Soviet positions in the Kurils, Korea, and Manchuria; and (d) give the United States a position from which to discourage any revival of military aggression on the part of the Japanese (NARA, NND755001). The CIA believed the

22

K. YONAHA

Ryukyus would be significant for the United States to defend against its potential enemy, the Soviets (and the threat of a revival of Japanese hostilities). This proves that the CIA was involved in the foreign policymaking process. As of October 7, 1948, the agenda of the Ryukyus remained pending in NSC13/2 and the possibility of using Okinawa as a naval base was mentioned, based on the assumption that the U.S. military would remain in control there on a long-term basis. Around the same time in 1948, the Department of the Army enlisted the Ryukyus among the foreign bases necessary to meet the requirements of the emergency war plan. The Ryukyus were placed tenth on the list with the categorization “occupational only,” and the Army and Air Force allowed expenditure of funds (NARA, NND780012). Even in January 1949, the mission of the U.S. military government was “to have Okinawa separate from Japan economically, socially, and politically as well as managing U.S. military rule over the Ryukyus until the political position of Ryukyu [would be] decided” (NARA, UND780072). These steps led to the period during which Okinawan educators were barred from using teaching materials related to Japan. This idea was the background in which “Ryukyu” was favorably used in place of “Okinawa” during the occupation by the U.S. military government and the United States Civil Administration of the Ryukyu Islands (USCAR). It was NSC13/3 (May 6, 1949), where the United States decided the long-term possession of the Ryukyus after it was approved by President Truman in NSC 13/2 (February 1, 1949).5 In June 1949, the navy department determined that Okinawa was not suitable as a year-round naval base because of unfavorable meteorological and hydrographic features (NARA, NND943011). Okinawa was evaluated as “very valuable to the U.S. as a major air base in the Far East.” Its U.S. policy was “at a politically expedient time to press for a U.S. trusteeship under the UN; meanwhile to foster and materially assist the expeditious development of native education, industries, and improved living conditions” (SWNCC No. 54) The general policy toward Okinawa during this time can be read as one to develop and maintain the facilities on a long-term basis by reason of the importance of the islands to the interests of the United States (OPA0000099641, 1945).

5 RG59, Office of Northeast Asia Affairs, Records Relating to the Treaty of Peace with Japan, Subject File, 1945–51, Box 6.

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In the fall of 1949, more than $50 million for building U.S. military bases was included in the budget for the fiscal year 1950. Major General J. R. Sheetz, the U.S. Military Chief in the Ryukyus, started building the bases in Okinawa with U.S. fiscal support. Although Sheetz gained popularity and his governance was well evaluated by Okinawan people, the finances acquired to build the bases may have worked advantageously for his governance. After a short period of governing by Sheetz, land confiscation by the U.S. military base began in full swing in 1950 with Okinawan people resisting. For the U.S., geological and economic factors, such as Okinawa’s dependence on external assistance, made Okinawa a convenient site for a major airbase in the Far East (OPA. 335-0002400001-003). In the office memorandum of the U.S. government as of April 27, 1950, which was prepared in connection with the “Reappraisal of U.S. Foreign Economic Policies and Program,” the following summary was provided to John Foster Dulles, consultant to the secretary in charge of the treaty project, and, in context, it can be read as U.S. policy. The United States intends to retain the facilities as deemed by the Joint Chiefs of Staff to be necessary in the Ryukyu Islands south of 29°N, Marcus Island, and the Nanpo Shoto south of Sofu Gan. The military bases at or near Okinawa should be developed accordingly. (NARA, NND 867207)

Finally, Article 3 of the San Francisco Peace Treaty confirming the political stance of the Ryukyus was signed on September 8, 1951. The Ryukyus would be put under the trusteeship of the United States as a single administrative power. The United States would possess part or all the authority of administration, legislation, and judicature against the residents and territories, including the territorial waters (Treaty of Peace with Japan 1951). Twenty-seven years of U.S. military occupation was a long and challenging time for Okinawa under extraterritoriality, but the door to reversion to Japan was opened because Japan’s residual sovereignty over the Ryukyus was approved (John Foster Dulles on the Status of Okinawa).

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K. YONAHA

Education Policy in Okinawa Before the San Francisco Peace Treaty Based on the early U.S. policy toward Okinawa of demilitarization, organized group activities were prohibited in Okinawan education. Nakamura Toshimasa, a teacher at the time, said that when he engaged students in group activities, U.S. military jeeps would often enter the schoolyard and U.S. soldiers would accuse the instructors of introducing militaristic education.6 Simultaneously, the policy separating Okinawa from Japan was issued by the General Headquarters (GHQ), the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers, on January 29, 1946.7 Based on such policies, Nakasone Seizen, the text compilation staff general editor, comments that the editing policies were to exclude: (1) militaristic materials; (2) ultranationalistic materials; and (3) typically Japanese materials.8 Okinawan educators were barred from using teaching materials related to Japan. Bunky¯o (Okinawa Educational Administration Agency) notification no. 1892, issued by Okinawa Bunky¯ obuch¯o Yamashiro Atuo on November 7, 1946, listed the songs “I’m a soldier” and “Play soldiers” as examples of “Militaristic songs and Japanese songs that should be prohibited” (1982) (Okinawa Kyoiku Iinkai). The first textbook editorial policy in Okinawa in 1946 stated that education was to learn about the affairs of East Asia and the world, particularly deepening the understanding of the influence of the United States. In keeping with the goal of maximizing U.S. interests, English language education was emphasized as follows: 1. hour per week from 1st to 4th grade 2. hours per week for 5th and 6th grade 3. hours per week for 7th and 8th grade9

6 A Centennial Commemorative Publication of Agarie Elementary School (Nago, Agarie elementary school, 1983). 7 Governmental and administrative separation of certain outlying areas from Japan, issued by GHQ, document as of January 29, 1946, SCAPIN—677. 8 Arasaki Moriteru. Okinawa Gendaishi heno Shogen, Okinawa Times sha, 1982. 9 Okinawa-ken Kyoiku Iinkai. 1977. Okinawa no Sengo Kyoikushi. In Report 53, issued

by Bunky¯obu on April 5, 1946, 197.

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25

The increasing emphasis on English-centered education—particularly language proficiency—in elementary schools continued from 1946 to 1951. From 1945 to 1950, the three branches of the U.S. military agreed on the militaristic value of Okinawa; however, in Washington, there was no direct answer for the future of Okinawa. As a result, Okinawa was in a precarious situation, having to deal with orders made on the spot from the GHQ in Tokyo. Lacking budgetary ability and an undetermined long-term view, Okinawa became a forgotten island on which military discipline worsened; crimes and accidents committed by U.S. soldiers became commonalities (Gibney 1949), and people who lost everything in the war eked out a living on the rationed goods of the military. In this disheartening situation, the education program was pursued with realism and a satisfactory degree of success considering the drastic shortage of buildings, equipment, teachers, and transportation facilities (Fisch 1988). Until its military value came into focus, Okinawa was almost abandoned. Contrastingly, GHQ was immediately stationed in Tokyo after the war. The document titled “Ryukyu no Kyoiku” (Education in Okinawa) shows that the U.S. contribution to education was also lacking in finances and U.S. educators in Okinawa, compared to mainland Japan. A U.S. delegation visited the Japanese mainland twice, in March 1946 and September 1959, to promote educational reform. The GHQ organized the groups by representatives of education-related organizations in Japan and held meetings with administrative officials, principals, and teachers to implement the policy recommended by the mission. In addition to fulltime personnel, specialists from various fields attended conferences and workshops, ranging from one week to nine months. The result was a conference, attended by more than four thousand principals and teachers, concerning methods to spread educational reform and new democratically based educational principles. However, in Okinawa, even though the same educational reform was introduced, there were no U.S. educators to help Okinawan educators understand the new educational principles. Its situation was as follows: On the other hand, in the Ryukyus, while the structure of Japanese educational reform was accepted as a guide, there has never been a comparable staff of educators to work with the Ryukyuans to give them an understanding of the philosophy behind the proposed changes, and to help

26

K. YONAHA

them draft the necessary laws, regulations, and standards to implement the changes. (NND957387)

The U.S. staff in charge of education were busy procuring school materials in Okinawa, where everything had been destroyed by the ground war that they rarely had time to address the content of education. Advisers from GHQ or SCAP (Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers) advisers visited Okinawa to give advice on education; however, it was impossible to secure the staff to work on the island permanently following the initial presentation. As a result, even six years after the war, educational reform had been made only at the policy level and was not actualized in practice. While educational reform progressed remarkably in mainland Japan, it did not progress at all in Okinawa. In response to these administrative discrepancies, the Kyoiku Sasshin Iinkai (Educational Reform Committee)10 was appointed to draft the Fundamental Law of Education. Okinawan educators, who were irritated with the slow recovery in education, began to want to model educational practices after Japanese ones in the educational system and administration.11 In the first meeting on November 11, 1950, of the principals in Okinawa under the auspices of the Bunky¯obu, the Okinawa Gunto government consisting of four groups of islands: Amami gunto, Okinawa Gunto, Miyako gunto, and Yaeyama gunto, resolved to make a plea to unify the Ryukyuan educational administration with that of mainland Japan. Specifically, the resolution sought to put Okinawa under the administration of the Ministry of Education of Japan. The appeal was made to the Japanese government and to the U.S. government. A request from Okinawan people living in mainland Japan was also submitted to General MacArthur.12 In opposition, the U.S. government replied that it would be impossible to put the Okinawan Bunky¯ obu directly under the administration of the Ministry of Education of Japan, so the discussion concluded without result.

10 This was set up in August 1946 under the prime minister’s jurisdiction. Its prede-

cessor was an educational organization set up to cooperate with the United States Education Mission to Japan (author’s translation taken from the Britannica Daihyaka Jiten). 11 Okinawaken Kyoiku Iinkai, 1977, Okinawa no Sengo Kyoikushi. 103. 12 “Letters from Japanese,” in Correspondence from Japanese (1945–1951),

(0000099645) 00173—007, RG10: B173, F7.

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27

After the San Francisco Peace Treaty The San Francisco Peace Treaty was signed in September 1951. Its conclusion meant that the political position of Okinawa had finally been determined. On September 15, 1951, the Okinawa Times ran an editorial titled “Education under the trusteeship,” and concerning education, it stated the following: If our nationality remains Japanese, it is natural to remain consistent with Japan in education, and we should steadfastly maintain knowledge of history, geography, policy, economics, and the culture of Japan so that we will not be at a loss when the reversion to Japan is realized. We will never allow ourselves to be called “The Wandering Ryukyus.” (Okinawa Times Sha 1951) (translation by the author)

The patriotic opinion expressed in this editorial was shared by Okinawan educators. Yara Chobyo, the head of Bunky¯ obu, became the head of the Okinawa Association of Teachers in May 1952 and stressed the importance of shutaisei (independence). The Association of Teachers (U.S.) led by Yara, guided the movement of Okinawa’s reversion to Japan. This was the time when Okinawan people innocently believed they could go back to a peaceful life without any military bases by reversing to Japan. Okinawan educators made efforts to have children learn Japanese in preference to English preparing for the day of return to Japan, though they had several years of struggle under the U.S. occupation. The fourth Bunky¯o Shingi Iinkai (Bunky¯ o meeting) was held on September 18, 1951, and the first item discussed was “trusteeship and Okinawa’s education.” The top request was “Follow Japan in its educational system, administration, and content, and employ Japanese educational law,” which was resolved in 1950. This appeal was made from Okinawa to the Japanese government and from the Japanese government to the U.S. government. The important objectives were: (1) the construction of school buildings, and (2) making daily educational activities more independent and fruitful by legislating educational regulations to provide legal grounds for educational activities (Okinawa no Sengo Kyoikushi 1977a, b, c). We can see jishusei (autonomy) in the second objective, on which Yara placed the most importance. Although Okinawan educators considered it a key objective, it was difficult to realize it under the occupation.

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K. YONAHA

On April 1, 1952, Governor Ridgeway stated in his message to residents in the opening ceremony of the Rippoin (the legislature of the Government of the Ryukyu Islands) that the legislature was authorized to make laws necessary for executing the powers of the Provisional Central Government as set forth under Article III of the Civil Administration Proclamation No. 3, “Establishment of Provisional Central Government” (April 1951). According to the article of the Peace Treaty, the Ryukyu Islands are continuously politically separated from Japan for the time being. However, political separation does not mean cutting off traditional, cultural, or economic ties. On the contrary, it is the U.S. civil government’s policy to put restrictions on only the necessities of military security and remove all unnecessary restrictions between the Ryukyus and Japan on travel, communication, business, etc.13 (translated by author)

Since education was not a matter of military security, it was understood that the U.S. civil government’s stance was to leave the matter of education to the Ryukyus. He stated that the United States would leave reunification matters between Japan and the Ryukyus to residents in the future. Governor Ridgeway’s message meant that the value of the Ryukyus was only in their connection to U.S. military objectives, and all the priorities should be placed on them. Civil administrator, James. M. Lewis also stated that the self-governance of the Ryukyus should be attained by the public election of a Ryukyuan governor (Okinawa no Sengo Kyoikushi, 1977b). Responding to the message of the governor, in the 4th Resolution of Rippoin on April 29, a letter of appreciation was submitted. Upon receiving the message that unnecessary restrictions between the Ryukyus and Japan should be removed, Okinawan people were delighted and considered it a step toward Ryukyu’s complete reversion to Japan. A memorandum from the Deputy Governor to the Deputy Civil Administrator (April 26, 1952) summarizes the following news article regarding the Japanese policy toward reversion: d. Japan recognizes the right of the United States to retain military bases in Japan under administrative agreement reached pursuant to terms in the

13 Ryukyu Shiryo Dai Ni Shu, Seijihen 2 (Ryukyu Bunky¯ o-kyoku, 1978), 114.

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Security Pact, it is unreasonable to argue that a segment of recognized Japanese territory be detached from Japanese Civil jurisdiction for strategic reasons. (No. 1, part d)

No. 2, which mentions the difficulty of Okinawa’s immediate return to Japan and gradual reversion, would entail the following: b. All economic, educational, and cultural administrative agencies should be made to conform with the Japanese pattern.

Another report favored having these matters placed under Japanese jurisdiction, with the exception of military affairs (United States Civil Administration of the Ryukyu Islands 1952). After the conclusion of the San Francisco Peace Treaty and the decision of the political position of Okinawa, Okinawa was allowed once again to conform to the Japanese program for education, that had been strongly requested by Okinawan educators. The acknowledgment of Japan’s residual sovereignty over Okinawa led to the theory that consolidating U.S. military bases in Okinawa was a term of exchange with the militarization of Japan (Ikemiyagi 2018). While this was the basis of Okinawans’ hope for decreasing military bases, after the conclusion of the treaty, many military bases in Japan were moved to Okinawa under U.S. occupation owing to the anti-military base movement in Japan betraying the hope of Okinawan people. The Transition of Compulsory Elementary School English Language Education Shimoji reports that it was meaningful that the U.S. government set up institutions of higher education such as Bunky¯o gakko and Gaikokugo gakko in Okinawa (Genki 2001), however, education is consistently placed last in the reports of the U.S. government on Okinawa. For example, in the document Historical Report (Ryukyu U.S. Military Government Section) from January 1 to December 31, 1949, there are 17 total objectives presented. The top three appear as (1) General; (2) Basic Directive; and, (3) Military Government Administration, with “Education and Information” being listed last (HMD 833537). This lack of prioritization for education went against the view of Okinawan educators and parents who prioritized education as a top priority.

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K. YONAHA

Building on this idea, a monograph on the Okinawan educational system underscores the inequality in wages, wherein highly educated teachers receive lower pay than people serving as dishwashers on the base. The monthly salary range for teachers in July 1947 was as follows: High School principals: 550 yen. Technical High School principals: 420 yen. Primary School principals: 363 yen. High School teachers: 316 yen. Grade School teachers: 263 yen (RG338, Entry 34179). The wages for jobs on military bases were about two to three times higher than the wages for ordinary teachers. Many teachers in dire straits, therefore, left teaching to take the jobs in bases. The response of the U.S. military to the head of the Bunky¯obu, Yamashiro Atuo, when he appealed for a pay review, was terse: “You should read the document of February 7, 1947, which directed you to obey our directions unconditionally” (Shinpo 1947). Arnold G. Fisch, Jr., writes that military affairs came before civil affairs for the military government in the Ryukyu Islands (Fisch 1988). It is clear in its policy toward the Ryukyus that the United States valued it only as a military base, so it seems natural for the United States to prioritize military affairs in the Ryukyus over civil affairs. In Okinawa, Gunto Jorei (a regulation issued by Okinawa Gunto) Dai 16 go, Okinawa Gunto Kyoiku Kihon-ho (Education Law issued by Okinawa Gunto) was issued on March 31, 1951. The second chapter of the document allows for Kantoku-cho, the Okinawan authorities supervising education under the U.S. military government, to have a preference in decisions regarding subjects of study in elementary schools. Article 18, Provision 4, explains that elementary education should “cultivate the ability of the Japanese language and easy English necessary for daily life so that pupils can understand and use them appropriately.” This shows that the government of Okinawan people regulated elementary school education (OPA 0000068230, 1951). The San Francisco Peace Treaty was ratified in September, 1951, and was made effective on April 28, 1952. The execution rule in Chapter 2, Section 2, of the School Education Ordinance issued on April 1, 1951, regulates the subjects as follows:

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In elementary school, standard subjects are Japanese, English, Social Studies, Math, Science, Music, Arts and Crafts, Home Economics, Business, P.E., and Special Education Activities. (Ryukyu Shiryo, No. 3, 1978)

At this point, English was listed as a second educational priority, following Japanese. According to the enforcement rules of Ryukyu Kyoiku Ho (Ryukyu Education Law, Ryukyu Islands USCAR Declaration 66, issued on March 2, 1953) the subjects are regulated as follows in chapter 2, “Elementary School,” Section 3. Article 23: The standard subjects of elementary school are Japanese, Social Studies, Math, Science, Music, Arts and Crafts, Home Economics, PE, English, and Independent Research. (Ryukyu Shiryo, No. 3, 1978)

The Ryukyu Education Law was written before the Ryukyu government was established on April 1, 1952. This law was drafted by the head of the education division of the U.S. civil government, who asked the opinions of the Okinawan people through Yara, the head of Bunky¯obu. Bunky¯obu drafted their own Education Law, which they thought was more democratic, but it was rejected by the USCAR after it was approved by Rippoin. According to the enforcement rules of Ryukyu Kyoiku Ho (Ryukyu Education Law, Ryukyu Islands USCAR Declaration 66), issued on March 2, 1953, English was still listed as one of the subjects; however, its order was shifted to second from last, as shown above, which is quite different from the previous rule in 1952. In October 1953, the Ryukyu government Bunky¯ obu began to draw up a standard curriculum, with the finalized curriculum from elementary school to senior high school, following that of Japan almost exactly. English was fully removed from the standard curriculum of an elementary school in 1954, which was drawn up by Bunky¯ o-kyoku (formerly Bunky¯obu). In short, it can be said that English disappeared as a subject officially after fiscal year 1954. This was because Bunky¯o-kyoku in Okinawa regulated the objectives and content of the Education Law following those of Japan. As Warner states: In the face of international acceptance of English as a second language and the knowledge that the majority of the scientific, technical, and professional

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K. YONAHA

journals of the world are printed in English, amendments to regulations for the enforcement of the School Education Law were passed on April 6, 1955, and the GRI Education Department decided to eliminate the study of English from the regular course of the primary schools. (Warner 1972)

It is clear that Warner wanted to continue English education in elementary schools. However, as Okinawan teachers were at the heart of the movement of reversion to Japan, there was no enthusiasm to continue English education in elementary schools in Okinawa. The introduction and subsequent removal of English education in the curriculum tells the story of a brief yet important chapter in Okinawan educational history. The first official curriculum after the war was presented in February 1946 by Bunky¯o Jiho 1 (educational guidance issued by Bunky¯ obu). At that time, English was a compulsory subject from the first grade of elementary school, and this continued until it was abolished in the basic (kijyun) curriculum in 1954. Table 1 illustrates the changes in class time for English in elementary schools in Okinawa (mainland), which have been summarized by the author according to the Bunky¯o reports: In April 1952, Yongunto Seifu (the system in which the local government was set up in each gunto of four, Amami, Okinawa, Miyako, and Yaeyama) was dissolved and the Ryukyu government started. In October 1953, Bunky¯o-kyoku began creating a basic curriculum with educational objectives. These educational objectives were set mostly by introducing the objectives of mainland Japan. For this reason, English was omitted from the curriculum in the Bunky¯ o report of October 1953. Table 2 displays the “Course of Study” for elementary schools that was introduced in the following month, November 1953. The curriculum from November 1953 and the curriculum from 1954 share the same content, Table 1

Number of hours of English per week for elementary school students

Grade levels

1st

2nd

3rd

4th

5th

6th

7th

8th

1946 1946 1949 1951 1953 1953

1 2 2–3 1 20 m 0

1 2 2–3 1 20 m 0

1 2 3–4 2 30 m 0

1 2 3–4 2 30 m 0

2 2 3–4 3 3 0

2 2 3–4 3 3 0

3

3

April Sep. April April April Oct.

33

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Table 2

Elementary school course of study, 1953 and 1954

Grade level

1

2

3

4

5

6

Japanese language

25% (6) 15 (3.5) 11 (2.5) 10 (2.5) 8 (2) 8 (2)

24% (6) 16 (4) 12 (3) 10 (2.5) 8 (2) 8 (2)

25% (7) 15 (4) 13 (3.5) 12 (3.5) 6 (1.5) 9 (2.5)

24% (7) 14 (4) 14 (4) 12 (3.5) 7 (2) 9 (2.5)

Special Education Activity

13 (3) (2.5)

Total Time per week Total hours in a year

100 24 840

12 (3) 10 (2.5) 100 25 875

10 (3) 10 (3) 100 28 980

10 (3) 10 (3) 100 29 1,010

22% (6.6) 13 (4) 13 (4) 12 (3.5) 6 (2) 7 (2) 7 (2) 10 (3) 10 (3) 100 30 1,050

22% (6.6) 13 (4) 13 (4) 12 (3.5) 6 (2) 7 (2) 7 (2) 10 (3) 10 (3) 100 30 1,050

Mathematics Social Studies Science Music Arts & Crafts Home Economics P.E

Source Ryukyu Shiryo 3. Ryukyu-Seifu Bunky¯o-Kyoku (1958), 217

and there is no English in either. Table 2 shows the curriculum that circulated in October 1953 and 1954. What can be shown from this curriculum is that English was removed and, at the same time, the focus was on Japanese. Japanese is studied nearly twice as often as some subjects, and more than twice as often as other subjects. It is considered that this was a reflection of the ideas of Yara, the head of Bunky¯ obuch¯o, as well as Okinawan educators, who asked for its identity from Japan and wished to return to Japan in the future. Having children receive instruction in Japanese was a primary concern to fulfil the wishes of Okinawan educators. Compulsory English language education in elementary schools in Okinawa ended in fiscal year 1954. The Kijun Kyoiku Katei (Standard Course of Study), announced in November 1953, was the result of the work of interdisciplinary committee members and over 70 individual planning sessions. The characteristics and procedures to be completed are described as follows.

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It was born from the request of teachers working in schools. It showed the criteria to be relied on as the region of Okinawa. It should only be used as a reference, and standardization should be avoided. (Ryukyu Shiryo. 543) The Standard Course of Study clearly says that it was completed by Okinawan teachers with a vested interest in improving the educational situation of the islands. Therefore, Okinawan educators were able to compile and develop a school curriculum. From the start of Bunky¯obu in 1946, the members of the organization were Okinawan educators who worked under the control of an officer of the U.S. military government. The first intent of the U.S. military government might be to provide education in English if possible. However, Okinawan educators, including Bunky¯obu, were against English language instruction in classes from the beginning. At the end of 1947, the U.S. military officer in charge of education gathered school principals in Okinawa and proposed to make English the official language of Okinawa. One of the principals said, “Japanese officers were not able to erase the Okinawan dialect even though they tried to make Japanese the common language of Okinawa.” Another said, “America pushed English in the Philippines. Americans think that they succeeded in English language education during their occupation of the Philippines for over 40 years and they want it to happen in Okinawa.” These people felt that they could not bear the same situation as that of the Philippines (Ikemiyagushiku, 1970). On December 25, 1950, USCAR was established and, in place of Yamashiro Atuo, Yara Chobyo became the head (Bunky¯ obuch¯o) of Bunky¯obu. Since the textbooks were the same as those of mainland Japan, Hensh¯u-ka, the section for textbook editing was abolished. The Kenky¯uch¯osa-ka (the research survey section), which dealt with the curriculum, was soon established. In February 1951, Bunky¯ o Shingi Iinkai (the Committee on Education) deliberated on educational matters, especially important laws on education. The mission of Bunky¯o Shingi Iinkai is explained as follows. At the turning point of education, not only we (educators) but also the general public. felt the necessity of the organization for guidance on education. For educational reform, we have to refer to Japanese educational laws and the Japanese system; however, at the same time, we should be creative

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enough to do so from an original Okinawan viewpoint. (Okinawa Sengo Kyoikushi, 1977c)

The members’ first goal was to enact the Fundamental Law of Education and School Education Regulations. In the discussion, committee member Maeda Giken argued that while the Fundamental Law of Education should follow that of Japan, school education ordinances should be flexible according to Okinawa’s unique situation. Regarding language education, he proposed that the current English language education was excessive and that the issue of English and Japanese language education should be discussed. In the discussion of Gunto Gikai (Okinawa Island’s Assembly) in April 1951, Yara explained the content of Okinawa Gunto Gakko Kyoiku Jorei (Okinawa Gunto School Education Regulations). In the beginning, he explained that Bunky¯obu followed the Japanese School Education Law to make the School Education Law of Okinawa. The draft of the Okinawan School Education Law was discussed in Bunky¯ o Shingi Iinkai, set up in Bunky¯obu. Yara argued strongly for the continuing emphasis on Japanese as the “national language needed for daily life,” even within a U.S-occupied state. His advocacy, both from a practical and cultural viewpoint, helped convince the governing bodies of the need to return to Japanese-centered language education. It can be understood from this discussion that the Bunky¯ obu and Bunky¯o Shingi Iinkai wanted to follow the Japanese Education Law and use Japanese to educate Okinawan children.14 The memorandum of the Deputy Governor for Deputy Civil Administrator (April 26, 1952) recommended that all economic, educational, and cultural administrative agencies be made to conform to the Japanese pattern. It is also clear that education in Okinawa was conducted by Bunky¯obu, according to its own educational laws, which, in the end, were compiled by Okinawan educators. It can be concluded that compulsory English education in elementary schools was completed by Okinawan educators themselves. Around the time that the San Francisco Peace Treaty was ratified, the USCAR’s concern was not necessarily on education in Okinawa but on other concerns, such as Okinawa’s governance 14 Minutes of the 7th Okinawa Gunto Gikai, April 28, 1951, OPA.

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and the land seizures that accompanied the construction of U.S. military bases. USCAR allowed Okinawan educators to follow the Japanese Education Law and return to Japanese-centered linguistic and cultural education. English was removed as a required course of study and placed in the elective courses of the senior high school curriculum, leaving it to the discretion of the local school board as to whether English instruction could or should be offered in elementary and junior high schools.

Conclusion Compulsory elementary school English language education was inseparable from U.S. occupation strategy and policy in the late 1940s. The harbingers of its end were the San Francisco Peace Treaty and the clarification of Okinawa’s political position according to the treaty. Two political concerns operated in the background of the ending of compulsory English language education in elementary schools: first, the approval of Japan’s residual sovereignty over the Ryukyus; and second, the stationing of the U.S. military in Japan and the Ryukyus for security. The first one, the approval of Japan’s residual sovereignty over the Ryukyus was acquired through the process of concluding the San Francisco Peace Treaty. Even though there were great efforts by Okinawan people and educators who wished to reunite with Japan to restore education, without the approval of Japan’s residual sovereignty suggested in the San Francisco Treaty, following Japan’s educational system would have been impossible. It was only after the ratification of the San Francisco Peace Treaty that Okinawa’s following of Japanese education was approved by the U.S. government. Therefore, it can be said that compulsory English language education in elementary schools ended in 1954 because of the approval of Japan’s residual sovereignty over the Ryukyus as well as the clarification of its political position, both of which were outlined in the San Francisco Peace Treaty. The second one, the stationing of the U.S. military, was realized by the Japan–U.S. Security Treaty. As read in PPS10/1 recommending the emperor’s message that suggested a long-term lease of the Ryukyus as an idea to solve the conflict between the JCS and the State Department, a separate bilateral treaty with Japan, the Japan–U.S. Security Treaty, was a necessity accompanied by the peace treaty. In the situation where the

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U.S. military government valued Okinawa only as a military base, it was natural for the United States to prioritize military affairs in the Ryukyus over civil affairs, including education. Which enabled to leave education to Okinawan educators, and they wished to follow the Japanese education system to restore education devastated by the war. However, the realization of restoring education by following the Japanese education system was also the betrayal of another stronger wish to restore Okinawa without any military bases by reunification with Japan. It was the Japan– U.S. Security Treaty that made the U.S. military bases in Okinawa remain against the strong wish of Okinawan people seeking peace and brought more military bases for the SDF (Self Defense Force, Japanese army) from Japan. Furthermore, restoring education by acquiring jishusei (autonomy) was a strong motivation of Okinawan educators under the U.S. military’s extraterritoriality. However, Okinawan educators found it more difficult to acquire Jishusei (autonomy) in education because they had to follow the directions of the Japanese Ministry of Education where independent curriculum or textbook for teaching local history and culture were not allowed under the unified guidance and the textbooks. The short history of the end of compulsory English language education in Okinawa exemplify the history of Okinawa under U.S. occupation, trifled by U.S. policies toward Japan and Okinawa, and it is a showcase of the weak being trifled by the strong. Okinawa had no choice but to move from the occupation period with U.S. military bases to another period filled with military bases of both the United States and SDF by the Japan–U.S. Security Treaty accompanied by the peace treaty. Now, with the competition between the United States and China becoming fierce, Okinawa, full of military bases, is being thrown into a crisis of becoming a battleground again in a war against both the countries’ hypothetical enemy, China. Okinawan people, who had fully experienced the hell of the Okinawan war and suffered enough under the U.S. occupation, are now being frightened by another war approaching. As such, the following question emerges: “Did the San Francisco Peace Treaty bring peace in the region?” To the weak, people victimized by the strong, the answer is definitely “No!!” The Ryukyus used to be a kingdom that enjoyed its peaceful 400 years without any weapons. To people that traditionally believed in “life is a treasure,” it is obvious that “Countries with military bases invite military destruction. Countries with nuclear weapons invite nuclear destruction.”

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References Arasaki Moriteru. 1982. Okinawa Gendai-shi e no Shogen. Okinawa Taimusu-sha 184. Arnold. G. Fisch. Jr. 1988. Military Government in the Ryukyu Islands, 1945– 1950. 89. Frank Gibney. 1949. Okinawa: Forgotten Island, in Time (November 28, 1949): 24, 27. Gordon Warner. 1972. History of Education in Postwar Okinawa (p. 125). Nihon Bunka Kagakusha. Harry S. Truman President’s Secretary’s Files, 001 Harry S. Truman Library, Box 119, SWNCC59/1, June 24, 1946. Ikemiyagushiku Shui. 1970. Okinawa ni Ikite, 293. Ikemiyagi, Yoko. 2018. Okinawa Beigunkichi to Nichibei Anpo. Tokyo Daigaku Shuppan. James T. Watkins. Watkin’s Paper IV , 29–176, R4–901, Military Gov’t Circular No. 16. Subject: A Preliminary Welfare Program: District Education and Recreation, May 15, 1945. JCS 570/40, “Over-All Examination of U.S. Requirements for Military Bases and Rights” October 25, 1945; Box 272, section 9; file CCS 360 (12—9— 42); Central Decimal Files, (1942–1945), RG 218. John L. Gaddis, John L. 2011. George F. Kennan: An American Life. New York: Penguin Press. NARA, HMD 833537, OPA 554—00141—00004—001. NARA, NND959297, OPA, 059—01586—00049—001. NARA, NND755001, RG319, OPA, 0000003837, RG319. NARA, NND780012. Basic Policies and Objectives of the United States in the Pacific and Far East as of May 1949 RG335, Records of the Office of the Secretary of the Army. OPA 0000106865, 211J, 0000003853. NARA, UND780072, OPA, 335—00024—00002—004. NARA, NND943011, OPA, 211Ba052, Memorandum for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, June 8, 1949. NARA, NND 867207 OPA, 059—01228—00001—006. National Archives and Records Administration (NARA), Memorandum for the Under Secretary of the Army, October 20, 1947. U.S. policy Toward a Peace Settlement with Japan issued from P&O (NND770012, 00012—002, Memorandums to JCS and Others, 1947–49, OPA, 0000098435). NND957387 (319—00061—00001—011), “Ryukyu no Kyoiku.” Office of the Historian, Bureau of Public Affairs, U.S. Department of State. [email protected].

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Okinawa Gunto Jorei OPA (0000068230, 1951). Okinawa no Sengo Kyoikushi. 1977a. p. 56 Okinawa no Sengo Kyoikushi. 1977b. p. 105. Okinawa no Sengo Kyoikushi. 1977c. 452. Okinawa Prefectural Archive (OPA), 0000073428, NARA, The Berlin Conference, Territorial Studies. Prepared by the Department of State for the Meeting of the Heads of Government, page 8. Okinawa Times Sha. 1951. “Education under the Trusteeship.” Okinawa Times’s editorial, September 15, 1951. OPA, 0000073423, 00119–001, Trusteeship. Pacific Islands, Harry S. Truman Library, President’s Secretary’s Files, SWNCC 59/1, Box 119. OPA, 0000099641 Collection of Messages 1945–1951, Blue Binder Series, August 1945–June 1950, RG9, Message from DA (SAOUS OUSFE) dated December 9, 1949. OPA. 335–00024–00001–003. Memorandum of May 1949(335–00024–00001– 003). RG338, Entry 34179, Box 1, A Monograph on the Okinawan Educational System, 526th Counter Intelligence Corps Detachment Ryukyus Command APO33, 15 May, 1948, 2. Robert D Eldridge. 2001. The Origins of the Bilateral Okinawa Problem: Okinawa in Postwar U.S. Japan Relations, 1945–1952 (p. 78). New York: Garland. Ryukyu Seifu Bunkyokyoku. 1958. Ryukyushiryo Dai 3 shu, 217. Ryukyu Shiryo. 3, Kyoiku-hen, Fukkokuban, 1978, 525. Ryukyu shiryo. 3. 550. Ryukyu University Library. 1953. Sengo Shiryo. Civil Affairs Activities in the Ryukyu Islands. vol. 1, no. 2. 56 Shimoji Genki. 2001. Sengo Okinawa no kyoikushi gaikan Okinawa Kirisutokyo Tankidaigaku Kiyo30, 208. SWNCC No. 54: Basic Policies and Objectives of the U.S. in the Pacific and Far East (OPA, 0000106870, NND780012, NARA). SWNCC150/4/A, U.S. Initial Post Surrender Policy for Japan, (Sep. 21, 1945) National Diet Library, Sheet No. TS 00322, NARA, RG331. Treaty of Peace with Japan (with two declarations). No. 1832, Argentina, Australia, Belgium, Bolivia, Brazil, etc. Signed at San Francisco, September 8, 1951. https://treaties.un.org/doc/publication/unts/volume%20136/vol ume-136-i-1832-english.pdf. United States Civil Administration of the Ryukyu Islands, Office of the Deputy Governor (APO719). Memorandum for Deputy Civil Administrator, April 26, 1952, OPA, T00019769B, Ryukyu Shinpo, March (00000253, 00000254. United States Department of the Army (editor), Hokama Seishiro (translator) 1997, Okinawa: Nichibei Saigo no Sento, Kojinsha, NFbunko, 518.

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The Demise of the Rearmament Movement in the Aftermath of the San Francisco Peace Conference Ryutaro Yoshida

Introduction The San Francisco Treaty was followed by the Japan–U.S., Security Treaty signed on the same day. It marked Japanese engagement in the Western Bloc in the Cold War order. The Japan–U.S., Security Treaty was the driving force to ensure the San Francisco system. The most natural reaction from Japan seemed to be the decision to ensure the right of self-defence and to seek a more active role in the regional defence. There emerged several Japanese political movements which advocated the rearmament in the early 1950s. The most famous one was led by a diplomat turned politician Hitoshi Ashida (1887–1959) who previously served as a prime minister in 1948. He advocated Japan’s immediate full rearmament when Japan was about to regain its independence. He and other rearmament supporters belonged to the so-called “second conservative parties” which had been holding the second largest number of seats

R. Yoshida (B) Keio University, Tokyo, Japan e-mail: [email protected]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2022 Y. Sugita and V. Teo (eds.), Rethinking the San Francisco System in Indo-Pacific Security, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-1231-3_3

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among the non-socialist parties. Those parties were Kaishinto (Reformative Progressive Party, 1952–1954) to which Ashida belonged and Buntouha Jiyuto (Authentic Liberal Party, 1953). They accused other progressive opposition parties of being neutral and optimistic. They also criticized their main rival Shigeru Yoshida who was then prime minister from the Liberal Party which was the biggest and “first” conservative party. He was criticized as being bureaucratic and secretive. However, their rearmament advocacy couldn’t achieve their original goal. The purpose of this chapter is to clarify why the San Francisco system didn’t mean Japan’s official rearmament. It will describe how the San Francisco system was represented in Japanese politics by examining how the Japanese political movement which advocated the full rearmament had lost its momentum in the early 1950s. After overviewing the thought and activities of the rearmament movement in the first and second sections, the third and fourth sections will reaffirm how the rearmament movements had failed to get wider support. Recent historical studies on the “Second Conservative Parties” had emphasized their achievements, focusing on the impact of this group. As the latest and the most influential example, we can see Yajima (2019). On the contrary, this chapter tries to reconfirm their failure to get support, focusing on the external difficulties which surrounded them. Despite the San Francisco treaty which brought Japan to join in the Western Bloc, it didn’t straightly mean that Japan moved forward to the rearmament and the active engagement in the international strategic issues. We have to revisit and reexamine the diverse narratives those days on Japan’s role in the Bloc, with also looking at which narrative could get more attention from the United States who was the de fact organizer of the San Francisco system. Furthermore, this chapter will pay attention, in the fifth section, to the process of the compromise and self-imposed restriction, focusing on the adjustment and transformation of the discourses by the rearmament advocates themselves. This brings a major change on the analytical perspective on this theme. Existing researchers had the tendency to describe the politicians in the “second conservative parties” as the ideacentered ones who were keen to have consistent ideas and pursued those ideas through their political activities. While these researches have attributed the insufficient success of those politicians chiefly to the political circumstances surrounding them (Otake 1988; Mito 2005; Yajima 2019), this section will mainly focus on the actors’ own decisions and compromises, examining their discourses and behaviors.

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The Thought of the Rearmament Movement While San Francisco treaty marked Japanese engagement in the Western Bloc in the Cold War order, there remained diverse narratives in Japan on the interpretation of this fact. As for which kind of defence rights and responsibility Japan should have. Conservatives were also divided. Both types of conservatives tried to brand themselves as the most suitable figure to play the appropriate and acceptable role under the treaty and the Cold War. The basic foundation of the postwar foreign policy of Japanese conservative governments was established by Shigeru Yoshida who had been a prime minister for six years from October 1948 to December 1954. As the Cold War system became apparent, Yoshida prioritized the participation in the Western Bloc by concluding the San Francisco Peace Treaty accompanied by the Japan–U.S. Security Treaty. With this security treaty, the United States had held the right to keep their military base in Japan with limited Japanese initiatives (Uemura 1995, 66–67). While giving up taking initiatives, Yoshida could avoid taking risk to emphasize Japan’s active role in the Western Bloc. Yoshida’s foreign policy has been mainstream among the conservatives. In contrast, Hitoshi Ashida in the Reformative Progressive Party claimed that “the real issue should be how Japan can contribute to the Liberal Countries” (Shindo and Shimokoube, ed. 1986a, 195). As for diplomacy, Ashida attacked Prime Minister Yoshida’s attitude against the Communist Bloc as being optimistic about the prospect of the Cold War, including the Korean War. Immediately after the conclusion of the San Francisco Treaty with Japan, the parliament session saw Prime Minister Yoshida facing Ashida in October 1951. This is known as the “YoshidaAshida debate.” Ashida said, “On the outlook of the world affairs, the current cabinet is always making the unmatured observations. Around last fall, the government said that the Korean War would be over within three months. The government said that the Chinese military would never intervene in the Korean affairs. On the next day, the Chinese military broke in. Such misunderstandings can be found one after another.” He accused the Yoshida cabinet, which seemed to be optimistic about the Cold War, of being incapable to capture the exact situation of the Soviet Union (Ministry of Finance Printing Bureau 1951, 20). Ashida had a strong sense of crisis regarding possible Soviet expansion beyond its border. On this premise of the Soviet Union’s expansion,

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he advocated the scheme of collective security by tightening the collective alliance of the Western Bloc, resonating with the containment policy (Mito 2005, 21–25). At that time, he regarded the Eastern Bloc as being united, holding sufficient military power to threat the West, and planning the attack in the near future. Therefore, he claimed that the Western Bloc would have to take a tougher stance to win the Cold War or even to achieve a mere balance of power (Ashida 1952a). With such perspectives, the Japanese Communist Party was criticized as an agent attempting to overthrow the Japanese regime into a communist satellite state. The party was supposed to cooperate with the Soviet Union, which was the “head” of the communist countries, and the Chinese Communist Party, which was its biggest ally in Asia, to spread pro-Soviet sentiment in Japan and to prepare the direct attack against Japan (Ashida 1952b). Ashida, who had been known as a staunch social liberalist since the prewar era, refused the possible influence of the Soviet Union, calling it a “totalitarian aggression” against the “constitution of democracy” (Ashida 1951b). He claimed that the possibility of Japan’s neutral diplomatic policy should have been completely denied especially after the outbreak of the Korean War (Ashida 1951c). In addition to strengthening the defence capabilities, he proposed the cooperative defence with the participation of the people, mainly the youth, such as the “Home Guard” (Ashida 1951a; Uemura 1995, 86; Sado 2003, 16, 19, 30; Nakajima 2006, 52).

The Formation of the Rearmament Movement In order to realize such foreign and security policy, Ashida launched the campaign for the dissemination and enlightenment through public speeches and social movements. Shortly before Japan restored independence following the enactment of the San Francisco Treaty in April 1952, Ashida and his long-time acquaintance Tetsuzo Watanabe, Jyuitsu Kitaoka, and Tadao Tanabe formed a group named “Shin Gunbi Sokushin Renmei (New Armament Promotion Association)” and advocated reintroducing the armed forces and cultivating the patriotism among the people (Otake 1988, 139–140; Uemura 1995, 87–89). All of those three were former professors of socioeconomics at the University of Tokyo whose research interests included the border between communism, social democracy, and social liberalism.

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After holding a “New Armament Promotion Speeches” in major cities such as Tokyo, Osaka, and Yokohama from February to May, this group held an inaugural ceremony at the Hibiya Park Public Hall in Tokyo in May 1952. The secretary-general was Toshinao Miyamoto, who had been active in China and was Ashida’s main source of information about Chinese affairs (Kitaoka 1976, 74). Their aim was not just encouraging the people to embrace the military forces as the symbol of restored sovereignty. They rather focused on the purpose of the rearmament such as security and foreign policy which aimed at the specific countries and the related forces. In October 1951, preceding this rearmament movement, the Japanese Communist Party had adopted the armed struggle policy igniting the illegal and violent activities (Tanaka 1993, 55–57). Under such circumstances, the New Armament Promotion Association was launched, declaring the need to counter the invasion by the communist state as well as the armed uprising by the domestic Communist Party. The statement issued at the inaugural ceremony of the association began with saying “the forces of the international Communist Party, whose ultimate goal is the world revolution, are set to surge in Japan” (“Shin Gunbi Sokushin Renmei Kessei: Sengen” 1952). In the statement for recruiting new members written by Ashida himself, it said “The wheel of the aggression targeting the cleavage in the free world has already extended to Korea and Vietnam. And in response to this, Japanese elements who are planning a violent revolution have emerged.” (“Doyu no Shi Kitare: Shin Gunbi Sokushin Renmei no Kessei” 1952). His perspective on the international situation was straightly represented here. And at the beginning of his first speech on February 10, 1952, he put the topic of “the organization of the communists that threatens Japan” (Shindo and Shimokoube, ed. 1986a, 97). On the other hand, fierce heckles were blown off by a part of the audience at each venue of the speeches. Ashida attributed this to the sneaking in members of the Japanese Communist Party (“Doyu no Shi Kitare: Shin Gunbi Sokushin Renmei no Kessei” 1952; “Dai Nikai Gunbi Sokushin Enzetsu-kai” 1952; “Dai Sankai Gunbi Sokushin Enzetsu-kai” 1952; “Sendai-shi no Enzetsu-kai: Kyosanto Kyoudo no Bougai” 1952). During this rearmament movement, they also put importance on developing young intellectual groups, mainly among university students. Ashida, along with Kitaoka and Tanabe, worked to establish the “Gakusei Kokubou Kenkyu Kyoukai (Student Defence Research Association)” which was an affiliate of the “New Armament Promotion Association”

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(Shindo and Shimokoube, ed. 1986a, 160, 165, 179–182, 245). In addition, he was engaged in the actions such as distributing to prefectural high schools the copies of a booklet which was critically commenting on the foreign policy of the communist countries (Shindo and Shimokoube, ed. 1986b, 65–66). In addition, he planned to cooperate with the ultranationalists. Ashida appreciated the activities of Bin Akao (Otake 1988, 140), the socialistturned rightwing activist who shares pro-U.S. foreign policy with him since the 1930s, as well as Tatsuo Tsukui, who had connections with Asianists such as Genyosha (Shindo and Shimokoube, ed. 1986a, 300). Tsukui also formerly had a background as a national socialist like Akao. Although Tsukui had a less positive view of the United States, he was trying to decide how to draw a line between Communist China and Japanese Asianism. Even the plan and concept of the New Armament Promotion Association itself was formed at a meeting of Ashida and Akao in the first place. Initially, there was a plan to operate it by Ashida, Tetsuzo Watanabe, Akao, and Tsukui (Shindo and Shimokoube, ed. 1986a, 31, 53, 65). Ashida later abandoned the plan to bring Akao into the management in consideration of the possibility of worsening relations with other intellectuals around him who showed concern about Akao’s ultranationalist activism. But even after that, he shared with Akao the view of the domestic and international situation and moderately kept funding his activities. He also hoped Akao would win a national election (Shindo and Shimokoube, ed. 1986a, 76–77, 116, 252).

The Difficulties Surrounding the Rearmament Movement There was a prospect that Ashida’s advocacy could be accepted by the public in relation to the daily lives of the people. There were signs that their argument was welcomed, especially in the non-urban areas, through small group talks and lectures (Ashida 1952c, 1955a). This was because people were experiencing a series of attacks by the communists in the non-urban areas. In addition, in the area facing the Sea of Japan, they could share a sense of caution against communist countries in East Asia. His constituency was also facing the Sea of Japan in Northern Kyoto. He mentioned specific topics such as the Japanese fishing boats captured by the Soviet Union, China, or North Korea in the Sea of Japan

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(Ashida 1952c). This topic precisely described the coastal situation at that time. As of May 1952, there were 164 Japanese fishing vessels (with 1398 crew members) caught in the sea near Japan by the Soviet Union, 82 (973 crews) by China, and 53 (655 crews) by Taiwan and 110 (1299 crews) by South Korea. Among them, the problem with Taiwan and South Korea, which belonged to the Western Bloc, could see all crew members having been returned except for a few dead. In contrast, as for the communist states, 101 crews had not been returned from the Soviet Union and 270 had not been returned from China. It was the issue left behind (Iizuka 1952, 23–25). In later years, the number of non-returnees from the Soviet Union was 76 in June 1956 just before the restoration of diplomatic relation between Japan and the Soviet Union. It was decreased to 11 in January 1957 shortly after the restoration of diplomatic relation. However, the number had gradually increased again since then and soon returned to 95 in June in the same year (Ministry of Foreign Affairs 1957, 83–84). However, these crises related to the daily lives weren’t perceived by the general public. As for the threat of the Soviet Union, it was inevitable that there would be a different attitude among people regarding how to perceive that threat, depending on the region they lived. While a direct threat could be consistently recognized around the Sea of Japan coast, which was facing the border, it was difficult to imagine any urgent threat on the daily lives in other areas. Among the general public, the threat brought by the communist countries to daily lives seemed to begin waning during this period. This was not unnatural when we remember that this rearmament movement began after they had already seen the stalemate of the Korean War. While the public support for the rearmament was around or over 60 percent shortly after the beginning of the Korean War (Miyazaki 1988a, 57), it had been decreased into 40 percent in spring in the following year (Miyazaki 1988b, 212). Under these circumstances, Ashida’s caution against the Communist Bloc did not spread widely. On the contrary, the claim that the overly cautious attitude against communist countries was unnecessary or harmful was getting its momentum in the media discourses and social movements at that time, especially among the socialists. Itsuro Sakisaka, who was known as the ideologue of the Socialist Association which was the Marxist faction standing on the leftmost side of the

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Japan Socialist Party, claimed that he would trust the remarks by communist countries that they would not invade other countries, although he admitted that the Japanese people should resist by “all other means” than the military power such as general strike if any invasion by the Soviet Union took place. He cited the theoretical position of Marx as well as Stalin and other communist leaders as the proof that they would respect the voluntary movements by the proletariat emerging independently in each region in the world (Suzuki et al. 1951). Hitoshi Yamakawa, who belonged to the Socialist Association like Sakisaka but took a little more skeptical attitude against the Soviet Union than Sakisaka, had also shown the rapprochement discourses. Although he mentioned that “I admit that the concept of the Soviet’s world revolution is very invasive,” he claimed that “they can’t think of moving troops forward and conquering us when we don’t have the armaments” (Suzuki et al. 1951). The influence of these optimistic views further increased around when they saw the ceasefire agreement in the Korean peninsula in 1953. 1953 was a time when there spread the image of the first rapprochement during the Cold War regarding the situation in Asia and Eurasia which saw easing the tensions (Uemura 1995, 140–141). Shigeto Tsuru, known as one of the leading “progressive intellectuals” who were tolerant of the communist movements while standing at the liberal position, firmly said in his public dialogue with Ashida that the Soviet Union was so “realistic” that it would not come outside its border (Ashida and Tsuru 1953a). However, Ashida regarded those widespread notions of the rapprochement were nothing other than the success of the international propaganda by the communist countries. Regarding the Soviet Union, he thought the history of the country before and during the Cold War could not let anyone conclude that “the Soviet Union is a peaceful force.” Then he concluded that this kind of notion was “just a copy of the Communist Party’s propaganda from Moscow” (Ashida 1954). Although there were a few supporters for the rearmament among the socialists including the leftists, they were gradually marginalized, leaving pacifist sentiment being dominant (Uemura 1995, 110). As for the Japan Socialist Party chairperson Mosaburo Suzuki who made the famous slogan of the domestic anti-war and pacifist movement “Youth, don’t take weapons,” Ashida simply called it the result of the international propaganda by the communist countries (Ashida 1953).

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This perspective was based on the recognition that the contemporary situation in Japan was “very similar” to the situation in Russia he witnessed as a diplomat at the time of the revolution in 1917. He felt that the Japanese Communist Party in the 1950s was “doing exactly what the Russian Communist Party did at that time” (Ashida and Kurushima 1954). He had concluded that the reason why the Communist Party rapidly attracted the people during the Russian Revolution and easily overwhelmed other progressive parties like the Socialist Party, which led the early revolutionary government, was that the party fueled the people’s sentiment of reluctance against the war during the World War I (Ashida 1950, 366). On the pacifist sentiment in Japan, Ashida saw a general lack of liberal thought among Japanese people. He said that the Western Bloc might think “Japan is neither an enemy nor an ally. If it is an enemy, it is understandable and we can make a strategy. If it is an ally, we can treat it as an ally. Japan is neither an enemy nor an ally. It is rather trying to approach the Chinese Communist Party, or looking at the Soviet Union as an alternative choice. While it verbally says it will cooperate with the free nations, it is trying to use an abacus, calculate and eventually approach those who bring it the benefit. No country is as annoying as this” (Ashida 1957). Ashida also defended Japan’s reintroducing military power with the quasi-liberal discourses. He positioned military power as a basic element of the independent state, seeing the possession of military power as a natural right. He wrote “Self-defence is a natural right, regardless of whether it is a personal self-defence or a national self-defence. It is not a self-defence if it is particularly permitted by the provisions of the written law” (Ashida 1951a, b). Just as positioning the need for personal defence as self-protection, he affirmed the possession of the military forces as a natural right owned by the state, giving it the ethical foundation. He also claimed that strengthening military power is consistent with the statement of the “spirit of peace loving people” in the current Japanese Constitution (Ashida 1956). It was made on the premise that war for the self-defence can coexist with the pursuit of peace (Ashida 1955b). Therefore, he was also supportive of Japan’s possession of the nuclear weapons. He wrote that the existence of nuclear weapons shouldn’t be ethically denied, even critically calling the film about Hiroshima atomic victims “atrocity campaign” (Shindo and Shimokoube, ed. 1986c, 183). He rather required the “scientific research” on the nuclear weapon without fearing it too much (Shindo and Shimokoube,

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ed. 1986c, 329). In addition, he openly reiterated, in his public lecture, that the possession of nuclear weapons should also be considered (Ashida 1958). On the other hand, there was also a kind of unique liberalism behind the pacifist tendency criticized by Ashida. Among the “progressive intellectuals” in postwar Japan, the danger of reviving the “militarism” after reintroducing the defence organizations was regarded to be far more critical than the danger of the lack of the defence capabilities. In the above-mentioned dialogue, Shigeto Tsuru also argued, regarding Ashida’s theory of rearmament, that “the advocacy of re-armament at this stage can be still an opportunity to encourage the reactionaries in Japan” (Ashida and Tsuru 1953b). On the contrary, this kind of risk did not concern Ashida. He clarified that the purpose of rearmament would be to defend “the spirit of the Constitution that swore to establish a world of freedom and peace” or “the democratic constitution and peace”. The purpose of strengthening military power was to protect the constitutional regime in Japan. It was supposed to defend the independent liberal democracy (Ashida 1951b). In the intellectual circle and media at that time, this position was a minority (Otake 1988, 177–181). As mentioned earlier, when the inaugural ceremony of the New Armament Promotion Association was held, there was no coverage of it in the mainstream newspapers. In contrast, it was reported in the major newspaper that Tadao Yanaihara, who gave an inaugural speech as the president of the University of Tokyo, said “The recent re-armament movement has set the inappropriate hypothesis that we will be invaded if we have no defence force.” He also reportedly said “it is an emotional argument that is not supported by a truly academic analysis,” mocking the movement (“Saigunbi ha Kanjyou-ron: Yanaihara Soucyou Syunin Hatsu no Kouen” 1952). According to Jyuitsu Kitaoka of the New Rearmament Promotion Association, intellectuals who did not express the opposition to the communist countries were more advantageous in that era, being able to be popular in media as well as intellectual society and to earn well through writing (Kitaoka 1951). He expressed his resentment. Ashida had also criticized the editorial policy of the journal “Sekai (World) as aiming for commercial success” (Shindo and Shimokoube, ed. 1986a, 275). The magazine was known for its pacifist position promoting the exchanges with the communist bloc.

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Furthermore, it should be noted that a similar situation could be seen even within the second conservative party to which Ashida belonged. There was a backlash from the party colleagues against Ashida’s diplomatic and defence policies. At the time of the general election in October 1952, Ashida’s “rearmament advocacy” was strongly criticized not only by the Leftist Socialist Party, but also by some of the fellow Kaishint¯o party politicians. Junior colleagues such as MP Hideji Kawasaki, a leading figure among young MPs in the party, had criticized Ashida’s rearmament advocacy as an obstacle to expand the public support for the party. He sharply hit back this criticism (Takenaka 1994, 154). In short, Ashida attempted to disseminate to the general public and the younger generation the sense of crises regarding the threats of the communist countries. He did it through speeches and social movements. However, Ashida’s cautious position had become a minority compared to the various progressive perspectives that were not cautious against the Communist Bloc. Moreover, there was also a similar situation within the second conservative party to which he belonged. While Ashida was struggling in the conflict among the progressives, Yoshida administration was pragmatically developing the Japanese defence forces. The existing National Police Reserve which was established in 1950 as the precursor of the new army was upgraded into the Safety Forces (Hoan-tai) in October 1952. This was in parallel with the establishment of the Maritime Security Forces (Kaijyou Keibi-tai) other than the Coast Guard (Uemura 1995, 70–76). While the number of the personnel of the Safety Forces (around 110,000) was still half of what Ashida hoped, Yoshida administration spent more than double of what Ashida predicted to be necessary. It was said that Yoshida possibly planned to increase it to 200,000 as Ashida planned within years (Toyoshita 1996, 149–155). Following the enforcement of the new defence agency in 1952, Yoshida made speech to the executives, saying “Although we don’t financially afford to develop the new military forces, I hope to realize the system in which Japanese nationals can protect our country by ourselves. The security treaty is not sufficient” or “The purpose of establishing new security agency is the establishment of the new national military forces. You are tasked to be the foundation of the new national military forces.” This remark was made without the presence of the media (Otake 1988, 114–115; Uemura 1995, 71). At this point, the notable difference

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between Ashida and Yoshida was whether they should openly call new security forces military. Ashida’s rearmament movement which openly advocate the rearmament couldn’t get support from the United States. The report from GHQ-SCAP in Tokyo to the U.S. Department of the State regarded Ashida’s advocacy as being supported by the ultranationalists rather than the moderates (Yajima 2019, 240). This evaluation was not baseless. While Ashida was seeking Japanese active contribution to the Western Bloc, he and his party were critical of the possible use of the U.S. forces to maintain the public safety inside Japan, which was reserved under the protocol of the U.S. Japan Security Treaty. Ashida criticized in the parliament that it is an amount to be a protectorate (Ministry of Finance Printing Bureau 1951, 18).

Rearmament Movement as Election Campaign Those activities through the New Armament Promotion Association were not just social movements but also their campaign for the upcoming election. The speeches on the political ideas were the effective political advertising resources that the opposition politicians could provide to the voters. Ashida, for example, had sent to the constituencies the copies of the booklet criticizing the regime of communist countries. In addition, the summary of the aforementioned debate in the parliament between Ashida and Prime Minister Shigeru Yoshida regarding security issues was also sent to the municipalities in his constituency as political advertising tools (Shindo and Shimokoube, ed. 1986a, 53, 335). In addition, Ashida’s criticism of communism, which led the “New Armament Promotion Association”, was directly linked to the activities as a party politician. Bin Akao, the de-facto inventor of the concept of the New Armament Promotion Association, had suggested Ashida from the beginning that the national movement should be converted to the support for Ashida and his political party (Shindo and Shimokoube, ed. 1986a, 31). Although the Association officially declared to be bipartisan, the speakers at the events were dominated by Ashida, Tanabe, and Watanabe (“Shin Gunbi Sokushin Renmei no Tanjou” 1952; “Dai Nikai Gunbi Sokushin Enzetsu-kai” 1952; “Dai Sankai Gunbi Sokushin Enzetsu-kai” 1952; “Shin Gunbi Sokushin Renmei Kessei: Sengen” 1952; “Sendai-shi no Enzetsu-kai: Kyosantoou Kyoudo no Bougai” 1952). And

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all of them were engaged in the electoral activities in a position criticizing Prime Minister Yoshida. At the speech in Sendai, the people who were involved in the Kaishint¯o party were cooperating in the management and operation (Shindo and Shimokoube, ed. 1986a, 154). At that time, the Kaishint¯ o was strengthening the activities of the youth association (“Seinenbu Katsudou no Gaiyou to Kongo no Undou to Ninmu”, n.d.). The activities of Ashida, including the aforementioned “Student Defence Research Association,” were expected to complement these activities (Shindo and Shimokoube, ed. 1986a, 179–180). They thought that it was necessary for the politicians and the people to work together to disseminate the critical view of communism, and that the ruling Liberal Party government was too bureaucratic to have the will and ability to engage in such media and social activities (Ashida 1951a, b). However, the result of the anti-communist advocacy as an election campaign was as poor as it was for the social and media activity. They failed to get support from the voters in the elections. They, except Ashida himself, were unable to win the seats in the general elections held in both 1952 and 1953. For example, in the Tokyo 2nd district (which had 3 seats) including Ota Ward, where Ashida lived, Tadao Tanabe of the New Armament Promotion Association ran as the only candidate of Ashida’s Kaishint¯o Party in 1952 election in October. He finished sixth, following two candidates of the Rightist Socialist Party, two candidates of the Liberal Party, and one candidate of the Leftist Socialist Party by a large margin (Tokyo Metropolitan Electoral Management Committee Secretariat 1952). In the election, Ashida was pleased that Tanabe could run for the race, and provided active support such as canvassing and making speeches during the election. This means he left his constituency in Kyoto and returned to his home in Tokyo for several days. Therefore, he admitted that Tanabe’s defeat was a blow to his own political career (Shindo and Shimokoube, ed. 1986a, 205–206, 212–213, 221). In the general election in 1953, Tetsuzo Watanabe ran as a candidate of the Buntoha Jiyuto (Authentic Liberal Party which was led by Ichiro Hatoyama who defected from Yoshida’s party) in the same constituency, but lost too, with finishing fifth but with less than half of the votes for the fourth candidate (Tokyo Metropolitan Electoral Management Committee Secretariat 1953). Besides, Jyuitsu Kitaoka, who was also preparing to run as the

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Kaishint¯o candidate in his hometown of Nara Prefecture in those general elections, ended up not to run (Kitaoka 1976, 215). In this way, all election campaigns of those who managed this rearmament advocacy became unsuccessful, with Ashida himself being the only exemption. This result symbolized that the sense of crisis advocated by Ashida and the allies did not spread to the voters. Since the middle of 1952, the Japanese Communist Party had begun showing a sign to halt the series of violent tactics such as armed attacks (Tanaka 1993, 57). This coincided with the enactment of the Subversive Activities Prevention Act in July 1952. In the following general election in October, the Japanese Communist Party lost all 15 seats, which they held since the previous election in 1949. These happened around the same time as Ashida’s social and political advocacies. The fall of the Communist Party also meant that the rearmament advocacy by Ashida and others to warn against the communist movements would lose the momentum before converting their movements into the seats in the parliament. In the constituencies where Ashida’s allies during the movement were defeated, the conservative candidates who had defeated them were the ones of the ruling Liberal Party. After all, in these lower house elections after Ashida launched the rearmament movement, the ruling Liberal Party maintained the majority to stay in power under Yoshida, allowing them to continue the more closed and bureaucratic way to maintain the san Francisco System.

Compromise and Aftermath In the previous sections, we have reviewed Hitoshi Ashida’s view of the domestic and international situation and have confirmed how it was not accepted in the society, in his own party, and the election campaign. The rearmament advocacy which emphasized the threat of the communist forces had not been welcomed inside and outside the party. However, the causes of their demise were not only the external difficulty that surrounded them. In this section, I would like to confirm how Ashida himself adjusted his actions in response to the circumstances surrounding him. In other words, it reveals how much he actually pursued his rearmament agenda during his activities at his party. In fact, he occasionally made concessions in terms of what he actually did, with modifying or suspending his original policies through the political process within the party.

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As implied above, there were some politicians within the same party who did not want to emphasize the caution against the communist bloc. They rather focused on the promotion of exchanges with the Communist Bloc. Ashida’s position was not welcomed not only by the voters, but also by the politicians of the party to which he belonged. Despite his strong advocacy, Ashida was tolerant of these policy differences. When he formed the Kaishint¯ o Party in January 1952, Ashida tried to invite his acquaintance, a business executive Shozo Murata, to be the party’s president despite apparent difference on foreign policy (Shindo and Shimokoube, ed. 1986a, 86). Murata had already promoted expanding economic and cultural exchange with mainland China (Soeya 1998, 28). He was known as a leading figure in this movement. He organized the “International Economic Discussion Association” with Tanzan Ishibashi, who kept being close to Ashida as a “liberalist” since before the war but was at odds over the evaluation of the communist China, and Tokutaro Kitamura, a politician of the Kaishint¯ o party who was known for his tolerant perspective on Russia, and was working to participate in the Moscow International Economic Conference which would be held in April 1952. However, there was no sign that Ashida considered this point as a problem. Regarding the participation of Japanese politicians in the Moscow International Economic Conference, Ashida had not shown any particular opinions. As for the selection of the president of the Kaishint¯ o Party, Ashida also allowed Kitamura and Takeo Miki, who also allied with Ishibashi, to possibly take office (from Shindo and Shimokoube, ed. 1986a, 133). Even Takeo Mitamura, who shared the same cautious view of communism with Ashida in the Party, was actively promoting the appointment of Miki as a party president, and Ashida agreed on this (Shindo and Shimokoube, ed. 1986a, 92). Kitamura eventually served as the policy chief and Miki became the secretary-general. Ashida’s tolerant attitude can be interpreted as the compromise and consideration to maintain unity within the party. Ashida later said that parliamentarians involved in “actual politics” cannot be allowed to say everything they want to say (Ashida et al. 1955). In such a way, Ashida showed a tolerant attitude toward the politicians who were promoting the rapprochement with the Communist Bloc. Furthermore, he could compromise even on his rearmament advocacy which countered the Communist Bloc and was officially the most important issue for him. It was suspended by himself in consideration of the

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domestic circumstances of the party. As mentioned earlier, when a party member criticized Ashida for incurring voters’ fear during the general election in 1952, Ashida harshly rebutted it. However, what should be noted is that he had already suspended the activities of the New Armament Promotion Association since June 1952, before the election of the House of Representatives in October. And according to the memoir written by his fellow Tetsuzo Watanabe, this was in response to the request from the Kaishint¯o party to which he himself belonged (Watanabe 1956, 351–352). Although the New Armament Promotion Association was virtually forced to be halted, Ashida did not state any particular opposition or resentment either openly or privately at that time. He avoided getting into a decisive confrontation with less hawkish members within his party and took consideration in a way that would restrain his advocacies. The same attitudes can be seen regarding his domestic security policies. When the Subversive Activities Prevention Act, which allowed the government to designate and monitor the status of the specific groups like the Japanese Communist Party, was proposed by the Yoshida’s Liberal government in the ordinary parliament session in 1952, the Kaishint¯o Party opposed that, showing the concern that the bill would “restrict public speech and activities” and would “give anxiety” to the “activities related to publication” (Ministry of Finance Printing Bureau 1952, 6). Given Ashida’s position of criticizing the communists, there seems to be normal to have voted for the bill. However, in reality, he had not shown any particular support for the bill and abstained from the vote, choosing a more similar course to his party’s policy. Regarding the banning of the Japanese Communist Party which was under the consideration among the hawkish critics, Ashida said on August 16, 1952, that it was still premature and should be preceded by the development of police forces and intelligence agency to sufficiently counter the Communist Party (Shindo and Shimokoube, ed. 1986a, 195). He also raised concerns about the possibility of pushing the Communist Party into further underground activities. Ashida’s opposition was not only because of the practical reasons. When an author Tsunego Baba, a social democrat turned classical liberal who had been ideologically close to Ashida, showed in January 1952 a willingness to arrest all communists at once, Ashida took a distance from it, feeling Baba became radical (Shindo and Shimokoube, ed. 1986a, 75). While Ashida supported strengthening police forces in general, he kept cautious about targeting the communist movement in particular.

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This was in line with the Kaishint¯o’s position. It claimed an “improvement” of the existing police organization and then opposed not only the Subversive Activities Prevention Act but also the establishment of the Public Security Intelligence Agency, which was Yoshida’s important policy proposed to the parliament at the same time. In this way, Ashida refrained from continuing his advocacy within his party and showed consideration to coexist with the fellow politicians who had the positive views of promoting exchange with Communist Bloc and the negative view of the rearmament policy. The possible conflict was effectively shelved, making the party easier to be united. The reconciliation inside party was prioritized, making them united to criticize the bureaucratic way of the ruling Yoshida administration. Nevertheless, that effort for the party unity didn’t bring sufficient benefit to his party. In these general elections in 1952 and 1953, the numbers of the seats of the Kaishinto (Reformative Progressive party) were reduced to 84 and 76 respectively although it was still the biggest opposition party, surpassing the two biggest socialist parties. In the constituencies where Ashida’s allies during the rearmament movement were defeated, the ruling Liberal Party candidates could survive. After all, in these lower house elections, the Liberal Party, which won 240 seats in 1952 and 199 seats in 1953 maintained the majority and stayed in power under Yoshida, allowing them to marginalize their conservative rivals and be dominant in the San Francisco System.

Conclusion While The San Francisco Treaty was accompanied by the Japan–U.S., Security Treaty which brought Japan into the Western Bloc, consolidating the San Francisco system, this system didn’t lead to the Japanese decision to ensure the right of self-defence and to seek a more active role in the regional defence. Although there emerged the Japanese political movement which advocated the rearmament following the re-independence, the rearmament movement led by Hitoshi Ashida could not get momentum. This was partly due to the negative reactions from both inside and outside their party. While they could let the voters remember the threat from the northwest around the Sea of Japan coast, external threat couldn’t be recognized among the general public. The opposition of the rearmament by the progressive intellectuals and politicians represented

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the pacifist tendency in Japan influenced by the ease of the tension in the Korean Peninsula as well as the decline of the Japan Communist Party which once seemed to be an urgent threat. The rearmament movement couldn’t get notable support from the United States when its leader showed the critical attitude of the protocol of the U.S. Japan Security Treaty which gave the U.S. forces the right to deal with the internal security issues in Japan. Under such circumstances, Ashida, the leader of the movement, himself had to compromise to keep the unity of his own party. He kept cooperating with several politicians who promoted the rapprochement with the mainland China or Soviet Union and supported them to be party executives. In addition, he even suspended his activity of the rearmament advocacy after the criticism from the party members, and also abstained from the vote for the bill which pursued the general surveillance of the activities of the communist activists. Nevertheless, those efforts for the party unity didn’t bring his party the victory in the election. The winner of the election in 1952 and 1953 was the ruling Liberal Party. Ashida couldn’t get the achievement either through keeping his policy or through seeking an opportunity with compromise. While Ashida had to compromise with the party colleagues and had virtually withdrawn from the rearmament advocacy, the Liberal Party and Yoshida administration had eventually survived. This left the official rearmament as non-urgent agenda. The San Francisco system in Japan could not go any other way than Yoshida’s line which continued focusing on the non-official rearmament backed by the United States.

Bibliography Ashida, Hitoshi. 1950. Kakumei Zen-ya no Russiia. Tokyo: Bungei Shunju Shinsya. ———. 1951a. “Jiei Busou Ron.” Diamond, February 1. ———. 1951b. “Jiyu to Heiwa no Tame no Tatakai.” Bungei Shunjyu, March 1. ———. 1951c. “Chosen Jihen no Tsugi ni Kuru Mono.” Diamond, August 11. ———. 1952a. “So-ren no Heiwa Kousei ni Dou Taisyo Subeki ka.” Diamond, February 21. ———. 1952b. “Sousenkyo-sen no Tenkai.” Tokyo Dayori, October 1. ———. 1952c. “Sousenkyo Housou Genkou,” 471–473. Ashida Hitoshi Papers: Documents. National Diet Library. ———. 1953. “Warera no Zento wo Kangae Naosou.” Tokyo Dayori, February 1.

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———. 1954. “Shinto no Kessei wo Tenka ni Uttaeru.” Tokyo Dayori, September 1. ———. 1955a. “Futatabi Sensou no Jidai Kitaru.”Ryotan Jihou, February 26. ———. 1955b. “Shikoku Gaisho Kaigi.” Tokyo Dayori, December 1. ———. 1956. “Kenpou wo Dou Kaisei Suru ka.” Tokyo Dayori, March 1. ———. 1957. “Nihon ha Docchi wo Muite Iru” Keizai Ourai, October. ———. 1958. “Kakuheiki Jidai no Gaikou.” Tairiku Mondai, March. Ashida, Hitoshi and Hidesaburou Kurushima. 1954. “Shintou wo Meguru Seikyoku no Yukue.” Diamond, November 21. Ashida, Hitoshi and Shigeto Tsuru. 1953a. “Taidan: Heiwa no Kakuho ni Tsuite No. 1.” Asahi Shinbun, June 10. ———. 1953b. “Taidan: Heiwa no Kakuho ni Tsuite No. 3.” Asahi Shinbun, June 12. Ashida, Hitoshi, Tanzan Ishibashi, Masanori Itou, Toshie Obama and Seiki Miyake. 1955. “Old Liberalist Houdan.” Chuo Koron, November 1. “Dai Nikai Gunbi Sokushin Enzetsu-kai.” Tokyo Dayori, April 1, 1952. “Dai Sankai Gunbi Sokushin Enzetsu-kai.” Tokyo Dayori, May 1, 1952. “Doyu no Shi Kitare: Shin Gunbi Sokushin Renmei no Kessei.” Tokyo Dayori, March 1, 1952. Iizuka, Masaru. 1952. “Nihon Gyosen no Daho Mondai ni Tsuite.” Kaijo Rodo 5 (6): 23–25. Kitaoka, Juitsu. 1951. “Shin-so Shinri no Kaibou.” Tokyo Dayori, February 1. ———. 1976. Waga Omoide no Ki. Kanagawa: Waga Omoide no Ki Kankou-kai. Ministry of Finance Printing Bureau. 1951. Dai 12 Kai Kokkai Shugiinn Heiwa Jyouyaku oyobi Nichibei Anzen Hoshou Jyouyaku Tokubetsu Iin Kaigi Roku No. 3. Tokyo: Ministry of Finance Printing Bureau. Ministry of Finance Printing Bureau. 1952. Dai 13 Kai Kokkai Shugiinn Hon Kaigi Roku No. 65. Tokyo: Ministry of Finance Printing Bureau. Ministry of Foreign Affairs. 1957. Waga Gaiko no Kinkyo. Tokyo: The Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Mito, Eiji. 2005. “Ashida Hitoshi no Gaikou Anzen Hoshou Ron.” Rokkoudai Ronsyu: Hougaku seijigaku hen 52 (1): 1–47. Miyazaki, Ryuji. 1988a. “Dai Sanji Yoshida Naikaku-ki no Seiji Katei.” Chiba Daigaku Hougaku Ron-shu 3 (1): 33–67. ———. 1988b. “Nihon ni okeru Sengo Democracy no Kotei-ka.” In Sengo Democracy No Seiritsu, edited by Kazuo Indo, Yasushi Yamaguchi, Yasuo Baba and Susumu Takahashi, 151–222. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten. Nakajima, Shingo. 2006. Sengo Nihon no Bouei Seisaku. Tokyo: Keio University Press. Otake, Hideo. 1988. Sai-gunbi to Nationalism. Tokyo: Chuo Kouron-sha. Sado, Akihiro. 2003. Sengo Nihon no Bouei to Seiji. Tokyo: Yoshikawa Koubunkan.

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“Saigunbi ha Kanjyou-ron: Yanaihara Souchou Syunin Hatsu no Kouen.” Asahi Shinbun, February 16, 1952. Seinenbu katsudou no gaiyou to kongo no undou to ninmu. n.d. 8–58. Murakawa Ichiro Papers. Parliamentary Museum. “Sendai Shi no Enzetsu-kai: Kyosanto Kyoudo no Bougai.” Tokyo Dayori, July 1, 1952. Shindo, Eiichi and Motoharu Shimokoube, ed. 1986a. Ashida Hitoshi Nikki Vol. 4. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten. ———. 1986b. Ashida Hitoshi Nikki Vol. 5. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten. ———. 1986c. Ashida Hitoshi Nikki Vol. 6. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten. “Shin Gunbi Sokushin Renmei no Tanjou.” Tokyo Dayori, March 1, 1952. “Shin Gunbi Sokushin Renmei Kessei: Sengen.” Tokyo Dayori, June 1, 1952. Soeya, Yoshihide. 1998. Japan’s Economic Diplomacy with China: 1945–1978. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Suzuki, Mosaburo, Hitoshi Yamakawa and Itsuro Sakisaka. 1951. “Touron: Zenshin ka Koutai ka.” Kaizo, June 1. Tanaka, Takahiko. 1993. Nisso Kokkou Kaihuku no Shi-teki Kenkyu. Tokyo: Yuhikaku. Takenaka, Yoshihiko. 1994. “Chudo Seiji no Houkai.” Nenpou Kindai Nihon Kenkyuu 16: 132–165. Tokyo Metropolitan Electoral Management Committee Secretariat. 1952. Showa 27 Nen 10 Gatsu Shikkou: Syugiingiin Sousenkyo Touhyou Kekka Shirabe. Tokyo: Tokyo Metropolitan Electoral Management Committee Secretariat. ———. 1953. Showa 28 Nen 4 Gatsu Shikkou: Syugiingiin Sousenkyo Kekka Shirabe. Tokyo: Tokyo Metropolitan Electoral Management Committee Secretariat. Toyoshita, Narahiko. 1996. “Yoshida Doctirine no Sai-kentou.” Nenpou Nihon Gendai-shi 2: 141–170. Uemura, Hideki. 1995. Saigunbi to 55 Nen Taisei. Tokyo: Bokutaku-sha. Watanabe, Tetsuzo. 1956. Hansen Hankyou 40 en. Tokyo: Jiyu Asia-sha. Yajima, Akira. 2019. Ashida Hitoshi to Nihon Gaikou. Tokyo: Yoshikawa Koubunkan.

The Contribution of the United States to the Yoshida Doctrine in Japan Yoneyuki Sugita

Introduction Demilitarization was one of the most important purposes the Allied Powers were determined to achieve through their occupation of Japan; however, this noble goal precipitated a difficult national security issue for Japan. The Allies’ occupation culminated in the San Francisco Peace Treaty, which was followed by the Japan-US Security Treaty in an effort to solve this problem. Out of these arrangements emerged a so-called “Yoshida Course” and later the “Yoshida Doctrine,” named after Prime

This chapter is a much-revised version of the original paper which was originally published as “The Yoshida Doctrine as a Myth,” in The Japanese Journal of American Studies, No. 27 (2016), 123–43. I would like to thank the editorial board of The Japanese Journal of American Studies for permission to reprint this article. Y. Sugita (B) Kobe Women’s Junior College, Kobe, Hyogo, Japan e-mail: [email protected]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2022 Y. Sugita and V. Teo (eds.), Rethinking the San Francisco System in Indo-Pacific Security, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-1231-3_4

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Minister Shigeru Yoshida. Masataka Kosaka defined this doctrine based on three core principles: 1. Japan’s alliance with the United States guarantees its national security; 2. Japan maintains its self-defense capability at a low level; and 3. Japan uses the resources that it saves through the first and second policies to expand its economic activities and develop its status as a trading nation (Kosaka 1989, 299). In 1977, Masashi Nishihara used the term, “Yoshida Doctrine” to describe the consistent, pragmatic nature of Japan’s postwar strategy (Nishihara 1978, 151–54). This chapter will address two related research questions: How did the US policies enable the weakened, vanquished Japan to establish the Yoshida Doctrine? What are the consequences of the Yoshida Doctrine? Those scholars who have examined the Yoshida Doctrine tend to take one of two positions: one group criticizes Yoshida for his naïveté and secrecy, and considers his policies to have been inappropriate (Yoshitsu 1983; Ohtake 1988; Muroyama 1992; Kataoka 1992; Toyoshita 1996a, 1996b, 141–70; Miura 1996; Nishikawa 2001); while the other praises him for his foresight, strategic thinking, and pragmatism (Kosaka 1968; Nishihara 1978; Inoki 1981; Hosoya 1981, 1984; Nagai and Okazaki 1984, 46–61; Mochizuki 1983/84, 152–79; Nagai 1984, 382–405; Nagai 1985; Dower 1979, 1985; Pyle 1987, 243–70; Hara 1988; Iokibe 1989a; Kitaoka 1994, 105–31; Iriye 1994; Watanabe 1995; Nakanishi 1996, 240–65; Tanaka 1997; Nakanishi 1999; Sakamoto 2000; Okazaki 2002; Kusunoki 2006, 99–115). The second group is generally in the majority, seeing Yoshida, and even Japan as a whole, as having been skillful and powerful in their resistance to the consistent pressure applied by the United States to rearm. The Japanese chose, instead, to prioritize their economy and to avoid heavy expenditure on a military buildup. This raises the question, however, of how it was possible for Japan, in the wake of its defeat in World War II, to maintain such independence of policy while substantially under the hegemony of the United States. This chapter verifies my hypothesis that the Yoshida doctrine was able to succeed only because it coincided with the interests of the United States

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and because Washington gave it, at least, tacit approval. To illustrate this, this chapter will focus on the US viewpoints and policy decisions that created the context for Japan to take forward Japan’s national interests, as well as the consequences that followed from their choices.

Isolation from International Community Following the Asia–Pacific War, defeated Japan was occupied by the Allied Powers, and segregated from the international community. The Allied Powers controlled Japan’s foreign trade; however, this freed Japan from the great weight of its enormous trade deficit, which was largely covered by American aid. This aid had a total value of $404 million in 1947 and $461 million in1948 and, making up 92% of Japanese imports in 1947 and 75% in 1948 (Allen 1958, 163). From 1937 onwards, Japan’s trade had steadily declined, so its takeover by the victorious western allies actually led it to greatly increase. Japan’s exports of commodities increased by 69, 48, 94, and 61% in successive years from 1946 to 1950 (Guttman 1989, 72). Japan’s shelter under the occupation made it a greenhouse in both economic and military terms; in the late 1930s and early 1940s, over 70% of Japan’s governmental expenditure was devoted to the military, but occupation by the Allied Powers provided a military shield (Teikoku Shoin 2021). Consequently, a focus on internal reforms became easier to achieve.

Demilitarization and Rearmament According to the U.S. Initial Post-Surrender Policy for Japan (SWNCC 150/4/A), issued on 21 September 1945, “Japan will be completely disarmed and demilitarized. The authority of the militarists and the influence of militarism will be totally eliminated from her political, economic and social life. Institutions expressive of the spirit of militarism and aggression will be vigorously suppressed” (State-War-Navy Coordinating Committee 1945). When the occupation began, Japan had about 7 million organized soldiers, of which over 2.57 million were stationed in Japan. The disarmament and demobilization of Japanese soldiers in Japan had been completed by as early as October (Masuda 2012). Completing its demilitarization, the war-renouncing Article Nine was inserted in the new Japanese Constitution (The Constitution of Japan 1946).

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General Douglas MacArthur, Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers (SCAP), announced in March 1947 that the Allied Powers should conclude a peace treaty with Japan as soon as possible, which precipitated discussion of how to handle Japan’s security after the occupation. There were many who supported Japan’s rearmament. The Defense Department advocated Japanese rearmament as being “consistent with the overall strategy of the United States of concentrating its power in Europe and maintaining minimum strength in the Far East” (US Department of State 1986a, reel 12). In contrast, there were those who had reservations about Japanese rearmament, including George Kennan, director of the Policy Planning Staff (PPS) in the State Department, and MacArthur (US Department of State 1974b, 6:708; 1974c, 6:713). However important Japanese rearmament might be, it could have unpredictable consequences. The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) cautioned that “There would be no assurance that those forces would be used in opposition to Communism, if there were compelling economic reasons for an accommodation with the Communist world” (Central Intelligence Agency 1949). Aside from the trust issues, the CIA was worried about negative reactions to Japanese rearmament from its former enemies. Harboring similar suspicions, the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) pursued a limited Japanese rearmament that would be easy to control (Shibayama 2010, 59).

Base Issue The Navy Department demanded in August 1947 “base rights at Yokosuka and necessary air fields to provide protection for the base” after the peace treaty (US Department of State 1972b, 6:495). MacArthur opposed this proposal as being “imperialistic in concept” (US Department of State 1972a, 6:454). He argued that, given adequate US forces at Okinawa, the United States would require no military bases in mainland Japan (US Department of State 1974a, 6:700–1; 1974b, 6:708, 713). Not concurring with MacArthur, the JCS claimed that Okinawa was not suitable for a naval base and wished to continue to use Yokosuka as a base (US Department of State 1976j, 7.2:775). In October 1949, Secretary of State Dean Acheson asked Secretary of Defense Louis Johnson about the essential security requirements, to which Johnson replied in December that the United States should be the only power to have military forces and base rights in any part of the

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Japanese islands. He did not include Japan’s rearmament in the essential military requirements (US Department of State 1975, 7.2:923). The Joint Strategic Survey Committee of JCS argued that, as long as US forces remained in Japan, “the prohibition against rearmament in the Japanese Constitution may remain in effect” (Kesaris 1979). Acheson considered it “essential that there be retained United States forces in Japan.” He made it clear that: “No alternative desirable means for Japan’s security exists,” because the “rearming of Japan for self-defense is not under present circumstances an acceptable alternative” (US Department of State 1990b, reel 8). In February 1950, John Howard of the State Department reported to Dean Rusk that “the minimum security requirements … [included] US bases and forces on Japan itself,” while the maximum demands would be “the rearmament of Japan and the reactivation of Japanese armed forces” (US Department of State 1990a, reel 11). MacArthur was at first completely opposed to the maintenance of US military bases in Japan during the post-Occupation period, saying, “95% of the Japanese people are opposed to American bases in Japan and that unless a wholehearted request for American troops and bases is made by the Japanese, the entire proposition should be abandoned” (US Department of State 1976b, 6:1170). However, he gradually learned to compromise. He proposed that it would be ideal for the United States if Japan made a voluntary request for the retention of US bases in Japan in the post-treaty era. This is exactly what Yoshida provided. In spring 1950, Yoshida sent Finance Minister Hayato Ikeda to Washington. On 2 May 1950, in his talks with Joseph M. Dodge, SCAP’s financial adviser, Ikeda conveyed Prime Minister Yoshida’s secret message to the effect that the Japanese government “desires the earliest possible treaty. As such a treaty probably would require the maintenance of US forces to secure the treaty terms and for other purposes, if the US Government hesitates to make these conditions, the Japanese Government will try to find a way to offer them.” Referring to Article Nine, Ikeda said, “Even volunteering the continuance of these bases would not be a violation of the Japanese Constitution” (US Department of State 1976c, 6:1195–96; Ohkurasho 1950; Miyazawa 1956, 54–55). High-ranking officials, including Acheson, Assistant Secretary of State for Far Eastern Affairs W. Walton Butterworth, John Foster Dulles, special advisor to President Harry Truman, and MacArthur, read the summary of the conversation. Butterworth wrote on the copy that “the conversation is regarded as significant because it is the first expression we have

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had at an official level of the attitude of the Japanese Government on the peace treaty and related questions” (US Department of State 1976a, 6:1195–98; Ohkurasho 1950). Washington officials tried to convince MacArthur about the base issue. In June 1950, Secretary of Defense Johnson visited Japan with General Bradley to assess Japanese conditions and exchange opinions with General MacArthur. On 23 June 1950, before the outbreak of the Korean War, MacArthur made a drastic proposal: “The entire area of Japan must be regarded as a potential base for defensive maneuver with unrestricted freedom reserved to the United States.” He justified his change of attitude by the economic benefits which the bases would generate, arguing that “the protecting power should maintain security forces on Japanese soil on a fully ‘pay as you go’ basis … [because the Japanese people] would welcome the contribution to their national economy reflected from a ‘pay as you go’ basis which under present conditions would mean approximately $300,000,000 annually” (US Department of State 1976g, 6:1227–28). He changed his opinion because of his keen sense that, without an appropriate security arrangement, Washington would not terminate the Occupation in the foreseeable future (Miura 1996, 1:211, 27).

Economic Recovery Demilitarization and democratization proceeded smoothly in occupied Japan, but economic recovery was indispensable to solidify these earlier achievements. The National Advisory Council on International Monetary Affairs, a council to coordinate the policymaking of US government agencies involved in foreign lending, foreign exchange, or foreign monetary policy, argued that economic stabilization would be a prerequisite for the effective use of US aid to Japan. Consequently, NSC13/2 stipulated that “second only to US security interests, economic recovery should be made the primary objective of United States policy in Japan for the coming period” (National Security Council 1952). In the election of January 1949, the Democratic-Liberal Party, led by Yoshida won the majority of seats (264 seats out of 466). This was the beginning of stable postwar conservative rule. Japan, for the first time since the end of the Asia–Pacific War, had a majority single-party government. General MacArthur argued that this result clearly showed the Japanese willingness to choose political conservatism (MacArthur

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1954, 167–68). Japan, however, contained potential seeds of destruction. According to State Department research of February 1949, “unless the economic recovery program gives early promise of success and does so without patently inequitable distribution of burdens on major economic group, there is no guarantee of continuing political stability under Democratic-Liberal leadership …” (Hiwatari 1991, 36–37; Iokibe 1989b). This election also witnessed remarkable progress for the Japan Communist Party (JCP), winning 35 seats in the Diet. The CIA predicted that “in the event that Japanese economic conditions were to improve measurably in the near future, the Party’s support could easily be halved” (Kesaris 1987, reel 3). Economic stability and prosperity were necessary to strengthen conservative elements and contain the JCP in Japan. President Truman sent Dodge to Japan in February 1949 to stabilize the Japanese economy. Dodge requested the Japanese government to implement Japan’s economic recovery based on a rigid balance in the consolidated budget. Inflation spiraled downward almost immediately after the so-called Dodge Line was set out, which not only brought stability to the Japanese economy but also laid the groundwork to support the rise of the financial community by establishing a close linkage among Dodge, Ikeda and Hisato Ichimada, governor of the Bank of Japan. Their common objective was to establish and maintain the balanced budget. Ikeda was determined to execute the Dodge Line in earnest because of his conviction that the Japanese economy “was a green-house economy and there was a need to break some of the windows in it” (Dodge 1949a). Ichimada was glad to say to Dodge, “The grand policy for Japanese economic rehabilitation which you so clearly put into effect was a policy which I had always earnestly desired to put into practice myself but had not succeeded in doing so due to my lack of power” (Dodge 1949b).

Korean War The Korean War broke out in June 1950. Dulles believed that this was the beginning of an increase in communist efforts to conquer Japan (US Department of State 1986b, reel 16). The Korean War led him to believe that the Soviet Union was increasingly making efforts to secure two workshops: one in Germany and the other in Japan. He predicted, “the future of the world depends largely on whether the Soviet Union will be able to get control over Western Germany and Japan by means short of war” (US Department of State 1990c, reel 11; Council on Foreign Relations 1950).

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Under Secretary of the Army Tracy Voorhees warned, “Japanese industry, if captured by the Communists and coupled with the raw materials and other resources on the mainland already under Communist control, could be made a new Frankenstein dominating the Orient” (Dodge 1950a). Japan would be “a major prize” for communist aggression in Asia (US Department of State 1990f, reel 3). Kennan abhorred the possibility of these countries coming under Soviet control, indicating, “If they [the Soviets] were to extend their power to Japan, the whole fruits of our victory in the Pacific would be lost.” Thus, he considered it “essential to us to prevent Soviet seizure of Germany and Japan” (Kennan, n.d.). The State Department warned, “If Japan was added to the resources now possessed by the Soviet Union [it] would greatly alter the balance of power in the world to the disadvantage of the United States and its allies” (US Department of State 1990e, reel 3). When war broke out in Korea, majority opinion swung towards rearmament. SCAP instructed Japan in July 1950 to set up a Police Reserve Force of 75,000 men and to strengthen the Maritime Safety Force by a further 8,500 (Welfield 1988, 72). There was hesitancy in Washington, over the extent to which they could pressure Japan; Dulles advised Paul Nitze, the PPS Director, that Japanese rearmament at that time “would encounter serious and understandable objections on the part of former victims of Japanese aggression and, indeed, from the Japanese themselves” (US Department of State 1976e, 6:1247). In General MacArthur’s opinion, the Allied Powers still needed to be more concerned about the threat from a remilitarized Japan than the threat of an attack on Japan. He argued that a remilitarized Japan would pose a greater threat than that of an attack against Japan in its current state (Asahi Newspaper 1950). A working group in the Department of Defense circulated a draft peace treaty that would allow Japan to possess its own armed forces, stipulating that “Following ratification of the Treaty of Peace, such prohibitions against the rearmament of Japan” during the Allied occupation “shall cease to be operative.” The draft nonetheless paid careful attention to the anxieties of those who remained distrustful, specifying that, “No land, sea, or air forces will be established by the Japanese government … except with the advice and consent of the United States government.” Moreover, to prevent the Japanese armed forces from becoming independent, “In the event of hostilities or imminently threatened hostilities, as determined by the United States, all armed forces in Japan … shall

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be placed under the unified command of a Supreme Commander designated by the United States government” (US Department of State 1976d, 6:1341). In the end, on 7 September 1950, the secretaries of state and defense agreed on security matters and wrote a joint memorandum for the president, stipulating that the peace treaty “must not contain any prohibition, direct or implicit, now or in the future, of Japan’s inalienable right to self-defense in case of external attack, and to possess the means to exercise that right” (US Department of State 1990d, reel 1). However, Washington doubted that Japanese democracy was strong enough. The PPS “strongly doubts that any Japanese political system, … will be recognizable as ‘democracy’ from the U.S. viewpoint” (Iokibe 1989c). The CIA’s analysis indicated that “democracy in Japan is still a tender plant. … much of the philosophy of humanism or individualism that underlies Western democracy does not yet exist in sufficient degree in Japan …” (US Department of State 1986c, reel 1). What Washington desired was controlled and constrained rearmament. On the subject of bases, MacArthur’s abrupt change prompted Dulles to prepare a proposal for discussion with Tokyo. Dulles considered that this proposal “gave the United States the right to maintain in Japan as much force as we wanted, anywhere we wanted, for as long as we wanted, and I did not see very well how the Defense Establishment could want more than that.” This delighted Johnson (US Department of State 1976i, 6:1264–65) and a solid triad formed, uniting MacArthur, Dulles, and the military. A joint memorandum was sent by the secretaries of state and defense to President Truman, urging that the United States “should now proceed with preliminary negotiations for a Japanese Peace Treaty.” The memorandum also stressed that the treaty “must give the United States the right to maintain armed forces in Japan, wherever, for so long, and to such extent as it deems necessary” (US Department of State 1976h, 6:1293–94). The Departments of State and Defense prepared NSC 60/1, which Truman approved on 8 September 1950. For Japan’s economic recovery, the Korean War came along as a divine wind: Japan received large orders from the United States to manufacture military supplies and to repair ships, tanks, jeeps, aircraft, and other equipment, which stimulated the Japanese economy, especially the textile, metal, chemical, transportation, machinery, and electricity industries (Nester 1990, 39). The war was sufficient to return the Japanese economy to its prewar level of productivity by 1951. The outbreak of the Korean War made Japan not only a military entrepot and large repair base

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for the US army, but also a key station for the US rearmament program in Asia, which brought an enormous amount of special dollar earnings to Japan (Hunsberger 1964, 41; Holland 1952). Between June 1950 and June 1951, manufacturing production increased by 50%, manufacturing productivity by 30%, and the wholesale commodity price index by 52% (Seiyama 1989, 45). The manufacturing production index jumped from 68.9 (1934–36 = 100) in 1949 to 189.4 in 1955. The index of manufacturing capacity almost doubled between March 1950 (100) and September 1955 (192.4). Real per capita income increased by 6% annually, from 81 in 1949 (1934–36 = 100) reaching 125 in 1956 (Tsuru 1958, 77). Although Japan was faced with a large trade deficit throughout the 1950s, it was financed by special offshore procurements amounting to about $500 million annually until 1961 (Asai 2002, 231–33). Once the Dodge Line put a stop to inflation, Japan’s exports soared on the back of rising international prices. From 1949 to 1951, export volumes rose by 270% and production by 70% (Nakamura 1993, 156– 57, 175; Redford 1980, 282; Nester 1990, 39). From 1949 to 1950, Japan increased its ordinary exports by 89%, followed by a further 40% in the following year (Seiyama 1989, 45). Furthermore, American assistance gave Japan easy access to inexpensive energy supplies and sources of raw materials (Nakamura 1993, 156–57, 175; Redford 1980, 282). From a $300 million trade deficit at year-end 1949, Japan grew a trade surplus of $40 million by the end of 1950 (Rotter 1987, 205). With import surpluses of $1.975 billion during this period, the US special procurement facility eliminated the trade deficits and capital began to accumulate (Rekishigaku Kenkyukai 1961, 2:72). Admitting that the Korean War provided Japan with substantial economic benefits, Dodge warned that it was “unusual, probably temporary, and subject to obvious limitations” (Dodge 1950b). The Japanese business community, as well as the government, anticipated that the end of the Korean War would conclude the special offshore procurement program and, as a result, cut short the economic boom. Indeed, the worldwide economic expansion began to recede in April 1951 (Cohen 1958, 87–89). Dodge advised Ichimada that the end of the Korean War “might bring serious repercussions on business and banking …” (Dodge 1994, 4:102–41). The early 1950s presented Japan the options of peaceful economic growth or the development of military industries. In the view of the US Defense Department, “Japan should be a primary source of MDAP

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[Mutual Defense Aid Program] supplies for the democratic nations of the Far East” (US Department of State 1986d, reel 35). Similarly, the Defense Department’s Munitions Board considered, “It would be in the best interests of the U.S. to initiate industrial mobilization planning in Japan with a view to utilization of Japan as a supplemental source of supply for U.S. military requirements in another world conflict” (US Department of State 1986e, reel 23). Ichiro Ishikawa, president of the Federation of Economic Organizations (Keidanren) went public in September 1951 with the view that Japan should develop its own military industry. To this end, the Ministry of International Trade and Industry supported an export-focused program of technological development that involved seeking US subsidies for developing a munitions industry (Kihara 1994, 90). In March 1952, the United States gave approval for resuming weapons production in Japan, and two months later, orders for weapons started to be received from the US military. This provided a major stimulus to weapons production in Japan (Samuels 1994, 142–43). In August 1952, Keidanren set up the Defense Production Committee to examine ways to improve Japan’s defense capabilities and this committee set a deadline of six years for the creation of thirty military divisions (Ohtake 1953, 25; Rengokai 1971, 316). On the other hand, the Finance Ministry and the Bank of Japan led opposition by the financial community to prioritizing militarization, on the grounds that the capital needed to do so was scarce and could be used more productively (Samuels 1994, 145; Hiwatari 1990, 40). Dodge made the recommendation to Ikeda in October 1950 that Japan should not follow the United States’ model of rearmament, but rather should limit domestic consumption and focus on increasing exports (Watanabe 1966, 319). Dodge was strongly in favor of a balanced budget, and the consistent support of Dodge and Yoshida enabled the financial community to sustain the balanced-budget policy, consequently checking Japan’s rush to remilitarization. From 1951 to 1953, Japan headed in towards extensive rearmament and reliance on a defense industry, but this course was ultimately blocked by the consistent conviction that it was right to preserve the policies of tight money and a balanced budget, and by continued US distrust of Japan. The Dodge Line guided Japan’s economic development down the route plotted by the financial community. This pattern of economic development combined with consistent US pressure on Japan for larger and speedier rearmament on one hand and US distrust of Japan

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on the other hand established the conditions that allowed Japan to carry out a persistent but restrained rearmament program.1

1951 Negotiations In January 1951, President Truman decided to start a peace settlement negotiation and sent Dulles to Japan (US Department of State 1977a, 6.1:788–89). Dulles regarded his real purpose as securing base rights in the post-occupation period and discovering “how dependable a commitment could be obtained from the Japanese Government to align itself with the nations of the free world against Communist imperialism” (US Department of State 1977b, 6.1:791). On 29 January 1951, Yoshida and Dulles had their official meeting. Dulles solicited Yoshida’s view on Japan’s rearmament. His purpose was to confirm Japan’s willingness to commit itself to the free world. Dulles states, “No one would expect the Japanese contribution at present to be large, but it was felt that Japan should be willing to make at least a token contribution and a commitment to a general cause of collective security” (emphasis added). On 30 January 1951, the Japanese Government submitted Our View to the United States. According to Our View, “Japan will ensure internal security by herself. But as regards external security, the cooperation of the United Nations and, especially, of the United States is desired through appropriate means such as the stationing of troops.” Dulles obtained Yoshida’s commitment to provide the United States with bases in Japan, which ensured the basic assumption of his peace treaty scheme (Gaimusho 1951). On 31 January 1951, linking the base issue to Japanese rearmament, Dulles stated, “The US armed forces will stay in Japan until Japan can defend itself. We cannot, however, stay here forever. As Japan increases its defensive power, the United States will reduce its bases” (Ohtake 1991, 2:43; Inoki 1981, 3:401). On 1 February, the Japanese government submitted its “Formula concerning JapaneseAmerican Cooperation for Their Mutual Security” to the US delegates, clearly stating, “Japan will agree to the stationing of United States forces within the Japanese territory.” Japan also assured free movement of US 1 For more details about the role of the financial community, see Yoneyuki Sugita, “US Strategic Preference for Securing Military Bases and Impact of Japanese Financial Community on Constrained Rearmament in Japan, 1945–1954,” in Demilitarization in the Contemporary World, ed. Peter N. Stearns (University of Illinois Press, 2013), 89–110.

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armed forces anywhere in Japan (Gaimusho Seimukyoku 2002, 2:40, 162). The US delegates repeatedly requested that Japan contribute to the defense of the free world, not only by the use of its police forces and industrial power, but also to a certain extent with its ground forces. They understood that Japan could only increase its forces gradually but wanted to know the rough size of the first stage. When the US delegates offered assurances that they would provide enough assistance, both fiscally and materially, to build up Japanese ground forces, their Japanese counterparts asked to know the amount they would receive. Thus, the Japanese government accepted, in principle, the US proposal to establish ground forces and tried to secure the best possible deal. The focus of the negotiation was not on whether Japan would implement a rearmament program but rather on the terms and conditions of Japan’s rearmament. Finally, on 3 February 1951, Tokyo submitted its “Initial Steps for a Rearmament Program,” which stipulated that the “security forces, land and sea, totaling 50,000, will be created apart from the existing police forces and the National Police Reserve” (Gaimusho 2002, 2:192). Because it was considered essential for Japan to rearm following the peace treaty, Dulles obliged Yoshida to commit irrevocably to rearmament in order to gain the support of the military. Although Yoshida’s commitment was less than whole-hearted, Dulles considered it sufficient, bearing in mind that there were still substantial reservations in the United States about Japanese rearmament. For the purposes and security of the United States, it was more important in practical terms to acquire base rights than to force Japan to undertake rapid rearmament.

Consequences The US decision to strengthen Japan in the Cold War power struggle ironically narrowed the range of policy options toward Japan: It was imperative for Washington to ensure Tokyo’s orientation toward Washington.2 As for US base rights, the Japan-US Security Treaty was overwhelmingly favorable to the United States, because “all of the basic decisions 2 For more detail about the irony of American hegemony, see Yoneyuki Sugita, Hegemoni no Gyakusetsu: Ajia Taiheiyo Senso to Beikoku no Higashi Ajia Seisaku, 1941nen– 1952nen [Irony of Hegemony: The Asia–Pacific War and US Policies Toward East Asia, 1941–1952] (Sekai Shisosha, 1999).

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were left” in US hands (Acheson 1954). As Secretary of State, Acheson informed the British ambassador, Sir Oliver Franks, this security treaty was “dual in purpose: security against renewed Japanese aggression and security for Japan against Soviet-Communist aggression” (US Department of State 1976f, 7.2:927). Rearmament was a stumbling block. Many Japanese supported US policies toward Japan, but according to the Psychological Strategy Board, “the situation may radically change … if a serious effort to rearm Japan is undertaken” (Psychological Strategy Board 1952). The American Embassy also warned that opposition to rearmament in Japan was “found throughout wide segments of the Japanese population” (US Department of State 1988a, reel 2). Given these reservations, acquiring base rights was far more important to the United States than Japanese rearmament. The retention of bases in Japan, however, had forged a double-edged sword for the United States. Deputy Under Secretary of State Freeman Matthews emphasized the importance of Japan’s role as a successful model of democracy for other Asian countries; Japan’s spontaneous ties with the United States and voluntary acceptance of stationing US troops would greatly increase “United States prestige and influence throughout Asia” (US Department of State 1988b, reel 1). Yet, it would be disastrous if the United States forced Japan to accept US bases and armed forces against the wishes of the Japanese people (National Security Council 1952a). It was possible that the issues of rearmament and bases would stimulate nationalist sentiments in Japan and lead to accusations of American imperialism among other Asian populations, so the United States needed to act prudently to avoid a heated debate. A dispute over one issue was likely to have repercussions on the other. Thus, in order to keep a low profile, it was not possible for the United States to force Japan to undertake large-scale rearmament, but they had to accept limits to rearmament which would preserve Washington’s benevolent image as stationing US troops in Japan in response to Japan’s own wishes. In terms of the economic recovery, Japan being a former enemy, the United States needed to promote Japan’s self-interest to make it align with the West. The State Department’s Office of Intelligence Research determined that the United States would need to meet two criteria to ensure Japan’s support: Japan’s security must be ensured, and its economic prosperity must be promoted. In the absence of either of these,

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Japan might seek accommodation elsewhere, becoming neutral in terms of its Cold War alignment (US Department of State 1986c, reel 1). Despite Japan’s docility and cooperative attitude during the Occupation, the American Embassy realized that the Japanese people “have developed certain critical and hostile attitudes toward the United States.” The embassy worried about the rise of “a strong neutralist sentiment” among the Japanese (US Department of State 1988a, reel 2). In May 1952, various intelligence organizations, including the CIA, predicted that Japan’s “pro-Western orientation [will last] at least during the next two or three years.” Economic prosperity, however, would be essential to maintain this orientation (National Intelligence Estimate 1952). “Whether this alignment continues and becomes permanent,” an NSC staff study asserted, “is the basic problem to which United States policy must be directed” (National Security Council 1952). In August 1954, viewing Japan as a realist country, the American Embassy sent the secretary of state a critical analysis of Japan: “Japan does not consider itself an ally or partner of the United States but rather a nation which for the time being is forced by circumstances to cooperate with the United States, but which intends while doing so, to wring out of this relationship every possible advantage at the minimum cost.” The embassy pointed to a particular Japanese value system: “We should remember that Japanese have no abstract sense of right or wrong— their guide to conduct is situational and specific rather than general and ideal.” Guided by such pragmatics, Japan was able to make a rational, realist choice: “Japan has no basic convictions for or against the free world or communism. The attitude toward either at any particular time depends upon specific situations and upon whether in the eyes of Japanese leaders cooperation with the one or the other will advance Japanese interests.” Out of this analysis, the American Embassy recommended that the “Japanese must be convinced that ours is [the] winning side” (US Department of State 1985, 14.2:1714–15). The strong and persistent American distrust of Japan, its underestimation of Japan’s power, and its overestimation of Communist power all combined to lead the United States along a course whereby the United States preferred its base rights and stationing its armed forces in Japan to Japanese rearmament and, consistently with this approach, entertained fears about deterioration of Japanese economic performance.

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Given this background, the chief goal of the Japanese government was to determine the lowest possible contribution to defense without jeopardizing its alliance with the United States. Tokyo endeavored to acquire security without wasting scarce resources on defense. Japanese officials were excellent at exploiting the hegemon’s Achilles’ heel: they used US security anxiety about Japan as a bargaining chip to entice greater US engagement in Japan’s economic recovery. As a weak ally in an unstable area surrounded by two giant Communist countries, Japan found its weakness to be its best asset for dealing with the United States. Indeed, Japan implemented realist pragmatic policies and carried out interactions with the United States accompanied by concessions and shrewd bargaining, but it did so only within the arena set and approved of, or at least acquiesced to, by the United States.

Concluding Observations My main research questions are: How did the US policies enable the weakened, vanquished Japan to establish the Yoshida Doctrine? What are the consequences of the Yoshida Doctrine? This chapter verifies my hypothesis that the Yoshida doctrine was able to succeed only because it coincided with the interests of the United States and because Washington gave it, at least, tacit approval. The United States was successful in acquiring a firm commitment from the Japanese to rearm. But the decision to rearm Japan narrowed the range of policy options: Washington had to make sure that Tokyo would not join the Communist bloc. Strong and persistent American distrust of Japanese intentions made the United States seek two forms of insurance against any trouble with Japan: acquiring the base rights to prevent Japan from becoming an independent military power and implementing Japanese economic recovery to assure Japan’s orientation toward the capitalist Western bloc. At the same time, the United States had to hedge against the possible consequences of these two policies. The rearmament and base issues could stimulate nationalist sentiments among the Japanese people and might stir resentment among people in other Asian countries as evidence of American imperialism. Thus, Washington sought to maintain a low profile without compelling Tokyo to implement rapid, large-scale rearmament but instead agreeing to a constrained rearmament. Rampant inflation was stabilized by the Dodge Line, and Japanese economic growth was

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developed along a path charted by the Japanese financial community. This specific type of economic development allowed Japan to maintain its restrained rearmament. Moreover, US underestimation of Japan’s power and its overestimation of the Communist threat stoked fears about allowing the Japanese economy to falter at all. So intense were these concerns that Washington had to preserve a delicate balance between pushing Japan to spend more money on building up the Japanese armed forces and putting more emphasis on Japanese economic growth. Tokyo, taking advantage of US anxiety about Japan, set its own goals. Japan would ensure its security without wasting scarce resources on defense and without undermining the US–Japan alliance. In other words, the consequence of the Yoshida Doctrine has been Japan’s security policy of calculating the bare minimum contribution to defense that would not damage seriously the US–Japan alliance. Japan exploited the hegemon’s Achilles heel to draw an ever-greater commitment from the United States to maintain Japan’s security and economic recovery. As a feeble ally in an unstable area surrounded by two giant Communist countries, Japan transformed its weakness into an asset in dealing with the United States. Indeed, Japan deftly deployed power politics and shrewd bargaining in its relationship with the United States, even if only within the bounds established and approved of by the occupying power—this was the essence of the Yoshida Doctrine.

References Acheson, Dean. 1954. “14 March 1954,” Papers of Dean Acheson, Harry S. Truman Library & Museum, Independence, Missouri. Allen, G. C. 1958. Japan’s Economic Recovery. Oxford University Press. Asahi Newspaper. 1950. 19 August 1950. Asai, Yoshio. 2002. “1950nendai no Tokuju ni tsuite (1)” [US Military Procurement from Japan: 1950–60 (1)], Seijo Daigaku Keizai Kenkyu 158 (November). Central Intelligence Agency. 1949. “Intelligence Memorandum no. 197, 25 July 1949,” Records of the National Security Council, Papers of Harry S Truman [Hereafter PHST]. Cohen, Jerome B. 1958. Japan’s Postwar Economy (Indiana University Press). Council on Foreign Relations. 1950. 23 October 1950. CFR Papers, Council on Foreign Relations Archives (New York).

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Inoki, Masamichi. 1981. Hyoden Yoshida Shigeru [Biography of Yoshida Shigeru], vols. 1–4 (Chuo Koronsha). Iokibe, Makoto. 1989a. Nichibei Senso to Sengo Nihon [Japan–US War and Postwar Japan] (Osaka Shoseki). Iokibe, Makoto, ed. 1989b. “4 February 1949,” in The Occupation of Japan Economic Reform 1945–1952 (OJER) Part 2 U.S. and Allied Policy 1945–1952 (Maruzen), 4D-76. Iokibe, Makoto, ed. 1989c. Policy Planning Staff, US Department of State, “Draft Paper by the PPS. 28 June 1949,” The Occupation of Japan Economic Reform 1945–1952 (OJER) Part 2 U.S. and Allied Policy 1945–1952, 3H-40. Iriye, Akira. 1994. “Japan Returns to the World: Yoshida Shigeru and His Legacy,” in The Diplomats, 1939–1979, ed. Gordon A. Craig and Francis L. Loewenheim (Princeton University Press). Kataoka, Tetsuya. 1992. Nihon wa “Seiji Taikoku” ni Nareru [Japan as a Political Giant]. PHP Kenkyujo. Kennan, George. n.d. “The Present International Situation,” lecture at National War College, Washington, DC, No date. Kennan Papers, Mudd Manuscript Library. Princeton University. Kesaris, Paul, ed. 1979. “JCS 1380/77, 10 December 1949,” Records of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, pt. 2, 1946–1953, The Far East (University Publications of America), reel 6. Kesaris, Paul, ed. 1987. Documents of the National Security Council, Fourth Supplement (University Publications of America), reel 3. Kihara, Masao. 1994. Nihon no Gunji Sangyo [Japan’s Military Industry] (Shin Nihon Shuppan). Kitaoka, Shin’ich. 1994. “Yoshida Shigeru no Senzen to Sengo” [Prewar and Postwar of Yoshida Shigeru], Nempo Kindai Nihon Kenkyu 16. Kosaka, Masataka. 1968. Saisho Yoshida Shigeru Ron [On Prime Minister Yoshida Shigeru] (Chuokoronsha). Kosaka, Masataka. 1989. “Nihon Gaiko no Bensho” [Dialectic of Japanese Diplomacy], in Koza Kokusai Seiji [International Politics], vol. 4, ed. Tadashi Aruga, Shigeaki Uno, Shigeru Kido, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, and Akio Watanabe (Tokyo Daigaku Shuppankai). Kusunoki, Ayako. 2006. “Yoshida Shigeru no Anzenhosho Seisaku” [Shigeru Yoshida’s Security Policies]. Kokusai Seiji 144 (February). MacArthur, Douglas. 1954. “Douglas MacArthur’s Announcement, 24 January 1949,” in Yoshida Naikaku Kankokai, Yoshida Naikaku [The Yoshida Cabinet] (Yoshida Naikaku Kankokai). Masuda, Hiroshi. 2012. MacArthur in Asia: The General and His Staff in the Philippines, Japan, and Korea (Cornell University Press). Miura, Yoichi. 1996. Yoshida Shigeru to Sanfuranshisuko Kowa [Yoshida Shigeru and the San Francisco Peace Treaty] (Otsuki Shoten).

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Ohtake, Kanzo. 1953. “Boei Seisan Iinkai no Jittai” [Substance of the Defense Production Committee], Keizai Shincho 18, no. 4 (May). Okazaki, Hisahiko. 2002. Yoshida Shigeru to Sono Jidai [Yoshida Shigeru and His Era] (PHP Kenkyujo). Psychological Strategy Board. 1952. “7 February 1952, Psychological Strategy Board Files,” PHST. Pyle, Kenneth B. 1987. “In Pursuit of a Grand Design,” Journal of Japanese Studies 13, no. 2 (Summer 1987). Redford, Lawrence, ed. 1980. The Occupation of Japan: Economic Policy and Reform (The MacArthur Memorial). Rekishigaku Kenkyukai [The Historical Science Society of Japan]. 1961. Sengo Nihon Shi [Postwar Japanese History] (Aoki Shoten) 2:72. Rengokai, Keizai D. 1971. Ishikawa Ichiro Tsuisoroku [Reminiscence of Ishikawa Ichiro] (Kashima Kenkyujo Shuppankai). Rotter, Andrew. 1987. The Path to Vietnam (Cornell University Press). Sakamoto, Kazuya. 2000. Nichibei Domei no Kizuna [The Ties of the Japan–US Alliance] (Yuhikaku). Samuels, Richard J. 1994. “Rich Nation, Strong Army”: National Security and the Technological Transformation of Japan (Cornell University Press). Seiyama, Takuro. 1989. “A Radical Interpretation of Postwar Economic Policies,” in Japanese Capitalism Since 1945: Critical Perspectives, eds., MorrisSuzuki and Takuro Seiyama (M.E. Sharpe, Inc.). Shibayama, Futoshi. 2010. Nihon Saigunbi eno Michi-1945–1954nen [Toward Japan’s Rearmament, 1945–1954] (Minerva Shobo). State-War-Navy Coordinating Committee. 1945. SWNCC 150/4/A, 21 September 1945 Tanaka, Akihiko. 1997. Anzen Hosho [National Security] (Yomiuri Shimbunsha). Teikoku Shoin. 2021. “Statistical Documents, Historical Statistics, Military Expenditure 1867–1945.” https://www.teikokushoin.co.jp/statistics/his tory_civics/index05.html (Accessed on 23 December 2021). The Constitution of Japan. 1946. https://japan.kantei.go.jp/constitution_and_ government_of_japan/constitution_e.html (Accessed on 23 December 2021). Toyoshita, Narahiko. 1996a. Ampo Joyaku no Seiritsu [Establishment of the Japan–US Security Treaty] (Iwanami Shinsho). Toyoshita, Narahiko. 1996b. “‘Yoshida Dokutorin’ no Saikento” [Review of the “Yoshida Doctrine”], Nempo Nihon Gendai Shi 2. Tsuru, Shigeto. 1958. Essays on Japanese Economy (Kinokuniya). US Department of State. 1972a. “Memorandum by MacArthur, 21 March 1947,” Foreign Relations of the United States (FRUS) 1947 The Far East and Australasia (US Government Printing Office) 6. US Department of State. 1972b. “Memorandum by Rear Admiral E. T. Wooldridge, Assistant Chief of Naval Operations for Politico-Military Affairs,

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Japan’s Early Diplomacy with the Nonaligned World and the Communist Yugoslavia Ljiljana Markovic

The San Francisco Peace Treaty, signed in 1951, will be marking its 70th Anniversary this September. It is perhaps the suitable time to evaluate what Japan, its participants, its signatories, and countries which signed Peace Treaties with Japan subsequently, achieved in the world thereby created. The Post-World War II world has often been attributed to the accords arrived at the Yalta Summit. This system originated from the US–UK– USSR agreements over the construction of the postwar international order agreed upon at Yalta in February 1945. However, with respect to the regional international order in the Asia–Pacific, the Yalta matrix gave way to the San Francisco System (Hara 2014). The San Francisco System fully reflected the strategic interests and the policy priorities of the peace conference’s host nation, the United States. The system assured the dominant influence and lasting presence of the United States, or “Pax Americana” (Alasuutari 2004) and brought Japan

L. Markovic (B) University of Belgrade, Belgrade, Serbia e-mail: [email protected]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2022 Y. Sugita and V. Teo (eds.), Rethinking the San Francisco System in Indo-Pacific Security, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-1231-3_5

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democracy and economic prosperity along with its peace constitution, but at the expense of lasting divisions among peoples and countries in East Asia. The Cold War developed differently between the Atlantic and Pacific sides of the Eurasian continent. While falling short of “hot” war, it was “cold war” in Europe and the US–USSR context. By contrast, in Asia it was “hot” in places, and more complex. After the Japanese withdrawal, the postwar liberation and independence movements in some parts of the region turned to civil war over the governing principles for the new states, where there was competition over spheres of influence between the superpowers (Hara 2014). When the San Francisco Treaty was signed, Japan was the Easternmost terminus of the US containment policy. When Yugoslavia signed the Peace Treaty with Japan subsequently, and, as the first communist country, established diplomatic relations with Japan in 1952, it became the Westernmost gate in the East European world for the same containment policy. Although communist, Yugoslavia was not a member of the Warsaw Pact, the Soviet Block, or the COMECON. The particular importance of Yugoslavia’s signing the Peace Treaty was that it signed the Treaty which the Soviet Union, the Czech Republic, and Poland refused to sign. Yugoslavia thereby became the first communist country to sign the Peace Treaty, thus opening the door to establishing diplomatic relations and multifaceted cooperation with Japan. The Non-Aligned Movement was the first major radical disruption that happened to the San Francisco Treaty world. The world has been changing after 1951, and a number of nations won their independence from colonial rule. These newly formed states found a clear common interest in protecting their independence by keeping the superpowers as well as their previous colonial masters at bay. The San Francisco world had been formed in line with American interests and world view (Hara 2014; Price 2001). The formation of the Non-Aligned Movement, precisely because it hallmarked Non-Alignment and equidistance from the superpowers, represented a profound challenge to the San Francisco world order (Miskovic et al. 2014). We shall strive to analyze the Non-Aligned Movement in the context of its role as the New Paradigm of Modernization which it helped shape. Its origins in the inter-war period, its decidedly anti-colonial attitude, and its practically sole cohesive factor—the underdeveloped nature of its members’ economies, all create a framework of modernization. The

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member countries have been trying to effect a “take-off” (Pakrashi and Frijters 2017) into sustained growth as the only way of improving living standards and productivity conditions. Almost all member countries were rich in raw materials and natural resources but were merely exporters of these resources in their primary form. Therefore, their aim was to industrialize and to use the natural resources to the greater benefit of their populations which pre-supposed a higher degree of value-added in their processing (Todorovic 1998). The Non-Aligned countries considered that if they could attract foreign aid and investment into their productive capacities, they would succeed in transforming their societies and their economies from underdeveloped to developing ones. They harbored a strong sense of dependance on their previous colonial master country or one of the superpowers, and they hoped thereby to distance themselves from such domination by professing peaceful and friendly co-existence with all other nations while maintaining a strict equidistance toward the two superpowers. The two superpowers of the time were the United States and the Soviet Union. From the viewpoint of the Non-Aligned countries, the world was fatefully divided into actually the developed one and the underdeveloped one. The only genuine ideology that appealed to the underdeveloped world was how to develop and catch up with the developed countries. The world was not bipolar in that sense only, it was also bipolar in the sense of the two opposing social, economic, and political systems: capitalism vs. communism. Communism represented the major threat of the day, quite unimaginable to us in the twenty-first century (Bogetic 2010). After the Second World War, the world was divided into two realms: the world created by the San Francisco Peace Treaty, shaping itself within the “Pax Americana” Paradigm, and the Communist World (Shibayama 2008). The Non-Aligned countries sought their place under the sun between these two worlds (Rajak 2014). The San Francisco world could be viewed as an attempt to halt and redirect this New Paradigm of Modernization, bending it to the needs, the views, and the interests of the highly developed capitalist countries, championed by the United States. However, within the first five years of the signing of the San Francisco Peace Treaty, the Bandung Conference took place (Ampiah 2008), and within 10 years, the Belgrade Conference (Cavoski 2014). These two conferences represent clear signs that the New

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Paradigm of Modernization ran like unstoppable waters, expressing the clear and unswerving decision by the developing countries to take destiny into their own hands and to work hard to realize their natural potential. Some of the signatories of the San Francisco Peace Treaty took several years to ratify it in their parliaments so that, for example, Indonesia ratified in 1958, and the Philippines (Villegas 1985) two years earlier, in 1956 (Price 2001). The reason for these delays were, however, chiefly the issues of reparation settlements which these countries expected from Japan. Both Japan and Yugoslavia were present at the Bandung Conference in 1955, in Indonesia, where a total of 29 countries participated, thus representing more than half the world’s population. This conference condemned “colonialism in all its manifestations,” and foretold the formation of the Non-Aligned Movement. Owing to its participation in the Bandung Conference, Japan subsequently received strong support from the Bandung Initiative in her quest to become a member of the United Nations. Japan became the 80th member of the United Nations, on December 18, 1956 (Sant et al. 2010). The chief aim of “Pax Americana” Paradigm was the containment policy, and the control of the influence of communism in the East and in the West, as well as along the primordial Silk Roads regions. The aim of this Paradigm was to see the San Francisco world as the New Paradigm of Modernization. However, there was one more emerging Paradigm based on the vitality and the energy of the Non-Aligned Movement, whose member countries were in search of rapid and thorough economic, social, educational, and cultural development. Many of those countries are situated along the Silk Road routes, continental and maritime alike, as is today’s Presiding country of the Non-Aligned Movement, Azerbaijan. The other development paradigm, the Non-Aligned New Paradigm, could develop and prove effective and successful leaning on the shoulders of Japan’s unique developmental experience which started in 1868. Japan’s development model went through a preparatory stage in 1825, with an intellectual campaign expressed by Aizawa Seishisai’s famous work Shinron (The New Thesis) (Aizawa 1825; Wakabayashi 1982, 1986). By becoming the first country outside of the European civilizational circle to modernize successfully and thoroughly, Japan became a great precedent of a successful modernization for all “late-comers” (Markovic 2015). Japan and Yugoslavia recognized each other as two “late-comers,” embarking on their Modernizations in 1868 and 1878, respectively, with a

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deep sense of national dignity, one from Asia, one from Europe, one from the defeated side, one from the Allied victorious side, and both striving to achieve a better life for their peoples, better status for themselves on the international arena, a better world and a more just future for humankind. The Non-Aligned Movement was, even in its earliest embryo stages, before World War II, at the same time an attempt to control and direct this New Paradigm of Development away from the communists. Yugoslavia was one of the founders of the Non-Aligned Movement (Arnold 2010). Yugoslavia was not a newly decolonized country. It was a successor to the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, internationally recognized after the First World War, as the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes, itself a successor to the Kingdom of Serbia, which gained its international recognition at the Berlin Congress in 1878. Yugoslavia was also the only European country that took an active part in the formation of the Non-Aligned Movement (Dinkel 2018). Yugoslavia’s common ground with other Non-Aligned countries was the “late-comer” status on the scene of economic and social development. This common ground was a mighty one because all Non-Aligned nations felt a desperate need to develop economically and catch up with the developed world. The founding fathers of the Non-Aligned Movement were Josip Broz Tito of Yugoslavia, Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt, Jawaharlal Nehru of India, Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana, and the first President of Indonesia, Sukarno (Miskovic et al. 2014). Yugoslavia played an extremely active role within this movement. The Non-Aligned movement embraces the collective security system of the United Nations and supports the United Nations’ peace-keeping efforts. The firm stance of independence from the two competing political and military alliances was the essential element of Non-Alignment. It was not only of crucial importance to its founding fathers, Nasser, Nehru, and Tito in 1956, it was also valuable to Japan, striving to implement independence and national authenticity in the post-San Francisco Treaty World, which is why Japan decided to be a participant of the Bandung Conference, once it had received American approval to do so (Makoto et al. 2008). This Chapter focuses on The San Francisco System through the following two-phase prism, thematically through the axis of the NonAligned Movement:

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• The Initial Cold War Phase, signing Peace Treaties with the Soviet Union and the Soviet Block countries in 1956; • The High Growth Era in Japan and Yugoslavia. Throughout the latter half of the 1950s and in the 1960s, gaining confidence, a larger than hitherto democracy and independence, both countries grew rapidly. Japan and Yugoslavia, as two “late-comer” countries, concentrated on devising their rapid economic growth and economic development paradigms. The model of their economic development was import-substitution and the light-industry-first model. Within this lightindustry-first model, both Japan and Yugoslavia identified those industries that had the greatest export potential and fostered them by lavish infant industry protection measures. However, they both did so only in the initial phases of these industries’ development and took good care to secure their gaining international competitiveness in due course. Japan was far more successful in this than Yugoslavia, but both countries exhibited very high rates of economic growth in the 1950s and 1960s, hitherto unprecedented and of the order of 9–10% per year (Mosk 2007). Such growth rates produced rapid and radical social change as well, so that both Japan and Yugoslavia acquired large middle-class populations. These populations manifested a high propensity to consume, based on an equitable income distribution and baby-boom generations, which, in turn, strengthened the domestic market demand for goods and services. Both the Japanese and the Yugoslavs became consumers of home appliances, automobiles, train travel, air travel, tourism, quality education, etc. Both Japan and Yugoslavia established and maintained carefully their relationships with the World Bank, the IMF, as well as with other relevant international organizations. Foremost among these were the United Nations and their various agencies. The importance of Japanese international cooperation agencies increased with time, and Japanese International Cooperation Agency (JICA) and Japanese Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC) became factors of economic development in many Non-Aligned countries. The aid dispensed through these agencies became instrumental in addressing critical problems of water supply and sanitation, as well as other infrastructural pre-conditions for economic development throughout the developing world in Asia and Africa (Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Japan 2020). Education was one of the pillars of the San Francisco world as no economic development or political stability could be envisaged without

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raising the educational level of the population (Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Japan 2020). Many educational institutions have been created and fostered in this process. Let us mention just two at this moment, the United World Colleges (UWC 2021) and the International Baccalaureate Organization (IBO 2021). United World Colleges were set up in most of the burning areas of the world with an aim of increasing multi-ethnic understanding and promoting world peace. One of the founders of the United World Colleges was Lester Pearson (The Nobel Prize 2021), the former Prime Minister of Canada. Through educating the most talented and most brilliant students, The United World Colleges hoped to achieve a higher degree of closeness of the future leaders of the world. Since 1962, when the first of the United World Colleges opened in South Wales, UK, the number of colleges grew constantly and covered the whole world. The contribution of the United World Colleges to a better international understanding and resolution of conflicts has been marked (Maclehose et al. 2021). Japan, Yugoslavia, and a number of Silk Road countries have been founders, as well as active members of most of these educational efforts and networks. Careful equidistance toward the superpowers characterized Yugoslavia’s strategy, coupled with empowerment of the Non-Aligned Movement. Japan emphasized cooperation with Southeast Asian countries and considered Yugoslavia interesting as a diplomatic partner. Yugoslavia afforded Japan information about the Soviet Block from an Eastern European perspective, and an approach to Southeast Asian countries through the Non-Aligned Movement. This was beneficial to Japan from both the domestic political, and the international, standpoints. Japan and Yugoslavia engaged in industrial, economic, cultural, and educational cooperation, finding each other congenial partners. Japan became Yugoslavia’s window to the hitherto unknown world of the Eastern civilization, as well as, through Japan’s amazing modernization, a roadmap to accomplishing a take-off into the Western, highly developed world. Japan thus soon became a window onto the East, as well as onto the West for Yugoslavs. By mirror symmetry, Yugoslavia became Japan’s window onto that part of the geographical and civilizational West, which was known as Eastern Europe, dominated by the Soviet Bloc, as well as a reliable gateway to the Non-Aligned developing world, thus helping Japan to transcend the San Francisco system. The position of Yugoslavia

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between Japan and the then Soviet portion of the Silk Roads, as well as among the Non-Aligned countries along the Silk Roads, hallmarks the qualitatively new, softening contours of the San Francisco world in which Japan would gain greatly in significance and emerge as the civilizational superpower, which broke the equation “Western = highly developed” and symbolized the possibility and the reality of the development model outside of the Western parameter. Ten years before becoming President, John F. Kennedy visited Belgrade on January 25, 1951. He met with Josip Broz Tito The President of The Socialist Federative Republic of Yugoslavia. Tito asked the young US Senator to provide him with arms. Tito told him: “Yugoslavia has a moral right to ask Americans or anyone for arms, since Russia is arming our neighbors.” Tito told Kennedy that if he could have sufficient armaments, he could equip 2 million soldiers (Vesic 2021). The leader of Yugoslav communists also told Kennedy that his confrontation with Stalin was easier than generally considered (Vesic 2021). The reason Stalin had less support within Yugoslavia was that, out of 12 thousand Yugoslav communists in the pre-World War II period, who were dominantly educated in the Soviet Union and absolutely loyal to Stalin, only one quarter survived the War. Until 1948, the Communist Party of Yugoslavia admitted 470,000 new members and to all of them, Tito was the only leader (Vesic 2021). Kennedy was fascinated by the Partisan leader who defeated his internal competitors and defeated the Germans. Kennedy considered Tito to be a communist and a nationalist, with his will, his troops, and his prestige connecting and holding the historically antagonized peoples of Yugoslavia together. Upon his return from the European tour to the United States, Kennedy expressed his respect for Spain and Yugoslavia. Both countries were dictatorships. In his interview given to New York Times, Kennedy said that, in the event of a conflict between the USSR and the West, Yugoslavia would be on the side of the Western Allies which drew great attention among American public and helped Tito a great deal. Several months later, the chief of staff of the Yugoslav’s Peoples’ Army, General Koca Popovic, visited Washington in secrecy. The result of his visit was the pact on military aid signed on October 14, 1951, in Belgrade, between USA and Yugoslavia (Vesic 2021). The United States were confused by the rift between Tito and Stalin in 1958 and the American diplomat, George Kennan, was given the task

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of formulating policy toward a communist country which rests on Soviet organizational principles and Soviet ideology, but which is independent of Moscow. Kennan believed that other communist countries could follow the suit of Yugoslavia if Tito survived in power. He therefore suggested that the United States should support the independence of Yugoslavia, not allowing the communist nature of its regime to hinder normal development of economic relations between Yugoslavia and the West, under the condition that Yugoslavia is ready to be loyal and cooperative in her international relations. The American Congress, upon the request by President Truman, passed in December 1950, Law on Emergency Aid to Yugoslavia, and a month later, the Yugoslav government officially asked for military aid from the United States, Great Britain, and France. The value of this aid was estimated at around $15 bn. John Kennan was the author of the American Doctrine of the Cold War and, at the time, a most influential diplomat in America’s foreign policy. The importance of Yugoslavia from the American standpoint is illustrated best by the fact that President Kennedy dispatched John Kennan as his ambassador to Belgrade. This ambassador helped Yugoslavia survive through her rift with Moscow and in building the Non-Aligned Movement. In his report to President Kennedy, John Kennan wrote: “Tito and his leading collaborators are too obsessed by their earlier communist past to be able to change completely.” The current Yugoslav leadership shall always remain sensitive to accusations that they have become tools in the hands of the imperialists, advising the United States to concentrate their attention toward “the second generation” of Yugoslav leaders, primarily the younger ones. When Kennan came to Belgrade, Belgrade was organizing the Non-Aligned Movement Conference of 1961. Kennan persuaded Kennedy that the gathering of newly liberated countries around Yugoslavia and their acceptance of the Non-Aligned policies meant that they would be independent of the United States, but also independent from the Soviet Union who’s prey they might have become. The CIA passed a similar verdict, having thoroughly understood Tito’s intentions in founding the Non-Aligned Movement (Vesic 2021). Kennan was often Tito’s private guest and forged many a friendship among Yugoslavia’s leadership. Despite that, Tito’s decision to establish the Non-Aligned Movement created many adversaries in the United States. They considered that Yugoslavia would become too influential and that the time has come for her to decide whether she wanted to

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be with the East, or with the West. The US Congress banned President Kennedy from selling airplanes to Yugoslavia in spite of Kennan’s trip to Washington and his lobbying. Disappointed because of insufficient support from Washington to his vision of the Yugoslav-American relationship, Ambassador Kennan resigned in 1963. Shortly after that, President Kennedy was assassinated. Belgrade lost two friends in a short span of time, which was an irreparable setback in the US-(Yugoslav) Serbian relations which celebrate their 140th Anniversary as we write (Vesic 2021). The relations between Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union, starting with Stalin’s death on March 5, 1953, kept improving slowly but consistently through their full normalization in 1955 and 1956, to the renewed ideological confrontation at the end of 1956. The normalization of Yugoslav-Soviet relations brought to an end a conflict between Yugoslavia and the Eastern Bloc, in existence since 1948, which threatened the status quo in Europe. The significance of the Yugoslav-Soviet reconciliation went far beyond the bilateral relations between the two countries. It had significant ramifications on relations in the Eastern Bloc and in the global Communist movement, and on the dynamics of the Cold War world at its crucial juncture. The reconciliation had brought forward the process of de-Stalinization in the USSR and in Peoples’ Democracies; it had also encouraged the process of liberalization throughout Eastern Europe and had helped Khrushchev win the post-Stalin leadership contest. Finally, the reconciliation had enabled Yugoslavia to acquire equidistance from both Blocs and to successfully embark upon creating, together with India and Egypt, a new entity in the bipolar Cold War world—the Non-aligned Movement. In developing Yugoslavia’s relationship with Japan, Yugoslavia made a contribution to Japan’s functional transcending the San Francisco system boundaries, both through her close access to the Soviet Union sources, and through her building of the NonAligned Movement, acting actively and to the best of her political and diplomatic capabilities both as a conduit and as an intermediary. This was helpful to Japan, eager to gain a political weight in international affairs commensurate with her prominent economic might and positioning. Relations between Japan and Yugoslavia during the Cold War were based on their respective national interests. Economically, Yugoslavia needed Japan’s technology and capital in its efforts to modernize the economy. On the other hand, Japan needed to diversify its export markets, and Yugoslav raw materials to some extent were useful for raw

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materials deficient Japan. Japan’s good trade relations and relatively good political relations with communist countries could be explained through the Japanese policy of seikei bunri (separating politics and economics) (Glisic 2016, 123). Japanese trading corporations, Mitsui, Mitsubishi, and C-Itoh, started opening their Representative and Liaison Offices in Belgrade, in the early 1960s. The first Japanese factory, a paper mill Natron in Maglaj, utilizing ample timber resources was opened in 1967 (Calic 2016). Politically, Yugoslavia needed Japan, which was an industrialized country and a member of the Western club, to boost the support for the Non-Aligned Movement, as well as to diversify its allies in order to assume more power vis-à-vis the superpowers. In contrast, Yugoslavia was a regional and political power among the Third World with global importance. Japan needed Yugoslavia’s support in its drive for a major political role in global and regional politics, which Japan rightfully desired

The Opening Ceremony of the Natron Factory on March 10, 1967, With the Japanese Delegation (Calic 2016)

After a devastating defeat at the end of World War II in 1945, Japan’s economy and military power had been destroyed, its territory occupied, and she had little choice but to ally with the United States. What started as forced occupation and alliance, changed swiftly under the new

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plan for restoration of Japan created by Prime Minister Yoshida Shigeru (1946–1947, 1949–1955). His plan became later known as The Yoshida Doctrine in which, based on the internal and external circumstances, Yoshida formed a tactical plan to utilize American military shield in order for Japan to rebuild its economy. The three main points of the doctrine were: (1) economic rehabilitation of the country as a major national goal, (2) Japan should avoid involvement in international conflicts and in that regard should be only lightly armed, and (3) as a guarantee for her own security, Japan would provide bases for the United States military (Sant et al. 2010). Due to the outburst of the Cold War in Europe in 1947, and in the events of the establishment of the People’s Republic of China under communist rule in 1949, and the outbreak of the hot war on the Korean Peninsula in 1950, the United States changed original plans for Japan’s future and designed Japan as an “unsinkable aircraft carrier” (Lendon and Lim 2019; Oberdorfer 1983) and a mighty bastion against Communism in Asia. The economic recovery and transformation of East Asian countries for the last six decades from the ruins of war are in fact remarkable. Beginning with Japan in the 1950s, followed by the so-called newly industrializing economies (NIEs) in the 1970s and 1980s, and subsequently, with China’s rise, East Asia, with the exception of North Korea, has become the most expansive center in the world economy (Hara 2014). Economics is indeed the glue connecting the regional states, a glue that transcends old divides to make possible the so much desired economic growth and social development (Sedgwick 2007). By the end of the 1960s, Japan had surpassed several major Western European countries to become the third-largest economy in the world, behind only the United States and the Soviet Union. This was the actual turning point, in Japan, as well as, toward Japan. From the end of World War II to 1964, the United States had a trade surplus with Japan. In 1965, Japan’s exports to the United States exceeded its imports for the first time. Only 13 years since the beginning of its post-World War II recovery, Japan was The Number Three Economy in the world. The irrevocable “Economic Miracle” of Japan worked fast. First trade frictions occurred before the end of the decade in which Japan developed with magic speed, hosted perfectly, the Tokyo Olympics in 1964, demonstrated to the world the super-express trains, the Shinkansen (as of October 1964) and earned the third place in the world measured by

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the size of its GNP. It seems, however, that America wanted Japan to be successful in her development drive, but not as successful as she turned out to be. Part of the answer to Japan’s success came abruptly from the United States, in the form of their sudden reconciliation with the People’s Republic of China. The United States would with that move, gain People’s Republic of China on their friendly side, and would curb Japan’s relative importance, on the other. By the end of the 1960s, trade frictions between the United States and Japan escalated as bilateral trade deficits continued to surge, culminating in the explosion of the textile dispute in 1969. Many Japanese businessmen, realizing the risk of overdependence on the United States, began to look for export opportunities elsewhere. In that line, they started looking elsewhere for trading partners and started creating Trade Committees with the communist countries in Eastern Europe. Japan considered East European countries as potential trade partners, since “they live in the same international society although their political, economic and social systems are different” (Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Japan 1972). The goal of this policy was to “make it possible for Japan to have more options and to act more flexibly to promote her national interests” (Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Japan 1972). The leaders of the Non-Aligned world met in Belgrade at the beginning of September 1961, to solidify their unity and common goals (Ancic 2017). Belgrade thus quite symbolically became the birthplace of the Movement, gathering on the banks of its two beautiful rivers, Sava and Danube, the developing countries of the East and of the West, rich in cultural traditions, religious beliefs, and the degree of their development. The only common trait of the Non-Aligned was to achieve and maintain their newly won independence from the great powers, and to cherish the equidistance from them in the then bipolar world. The equidistance, though not an easy aim to achieve, was important as it served the developmental goals of these countries best. Tito had become well known at the beginning of the 1960s for his travels around the world and meetings with numerous world leaders. As one of the leaders of the Non-Aligned Movement and an influential figure in East–West relations at the time, Tito visited many countries, including the United States, UK, Japan, India, Thailand, Indonesia, the Soviet Union, and many others. He was focused on increasing his political power within the Non-Aligned Movement as well as on an international level. Japan, as the most prominent economic power in Asia (and the

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third largest economy in the world), was a logical target for his ambitions. Furthermore, Japan was an influential country in Southeast Asia, in a region where Tito had strategic interests as a leader of the Non-aligned Movement. On the Japanese side, one of the motives might lie in the nature of Japan’s relationship with the United States. Namely, while the alliance with the United States was beneficial to Japan, particularly in the economic sphere, it imposed many restrictions on Japan’s bilateral relations with many countries. Therefore, while it was maintaining a beneficial alliance with the United States and pursuing their combined common interests, Japan was at the same time looking for ways to pursue interests that were not shared with the United States. Developing relations with communist countries and the Non-Aligned Movement countries was part of those endeavors, and Yugoslavia seemed to be a congenial partner for realizing Japan’s ambitions in that direction.

The First Non-Aligned Conference in Belgrade, 1–6 September 1961 (Bakovic 2021)

Belgrade Conference itself had been considered unwelcome and unimportant until the building of the Berlin Wall began on 13 August 1961. From one day to the next, as a gathering of Non-Aligned states, the impending conference was thrust to the center of world politics. When it came to the Wall’s legality, an issue on which East and West disagreed profoundly, both attempted to gain the support of the “neutral” and Non- Aligned governments. The Soviet Union, United States, and East and West Germany sent greetings and memoranda to the participants welcoming the conference and setting out their views on the erection of the Berlin Wall. Applying tremendous diplomatic pressure, the two superpowers also warned the conference participants not to endorse what

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they saw as a false interpretation of events in Berlin to Cold War détente and to help maintain the world peace (Dinkel 2018). Similar sentiments were expressed worldwide by politicians, peace activists, literary figures, and scholars who did not all write directly to Tito. The Belgrade Conference was welcomed in newspaper articles and interviews by former British Prime Minister Clement Attlee, Fenner Brockway, a Labour MP and later Chair of the British Movement for the Liberation of the Colonies, Antoine Gizenga, Deputy Prime Minister of the Congo, Pietro Nenni, National Secretary of the Italian Socialist Party, British author J. B. Priestley and renowned British philosopher Bertrand Russell. They hoped this gathering of the Non-Aligned governments would help defuse the crisis in Berlin in particular and the East-West conflict in general. Contrary to their original plans, the Conference attendees now had to respond to the very concrete manifestation of a worsening East-West conflict in Berlin and address both camps’ expectations of their next moves. The United States demands for Japan’s more active military engagement were rejected by the Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Yoshida, who was mainly concerned with postwar economic reconstruction in Japanese economy in order to create a solid, strong country which would not fall over into communist camp and moreover would serve as an ally in the fight against communism (Gordon 2013). The United States supported Japan to enter into international economic institutions and, perhaps more importantly—opened its market for Japanese exports, enabling Japan to grow fast and become the world’s third largest economy in 1968 (after the United States and the Soviet Union). This was precisely the year in which President Tito visited Japan. Meanwhile, National Security Council of United States created an assessment of Japan’s value to the United States at the time (“United States Policy towards Japan” (NSC 6008/1), (June 11, 1960, FRUS 1958–1960, XVIII). Since the Cold War and Soviet-American confrontation was still very much alive, the value of Japan also remained as it was at the beginning of the Cold War. It was considered to have more and more impact on the region, and that it is in the United States interests to keep that growing industrial power within the Western Bloc, or otherwise the Soviet Union might use it for its interests (Glisic 2017, 86). As a part of the process of Japan’s reentering onto the World scene, Japan was gradually accepted into the international institutions—the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in 1952, General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) in 1955, UN in 1956 and OECD in 1964.

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Acceptance into all of these institutions was supported by the United States. The acceptance into the UN was prolonged and made difficult due to the Soviet opposition. Only when Japan and the Soviet Union decided to initiate rapprochement and signed a joint declaration, Japan got Soviet approval. Peace Treaty and Security Treaty provided Japan with American assistance in economy and security matters. Both, economically strong and security-wise safe and stable Japan served American interests as much as the Japanese ones. Because of its own interests, the United States made its goal to help the development of Japanese economy, which had been an excellent performer for almost a century to date (Macpherson 1995) in order to create a solid, strong country which would not fall over into communist camp and moreover would serve as an ally in the fight against communism. As a function of the alliance, the United States provided Japan with access to the Western markets. Moreover, during the occupation period, Japan’s economy got a boost by making procurements for United States military in the Korean War. Realizing that she could grow stronger only through economic recovery and development, Japan set economic development as one of the three main goals of her foreign policy. The South East Asian region has always been the most important diplomatic sphere for Japan toward which she traditionally gravitated. Soon after regaining her sovereignty, Japan set improving relations with the countries of the region as one of her highest priorities. Although in a very bad economic state at the time, the South East Asian countries were geographically natural trading partners to Japan. Economically, it was an opportunity to enter into those markets. Politically, it was a chance for Japan to rebuild herself as a regional power, surrounded by those countries. Japan’s Diplomatic Bluebook 1957 describes South East Asian peoples as racially, culturally similar to the Japanese, peoples who share a “strong psychological ties” with Japan. This represents a radical and historical divide with Japan’s uniqueness and divine origins framework expounded in Kokutai no Hongi (Kublin 1950) textbooks prior to and until the end of World War II. Later on, in the 1960s, Japan committed further to the development of the countries in the region, initiated multilateral meetings with this goal (for example the Ministerial Conference for Economic Development of Southeast Asia in 1966, increased involvement in Asian Bank, etc.).

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Japan, in its post-World War II Constitution, denounced war as a country seeking friendly diplomatic relations with all peace-loving countries in the world (Markovic and Djurovic 2011). Unofficially, and seldom even officially, Japan presented herself as a neutral country while supporting the endeavors of the United States in the fight against communism. In many Yugoslav Ministry of Foreign Affairs archival documents, there are statements from various Japanese officials, recorded during unofficial conversations as well as during official meetings, expressing Japan’s desire to achieve neutrality in foreign policy (Glisic 2017, 90). The main backing for the ideology of neutrality lay within the Japanese intellectual elite. Gathered around the magazine Sekai (The World) (Yamagiwa 1955) promoted neutralism and antimilitaristic policies as what should be the core of Japanese foreign policy. “These ideas were also supported by Japanese Socialist Party and, according to an opinion poll of 1958, 68 percent of Diet members, including a majority of 52 percent of LDP members, agreed that Japan should chart a neutral course between the United States and the Soviet Union, as far was possible” (Glisic 2017, 90). The neutral politics, which insisted that Japan pursue unarmed neutrality, relying on the United Nations for defense, and resist all pressures to participate in collective security arrangements, had been developed in the 1950s by Maruyama Masao and the other scholars in the “Peace Problems Symposium” (Heiwa Mondai Danwakai), and had found adherents from across the political spectrum (Maruyama 2008). The underlying US fear was that of Japan going communist. Moreover, the United States feared that Japan after regaining its sovereignty might exploit United States-Soviet confrontation in order to gain leverage in its bilateral relationship with the United States. Fear from Japan falling into communist bloc provoked some of the United States government actions toward preventing the conclusion of the peace treaty between Japan and the Soviet Union. According to intelligence documents from the Yugoslav embassies in Moscow and Tokyo, the Americans were working on both sides implanting distrust between Japan and the Soviet Union. Namely, they were warning the Soviets not to trust Japan since she might restore its imperialistic aspirations and take back not only the disputed islands but go even further. At the same time, the United States was advising Japan not to trust too much in Soviet promises regarding the possibility of returning the islands. By interacting actively with Yugoslav diplomats in this sphere, Japan, fully aware

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of Japan’s long-run national development goals, courageously demonstrated how profoundly she resisted and countered this American double play (Dulles et al. 1957; Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Federal Republic of Yugoslavia 1955). Another Belgrade Conference, marking the 60th anniversary of the birth of the Non-Aligned Movement, is now under preparation and is expected to take place on October 11–12, 2021 (Stojanovic 2021), depending on the situation of the Covid-19 pandemic (Bakovic 2021). This global meeting could well prove to be the largest multilateral gathering of the year if the General Assembly of the United Nations does not meet face to face because of Covid-19. (The last year’s meeting had been held online.) Representatives of 120 member countries and 25 observer countries, of which Serbia is one, are invited (Munro 2020). Serbia is now actively in communication with Azerbaijan, the current Chair of the Non-Aligned Movement, ascertaining the Silk Road significance in the twenty-first century for the almost 150 member and observer countries spanning the global political space between the East and the West. The special emphasis will be placed on the presence of the founding states of the Movement: India, Egypt, Ghana, Indonesia, and Serbia (one of the successor countries of Yugoslavia), as well as the current presiding country of the Movement, Azerbaijan. The 2021 Conference aims to define ideas for the twenty-first century, ideas for a new multipolarity, a new order, equality, and closer cooperation among countries with similar interests, and shared developmental goals. The Non-Aligned Movement is a quite numerous international multilateral organization (member states now number 120, plus 25 observers, representing 2/3 of the United Nations member states, having grown from only 25 members in 1961) and it is, because of this, difficult to achieve a high degree of consensus on major political issues, but precious bilateral agreements often ensue owing to these Meetings. It remains to be seen how the Non-Aligned Movement continues to contribute to a better understanding within The San Francisco World, between the multi-polar actors in a once bipolar world, consisting of those nations who have been signatories of The San Francisco Treaty 70 years ago, and those who had not been or had not been born yet. Owing to the San Francisco Treaty provisions, most favorable demand-pull from the United States, Japan’s growth had been most impressive in the 1950s and 1960s. This helped Japan regain her confidence and desire to take a more independent stance on the

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international arena, commensurate with her status as a Number Three world economic power. This Chapter endeavored to shed some light on this process through the focus of Japan’s relations with Yugoslavia, and through that with the Non-Aligned world of mostly freshly decolonized countries striving to develop economically and to emulate Japan’s development paradigm in the San Francisco world circumstances. Through these efforts, a new model of development was born, and we termed it The New Paradigm of Modernization. This model was based on a wise agricultural policy and on an open economy model leaning on comparative advantages, importsubstitution, and light-industry-first development. The heart of the model represents an effective permeating of the traditional and of the modernizing sectors of the economy. This paper, furthermore, enlightens Yugoslavia’s role in bridging the deep divide and bringing into the same world not only Japan with the Non-Aligned Movement countries, but also with Western Europe, Soviet Union, and Eastern Europe.

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The San Francisco System in Southeast Asia and Japan’s Search for a Regional Order in the 1950s Heiko Lang

The San Francisco Treaty, Japan, and Southeast Asia in the 1950s The San Francisco System, constituted by the San Francisco Peace Treaty and its concomitant bilateral security pacts,1 laid the foundations for the regional political and economic order in Southeast Asia after the Asia– Pacific War. By design, this system sought to establish US political and economic hegemony in the region. A key US aim was the containment of communism in Asia, and the establishment of a regional security order that would ensure that Southeast Asian nations remained firmly inside the “liberal camp”. The basis for this framework of anti-communist “mutual 1 Besides the Security Treaty with Japan, a tripartite pact with Australia and New Zealand, and a mutual defense pact with the Philippines were concluded in 1951.

H. Lang (B) H¯ osei University, Tokyo, Japan e-mail: [email protected]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2022 Y. Sugita and V. Teo (eds.), Rethinking the San Francisco System in Indo-Pacific Security, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-1231-3_6

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security” was a system of bilateral economic and political ties between the United States and the Southeast Asian nations (Weatherbee 2008, 63). The United States was initially not interested in creating a Southeast Asian multilateral security order similar to the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (Tarling 2006, 88). The San Francisco Peace Treaty also laid the foundations for Japan’s economic re-integration into Southeast Asia with its stipulations on the conditions for war reparations in Article 14. Inseparably from the Peace Treaty, the US–Japan Security Treaty of 1951 established the US–Japan alliance. As the main pillar of the American strategy in Southeast Asia, this alliance had the twin aims of containing Japan’s military power and recruiting it as a deputy to realize American political and economic interests in Southeast Asia. Suehiro Akira argues that “the Cold War regime in Asia put together three factors, i.e. the US anti-Communist strategy in Asia, the securing of economic recovery and economic self-sufficiency of Japan, and economic links between Japan and Southeast Asia” (Suehiro 1999, 87). From the US perspective, Japan’s regional economic integration had the clear purpose of stabilizing the Southeast Asian nations to prevent them from turning communist. Furthermore, the US strategists intended for Japan to assume the political role of “moderating” the fervent anti-Western nationalism in Southeast Asia (Miyagi 2013, 154). This, of course, raises the question of whether the American vision of regional order in Southeast Asia corresponded to Japan’s regional political and economic interests. In the research literature, Japan’s early post-war relations with Southeast Asia are usually portrayed as closely aligned with the United States’ Asia strategy. For instance, Llewelyn argues that in its “policymaking in Southeast Asia […] Japan has used its economic power and influence to support and supplement Western geopolitical goals, usually in concert with American diplomatic aims” (Llewelyn 2014, 87; for a similar argument, see Watanabe 2001). Sat¯o argues that the threat of Chinese communist expansion was a dominant factor in Japan’s Southeast Asia strategy, and that since the late 1950s, Japan used its economic assistance to strategically support nations which were endangered by the spread of communism (Sat¯o 2004, 131). Japan’s fundamental agreement with the American political goals—that is, the geo-strategic agenda of anti-communism—did not mean, however, that all aspects of the American vision of regional order were welcomed by Japanese strategists. Indeed, a naïve assumption of close Japan–US cooperation in establishing the San Francisco System in Southeast Asia

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leaves one with the puzzle of why Japan, throughout the 1950s, continuously advanced proposals for regional development and integration which fundamentally differed to the US economic designs (Tomaru 2000, 151), and which were continuously rejected by the United States. One also wonders why American strategists were highly sceptical of Japan’s commitment to the US–Japan alliance (Miyagi 2011, 17). This chapter sheds some light on the ambivalence of Japan’s support of the San Francisco System in the early post-war period, and analyses the Japanese attempts to shape its formation in Southeast Asia. It argues that Japanese strategists did not subscribe fully to the American vision of Southeast Asian regional order, and that the argument of Japan’s support of the emerging San Francisco System in the 1950s has to be reconsidered by distinguishing Japan’s support of the political and security dimension of this System from Japan’s dissatisfaction with key elements of its economic dimension, which Japan sought to modify according to its strategic interests. As will be further outlined in the following sections, Japan’s discontent with the economic configuration of the US-led San Francisco System in the 1950s stemmed from a complex calculus of economic and political national interest which was not wholly congruent with the US regional designs. Japan sought to establish the San Francisco System in Southeast Asia as a framework for regional economic development, with the US–Japan alliance as its core. In the face of widespread regional dissatisfaction with the US regional policy, this strategy was intended to increase regional acceptance of both the San Francisco Treaty and the US–Japan alliance among the Southeast Asian nations. Japan sought to define its regional role as an apolitical actor, thereby increasing its regional acceptance and influence. By seeking a leading role in regional development, Japan attempted to establish itself as an indispensable ally for America in order to put the US–Japan alliance on a more “equal” footing. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, Japan sought to overcome the bilateral regional economic configuration that was favoured by the United States, and attempted to establish an order of economic integration in Southeast Asia. Importantly, Japan sought to establish an economic system of regional integration in opposition to the United States’ economic interests precisely in order to support the political goal of anti-communism of the San Francisco System in Southeast Asia; this has not been sufficiently explored in the literature until now.

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While Japan sought to co-opt the San Francisco Framework to establish a system of regional economic integration, the United States had no interest in such a project. American strategists designed the economic dimension of the San Francisco Framework in Southeast Asia to be based on bilateral trade relations, as opposed to a system of multilateral economic cooperation, and did not seek regional economic integration. Shimizu argues that in the 1950s the United States made one deliberate choice with regard to Asia: it would settle for an economically unintegrated Asia […] with neither China nor Japan serving as its integrative core. To the architects of U.S. foreign economic policy, a fragmented Asia was preferable to a more risky alternative: a united Asia, revolving around either Japan or China, inhospitable to the Western capitalist rules of the game. (Shimizu 2001, 201)

The prime interest that undergirded the US economic strategy in Southeast Asia2 was to strengthen the region against communist expansion (McMahon 2003, 217). The provision of American economic assistance to the Southeast Asian nations was effectively tied to the receiving nations’ acceptance of the anti-communist agenda and was increasingly conflated with military assistance (Macekura 2013, 155); deeper economic ties between the Asian nations were not favoured by the United States. This American bilateral economic strategy for Asia3 was quite contrary to Japan’s interests of realizing an economically integrated region under Japanese leadership, and it can be of little surprise that Japanese strategists in the 1950s embarked on a deliberate course to modify key economic elements of the emerging San Francisco System in Southeast Asia in order to align it more with Japan’s regional interests. In the next section, the critical stance of the Southeast Asian nations to the San Francisco System will be outlined, before Japan’s strategic interests are analysed in detail. In the main part, three key areas where Japanese strategists sought to 2 The US Asia policy found its most succinct expression in the National Security Council’s “New Asia Policy” (NSC 48/5) of 1951. 3 The economic policy of providing only “minimalist” aid (Shimizu 2001, 198) to Southeast Asia and rejecting regional integration was settled on 21st January 1955 in NSC 5506 (“Future United States Economic Assistance for Asia”).

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re-define Japan’s role in the San Francisco System, and to amend the economic configuration of this system itself, will be outlined.

Regional Discontent with the San Francisco System in Southeast Asia The San Francisco Treaty was not widely accepted in Southeast Asia.4 Strongly informed by the political ideas of anti-colonialism and nationalism, the newly independent Southeast Asian nations were sceptical against what they perceived as American imperialism and external influence on their national economic and political development. Many Southeast Asian nations were highly critical of the bilateral and minimalist United States economic Southeast Asia policy, as outlined in Sect. 1: They questioned the American motives in face of the conflagration of technical assistance with military assistance. While the Southeast Asian nations were dependent on foreign aid and many were highly wary of communist expansion, they increasingly questioned the US priority of military assistance over economic development in the 1950s (Shimada 2013, 25–27); for many unaligned nations, the conditionality of US aid was simply “unacceptable” (Murphy 2008, 253). There was also a widespread distrust of the Colombo Plan, which many Southeast Asian nations regarded as an organization to merely promote the interests of their former colonial masters (Macekura 2013, 152). Their general assessment was that the US assistance did not contribute to their aspiration of national industrialization (Macekura 2013, 153). Importantly, the US-led San Francisco framework was not the only way of conceptualizing the Southeast Asian regional order in the 1950s. A rivalling attempt was the effort to establish a politically “neutralist” Asian regional order as an alternative to the divisive Cold War logic that was the basis of the San Francisco System. Several Southeast Asian nations attempted to foster inter-regional solidarity and sought to accelerate the process of anti-colonization through a series of regional conferences.5 4 Among the Southeast Asian signatories of the Peace Treaty in 1951, only Pakistan and Ceylon unequivocally supported the system; as Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos represented French interests, they cannot be included in the category of Southeast Asian supporters of the San Francisco Agreement (Price 2001, 52). Indonesia refused to ratify the treaty, and the Philippines did so only after it had come into force. 5 For more on these conferences, see Goto (2003, 248ff.).

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Politically, their aim was to prevent the Cold War confrontation between the communist and the capitalist camp from “entering” and dividing Southeast Asia (Miyagi 2013, 153). Economically, in order to overcome the persisting structure of the colonial system, characterized by bilateral relations with their former suzerain states of the West, the Southeast Asian nations sought to form a regional system of relations with economic and political linkages among themselves (Goto 2003, 249). In opposition to the attempts by Western states to regain their economic dominance over the Asian nations, the Southeast Asian nations pursued nationalist economic development policies with the aim of reducing the former colonial suzerain states’ influence. When in 1954 the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) was established through American initiative with the twin aims of containing both communism and Asian neutralism (Gabriel 2002, 2), the only Southeast Asian nations that joined were Thailand and the Philippines. The neutralist nations, led by India and Indonesia, convened the Bandung Conference of 1955 in reaction to the establishment of SEATO as an attempt to foster “Asian unity” against bipolar ideological divisions. In this highly polarized regional situation of the 1950s, characterized by a widespread regional opposition against the San Francisco System, Japanese strategists had to carefully chart a course to realize the nation’s regional interests. In the next section, Japan’s interests in amending key premises of the San Francisco System in Southeast Asia will be explored.

Japan’s Strategic Regional Interests Neither the Southeast Asian nations, nor Japan, were wholly content with the American vision of regional order in Southeast Asia. While the San Francisco System has, in retrospect, been invaluable for Japan to recover from the devastation of the Asia–Pacific War and to re-establish itself as a leading economic power in Asia, the contemporary Japanese debate during the 1950s focussed on the problematic aspects of this System for Japan’s emerging regional policy in Southeast Asia. Politically, many vital issues of Japan’s national interest were left unresolved by the one-sided Peace Treaty. It prevented Japan’s reconciliation with its Asian neighbours that had suffered from the Japanese occupation during the Asia–Pacific war, and in effect alienated Japan from Asia (Kwon

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2008, 12f.). Japan was able to re-enter the region as a US ally, but was supposed to fulfil the role of supporter of the American Asia strategy in Southeast Asia. This severely limited Japan’s diplomatic freedom. Consequently, the aim to put the US–Japan alliance on a more equal footing in order to regain diplomatic “autonomy” became a principal foreign policy goal in Japan’s Southeast Asia strategy (Kwon 2008, 44). Importantly, Japan’s regional approach towards Southeast Asia in the 1950s (and beyond) was not characterized by a strong support of the American anti-communist agenda, much to the frustration of US strategists, who were sceptical about the sincerity of Japan’s commitment to its affiliation with the “Western camp” and worried about the prevalence of neutralist thought within the Japanese strategic debate (Miyagi 2011, 17). In fact, a strong anti-communist consensus existed among Japanese conservative politicians. In contemporary public discursive interventions, the prevention of communist expansion into Southeast Asia emerged as an important motive for Japan’s Southeast Asia strategy (Lang 2020, 326f.). However, while supporting the aim of containment, Japanese strategists were highly sceptical of the political nature of the American economic designs in Southeast Asia and were reluctant to fully commit Japan’s own regional economic strategy to the political philosophy of anti-communism (Watanabe 2001, 41). The US aid policy was criticized by Takasaki Tatsunosuke, Japan’s lead delegate to the Bandung Conference and an important architect of Japan’s post-war relations with Southeast Asia, as politicized and only following the imperatives of America’s Cold War strategy (Takasaki 1958, 105). Foreign Minister Fujiyama Aiichir¯o openly questioned the saliency of the US anti-communist regional approach in Southeast Asia (Fujiyama 1959, 62–62). Some conservative politicians and bureaucrats even called for “an original Japanese Asia policy” (Tsushima 1954, 12–13), or an “original position”, towards regional development (Arakawa 1957, 44), seeking to dissociate Japan’s regional policy of economic cooperation from the United States’ Southeast Asia policy (Yoshida 1957, 16). Economically, Japan’s main interest in Southeast Asia was to secure access to raw materials and markets. This was considered vital for Japan’s economy after the “loss” of the China market due to the San Francisco Agreement (Akagi 1995, 126). Japan also had a strong interest in cooperating economically with the United States in the development of

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Southeast Asia, mainly because of US financial power. A trilateral development model, connecting American capital, Japanese technology, and Southeast Asian resources, would become the standard model among conservative Japanese policy-makers to conceptualize Japanese–American cooperation in the development of Southeast Asia, and became the basis for Prime Minister Kishi Nobusuke’s proposal of an “Asian Development Fund” (Lang 2020, 324). However, the maintenance of the status quo of the regional economic system, characterized by bilateral linkages between the former colonized nations and the former Western suzerains, was not in Japan’s interests. In order to realize Japan’s economic and political regional interests of re-establishing trust and achieving reconciliation with the Southeast Asian nations, of creating a more “equal” relationship with its American ally, and of attaining Japan’s economic re-integration into the region, Japanese strategists in the 1950s embarked on an ambitious regional policy: They had to present Japan as a trustworthy partner to the Southeast Asian nations; they had to prove to the United States Japan’s indispensable role for the American Southeast Asia strategy; and they had to offer an alternative vision of regional economic relations which was based on a form of development assistance that would ultimately lead to regional integration, instead of bilateral trade linkages. This, of course, entailed the necessity to amend key aspects of the economic configuration of the San Francisco System in Southeast Asia. This also meant to conceptualize Japan’s policy of regional economic cooperation differently from the United States’ economic approach in Southeast Asia (Lang 2020, 306–307). Ultimately, Japan’s decisionmakers opted for a regional policy line that supported the San Francisco System’s political agenda of anti-communism, but sought to modify the economic dimension of the US-led regional order in Southeast Asia by proposing an alternative order based on regional economic integration. In the following section, some examples of this strategy are delineated.

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Japan’s Attempts to Shape the Emerging Regional Order Under the San Francisco System The Reparations Negotiations: Seeking to Overcome Japan’s Isolation in Asia The requirement for Japan to pay war reparations was a corollary of the Yoshida Government’s choice to accept, at San Francisco, a one-sided peace treaty that secured Japan’s position as an ally of the United States, but left many Southeast Asian nations dissatisfied (Miyagi 2013, 147). Initially, American strategists hoped to free Japan from any obligations to pay reparations; ultimately, however, after pressure from the Philippines, the reparations stipulations of Art. 14 were included against strong US reservations (Price 2001, 47). Due to the scarcity of Japanese capital, the reparations were paid in the form of goods and services, the amount of which was determined in bilateral negotiations (Kitaoka 1996). The United States designed this extremely lenient approach in order to lay the smallest possible burden on the Japanese economy. The reparations stipulations were intended to enable Japan’s economic return to the region in order to secure the region’s stability against communist expansion. The newly independent Southeast Asian nations, however, strongly preferring payment in the form of capital over services, were left deeply dissatisfied with Article 14 (Shimizu 2001, 180–181). This regional dissatisfaction with the reparations was reflected in the bumpy negotiation process6 : The San Francisco Agreement was unable to ameliorate the animosity between Japan and the Southeast Asian nations, and indeed “marked the beginning of a new round of non-shooting wars” between Japan and the region (Shimizu 2001, 181). While the reparations paved the way for Japan’s economic re-entry into the region and critically helped Japan’s post-war economic recovery, they also helped to stabilize the San Francisco System in Southeast Asia by supporting the aim of anti-communist policies, as advocated by Prime Minister Yoshida (Suehiro 1999, 88).

6 Japan concluded the first agreement of reparations with Burma in 1954. In 1956, it reached a settlement with the Philippines, followed by accords with Indonesia in 1958 and with South Vietnam in 1959.

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Importantly, Japanese and American interests concerning Japan’s reparations were not fully aligned. For the United States, the reparations ultimately served to establish Japan’s economic presence in the region for its own anti-communist regional agenda. It was not in the US interest that Japan would achieve a strong leadership position in the Southeast Asian economic configuration. In fact, the United States had no strategic interest in “developing Japan’s ties to the Asian regional economy” to the detriment of its own economic interests (Shimizu 2001, 198) and did not support Japan in the negotiations with the Southeast Asian nations (Katada 2000, 211). For the Japanese side, however, the principal interest in the reparations was to establish the economic foundation for influencing regional economic development and to make the Southeast Asian nations dependent on Japan’s economy. The reparations negotiations were primarily a means to expand economically towards Southeast Asia; more than a means of atonement, they were considered an investment in the future (Miyagi 2008, 62–63). Furthermore, the reparations provided the opportunity for Japan to re-enter the region as an independent economic actor. Japan sought to use the reparations as the foundation to establish linkages of dependence with the Southeast Asian nations, ultimately in order to create an economically integrated order contra the US-led economic configuration of the San Francisco System. Politically, the reparations negotiations were seen as indispensable to overcome the Peace Treaty’s legacy of Japan’s isolation in Southeast Asia. By re-establishing trust and normalizing Japan’s relations with its Asian neighbours, Japan sought to embark on a “full-fledged Asia diplomacy” (Nakagawa 1957, 61). Importantly, this also included the neutralist group of nations. The reparations could thus become a chance for Japan to establish itself as an “Asian nation” and to amend, or at least relativize, its regional role as a US ally, as designated by the San Francisco System. The diplomat Tanaka Mitsuo argued in 1955 that the successful conclusion of the reparations agreement with Burma would enable Japan to strengthen its political relations with the neutralist Colombo Group (Tanaka 1955, 59–60). The reparations agreements, then, did not only serve to amend Japan’s alienation from Asia that was caused by the San Francisco Treaty, but also enabled Japan to forge closer relations with the neutralist nations, thereby enlarging its diplomatic leeway contra the American expectations of its role within the US–Japan alliance.

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However, due to both the widespread Southeast Asian distrust of Japan, and Japanese unwillingness to accommodate the Southeast Asian demands, the reparations negotiations proved complex and extraordinarily difficult. In the end, they did not achieve trust, reconciliation, and the regional acceptance of the intended Japanese economic leadership role. In order to overcome the San Francisco Peace Treaty’s legacy of Japan’s isolation in Southeast Asia, the reparations had to be supported by a regional economic policy which would establish Japan not only as an indispensable US ally, but also as an equally indispensable economic development partner for the Southeast Asian nations. The reparations negotiations were thus only one dimension of a comprehensive Japanese strategy of realizing regional economic integration. The first opportunity to present these plans to the Southeast Asian nations came at the Asian–African Conference at Bandung in 1955. The Bandung Conference: Establishing Japan as an Apolitical Economic Actor The Bandung Conference was convened in April 1955, under the initiative of the neutralist nations and hosted by Indonesia, in reaction to the establishment of SEATO in the preceding year. Of the Southeast Asian nations, Burma, Cambodia, Laos, India, and Ceylon were affiliated with the neutralist group. American allies such as the Philippines and Thailand, the only Southeast Asian members of SEATO, also participated. The conference was concerned with the issues of anti-colonialism, post-colonial development, and political neutrality. The notion of “Asian solidarity” and the developing political ideology of “neutralism” emerged in Bandung as the rallying cry for uniting the Southeast Asian nations in their struggle against foreign interference, and for countering the Cold War logic of the San Francisco System (Lang 2020, 209). Although the ideological gulf between the participants, aligned with different sides in the Cold War, was huge, as the first international conference that excluded any major Western power, Bandung sent a powerful message to the world: The Third World was seeking to take matters of development and regional order into its own hands. The conference was Japan’s first major opportunity to correct Yoshida’s pro-Western course: Japan’s participation was widely considered to be an opportunity to “return to Asia”. At Bandung, Japan sought to cast off two problematic images: First, its wartime legacy as imperialistic aggressor

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against Asia, and second, that of imperialist US ally. Both images would hinder Japan’s attempts to build relations of trust, which were necessary for its smooth economic re-integration. Japan sought to present itself at the international stage as a trustworthy and responsible economic partner for the region; its main aim was to establish economic relations with the Southeast Asian nations (Denney 2006, 219). Politically, a strong emphasis on Japan’s commitment to anticommunist principles would have made Japan appear as a deputy of the United States and would have alienated it further from an Asia that was widely perceived to be embarking on a neutralist course. The Foreign Ministry was worried that such a strong anti-communist stance would have been interpreted as a show of force and linked to Japan’s wartime imperial aggression (Abel 2015, 222), even if some diplomats publicly argued that Japan’s diplomatic behaviour at the conference had to be based on its identity as a member of the West (Lang 2020, 243). The Japanese delegation sought to use the conference to increase Japan’s regional standing by establishing Japan’s image as a politically neutral, non-aggressive, and trustworthy partner in economic regional integration. In a clear conceptual distinction from Japan’s role as a US ally in the anti-communist San Francisco System, Japan sought to present itself at Bandung as a “peace state”, dissociated from any political agenda. Japan’s diplomatic elite was well aware that memories of Japan’s recent imperial aggression were still fresh in the minds of the Asian participants to the conference; only the attempt to present Japan as a peaceful nation would enable Japan to rebuild relations of trust with the Southeast Asian nations (Abel 2015, 234). Eschewing the debate on political matters, the Japanese delegation was highly active in discussions on economic and cultural problems. This can be seen as an early example of Japan’s “economic diplomacy”, with the clear aim of re-evoking its leadership position in Southeast Asia (Ampiah 1995, 15). In the politically divisive situation of the 1950s, apolitical proposals such as economic cooperation and cultural cooperation were in fact more likely to achieve tangible results for Japanese diplomats than seeking to take a stance in political matters (Abel 2015, 226). Refusing to aggressively defend the anti-communist cause, Japan sought to downplay its political status as a US ally and its security role in the San Francisco System by making practical proposals for regional economic and cultural cooperation. It has been argued these proposals drew heavily on anti-imperialist ideas that Japan had developed during

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the wartime (Abel 2015). Perhaps even more importantly, the content of these ideas—regional development and “co-prosperity”—were a direct challenge to the US-led economic order in Southeast Asia. In sum, Japan proposed the establishment of an integrated economic zone in Asia (Miyagi 2008, 53–54). The proposals called for a system of regional development in which Japan would be a role model for the Southeast Asian nations, and in which it would act as an instructor and economic partner for the modernization of the Southeast Asian industrial structure (Abel 2015, 232–234). All of these proposals were quite vague, and the Conference did not adopt a concrete plan for economic regionalization, but Japan’s intentions were clear: It would again seek a leading role in influencing the regional industrial structure in order to realize regional co-prosperity, this time as a peaceful nation and as a partner, not a “leader”, of the Southeast Asian nations. At least in the eyes of its delegates to the Bandung Conference, Japan was successful in establishing itself as a faithful partner to the Southeast Asian nations. Against the regional order imposed by the San Francisco System with its emphasis on bilateral economic ties between the Southeast Asian nations and their former colonial suzerains, and political relations based on anti-communism, Japan was able to offer a vision of regional order based on a mode of economic development that took into account the political and economic aspirations of the Southeast Asian nations. This view is reflected in an influential diplomat’s recollection of the Conference: [A]t the Bandung Conference […] 29 nations, Japan included, boldly proclaimed their racial affinity, closing ranks in a great movement forward toward the final fulfilment of their historic destiny. […] Japan has championed for many years past ‘the principle of equal rights and selfdetermination of peoples.’ […] [A]t the Bandung conference […] Japan joined forces anew with the other participants in re-affirming this principle. (Kase 1957, 298–299)

Thus, while the San Francisco Treaty with its reparations stipulations of Art. 14 was insufficient as the basis for re-establishing trust with Southeast Asian nations and failed to fully legitimize Japan’s return to the region, the Bandung Conference was indeed a chance for Japan to re-join Asia through its proposals to create a regional development order that was attuned to the ambitions and interests of the Southeast Asian nations.

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While Japan sought to amend the economic configuration of the San Francisco System in Southeast Asia, i.e. the US-led bilateral economic order, through its economic proposals at Bandung, the Conference can also be seen as an opportunity for Japan to assume the role of a mediator between the West and Asia. In order to relativize its role as a US ally (Kase 1957; see Lang 2020, 258–259), Japan’s political role was conceptualized as transcending the divisions of the Cold War: Japan refused to act as a political US proxy, but also did neither openly challenge the current political order nor support the neutralist nations’ political cause against the West.7 Rather, Japan sought to establish itself as a “bridge” between the West and Asia. This also meant Japan’s acceptance of the political regional status quo and the division of Asia (Kwon 2008, 278). However, because of the ideological differences among the participants, the Bandung Conference was not able to create a consensus towards neutralism or a neutralist bloc; tensions around the future of the regional political order were very strong (Ewing 2019, 16). Furthermore, despite Japan’s efforts, there emerged no tangible momentum towards regional economic integration. Soon after the end of the conference, the Southeast Asian nations competed again for bilateral development aid from their former colonials suzerain powers (Hoshiro 2008, 97). The Proposal for an “Asian Development Fund”: Seeking to Establish Multilateral Economic Integration While Japan did not outline a coherent plan for regional economic integration at the Bandung Conference, only two years later, in June 1957, Prime Minister Kishi went to an unprecedented round of state visits to Southeast Asian countries in order to present his vision of an “Asian Development Fund” (ADF) to the region. This proposal was the apex of Japanese attempts to amend the bilateral American aid strategy. The Fund was part of a series of Japanese proposals during the 1950s8 seeking to convince the United States of the saliency of Japan’s regional economic 7 The refusal, by the Japanese delegation, to take a position in political issues was strongly criticized by the contemporary left-wing discourse (Lang 2020, 291). 8 Yoshida’s economic regional policy initiatives in Southeast Asia—the proposals for an Asian Payment Union, and Asian Development Fund, or an Asian Marshall Plan—had already posed a challenge to the US economic bilateralism, and were rejected by the United States (Tomaru 2000, 151).

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development strategy, which was neither informed by a strong political anti-communist agenda, nor by a strong conceptual defense of free trade (Hoshiro 2008, 25). The fund would establish a financial organization for regional development, initially funded with US$ 500 million, of which US$ 300 million would be contributed by the United States. It envisaged credits for longterm regional development projects which would not be covered by other institutions, such as the World Bank, the Colombo Plan, or ECAFE (Tomaru 2000, 166). While the bulk of the initial financing would come from the United States, Japan would be responsible for administering the funds in order not to aggravate anti-Western nationalism in the region (Hiwatari 1989, 223). Importantly, this Japanese proposal to establish a multilateral financial institution, aimed at regional economic integration, challenged the US economic policy in Southeast Asia, which was structurally based on bilateral trade relations with the United States as the centre or “hub”, and the Asian nations as the “spokes”. While the American aid policy changed profoundly in post-war period (Kaufman 1982), the US did not seek to establish a unified Southeast Asian economy throughout the 1950s and beyond (Shimizu 2001, 201). It adhered to the concept of free market competition and liberalist principles for the regional economic development in Southeast Asia (Suehiro 1999, 97–98), and was highly sceptical of the idea of nurturing a regional awareness of an “Asian community”, as this would endanger the system of bilateral trade relations between the West and the Asian nations. While the United States encouraged Japan to deepen its trade relations with Southeast Asia, it was highly critical of Japan’s attempts to promote regional economic integration (Schaller 1997, 107). US strategists feared that Japan sought to “disengage” itself from its ally (Tomaru 2000, 168) and “create a system that was semiautonomous of the Euro-Americancentric capitalist world” (Shimizu 2001, 195). From the US perspective, the ADF plan, with its aim of economically integrating Southeast Asia under Japanese leadership, carried the danger of developing into a form of economic pan-Asianism and risked cementing Japan’s leading economic position in a new sphere of co-prosperity (Shimizu 2001, 194–196). Analytically, the ADF plan can be seen as an attempt to modify the San Francisco System in Southeast Asia in three important respects:

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1. Vis-à-vis the United States, Japan’s aim was to strengthen its credentials as an indispensable, and therefore “equal”, partner to the US anti-communist strategy in Southeast Asia, thereby casting off its junior or “deputy” role in the US–Japan alliance. Kishi designed the Plan to complement and support the US anti-communist policy. During his visit to Washington in 1957, he presented his vision of combining American capital and Japanese technology as the only viable way to ensure the political stability of Southeast Asia (Lang 2020, 329). Kishi framed Japan’s role as indispensable for the joint Japanese–American effort to develop Southeast Asia and to prevent the spread of communism: As Japan “understands Asia as a member of Asia”, there was “much that America has to learn from our country concerning the solutions to Asian problems”; hence, the Japanese–American cooperation in the economic development of Southeast Asia had to proceed with “America and Japan on the same footing” (Kishi 1957, 46). Importantly, Japan’s economic regional strategy was framed as an alternative, and in many ways as a more appropriate, approach than the US policy for containing communism in Southeast Asia and for stabilizing the regional order. The feasibility of the San Francisco System for the Southeast Asian economic development was doubted in Japan: There was a broad consensus among Japan’s political and economic elites that the United States was fixated on its anti-communist policy and the Cold War logic, and that therefore it was Japan that would have to take the lead in the economic development of Southeast Asia (Hoshiro 2008, 41). Thus Kishi argued that [t]here is a common thinking in Asia: The United States has become too short-sighted. Instead of speaking only about the ‘sole danger of communism’, only the aim of improving the livelihoods of the population is a good anti-communist method in the long run. The spending of funds in this sense would be useful. […] We should act in a purely economic fashion. (Ajia Kaihatsu 1957, 17–18)

Indeed, Kishi’s visit to the United States was intended to change the US policy to accommodate the Japanese Asia policy (Kwon 2008, 73). Kishi sought to convince his American counterparts that the US–Japan alliance should no longer emphasize the military aspect, but concentrate on the

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economic partnership in the development of Southeast Asia (Hoshiro 2008, 146; Shimizu 2001, 195). 2. The ADF proposal would serve to establish Japan as an independent regional actor in the eyes of the Southeast Asian nations beyond its designated role as loyal supporter of the American-led liberal and bilateral economic structure in the region. In dealing with his Southeast Asian counterparts, Kishi conceptualized the Fund as an apolitical instrument (Hoshiro 2008, 160): Explicitly refusing the Cold War logic, the Fund’s capital to assist regional development was not to be connected with any political agenda, be it communism or capitalism, in order to increase both its acceptance by the Southeast Asian nations and Japan’s role as its manager. Kishi remarked in June 1957 that If [the Southeast Asian nations, HL] were dependent for the required capital on the United States, the Soviet Union, or China, the fund would necessarily involve politics. We therefore need to establish a purely industrial fund […] free from such politics. (Kishi 1981, 167)

In order to gain regional acceptance and discard the image of its subservient role in the American anti-communist security strategy, Japan sought to separate its regional economic role from its role as security partner in the US alliance. However, Japanese strategists did not call into question the anti-communist logic of the regional order. By concentrating on the economic field, they sought to minimalize an openly Japanese political role in Southeast Asia. The ADF proposal would offer Japan the economic means to realize a regional policy independent of the United States’ political strategy: Japan’s contribution to the US anti-communist agenda would take place in the economic field (Lang 2020, 328). 3. In connection with the second aim, the ADF proposal was intended to establish a regionally integrated economic order under Japan’s leadership that went beyond the bilateral hub-and-spoke system of economic relations which was favoured by the United States. It was the attempt to shift the regional economic configuration from bilateral ties towards a system of regional economic integration with Japan as the leading actor in controlling the regional development

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initiatives (Tomaru 2000, 166). For Kishi, the issue of Southeast Asia’s economic development and prosperity could not be left to the United States: Japan had to assume a leadership role, as it was Japan’s responsibility to develop Southeast Asia (Hoshiro 2008, 143f) and to fully realize its independence from the former colonial suzerain nations (Kwon 2008, 33). This could only be achieved with a multilateral, as opposed to a bilateral, economic framework (Kwon 2008, 277; Hoshiro 2008, 140). Ultimately, Japan’s aim was to realize economic regionalism in Southeast Asia. Leading Japanese industrialists and conservative politicians, prompted by a sense of crisis due to the recent moves to realize the integration of the European market, conceptualized a multilateral development framework as a counter-strategy (Hoshiro 2008, 140f.), effectively reviving Japan’s pre-war efforts of regional economic integration (Kwon 2008, 277). Importantly, Japanese economic strategists continued even in the immediate post-war era to frame international economic relations in terms of economic bloc thinking (Sat¯ o 1999, 175). In fact, many of those economic planners who had been responsible for conceptualizing Japan’s war-time attempts to create an integrated economic Asian order in the 1930s and 1940s quickly regrouped after 1945 and resumed their efforts to work towards an Asian economic order which transcended the limits of nation-states (Karashima 2013, 154–156). For these strategists, the contemporary Asian anti-colonial movements were only a transitionary phase in the inevitable historic process of regional economic integration (Lang 2020, 211). For instance, Yamazaki Ry¯uz¯o, a bureaucrat within the Ministry of International Trade and Industry, argues that in face of the integration of the European markets, it was urgent time to consider the creation of an “Asian economic sphere” (Yamazaki 1957, 61). In the same vein argues Ichimata Hisato, a former Minister of Finance, declaring the era of economic competition between nation-states to be over, and arguing for the economic integration of Southeast Asia based on the appropriate division of labour among regional members (Ichimata 1960, 87). This,

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of course, is highly evocative of Japan’s pre-1945 attempts to realize a “co-prosperity sphere” in Asia.9 Ultimately, however, Kishi failed to convince the United States of accepting a more independent Japanese role in the regional development, one that would exceed its reparations obligations towards the Southeast Asian claimant states (Hoshiro 2008, 149). More importantly, he failed to convince the Southeast Asian nations; even before the US rejection of the ADF, Japan’s Asian neighbours had already refused to support Kishi’s proposal.

Conclusion Japan’s reaction to the emerging San Francisco order in Southeast Asia was neither characterized by a passive adaptation to the American strategy, nor by unconditional support. Japanese decision-makers carefully calibrated the nation’s regional policy to accommodate the competing visions of regional order, that is, US-led liberal anti-communism and Southeast Asian neutralism. Japan employed different strategies to overcome the limitations of the San Francisco Framework for its regional foreign policy. First, Japan sought to correct its regional image as a US ally politically bound to the anti-communist political agenda in order to present itself as an apolitical, economic partner to the region. Furthermore, Japan sought to re-define the US–Japan alliance, the primary pillar of the San Francisco System, in terms of an economic partnership with the purpose of regional development cooperation, thereby effectively depoliticizing the meaning of the alliance for the Southeast Asian regional order. From the perspective of Japan’s strategists, this redefinition would not only assuage Southeast Asian opposition to the San Francisco System and increase the acceptance of the US–Japan alliance, but also allow Japan to assume the role of economic developer for Southeast Asia and thus facilitate its regional economic integration. The Bandung Conference was to serve as a showcase for Japan’s ability to act as a “bridge” or intermediary between the conflicting ideological camps. Japan was able to strengthen its “Asian” credentials, 9 For more on the conceptual continuities between Japan’s pre-war Southeast Asia strategy and its post-war approach during the 1950s in the strategic thinking of leading members of the conservative political elite, see Lang (2020, 345–353).

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demonstrating Japan’s commitment to regional economic prosperity and development free from foreign intervention. The ADF proposal was to serve as the financial mechanism to disentangle regional development assistance from the conditionality of the US anti-communist political agenda. Second, Japan sought to utilize its Southeast Asia policy to put its relations with the United States on a more equal footing. Japan sought to correct its status as a deputy of the American Asia strategy by establishing an equal partnership with the United States, based on Japan’s indispensability for regional development (Hoshiro 2008, 144). This was to serve the aim of increasing Japan’s diplomatic leeway. Third, Japan sought to offer an alternative vision of regional economic relations in Southeast Asia based on apolitical economic cooperation and integration in opposition to the bilateral US economic regional strategy. The aim was to overcome the bilateral economic regional configuration imposed by US hegemony through establishing a system of multilateral economic integration. Key building blocs of this strategy were Japan’s proposals at the Bandung Conference, and the ADF proposal as its concrete form. Importantly, these proposals to amend the regional economic configuration were always conceptually bound to the United States’ financial resources and stood and fell with American support. Japan did not seek, in this early phase of its post-war regional strategy, to dissociate itself from its American ally; the ultimate aim was to find a regional order that would accommodate the interests of the Southeast Asian nations, Japan, and the United States, safeguarded by the security order of the San Francisco System. For Japan, then, its economic policy in Southeast was the basis for enlarging its diplomatic leeway and for seeking to establish a more palatable economic system to Southeast Asian nations than that which was offered by the American regional economic strategy. In the political field, Japan supported the anti-communist logic of the San Francisco System. Confronted with the regional unwillingness to accept the politicalideological premises of US-led regional order, Japan refused to subscribe to the Southeast Asian agenda of forging a neutralist regional system. In fact, Kishi argued, albeit unsuccessfully, for Japan to join SEATO in 1958 (Kwon 2008, 83). Japan also did not abandon its political role of mediating Asian nationalism. This was not primarily out of allegiance to the American Asia strategy, but because of Japan’s economic interests: Japanese strategists were aware that the regional focus on national

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development plans largely inhibited intra-regional cooperation (Hatano 1997, 176) and would therefore hinder Japan’s strategy of realizing an economically integrated regional order. This, combined with the aim of stabilizing the region against communism, had the effect of strengthening the political and security order of the US-led anti-communist regional configuration under the San Francisco System that sought to weaken the Asian neutralist movement. However, despite the combined efforts by Japan and the United States to counter neutralism as a political force, the neutralist movement did not simply vanish. Regional opposition against the political divisions of the San Francisco System reached its apex with the establishment of the “Zone of Peace, Freedom, and Neutrality” in 1971, which was the explicit attempt by Southeast Asian nations to establish a system of regional security that excluded extra-regional influence. While the Cold War system lasted, it was not realized; however, Southeast Asia’s attempts to forge a security system based on its own terms re-emerged in the form of the Asian Regional Forum in 1994, its core aim being the prevention of hegemony by extra-regional powers. Ultimately, Japan failed to overcome Asian suspicions that it was more than a US deputy, and Japan’s economic motives continued to be scrutinized with concern from the region in the 1950s and beyond. The ADF proposal failed to gain substantive support from the Southeast Asian nations before being rejected by the United States. In the short term, Japan was unsuccessful in establishing a new regional order of economic integration due to Southeast Asian and American resistance. In the long run, however, Japan’s ensuing economic regional policy of strategically using Official Development Assistance (ODA) proved indispensable to stabilize Southeast Asia economically. Politically, Japan was able to mitigate the Southeast Asian misgivings against the San Francisco System and the US–Japan alliance by offering its services as a mediator between Western and Asian economic and political interests. If the San Francisco System has proven remarkably stable and influential in shaping the regional order in Southeast Asia until the present day, it was not least due to Japan’s efforts in the 1950s to create an economically integrated regional order, which helped to promote regional acceptance of this System throughout the Cold War period and beyond.

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Bilateral Issues with Multilateral Origins: The Case of Korea and Japan Seung Mo Kang

Amity and enmity have co-existed uneasily between Korea and Japan for decades since the end of the Pacific War. While much progress has been achieved in strengthening friendship, tension also continues due to “history issues,” as exemplified in Korea’s efforts to press Japan to compensate the former “comfort women” and conscript for laborers. This diplomatic conundrum could be partly attributed to the Japanese peace treaty, as the terms related to Korea had an important bearing on postwar relationship between the two countries. This chapter focuses on two particular aspects of the treaty, both of which are relatively unknown outside of Korea and Japan: the question of South Korean representation and reparations. As explained below, South Korea was not invited to sign the treaty due to a complex interplay between big power interests—specifically Britain, Japan, and the US—and South Korea’s own diplomatic blunder. Consequently, Seoul was not recognized as a belligerent in the Pacific War and

S. M. Kang (B) Korea Institute for Maritime Strategy, Seoul, Republic of Korea e-mail: [email protected]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2022 Y. Sugita and V. Teo (eds.), Rethinking the San Francisco System in Indo-Pacific Security, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-1231-3_7

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thus not entitled to demand war reparations from Tokyo. This significantly disadvantaged South Korea in subsequent years when it sought to secure some form of compensation from Japan for the wartime past. While an agreement was eventually reached, it was deemed unsatisfactory by the South Korean public. Unsurprisingly, there is a lingering feeling in Korea that a wrongful past has never been properly settled. This then warrants a close examination of why South Korea was excluded from the Japanese peace treaty. Here, one must be careful to note that while South Korea’s exclusion certainly made it difficult for Seoul to demand compensation from Tokyo, it is doubtful that South Korea would have been able to secure a truly satisfactory form of indemnification, even if it had signed the treaty. Indeed, the overarching principle of the treaty was to help Japan recover economically, rather than rectifying the past. The terms dictating reparations were negotiated accordingly, discouraging any capital or monetary extraction from Japan. Hence, the idea of holding Japan accountable for its wartime misconducts—which were not only demanded by Asians, but also by the British, Dutch, and French—largely went unheeded. Taking this into account, this chapter explores why and how the reparations terms became what they are. As mentioned above, the questions of South Korea’s exclusion from the Japanese peace treaty and reparations have been amply dealt with in Korea and Japan but is almost unknown outside (Tsukamoto 1992, 95– 100; Kim 2002, 133–47; Ch˘ong 2019; Pak 2008, 27–96; Yi et al. 2010, ¯ 2008; Asano et. 121–56; Kang 2015, 153–177; 2021; Hara 1984; Ota al. 2013; Chang 2014). Hence, this chapter introduces an important piece of postwar history of Northeast Asia to audiences outside of Korea and Japan. But more importantly, it builds on these findings to highlight the fact that what may appear to be “bilateral” problems between Korea and Japan might actually be more “multilateral” than hitherto thought. This is an aspect of postwar Korea–Japan relations, which scholars have tacitly acknowledged but have not sufficiently vocalized. At most, scholars tend to treat the present-day “history issues” as a regional one involving Japan and its neighbors, and to some extent the US. This chapter attempts to situate Korea–Japan relations in a much broader context.

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South Korea’s Representation Before discussing the details, it is necessary to provide a brief history of Korea’s annexation and independence. Korea was absorbed into part of the Japanese Empire with the signing of the annexation treaty of 1910 and was thereafter ruled by Japan until August 1945. While there were resistance movements, the Korean people were not able to regain their independence. Furthermore, a Korean government-in-exile based in China was never recognized by outside powers. Instead, Japan’s rule over Korea was internationally recognized. Although the 1943 Cairo Declaration promised Korea’s independence in “due course,” when and how this would be achieved were never specified. Additionally, while the US and the Soviet Union agreed on the need for a trusteeship for Korea at the 1945 Yalta Conference—the implication being that Korea would eventually earn its independence—no concrete plans were formulated. When Korea was finally liberated with Japan’s surrender on 15 August 1945, the peninsula was subsequently divided into two competing blocs in 1948 with the founding of the Republic of Korea (ROK) in the south and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) in the north, each under the respective auspices of the US and the Soviet Union. Thereafter, the US sought not only to ensure South Korea’s survival, but also to build up its legitimacy. It was against this backdrop that South Korea’s representation in the Japanese peace treaty was discussed. While the South Korean question first emerged in 1947, when a peace conference for Japan was first proposed by the US, this section will focus mostly on the periods between 1949 and 1951, when the Japanese peace treaty negotiations were at its peak and the South Korean representation developed into a serious issue. Amid the on-going rivalry with the DPRK since the Peninsula’s division, South Korea on 8 January, 18 November, and 24 November 1949 expressed strong interest in partaking in the Japanese peace settlement (Tonga ilbo 1949; Kyoˇ nghyang sinmun 1949). According to the State Department note of 3 December 1949, Koreans believed that they had been a “belligerent” that had fought against Japan and thus rightfully entitled to participate in the peace settlement (Department of State 1976a, 911). In response, the State Department on 12 December 1949 expressed legal and political concerns. To begin with, Japan’s annexation of Korea was “recognized by almost all countries, including the US,” and no recognition was given to any Korean state, until the founding of the ROK in

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1948. Furthermore, the legal status of postwar Korea—in other words, whether or not Korea was an independent state—remained unclear.1 Of course, South Korea was de facto independent, having been recognized by the United Nations on 12 December 1948 and having already exchanged ambassadors with Nationalist China (ROC), the Philippines, and the US (ROK Ministry of Foreign Affairs 2008, 482). However, the 1910 annexation treaty had neither been rescinded nor superseded by another treaty. Hence, it was questionable if Korea was de jure no longer Japan’s colony. In turn, it was doubtful if Korea could be acknowledged as a former belligerent of Japan and entitled to participate in the Japanese peace settlement. Equally important was a fear that South Korea might demand excessive reparations and go against the existing US plans to rebuild Japan’s economy. Although the initial Allied postwar policy for Japan focused on demilitarization, the deepening rivalry with the Soviet Union led the US to increasingly stress the importance of rebuilding Japan. Conventionally known as the “reverse course,” the US by 1948 decided that the primary objective for Japan was to be economic reconstruction and by 1949 all reparations removal from Japan were to be terminated. To the annoyance of many countries in the Pacific, the US also started to stress the importance of rearming Japan (Department of State 1976a, 773–7, 870–3). At the time, feelings of animosity against Japan ran deep in South Korea, whose legislative body in 1949 adopted a resolution to demand over two billion dollars-worth of compensation from Japan ¯ 2008, 39–92; Asano et al. 2013, 47–51). (Chang 2014, 93–202; Ota And South Korea’s participation in negotiating and signing the Japanese peace treaty could strengthen its position vis-à-vis Japan in demanding indemnification, which did not conform with US position. Nevertheless, the State Department acknowledged that a “complete rejection of Korean participation” could damage South Korea’s prestige and impair US–Korean relations. Consequently, “Korea” was added as one of the potential signatories to the treaty on 29 December 1949.2

1 DRF 163: Participation of the Republic of Korea in the Japanese Peace Settlement, 12 December 1949, RG59, Records of the Division of Research for Far East, Box 4, National Library of Korea. 2 Allison to Fearey, 23 February 1950, RG59, A1 1252, Treaty Drafts, 1949—March 1951, National Archives and Records Administration (NARA).

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Then came a momentous event that would impact the fate of the Japanese peace settlement and Korea: the outbreak of the Korean War on 25 June 1950. This war added urgency to the Japanese peace treaty negotiations. At the same time, the US abandoned its earlier ambiguity and expressed unequivocal support for South Korea’s participation in the treaty and thereby strengthen Seoul’s legitimacy.3 Meanwhile, to strengthen its case for signing the Japanese peace treaty, South Korea studied the past. This culminated in a special report of October 1950, which pointed out that after World War I, Poland and Czechoslovakia had become independent and signed the peace treaty with Germany and Austria. Similarly, after World War II, Albania and Ethiopia had become independent and took part in the peace treaty with Italy. In other words, Korea’s lack of independence until 1945 should not hinder it from participating in the Japanese peace treaty (Korea–Japan Normalization Records 1950). Subsequently, on 31 November 1950, South Korea again requested Washington to invite South Korea to participate in both the “negotiation and signing” of the Japanese peace treaty, stressing that Korea had been subjected to “Japanese aggression,” had engaged in “antiJapanese belligerency” and made a “significant contribution” to defeating Japan (Rhee Papers). Seoul also elicited British support on 11 December 1950. London, however, responded that there were legal difficulties. As was the case with the US, Britain was unsure if Korea could be considered legally independent. Although Britain was aware of the Albanian precedent, Tirana was at least treated as a nominally independent country during the war, whereas no such recognition was granted to Korea.4 Hence, it did not make sense for South Korea to either negotiate or sign the treaty. Around this time, South Korea dispatched a series of curious messages to Washington. On 17 January and 20 January 1951, the former

3 Commentary on 1947 Treaty, July 1950, RG59, A1 1230, NARA. 4 Korea and a Japanese Peace Treaty, 1 January 1951, FJ1021/214, FO371/83837,

The National Archives (NA); G.G. Fitzmaurice response to “Korea and a Japanese Peace Treaty,” 3 January 1951, Ibid.; Participation of the Government of Korea in the Signing of a Japanese Peace Treaty, 11 December 1950, Ibid.; Memorandum by C.P. Scott: Participation by Korea in the signing of a Japanese Peace Treaty, 11 December 1950, FJ1021/215, Ibid.

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informed the latter that South Korea should either sign the Japanese peace treaty or convene a “separate peace conference with Japan” (DOS 1983, 97; Rhee Papers). In doing so, Seoul essentially expressed its willingness to forgo signing the peace treaty. It is possible that this reflected South Korea’s on-going suspicion—especially the president, Rhee Syngman—of Japan’s potential for aggression and reluctance to sign a treaty that was premised on Japan’s remilitarization. Indeed, as explained below, Seoul expressly opposed Japanese rearmament. Whatever the reason, South Korea made a major diplomatic blunder, as the US now had a legitimate pretext to exclude South Korea from the peace treaty. Of course, South Korea had not yet given up all hope of signing the peace treaty, and on 26 January 1951 once again brought up the prospect of South Korean participation, to which the US expressed support (DOS 1977, 817). Britain, in contrast, continued to oppose South Korean participation. Whereas the US believed that there were “political advantages” to South Korean participation and that this issue should not be determined purely on legalistic grounds, Britain had a number of political concerns, in addition to the legal concerns explained above. To begin with, South Korea’s fate remained uncertain due to the on-going war. Furthermore, if South Korea were chosen to be represented over North Korea, this could antagonize certain neutralist countries in Asia, specifically Burma, India, and Indonesia. This was a serious issue, as Britain and the US were desperately trying to secure as many Asian participants as possible to sign the Japanese peace treaty, lest it became a white men’s pact with Japan. Equally important was the explosive issue of Chinese representation. China was also divided between the communist and non-communist blocs and there were disagreements among the Western allies on which China should be invited to sign the Japanese peace treaty, with Britain and the US respectively supporting the PRC and ROC. This was one of the most contentious aspects of the treaty that was hampering the progress for the Japanese peace settlement, and Britain did not want to add another problem by arguing about Korea (DOS 1977, 941).5 5 Telegram from Washington to London, 14 March 1951, FJ1022/134, FO371/92534, NA; Comments by C.P. Scott, 18 March 1951, Ibid.; Tomlinson to Johnston, 30 March 1951,” FJ1022/188, FO371/92536, NA; Johnston to Tomlinson, 22 March 1951, FJ1022/121, FO371/92533, NA; Tomlinson to Johnston, 27 March 1951, FJ1022/194, FO371/92536, NA; Clutton to Foreign Office, 30 March 1951, FJ1022/198, FO371/92536, NA; Anglo-American meetings on Japanese Peace Treaty, 3 May 1951, FJ1022/376, FO371/92547, NA; Anglo-American meetings on Japanese

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Japan also initially opposed South Korean participation. Tokyo did not believe that Korea had been in a state of war against Japan and argued that Korea was not yet an independent country. Furthermore, if Korea became a signatory, Korean residents in Japan, “most of them Communist,” would be entitled to compensation and cause tremendous financial burden for Japan.6 In response, the US indicated that it wished to build up South Korea’s “prestige” by inviting it to sign the treaty. At the same time, however, it acknowledged that the issues of Korean compensation rights “should be taken care of.” Thereafter, Japan expressed willingness to accept South Korea as a signatory, if it were “definitely assured” that Korean residents in Japan would “not” acquire the “status of Allied Powers nationals” (DOS 1977, 1007, 1011). While the US was working diligently to include South Korea as a signatory, the latter presented certain requests on 10 April and 26 April 1951 that did not conform with the US plans (Rhee Papers). For instance, South Korea expressed reservations about Japan’s rearmament, which was counter to the US objectives. Seoul also requested the maintenance of the “MacArthur Line”—a temporary maritime border established during the early occupation era that prohibited Japanese fishing activities in the high seas near Korea—to protect its fishing interests. However, the US was against continuing this restriction, as it could damage Japan’s economy. In addition, South Korea asked that all property belonging to its nationals that had been either confiscated or damaged by Japan should be restored. As explained above, Tokyo and Washington agreed that this should be prevented. Unsurprisingly, these demands were rejected by the US (Chang 2014, 267–8; Choˇ ng 2010, 731–2). The US also must have felt less motivated to support South Korean representation in the Japanese peace treaty. Sure enough, on 9 May 1951, the State Department internally noted that the Korean exile government had never been recognized and hence Korea’s purported belligerence against Japan had “no significance.”7 Subsequently, on 1 June 1951, the State Department concluded that peace treaty, 4 May 1951, FJ1022/378, FO371/92547, NA; Records of meeting between our representative and Mr. Dulles, 3 May 1951, FJ1022/370, FO371/92547, NA. 6 Korea and the Peace Treaty, RG59, Lot 56D527, Box 7, Second Tokyo Trip (April 1951), NARA. 7 Comments on Korean Note Regarding US Treaty Draft, 9 May 1951, RG59, A1 1252, Korea [October, 1948–August 16, 1951], NARA.

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“Korea is not entitled to be a signatory” (DOS 1977, 1068–1069). When the US relayed this decision to South Korea on 9 July 1951, the latter protested vehemently but to no avail (DOS 1977, 1183; 1983, 823). The US decision to exclude South Korea was final and was announced accordingly at the San Francisco Peace Conference on 5 September 1951 (DOS 1951, 84). In sum, two big factors led to the exclusion of South Korea from the Japanese peace treaty. One was external. Britain and Japan, two of the most important parties to the peace treaty, expressed opposition. And while the US worked enthusiastically to include South Korea as a signatory, Washington had its own qualms. The other was Korea’s own blunder. Although understandable, making certain demands that conflicted with US interests was not wise (Chang 2014, 267–8; Choˇ ng 2010, 722–34). More perplexing was the fact that it expressed willingness to forgo signing the peace treaty. Not only must have this created the impression that Seoul was not serious about its participation in the Japanese peace settlement, but also likely gave the US a convenient pretext to exclude South Korea. South Korea’s exclusion had long-term repercussions, as it was stripped of legal entitlement to reparations. As Chang Pakjin warns, however, one must not assume that Seoul’s ability to obtain compensation from Japan would have been substantially different even had it been recognized as a signatory (Chang 2014, 307). It is to this question that we now turn to.

The Reparations Issue To recall, the US had from 1947 began to shift its policy from Japan’s demilitarization to economic reconstruction in response to the escalating tension with the Soviet bloc. The US thereafter sought to craft the Japanese peace treaty in a way that avoided damaging Japan’s economic prospects. As a result, reparations were permitted in a very limited manner. As evidenced in Article 14, reparations were confined to two forms. One was “services” in terms of “production, salvaging and other work.” The other was allowing the Allies to confiscate Japanese property located within their own territories. Otherwise, the Allies were made to “waive all reparations claims.” No monetary reparations would be permitted (UN 1951). This immediately raised doubts that South Korea—whose demands, as will be explained later, were largely premised on monetary payment—could successfully demand compensation from

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Japan. This requires an overview of historical developments stretching back to the First World War. After nearly five years of gruesome war in Europe, leaders around the world gathered in Paris to negotiate the terms of a peace treaty with Germany. One of the most contentious issues was reparations. After much haggling, a compromise solution was reached, wherein Berlin was obligated to accept the “responsibility of Germany” for “causing all the loss and damage” to the “Allied and Associated Governments.” This socalled war guilt clause (Article 231) clarified that Germany ought to pay reparations. However, Article 232 stipulated that Germany did not have adequate resources to pay “complete reparation” (Library of Congress 1919). In other words, while Germany in principle should pay reparations, it was acknowledged that it could not make full payment. One of the proponents of this formula was John Foster Dulles, the mastermind behind the Japanese peace treaty negotiations, who at the time of Versailles peace treaty negotiations was assisting the American delegation in charge of negotiating the reparations terms. This solution was meant to satisfy both the Germans and the Allies. Important to note here is that the US wished to save the Germans from paying excessive reparations, because this would impair Germany’s economy and possibly drive the Germans toward Bolshevism, which in turn would damage overall international trade and inevitably hurt US economy. In contrast, the Allies—in particular, Britain and France—opted for harsh reparations. Not only did they wish to curb the German threat, but also their general sentiment did not incline them toward mercy for Berlin. Articles 231 and 232 were devised to resolve these differences (Pruessen 1982, 34–7, 45–7, 52–7, 76–105, 392–7; Steiner 2005, 38, 55–62; Sharp 2008, 90–1). Sadly, neither the Allies nor Germany was satisfied. Berlin was extremely unhappy that it was singled out as the sole villain of the war. It also accused the reparations formula as being an unworkable burden on the German economy and as adversely affecting world trade in general. There were also a number of notable figures within the Allied camp—including the celebrity economist John Maynard Keynes—who opposed harsh reparations on the grounds that it could lead to another war (Boemeke et al. 1998, 54, 203–220, 364, 392–7, 401–40, 490, 500). Meanwhile, subsequent progress on reparations was disappointing. Starting with the “London Schedule of Payments” in 1920, which agreed on a total sum of 132 billion marks to be paid by Germany in kind

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and importantly in cash, the amount and method of reparations were revised twice, once in 1924 (“Dawes Plan”) and again in 1929 (“Young Plan”), until the German economy faced imminent collapse in 1931 and reparations were eventually canceled altogether at the 1932 Lausanne Conference. It is also noteworthy that the US had been indirectly paying for reparations, as private American investors, mostly banks, were mobilized to provide loans to Europe that was on the verge of bankruptcy; and whatever loans provided to Germany were used to pay reparations (Steiner 2005, 183–250, 457–93, 667–90). This experience convinced Dulles that the formula that he had helped to create was fundamentally flawed. Hence, as elaborated later, he would do things differently for the Japanese peace treaty. Circumstantial evidence also suggests that others in the US government equally felt the need to handle reparations differently for post-World War II peace settlement. Consequently, at the height of the Pacific War, the State Department already opposed monetary form of reparations, as this could hinder Japan’s eventual economic recovery. Instead, reparations would be provided in-kind, wherein industrial equipment—such as steel and aluminum plants and machinery—would be dismantled and given to the Allies. The Allies could also confiscate Japanese property located within their own territories (Hara 1984, 165–70, 175, 178–9, 181–3). This principle of in-kind reparations was later adopted by the Allies in the Potsdam Declaration of 26 July 1945 and later in the Japanese peace treaty (DOS 1945, 137–8). Two other developments took place after World War II that would impact the fate of Japanese reparations. The first was the German settlement. At the Potsdam Conference in July 1945, the Allies agreed that certain industrial equipment from the western occupation zone (administered by Britain, France, and the US) would be given to the Soviet Union as reparations; in return, the Soviet Union would deliver raw materials from its occupation zone to the West. However, Kremlin refused to live up to its promise. Worse, it confiscated capital equipment in its own occupation zone indiscriminately without consulting the other Allies. Additionally, the Soviet Union started to take reparations from current production (goods), which was not even part of the Allied agreement. The Soviet behavior not only went against the Allied agreement of treating Germany’s economy as one unit, but also was bound to create difficulties in other zones of occupation. The resultant economic difficulties in Germany could only be overcome with American financial support,

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which Washington was not happy about. Not surprisingly, the US decided to terminate the reparations program in May 1946 (Steil 2018, 62–9, 75–6). The second important development was the 1947 Italian peace treaty. Under this treaty (Article 74), Italy was made to pay reparations from “current production” to Albania, Ethiopia, Greece, the Soviet Union, and Yugoslavia. The problem was that only the Soviet Union was in the position to receive reparations. Progress was extremely difficult for other recipients as they were tackling numerous other issues. Greece was embroiled in a civil war and on-going border skirmishes with Albania over Northern Epirus. Meanwhile, Albania and Yugoslavia were arguing with Italy over the war criminal issue—as Italy refused to extradite its nationals to Yugoslavia or Albania for trial—not to mention the territorial dispute over Trieste. In Albania, the American and British secret services were attempting to undermine the communist Enver Hoxha regime and thus sought to torpedo reparations payment to Albania (Pedaliu 2003, 9–34; Gori et al. 1996, 395–429; Grose 2000, 155–8; Pearson 2006, 333–4, 362–3).8 Simply put, the track record of post-war reparations settlements was unimpressive. One can safely assume that the US harbored suspicion that the Allies could ever come up with a successful agreement on reparations in the future. Unsurprisingly, the US would chart the course differently for Japan. Of course, the initial US reparations policy toward Japan was dictated by the wartime anti-Axis mentality and premised on the principle of demilitarizing Japan, as evidenced in the first draft peace treaty that was developed by the US in 1947. Additionally, during the early phase of the occupation, roughly between 1946 and 1948, some machineries were dismantled from Japan and delivered to certain countries, most notably China and the Philippines, as reparations (Hara 1984, 269). Fortunately for Japan, US policy was drastically revised amid the escalating Cold War tensions and the emergence of the “reverse course” in 1947 that prioritized Japan’s economic rehabilitation (Schaller 1985, 122–40). The reparations policy was transformed accordingly and culminated in no-reparations approach. In justifying this change, the Army Department claimed that Japan’s demilitarization was now complete, and that Japan’s economy needed to be revived to steer Tokyo away from

8 Reparations from current production, undated, RG59, A1 1252, Reparations, NARA.

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militarism and contribute to regional stability. Furthermore, demanding reparations from Japan was against American interests, as the US would foot the bill. Since Japan could only sustain itself with US financial support, the former’s reparations payment essentially meant burden on American taxpayers (Asano et al. 2013, 43–4). This change in mood culminated in NSC 13/3, signed by Truman on 6 May 1949, which sought to terminate all reparations program (DOS 1976a, 730–6). The draft peace treaty was duly amended, and the 7 September 1949 treaty encapsulated the no-reparations policy.9 When the Japanese peace treaty negotiations entered the formative phase in late 1950, the no-reparations formula was adopted in Dulles’ seven-point memorandum of 11 September 1950, which summarized the overall US position on the Japanese peace settlement. Apart from the confiscation of Japan’s overseas assets and the industrial equipment already received under the earlier punitive reparations policy, “all parties would waive [reparations] claims” (DOS 1976b, 1296–8). When this memorandum was circulated to the relevant governments, the Philippines immediately objected, citing the past “Japanese aggression.”10 Burma also expressed qualms, stressing the country’s economic difficulties, as well as the “damage done by the Japanese” and the “lack of Japanese assets present in Burma” that were available for seizure.11 At a later stage, Indonesia also expressed objections to the reparations clause envisioned by the US.12 Only the ROC and India, respectively on 19 December and 21 December 1950, acquiesced to Dulles’ no-reparations policy (DOS 1976b, 1373, 1383). One must note that the ROC was extremely unhappy about the noreparations policy. Indeed, Taipei’s legislative branch strongly demanded reparations from Japan. However, it was not until both China’s were excluded from the Japanese peace treaty in June 1951—which by the way explains why the ROC later had to negotiate a separate peace with Japan—that reparations became an explosive issue for Nationalist China. 9 Draft treaty of peace with Japan, 7 September 1949, RG59, A1 1230, Treaty-Draft9/07/1949, NARA. 10 Preliminary consideration of Japanese peace treaty, 27 September 1950, RG59, A1 1252, Philippines, NARA. 11 Memorandum of Conversation: Japanese peace treaty, 19 October 1950, RG59, A1 1252, Burma, NARA. 12 329: Cochran to Acheson, 28 August 1951, RG59, A1 1252, Netherlands, NARA.

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During the Japanese peace treaty negotiations between 1950 and 1951, the ROC government largely sought to conform its position with that of the US (Inoue 2010, 11–129). It is also noteworthy that the State Department since 1949 had been entertaining the idea of recognizing the PRC and letting ROC disappear, until the PRC intervention in Korea toward the end of 1950 and the subsequent public furor killed that prospect (Tucker 1983). Bluntly put, the ROC did not have much say on reparations. The Philippines, in contrast, played an instrumental role in the formulation of Article 14 and thus deserves close analysis. On 10 February 1951, the US Embassy in Manila cabled Washington that in light of the “terrible suffering” under Japan’s aggression, the Philippines demanded that Tokyo should pay approximately $8,000,000,000 worth of reparations in both in-kind and cash. In response, Dulles stressed that Japan’s economic reconstruction was necessary to anchor Tokyo to the West and fight communism, which in turn would benefit Manila. Dulles also explained “at length” the past difficulties with the German reparations question after WWI, as well as the post-WWII Italian and German reparations. Dulles added that the “only” way for Japan to pay reparations was for the US to foot the bill, which the American government did not want. In private, Dulles also doubted that the Philippines could put reparations to good use, citing Manila’s corruption. In short, reparations served no useful purpose, other than damaging Japanese and American economy (US Senate Committee on Foreign Relations 1976, 266–9).13 While it would be unjust to assume that all Filipinos took a hardline stance, the dominant sentiment forced the Filipino government to adamantly oppose the no-reparations formula. Although frustrated, Dulles could not ignore the Filipino viewpoint, as the Philippines was an important forward base for the US. In order to maintain bases in the Philippines, which became increasingly crucial after the communization of mainland China and outbreak of the Korean War, the US needed to ensure that the Philippines remained friendly to Washington (DOS 13 Joint meeting of Senate Committee on Foreign Relations and House Committee on Foreign Affairs attended by the Acting Secretary of Foreign Affairs on Saturday, 10 February 1951, on the proposed Japanese peace treaty, RG59, A1 1252, Philippines, NARA; Memorandum of Conversation (Dulles and Quirino), 12 February 1951, Ibid; Meeting with Far East Sub-Committee of Senate Foreign Relations Committee regarding a Japanese Peace Treaty, 19 March 1951, RG59, A1 1252, Congressional (Miscellaneous), 1950–52, NARA.

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1976b, 1515–20). The fact that the pro-US ruling party (Liberal Party) confronted formidable opposition from the Nacionalista Party, which tended to take a more independent line, and the militant Huk rebels further added urgency (Yoshikawa 1991, 18–20, 57). The US thus had to assist the Philippines in all permissible ways. Subsequently, in March 1951, Dulles began to entertain the idea of extending a security guarantee to the Philippines in return for the lenient reparations formula. Dulles correctly believed that one of the driving concerns for the Philippines was a possible Japanese re-aggression and that as long as this need was met, the reparations demand could be dampened.14 More importantly, in April 1951, Dulles moved away from his no-reparations formula and began to consider the possibility of obligating Japan to pay some reparations in the form of current production. This new formula was aimed at facilitating the flow of raw materials from Southeast Asia to Japan in exchange for the latter’s finished products to the former. In the long run, he hoped that this would revitalize trade between Japan and Southeast Asia (DOS 1977, 980). By June 1951, Dulles developed a new proposal, which became the backbone of Article 14. The new language stipulated that Japan would pay reparations, but only in the form of “manufacturing, salvaging and other services.” In other words, whatever finished products that the recipients needed would be provided by Japan. However, the raw material required for manufacturing them would be supplied by the recipients. Furthermore, no cash reparations would be provided. This formula effectively excluded the West as a beneficiary, as they were all advanced industrial societies and had no need for Japan’s manufacturing skills. The beneficiaries were essentially limited to Southeast Asia, which was industrially backwards but rich in natural resources. Dulles also added that reparations should neither interfere “with the economic reconstruction of Japan” nor impose any “additional liabilities on other Allied Powers,” which was another way of saying that the US had no intention of paying the bill.15 This new formula was adopted in the updated draft treaty of 14 June 1951 and would eventually make it into the final draft treaty (DOS 1977, 1120–32). 14 Dulles to MacArthur, 2 March 1951, RG59, A1 1252, Philippines, NARA. 15 Acheson (Dulles) to Cowen, 14 June 1951, RG59, A1 1252, Philippines, NARA;

3165: State Department to US Embassy in Manila, 14 June 1951, RG59, A1 1252, Manila I, NARA.

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There still remained two unresolved issues. To begin with, whereas the Philippines wished to stipulate Japan’s war guilt, the US opposed this. Secondly, whereas the Philippines wished to leave the door open for cash reparations, the US was absolutely opposed to this (Kang 2020, 152– 5). To break the impasse, the Philippines on 12 July 1951 suggested the following revision to Article 14: “It is recognized that Japan should pay reparations” for the “damage and suffering caused by it during the war.” This was a quasi-war guilt clause that did not bluntly state that Japan recognized its responsibility for the conflict. On 1 August 1951, the State Department accepted this proposal. Meanwhile, the Philippines aware that it did not have much leverage vis-à-vis the US finally relinquished its demands for cash reparations on 9 August 1951.16 The Philippines ultimately gave in, since it was dependent on the US for its economy and security. Also, Elpidio Quirino (President) and Carlos Romulo (Foreign Minister), the top decision-makers in the Philippines, unbeknownst to the public were supportive of the US policy toward Japan, including the need to rebuild Tokyo’s economy. Equally important is the fact that the priority for the Philippines had always been security. There was a genuine fear of the communist menace and a lingering concern about the possible resurgence of Japan as a military threat. For these two reasons, it persistently requested some form of security guarantee. Dulles shrewdly capitalized on this opportunity, demanding that the Philippines sign and ratify the US-led non-punitive Japanese peace treaty in return for US–Philippines security treaty, which was signed on 30 August 1951. Although not entirely happy, Manila believed that this was an acceptable trade-off (Yoshikawa 1991, 10–8, 23, 37–40, 52–57). It is worth noting while Western Europeans were largely in accord with the overall principles espoused by the US—rebuilding Japan in order to contain the Soviet bloc—they nevertheless had misgivings about Dulles’ lenient reparations approach. For instance, between January and June 1951, Britain sought to revise the reparations clause, demanding a war guilt clause and monetary form of reparations.17 London stressed that Japan’s past wrongdoings, especially the cruel treatment of POWs, were

16 164: Cowen to Acheson, 12 July 1951, RG59, A1 1252, Manila I, NARA; 390: Acheson to Cowen, 1 August 1951, Ibid; 569, 579: Cowen to Acheson, 9 August 1951, RG59, A1 1252, Manila II, NARA. 17 Treaty of Peace with Japan, 7 April 1951, FJ1022/222, FO371/92538, NA.

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“not forgotten and could not be wholly ignored in the treaty.”18 The US, however, stressed that the Allies had never been, and hence never would be, able to agree on reparations and that any reparations extraction from Japan would financially burden the US. Of course, Washington also stressed the need to rebuild Japan’s economy to combat communism. It also pointed out that it would be awkward to force Japan to pay reparations to Britain, when Dulles was trying to discourage the Philippines from making claims.19 Ultimately, Britain acquiesced and by June 1951, the argument between London and Washington over reparations ended. France also demanded revising the reparations clause. For reasons including the need for postwar economic revival for France proper and its colony in Southeast Asia, as well as discouraging future industrial competition with Japan, Paris wished to leave open the possibility of both in-kind and monetary forms of reparations. Hence, for instance, France insisted that Japan be held liable for repayment of prewar debts and repay French assets in Yokohama Specie Bank that were frozen during wartime. Furthermore, citing that there were not enough Japanese assets to be confiscated in France, Paris went far to argue that even Japan’s diplomatic properties, which usually have immunity, should be seized. Once again, for all the reasons explained above, the US rejected these demands (Hosoya et al. 2015, 35–63).20 In the case of the Netherlands, disagreements with the US over reparations continued well into 3 September 1951, a day before the peace conference. Pointing to the fact that there had been some “70,000” civilians, who had languished in Indonesia during the Japanese occupation, the Dutch government stressed that it could not ignore these victims. Unfortunately, while the Japanese peace treaty Article 16 provided for Japan’s responsibility to indemnify military POWs, no corresponding rights were acknowledged for civilian internees. The problem was that

18 6361: Gifford (Dulles) to Acheson, 4 June 1951, RG59, A1 1252, London, NARA. 19 Japanese peace treaty, 15 March 1951, FJ1022/133, FO371/92534, NA; Aide

Memoire: Japanese Peace Treaty, 16 March 1951, FJ1022/141, FO371/92534, NA; Discussion on points of substance in the Japanese peace treaty, 21 March 1951, FJ1022/121, AB21/3267, NA. 20 Allison to Dulles: French views on the Japanese peace treaty (Summary of French telegram regarding Japanese peace treaty), 4 May 1951; Memorandum of Conversation, 11 June 1951; French response to revised draft treaty, 24 July 1951; US response to French proposals, 8 August 1951 (RG59, A1 1252, France, NARA).

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the Dutch request opened the possibility of monetary reparations, which if accepted could induce other countries to demand similar treatment. Having worked tirelessly to dissuade the Philippines from demanding monetary compensation, the US could not accept this. At the same time, it could disrupt Dulles’ plans to establish trade links between Japan and Southeast Asia. Hence, while the Dutch position was understandable, it was ultimately rejected. As a token of concession, the treaty made a tacit acknowledgment that private Dutch individuals could demand compensation from Japan. The Netherlands had to content itself with this minor concession and pronouncing an express reservation at the San Francisco peace conference that private individuals still retained rights to reparations (DOS 1951, 197).21 In sum, many countries reluctantly acquiesced to US leadership. Of course, some states reacted strongly against it. Burma refused to sign the Japanese peace treaty on the grounds that it did not provide satisfactory reparations terms, while Indonesia signed but later negotiated another peace treaty for the same reason. Seoul was equally unhappy. South Korea continually stressed its “legitimate residual claims for reparations” and sought to leave open the possibility that Japan would pay reparations at a later date (DOS 1951, 97; Rhee Papers). The lesson here is that South Korea is not the only country that has grievances against Japan for the wartime past. Equally important is that the Japanese peace treaty made it extremely difficult for South Korea to obtain the kinds of reparations it envisioned. To begin with, the underlying assumption of Article 14 was that the beneficiaries would accept Japanese products, which was an anathema to Rhee and large segments of the Korean public. Furthermore, South Korea’s demands included payment of salaries that had been deferred during the war and return of the money that had been deposited in savings account in Japan (Chang 2014, 23–393). This constituted monetary payment, which the US had been adamantly against. Hence, even had South Korea signed the treaty and became a beneficiary, it is questionable if Seoul would have been able to obtain a truly satisfactory reparations from Japan.

21 Dutch response to 3 July 1951 draft treaty, 3 August 1951; Memorandum of Conversation, 3 August 1951; Response to Dutch requests of 3 August 1951 (10 August 1951); Aide-memoire, 16 August 1951; Aide-memoire, 23 August 1951; Memorandum of Conversation between Acheson and Stikker, 3 September 1951 (RG59, A1 1252, Netherlands, NARA).

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Conclusion While conventional understanding in Korea frames the various issues with Japan involving the past as being a bilateral problem—and at most an “Asian” problem—records indicate that it is much broader than that. The “history issues” between Korea and Japan partly stem from the fact that Seoul was excluded from the Japanese peace treaty. At the same time, this treaty adopted a somewhat indifferent view of Japan’s responsibility for war, thus drastically curtailing the prospects of reparations payment. It is important to remember that multiple countries were involved in making this treaty. The implication is that numerous countries played a role in contributing to Korea’s difficulty with Japan regarding the past. This in turn points to the need for a paradigm shift. Merely blaming Japan as lacking contriteness and failing to properly address the past is an oversimplified reading of history. At the same time, history points to the need to take a more international angle to better understand the quandary involving Japan’s wartime past. In other words, more needs to be said about Europeans and other Asians, who suffered under Japan’s past aggression, in addition to the experiences of Korean comfort women and laborers. The fact that countless number of Japanese nationals in Japan proper had also fallen victim to their own government’s wartime policies must also be remembered. These efforts to comprehend the true complexity of the historical developments regarding Japan’s past would surely contribute to a better understanding of what the problem is and hopefully facilitate finding a potential solution.

Bibliography Primary Sources Department of State (DOS). 1945. The Department of State Bulletin, Volume 8–318. Washington DC: Government Printing Office. ———. 1951. Conference for the Conclusion and Signature of the Treaty of Peace with Japan, San Francisco, California, September 4–8, 1951. ———. 1976a. Foreign Relations of the United States 1949, The Far East and Australasia Volume 7–2. ———. 1976b. FRUS 1950, East Asia and the Pacific, Volume 6. ———. 1977. FRUS 1951, Asia and the Pacific, Volume 6–1. ———. 1983. FRUS 1951, Korea and China, Volume 7–1.

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An Uneasy Marriage Between Territorial Sovereignty and the Cold War: Unconditional Surrender and Japan’s Search for a Uniform Perception of the San Francisco Peace Treaty Kyuhyun Jo

Introduction 70 years have passed since the San Francisco Peace Treaty was ratified (SFPT hereafter), but a clear agreement on the extent of Japan’s legal obligations still remains contested and disputed. The absence of the agreement rests on Japan’s ambiguous use of the SFPT in claiming sovereignty over Dokdo and the Kurile Islands, which, in turn, is rooted in the lack of a precise definition of “unconditional surrender.” While the ambiguity may have served as a useful expedient for America to turn Japan into an anti-Communist bastion in the Pacific and a solid national security policy, it also created the contradictory problem of repudiating the SFPT’s original commitment to demanding “unconditional surrender” through

K. Jo (B) Lecturer in Political Science, Yonsei University, Seoul, South Korea e-mail: [email protected]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2022 Y. Sugita and V. Teo (eds.), Rethinking the San Francisco System in Indo-Pacific Security, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-1231-3_8

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America’s offer of “residual sovereignty” to Japan over Okinawa and the Senkaku Islands. The imprecision renders the Treaty to be in a limbo between dual identities: a Treaty aimed at settling the terms of Japan’s surrender in World War II and a Treaty which served as a cornerstone for the foundation of the San Francisco System by serving as a groundwork for the U.S.-Japan security alliance. The main stake behind providing a clear definition to “unconditional surrender” is that it ascribes a firm identity to the SFPT as a post-war Treaty or a pre-Cold War Treaty and clarifies the problem of whether the SFPT’s role in originating the U.S.-Japan security alliance can be unequivocally reconciled with Japan’s desire to claim ownership over Dokdo and the Kurile Islands. Defining “unconditional surrender” is essentially a question of whether the SFPT can assume its legal position as an internationally definitive originator of the San Francisco System or as a nationally historical document serving as evidence of Japan’s claims to disputed territories. The main question which remains unanswered with respect to the tension between the international and national importance of the SFPT is: What is the source of the ambiguity confronting Japan’s understanding of the SFPT’s singular position within the territorial disputes and how has this ambiguity worked out to produce Japan’s approaches to Dokdo and the Kuriles? The main argument of this chapter is that because the United States originally did not specify the extent of “unconditional surrender” to mean only Japan’s military surrender or a full occupation of the country by Allied forces to contain the spread of Communism in the Asia–Pacific, Japan’s two different uses of the SFPT—as a historical evidence of territorial sovereignty regarding Dokdo and a negation of that very identity regarding the Kuriles—is a symptom of the ambiguity behind “unconditional surrender.” Japan can enhance its positional clarity in the disputes by precisely defining “unconditional surrender” and ascertaining the SFPT’s relevance to this objective. Japan can accordingly assign the SFPT a singular identity as a historical evidence of territorial sovereignty or an official instrument dictating terms of Japan’s surrender, whereby territorial concessions can better be understood as tools to dismantle Japanese imperialism. At the center of the ambiguity concerning the legal effect of the Treaty is the problem of territorial sovereignty, or more specifically, the problem of which islands belong to Japan and which do not strictly under the Treaty’s terms. The primary reason behind the persistence of diplomatic

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friction concerning these islands is because it has been difficult for Japan to maintain a consistent position with regard to how the SFPT ought to be conceived in relation to staking her claims on Dokdo and the Kurile Islands. On Dokdo, Japan argues that the SFPT’s Article 2 did not specify Dokdo as Korean territory, and because Shimane Prefecture “legally” incorporated Dokdo in 1905, it follows that Japan has the legal right by international law and historically must have sovereignty over Dokdo. Japan simultaneously rejects Korea’s presentation of pretwentieth-century evidence, such as royal annals and maps showing that Usando’s location is identical with the current location of Dokdo, which proves that Korean awareness of Dokdo had a long history before the advent of the SFPT. In other words, Japan mainly relies on international law and legal reasoning to argue for territorial sovereignty over Dokdo and excludes pre-twentieth-century evidence from Korea in handling her dispute over Dokdo. On the other hand, when Japan argues for her sovereignty over the Kurile Islands, Japan rejects the SFPT’s requirement that Japan must forfeit ownership over the Kurile Islands and instead, opts to rely on two nineteenth-century treaties—the Moscow Treaty (1855) and the Treaty of St. Petersburg (1875)—as key pieces of evidence to prove that Japan had territorial sovereignty before the signing of the SFPT. In other words, in contrast to Dokdo, Japan maintains that pre-twentieth-century historical evidence and the historicity of territorial sovereignty which preceded the SFPT are far more important than the legal demand of the SFPT that Japan must forfeit her territorial sovereignty as a consequence of her complete surrender to the Soviet Union in World War II. Every nation has the right to pursue its interests and utilize all evidence beneficial to proving the legitimacy of that right. However, that right is only valid and guaranteed contingent upon a maximum clarity of a nation’s ability to clearly identify unique functional identities to each relevant piece of evidence. Japan’s challenge is to formulate a standard and uniform logic with which she can clearly specify the position of the SFPT in advancing her claims to territorial sovereignty over Dokdo and the Kurile Islands. The principal challenge for Japan concerning the SFPT is that she must reconcile between her contention that the Treaty’s second Article is legally valid for Dokdo which is not explicitly mentioned in Article 2 and its contention that demanding a respect for the terms of a complete surrender to the Soviet Union is not legally binding compared with the Treaty of Shimoda and Treaty of St. Petersburg. From Japan’s

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perspective, resolving the disputes over Dokdo and the Kurile Islands must begin with placing a clear hierarchy between the SFPT’s identity as a piece of historical evidence regarding territorial sovereignty or as a reminder of Japan’s pledge to observe its complete surrender to the Allies. The fact that Article 2 is a consequence of the immense weight and influence of the latter might make it difficult for Japan to singularly focus on the former as the essence of the Article. In principle, deciding the SFPT’s position and singular identity within Japan’s logic of territorial sovereignty is also a question of whether Japan considers the SFPT as a piece of historical evidence for territorial sovereignty (Dokdo) or a respect for international law which binds Japan to respect the conditions for her total surrender to the Soviet Union (the Kurile Islands). In short, Japan’s logic toward territorial sovereignty, which has still yet to be organized with regard to the question of how much value she wishes to ascribe for the SFPT, has to be clarified by precisely defining “unconditional surrender” before engaging in the disputes regarding Dokdo and the Kurile Islands.

Methodology I will first briefly review the existing scholarly literature and then proceed to examine post-World War II history concerning the Dokdo/Takeshima and Kurile Island disputes to highlight their importance in KoreanJapanese and Russo-Japanese relations. I will show that Japan uses the SFPT as a historical evidence proving territorial sovereignty regarding Dokdo but discards the Treaty’s such identity regarding the Kuriles despite the fact that both Dokdo and the Kuriles are, respectively, clearly implied and defined in the Treaty itself. A main reason behind Japan’s use of the SFPT is because Japan’s pursuit of territorial sovereignty toward Dokdo and the Kuriles is intricately linked with a demand for Japan to directly confront its imperialist past and with the important right to control crucial economic resources such as natural gas and marine foodstuffs, rendering the territorial disputes as both historically and economically significant to Japan, Korea, and Russia. I will also show that the SFPT was an inherently geopolitical Treaty which was primarily concerned with establishing a new post-war international order in which the Asia–Pacific region and in particular, Japan, would be a pacifist and an anti-Communist ally of the United States because the United States perceived Japan as the ultimate bulwark against Communism’s spread in

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East Asia, possibly initiated and encouraged by China and the Soviet Union. Japan must take this feature of the Treaty into account while deciding on her official stance concerning the SFPT. I will then assess the importance of unconditional surrender as a precondition for the making of the SFPT. The weight of unconditional surrender is such that it is a crucial factor linking Dokdo and the Kuriles as territories which Japan has to forfeit as a major consequence of her surrender. However, because the exact nature of “unconditional surrender,” or more specifically, the question of whether it only applied to the Japanese military’s surrender or extended to allow for the Allies to reorganize Japan’s territorial limits as a consequence of that surrender was never clarified, Japan’s two radically different uses of Article 2 are symptoms of Japan inheriting America’s failure to clearly define “unconditional surrender,” rather than simply a choice borne out of national interest. The fundamental challenge for Japan concerning the SFPT is that Japan must specify what the burden of “unconditional surrender” means in relation to Article 2, since Japan has yet to decide on what the Treaty singularly means in principle as a post-war Treaty with regard to post-World War II territorial distributions. Ultimately, I will argue that Japan’s main challenge of deciding the SFPT’s precise identity in connection with the territorial disputes is essentially a question of figuring out the precise meaning and intention behind “unconditional surrender,” since “unconditional surrender” is the key requirement which prevents the Treaty from assuming a dual identity as a historical evidence for territorial sovereignty concerning Dokdo and as an instrument of surrender compelling Japan to forfeit the Kuriles as a consequence of her defeat by the Allies. Even if the contentious issues of whether Dokdo is a constituent of Ulleungdo and whether the “Kuriles” mean just Habomai or Shikotan Islands or includes Etorofu are disregarded, it is still true that both Dokdo and the Kuriles were by Article 2’s implication, territories which Japan had to cede to Korea and Russia as a direct consequence of Japan’s acquiescence to the Allies’ vision of peace. Moreover, forfeiting these territories was a necessary condition to render the SFPT into a central cornerstone for transforming Japan from the United States’ former enemy to a hub of an anti-Communist Pacific. Therefore, considering the immense weight and pressure of unconditional surrender imprinted upon Article 2, and considering the general geopolitical purpose of the Treaty to transform Japan into a reliable American ally in preparation for the coming of the Cold War, relying on the Treaty’s

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second Article’s silence about Dokdo as a signal that Japan has the right to own Dokdo does not square neatly with Japan’s refusal to forfeit the Kuriles. Japan’s primary task is to free itself from being in a limbo between a desire to use the SFPT as historical evidence to claim territorial sovereignty and the historical purpose of the SFPT as a Treaty spelling out precise conditions for Japan’s surrender during World War II and transformation into a prime Cold War ally for the United States in East Asia. Japan has to explain how it can afford to ignore the weight of unconditional surrender while claiming the Kurile Islands at the expense of emphasizing Article 2 to claim Dokdo when such a weight exerts itself throughout the SFPT and defines the SFPT’s essential purpose. Japan’s first step toward resolving the disputes on Dokdo and the Kuriles may lie not in clarifying and arguing her positions on the territories, but on the meaning, function, and influence of “unconditional surrender” in relation to Article 2.

A Brief Review of the Recent Scholarship on Dokdo and the Kuriles and the Significance of the Main Argument The English-language secondary literature on Japan’s territorial disputes is growing in timely response to the development of Japan’s territorial disputes concerning Dokdo and the Kuriles. On Dokdo, Min-kyo Goo, Kimie Hara, and Alexander Bukh have discussed political and social histories behind Korea and Japan’s dispute during the twentieth century. However, they do not focus on the function of “unconditional surrender” as the ultimate basis for which the Allies’ demands were translated into the SFPT’s Articles or understand “unconditional surrender” as the precondition for the United States’ intention to develop the SFPT into a blueprint for making Japan into an anti-Communist hub in the Asia–Pacific region. Although Goo addresses the disputes’ international dimension by relating Dokdo with the Diaoyus’ dispute, Goo focuses on the disputes’ current structures by diagnosing possibilities for reconciliation without examining why and how the disputes are prolonged due to Japan’s inconsistent behavior in the three disputes (Goo 2009). Hara and Bukh make explicit connections between the Treaty and the Cold War and correctly understand the ambiguity concerning Dokdo with regard to Article 2, but

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they do not explain how interpreting unconditional surrender as a critical linkage between the SFPT’s character as a post-World War II Treaty and a pre-Cold War Treaty allows for the coexistence of the Treaty’s two major inherent characteristics (Hara 2007, 2015; Bukh 2014). On the Kuriles, John Stephan first examined the territorial disputes between Japan and Russia and recently, Paul Richardson has shown how the Kuriles’ dispute is part of an ongoing search for Russia’s national identity as an East Asian nation and a contest with Japan to present a new map for a national frontier (Stephan 1974; Richardson 2018). However, because both scholars mostly focus on political developments concerning the Kurile Islands disputes rather than the significance of unconditional surrender in the context of the Allies’ decision to designate Russian sovereignty over the Kuriles, the issue of how strongly Japan is legally bound to observe the demand of ceding the Kuriles because unconditional surrender serves as bridge between SFPT’s nature as a post-World War II Treaty and a pre-Cold War Treaty is not substantially addressed. Hiroshi Kimura’s The Kurillian Knot (Kimura 2008) provides a comprehensive historical account of Japanese-Russian relations since the late nineteenth century, but his discussion of the San Francisco Peace Conference focuses primarily on the conference’s outcome regarding the Kurile Islands and does not delve deeply into the question of how “unconditional surrender” is related to Article 2’s demand for Japan to forfeit its control over the Kuriles in favor of the Soviet Union. Similarly, Kimie Hara’s discussion of the Kurile Islands in Cold War Frontiers in the Asia– Pacific (Hara 2007) and Konstantin Sarkisov’s examination of Russia’s negotiations with Japan over the Kuriles in the twentieth century (Sarkisov 2015), while informative in providing an overview of the Kurile Islands dispute since the end of World War II, does not comparatively analyze Japan’s position on Dokdo and the Kuriles from the perspective of understanding the influence of unconditional surrender upon Article 2. In short, the main lacuna commonly found in the secondary literature on Dokdo and the Kuriles is that it has yet to analyze the significance of “unconditional surrender” in allowing for the two chief characteristics to coexist within the SFPT and understand Article 2 as a direct product of the demand for unconditional surrender. Understanding the ambiguity of “unconditional surrender” not only allows for a precise understanding of why Article 2 remains contentious among Japan and her East Asian neighbors, but also allows for the identification of a precise cause behind Japan’s assignment of two different

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identities for Article 2 beyond the generic cause of differences in historical backgrounds. Such differences can be found in any territorial dispute and do not independently explain why Japan has to apply different strategies toward Article 2 due to the Article’s specific details. Accordingly, this paper will examine “unconditional surrender” and argue that the ongoing controversy surrounding Article 2’s designation of Dokdo and the Kuriles’ statuses stems directly from the fact that Japan inherited America’s original failure to clearly define and determine a specifically Japanese content of “unconditional surrender.”

The SFPT’s Silence About Dokdo’s Status and Continuing Tensions Between Korea and Japan The SFPT is silent about territorial sovereignty over Dokdo because it mentions nothing about Japan’s post-war obligations toward her Asian neighbors who suffered from brutal and inhumane violence, deplorable living conditions, and Japan’s will to industrialize while sacrificing the enormous amount of blood that Korean, Chinese, and Southeast Asian laborers shed. The Treaty’s silence on Japan’s role in executing post-war international justice remains the core source of controversy and tension between Seoul and Tokyo. Although the Treaty demanded that Japan forfeit claims to all of her colonial possessions, the Treaty was ambiguous about whether Dokdo was included among such possessions. However, the ambiguity must not mean that the intention behind placing the ambiguity is also incomprehensible. The SFPT’s silence on the issue of Dokdo was partially due to Korea not being invited to voice concerns about the Treaty’s terms and largely because the SFPT was an American blueprint for a post-war East Asian international order placing Japan as the core of an anti-Communist bloc against potential Communist aggression (Price 2001, 56). The Treaty’s intention won much support from the British Commonwealth because Australia, Canada, and New Zealand wished to have considerable influence in drafting and ratifying the Treaty. The United States could also rely on most South American nations as “neo-colonial” clients of Washington (Price 2001, 56). With a pro-American majority opinion secured, there were almost no obstructions to make the SFPT become a post-World War II scheme for a pro-American East Asian order around a capitalist and an industrialized Japan.

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Fulfilling this blueprint was quintessential for Washington such that the administration of post-war justice upon Japan for her war crimes against Asian nations and American prisoners-of-war was not critically discussed. The Treaty was originally an American-led settlement ensuring that Japan could be excused from paying reparations to Asian victims of her imperialism so the United States could quickly employ Japan as a Pacific buffer against potential Soviet threats in East Asia. Since the primacy of forming a Pacific anti-Communist security zone to render the ocean into an “American lake” was more urgent than settling post-war indemnities, the United States did not feel obligated to invite Asian countries which had suffered under direct or semi-Japanese occupation, denying them the right to examine the Treaty’s contents, let alone place their signatures. Naturally, Korea was uninvited to observe or participate in the SFPT conference. Korea’s absence in the conference, which translated into Korea’s failure to inspect whether Dokdo is under Korean jurisdiction, has been the core cause of controversy between Seoul and Tokyo. Since the 1950s, various Japanese grassroots movements petitioned the national government to guarantee fishing rights and open fishing areas near Dokdo to sustain Shimane Prefecture’s fishing industry (Kim 2010, 17). However, despite incessant pressure from Japanese grassroots campaigns, Dokdo irrevocably remains indisputably as South Korean territory because Syngman Rhee demarcated Dokdo as such out of dissatisfaction with the United States’s soft diplomatic postures toward Japan (Bukh 2014, 115–133). Rhee’s assertion that he would order the South Korean military to confront the Japanese first rather than the Chinese should they invade South Korea during the Korean War was probably a public gesture than a reflection of his sincere thoughts. Nevertheless, Rhee’s desire to replace the MacArthur Line with the Rhee Line to mark Dokdo as South Korean territory has served to continue rather than end the dispute over Dokdo because it is an important reminder of South Korea’s need to ceaselessly assert national sovereignty over the islands into the early twenty-first century, while for Japan, it has served as a prime object against which it has launched protests claiming that South Korea is illegally occupying Dokdo (Price 2001, 44). The controversy surrounding South Korea’s declaration of the Rhee line does not just concern the question of whether Korea or Japan gets to own Dokdo, but has also served as a marker to promote Japan’s attempts

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to claim it as Takeshima, and in turn, Korea’s active civic engagement to counter Japan’s such attempts. Although Japan’s civic groups and fishermen in Shimane Prefecture demanded the return of Takeshima ever since the conclusion of the SFPT and Prime Minister Shinzo Abe made recent attempts to promote nationalism concerning Dokdo—reflecting Right-wing nationalistic views, asking deliberately worded questions about Dokdo and trying to win intra-cabinet support to revise the Japanese Constitution to enable the creation of a standing national military—to reject Korean sovereignty over Dokdo before 1905, South Korea has stiffly countered the attempt through an extensive network of civilian activism (Bukh 2014; Kwon and Benham 2016). Since 1987, Korean civilian groups have actively asserted Korean sovereignty over Dokdo, protesting Japanese claims to the territory and calling for a separate administrative status for the island. Similarly, at a governmental level, Korea consistently issued numerous protests to the Japanese embassy throughout the early 2000s. The South Korean government even recalled the South Korean ambassador to Japan upon hearing Japan’s intent to revise high school history textbooks in favor of Japan’s historically inaccurate assertion of sovereignty over Dokdo. South Korea has authorized military training exercises and increased military security around the island (Choi 2005, 483–488). Along with tensions regarding Japan’s perception about its imperialist past, an ongoing competition for natural resources found in seas near Dokdo is another major reason for the dispute. The bodies of water surrounding Dokdo are filled with gas hydrates convertible into 600 million tons of LNG, enough to supply the South Korean population for 30 years. South Korea believes that protecting Dokdo is vital to her energy security because Japan wishes to develop the seas adjacent to Dokdo as a potential energy hub. South Korea has been trying to compensate for a missed chance to assert territorial sovereignty nearly seven decades ago. She has left practical imprints of ownership over the island through direct military occupation, verbal renunciations of Japan’s attempt to classify Dokdo as its national territory, and safeguarding a strategic and an economically valuable resource (Hankyeore 2005).

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The Kurile Islands and the Primacy of Cold War Realpolitik Over Unconditional Surrender If Japan’s controversy with Korea stems from the SFPT’s omission of Japan’s post-war obligations, Russia has continuously demanded a “victor’s justice” to counter Japan’s rejection of the SFPT’s requirement that Japan forfeits the Kuriles in exchange for the four central islands comprising the Japanese mainland. The Cairo Declaration had banned territorial expansion and declared that Japan would be expelled from territories she had taken “by violence and greed” (FRUS 1943, 448–449). However, during the Yalta Conference, the United States and the United Kingdom favored giving the Soviet Union control over the Kuriles as a reward for assisting the Allies in defeating Japan. Nevertheless, the Cold War’s rapidly looming shadow and rising tensions between Moscow and Washington made Japanese reconciliation with Moscow highly undesirable, as the Soviets might demand a removal of U.S. presence on Okinawa in exchange for Soviet recognition of Japanese sovereignty over the Kurile Islands (Hara 1998, 42). Therefore, although the SFPT demanded that Japan must renounce her rights over the Kuriles and portions of Sakhalin as a direct consequence of its unconditional surrender, Cold War realpolitik gained primacy over observing legal stipulations shortly after the Treaty’s ratification. Washington feared that a détente between Moscow and Tokyo would increase Soviet influence in East Asia and the Third World, inspire decolonization and anti-colonial movements across these regions, and upset the balance of power against the West (Hara 2001, 367). Moreover, since Tokyo was eager to penetrate into the Chinese market, American officials feared that a successful negotiation between Tokyo and Moscow would give Tokyo confidence to reconcile with Beijing, an undesirable scenario for Washington due to American involvement in the Korean War and containment toward Beijing (Hara 2001, 367). Moreover, when Tokyo began negotiations with Moscow, the Taiwan Strait Crisis suggested that Washington still needed her most reliable partner in the Pacific to continue containing Beijing’s influence in the region. Hence, the United States promised Japan that she would continue supporting Japan’s claim to Dokdo and the Kuriles if Japan could continue containing China and the Soviet Union on the United States’s behalf (Hara 2001, 367). Considering that the prime American objective in post-war Japan throughout the Cold War was to aid Japan’s rise as a leader of Asian

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capitalism and anti-Communistic democracy, the guarantee of national security and regional peace in the Pacific became Japan’s insurance policy in exchange for American recognition of Japan’s rights to claim the disputed territories (Gallicchio 1991, 69–101). However, Tokyo’s conclusion of her agreement with Moscow in 1956 and entry into a security alliance with Washington four years later meant that Japan had to choose between having some of the Kuriles or losing sovereignty over Okinawa in exchange for America’s defense of the Pacific. Tokyo still believed that asserting territorial sovereignty and historical nationalism were more important than regional and national security. Washington added more confusion by sending a mixed message about the Yalta Agreement and the SFPT, stating that while the Agreement didn’t have any “legal effect in transferring territories by the Powers which had signed it,” the SFPT didn’t allow Japan to transfer sovereignty over territories Japan had to renounce (U. S. Department of State 1956, 484). Although the Soviet Union did not sign the SFPT, per the Yalta Agreement, she was not obliged to return the Kuriles to Japan. Yet, simultaneously, Tokyo was not allowed to demand any island of the Kuriles if Japan observed the SFPT’s binding power. Japan’s post-World War II identity as a chief aggressor had made her become a sitting duck. Thus, Japan failed to walk away from the negotiation table with full satisfaction. Although the agreement officially ended a state of war between Tokyo and Moscow, there was no peace Treaty between them; the Soviet promise to return Habomai and Shikotan to Japan still remains as a pendulum inside a ticking clock, uncertain about the direction of its final sway. The fundamental problem which Japan should address is that its refusal to adhere to the SFPT’s requirement to forfeit the Kuriles constitutes a refusal to uphold Japan’s agreement to fully observe its unconditional surrender to the Allies. Although Japan regularly cites the Shimoda Treaty (1855), which stated that the southern Kuriles would belong to Japan and the northern Kuriles would be under Russian jurisdiction, and the St. Petersburg Treaty (1875), which stipulated that Russia would return the Kuriles to Japan in exchange for Japan’s relinquishment of Sakhalin, the treaties’ binding power is questionable for Russia, since Japan does not accept the Soviet Union’s full occupation of the islands as a consequence of Japan’s total surrender to the Allies on September 2, 1945 (Njoroge 1985, 500). Moreover, although the SFPT did not distinguish between North and South Kurile Islands, that Japan has to forfeit either of the

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islands is clearly stated. Such a demand aimed to confirm a suitable postWorld War II balance of power for the Allies, and according to the Yalta Agreement, the U.S.S.R. was entitled to demand unconditional surrender from Japan. Although Japan argues that the Soviets had illegally occupied the islands because Moscow had violated the 1941 Neutrality Pact, the Soviets had nullified that Treaty by accepting the Allies’ invitation to participate in ending the war, leaving the Yalta Agreement’s binding power intact (Trenin and Weber 2012, 5). In short, Japan’s forfeiture of the Kuriles, either in whole or in part, is a direct consequence of “unconditional surrender” and proves that the authority of the SFPT derives from its status as the heir of the Yalta Agreement. Japan’s charge that the U.S.S.R. could not force Japan to abide by the SFPT’s terms because Moscow never signed it is valid, but the bigger question is that such a charge alone does not explain why Japan must not abide by a Treaty which the rest of the Big Four had authorized (Mack and O’Hare 1990, 380–394). Furthermore, because the U.S.S.R. was authorized to receive the Kuriles via the Yalta Agreement, the Soviets occupied them to enforce unconditional surrender upon Japan (Yalta Agreement 1945). Since Japan accepted unconditional surrender, Japan consequently also accepted the Soviet occupation. Japan must explain why she could afford to ignore the SFPT if the Treaty’s chief purpose was to specify terms under which her unconditional surrender to the Allies would be effective. Another thorny issue is that the Kuriles’ precise identity is still hotly contested. While the Japanese want all of the Kuriles, the Russians only wish to cede the northern portion. The question of how the sum of individual islands holistically constitutes a “national territory” suggests that the Soviet-Japanese agreement’s validity on ceding only the northern islands is still subject to future debates. Consequently, whether the U.S.S.R.’s promise of returning two of the Kurile Islands constitutes a concession to Tokyo or a half-recovery of territorial sovereignty from Tokyo’s perspective is also left unanswered (Murthy 1964, 298–302; Kapur 2012, 390–394). Although there was a brief thaw when Boris Yeltsin offered to reach a compromise, public opinion in the Kuriles remained sharply divided (Okuyama 2003, 48). A rapid rise of Russian nationalism and the desire to make Russia a great power also nullified the effort. Moreover, Russia’s unrestricted access to the Ohotsk Sea and a booming fishing industry which regularly yields a diverse catch casts doubt on an early reconciliation. The ambiguity is compounded

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by Japan and Russia’s economic interdependence. Japan desires access to ample supplies of Russian natural gas and oil, and Russia desires Japan’s continued investment to facilitate an easier extraction of those resources and profits from selling them to Japan (Chang 1998, 179 and 181– 182). Nationalism and economic pragmatism maintain a shaky balance supported by a highly sensitive pivot of territorial sovereignty. What seems certain is that Japan will not forfeit her quest to “recover” the territories soon and neither will her fellow disputants. The territorial disputes are not just political questions, but social problems for which many Japanese civilian groups have rallied to demand a stronger position from the Japanese government. Japanese grassroots campaigns to win international recognition have focused on recovering fishing rights around the seas of the disputed territories, since many communities near them primarily rely on fishing and maritime trade. Furthermore, because Japan shares a common interest with her East Asian neighbors in securing energy resources stored in seas around the territories, the disputes are battles to claim a monopoly over strategic natural resources which could promote a sustainable development of alternative sources of energy and the national economy. The next section will examine “unconditional surrender” and how the lack of a precise definition is the root of the disputes. It will also argue that by providing an accurate definition of “unconditional surrender,” Japan can better clarify the exact position and nature of the SFPT in reference to Dokdo and the Kuriles, which will be a major step forward in helping Korea and Russia better understand Japan’s positions and perception of the SFPT.

The Burden of Unconditional Surrender as the Critical Linkage Between the SFPT as a Post-World War II Treaty and a Pre-Cold War Treaty While the conflict described in the previous section may be due to different national interests, the ambiguity of “unconditional surrender” and how it impacts Dokdo and the Kuriles may be the conflict’s root cause. Japan contends that because Dokdo was the only Korean territory not explicitly mentioned, Japan retains the right to claim Takeshima. On the other hand, Japan believes that the Kuriles ought to remain under its jurisdiction in observance of the Shimoda Treaty and the Treaty of

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St. Petersburg. There is an inherent tension behind Japan’s official claim that it has a right to claim the Kuriles based on two preceding treaties in the nineteenth century despite the SFPT’s clear specification that Japan had to forfeit them and Japan’s claim that Dokdo can be contested even though it had agreed to forfeit Ulleungdo, the island adjacent to Dokdo and the only representative, livable space denoting Dokdo as a territory contingent to Ulleungdo. The fundamental question which lies at the heart of both stances is what constitutes proper and official historical evidence and how does the SFPT function as such? Contextual differences on the two territories’ histories aside, the fundamental tension lies in the question of what exactly constitutes historical evidence for claiming territorial sovereignty, for if only the issue of whether a country can produce pre-twentiethcentury historical evidence is concerned, Korea, like Japan, possesses many kinds of historical evidence, from Il-yeon’s Sam-kuk Sagi’ s discussion of Usando (Dokdo) to Mun-heon bi-go (An Encyclopedia of Korean Culture and Customs) (Mayali and Yoo 2018, 531–578). Yet, while Japan ascribes primacy to the SFPT as undeniable proof of sovereignty regarding Dokdo, Japan nullifies the SFPT’s status regarding the Kuriles. It relies primarily on the Treaty of Shimoda and Treaty of St. Petersburg because it was through these two treaties that Japan affirmed ownership of the southern Kuriles in exchange for acknowledging Russia’s occupation of Sakhalin (Treaty of Shimoda 1855; Treaty of St. Petersburg 1875). Fundamentally, Japan’s two stances are in direct conflict with both Dokdo and the Kuriles’ statuses. Regarding Dokdo, the SFPT only lists Quelpart and Dagelet as examples representing Korea’s island territories, which in actuality numbers up to 3000 and declares that Ulleungdo ought to be Korean territory. Furthermore, Japan is compelled to relinquish the Kuriles in part or whole; even if it is not clarified whether “Kuriles” means the southern or northern half of the archipelago, it is clear that Japan has to forfeit at least either half of the archipelago as a consequence of her surrender to the Allies. In short, the territorial disputes, observed purely from the SFPT’s terms alone, is a question of whether Japan does or does not consider the SFPT as a whole to be a legitimate historical document such that Japan is ready to accept and recognize all of its terms. However, the conflict between Japan’s different treatments of the SFPT is not simply a reflection of Japan’s intention to use the document according to her national interests, but a deeper question of how Japan interprets the ultimate source of the SFPT’s legally binding power:

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unconditional surrender. The tension between Japan’s attempt to use the SFPT as a historical document confirming territorial sovereignty over Dokdo and its rejection of the same document in discussions about the Kuriles is not simply due to the radically different historical circumstances in which Japan is disputing the territories. A consideration of individual circumstantial differences alone, while potentially helpful in understanding the historical backgrounds and causes behind territorial disputes, is not specifically aimed at explaining why common factors seen in contextually different factors exist, for circumstantial differences can only explain what such differences are and why they happen, and do not serve to explain common roots as rigorously as the differences. Japan’s different uses of the SFPT and their conflicting natures can be understood as a difficulty with reconciling between the fact that the SFPT was simultaneously a post-war Treaty and a pre-Cold War Treaty. The United States’ interest in securing Okinawa as a military base in 1956 only further obfuscated the difficulty, for it was in effect, a tacit American concurrence and acceptance of Japan’s dual use of the SFPT regarding Dokdo and the Kurile Islands. The Americans exchanged Okinawa’s transformation into a military base for Japan’s right to exercise “residual sovereignty” over Okinawa, the Ryukyu Islands, and Senkaku Islands (known as Diaoyudao in China). The Americans conceded “residual sovereignty” to Japan in order to keep Japan’s southern islands as a chief base for anti-Communistic operations, use Okinawa as an American military base, and curb anti-American sentiment as Japan was recovering her economy and morale (Blanchard 2000, 98–99). In short, America’s concession of “residual sovereignty” marked a self-repudiation of the SFPT’s commitment to enforcing “unconditional surrender.” The existence of such an exception to the rule of unconditionally accepting all terms of the SFPT as a post-war document stands in glaring contradiction to the fact that the Kuriles are a product of this very rule while Okinawa and the Ryukyus were not mentioned either as examples or exceptions to the same rule. Another related problem is that the core issue which allows for the coexistence of these two different identities is that the Treaty was written under the assumption that Japan would accept all of its terms because they were products of Japan’s unconditional surrender. The signing of the U.S.-Japan Security Treaty in 1960 helped clarify the SFPT’s categorization as a post-war Treaty in that the SFPT was specifically aimed at

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addressing terms of surrender related to World War II, but the interconnected nature of “post-war” and “pre-Cold War” in terms of chronology suggests that the former still cast a deep shadow over the latter (Jo 2021, 98–113). Taking this particular assumption and interconnectivity into consideration, the general purpose of Article 2 can be understood as a mechanism to tie the assumption and interconnectivity together by specifying territories which Japan had to cede to its former colonies as a consequence of Japan’s agreement to unconditionally surrender to the Allies. Although Japan’s conflicts with Korea and Russia seem to primarily lie in the status or definition of Dokdo or the Kuriles, the real gist of the problem is that Article 2 cannot be independent from the two overarching major issues of the period in which the SFPT was drafted: assuring Japan’s capitulation and its subsequent transformation into a Cold War ally of the United States. However, despite possessing such important dual functions, the essential controversial legacy which the United States left behind through the SFPT is that neither a clear definition nor substance of “unconditional surrender” as it applied to Japan were provided. While “surrender” amounted to a complete military surrender of Japanese forces to the United States, the real source of controversy concerning Article 2 lies not so much with what it states or does not state, but with the actual extent to which “unconditional” can be applied, and whether Japan is willing to link “unconditional” to Article 2’s contents. Although there was a general agreement within American political and military circles that Japan had to be forced to capitulate, there was never a clearly determined or agreed definition of “unconditional surrender.” A major reason behind such an ambiguity is because the United States was not completely certain whether “unconditional surrender” would be sufficiently addressed through an elimination of the Axis’ war power (Ando 1987, 13). Until September 1945, a heated debate ensued between the U.S. military and State Department officials about whether “unconditional surrender” would only feature a military surrender featuring Japanese generals officially acknowledging defeat or have a more expansive and important ramification of becoming a license for the United States to impose a more lasting and direct influence on Japan through a formal occupation (Villa 1976, 66–92). Furthermore, American public opinion was torn between whether Japan’s emperor system had to be retained or eliminated and although MacArthur would eventually retain the system because it was in his

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authority to determine as such, it was not “unconditional surrender” in itself which made such a decision obvious or a matter of fact (Brands 2005, 431–457; Borton 1947, 255). Most importantly, although the Instrument of Surrender had demanded “a complete acceptance of the Potsdam Declaration,” because the Declaration stated that the fate of “minor islands” shall be determined by the Allies, it remains unclear what the silence of Article 2 on Dokdo actually means from the perspective of “unconditional surrender” and whether “unconditional surrender” implies that Japan can interpret the silence on its own. The urgency of pacifying Japan as an end in itself was such that the precise form that “unconditional surrender” should assume was never fully agreed in the United States, which was essentially responsible for originating the term, and excluded the question of whether Japan’s post-war territorial arrangements were going to be part of “unconditional surrender” (Hasegawa 2011, 254). Ultimately, as historian Michael Schaller argues, “unconditional surrender” turned out to be a license for the United States to direct Japan to focus on containing Communism in Asia. The debate on “unconditional surrender,” concluded, at least in the United States, with the initiation of Dean Acheson’s vision of a “great anti-Communist crescent” that would stretch from Japan to India to actualize a pan-Pacific bulwark against potential Chinese and Soviet aggression (Schaller 1987). The United States’ almost exclusive focus on assuring Japan’s military surrender ironically meant that because the consequences of the surrender could not be foreseen or expected, the United States had given itself considerable leeway in determining Japan’s post-war condition as the White House saw strategically fit in direct response to the emerging specter of the Cold War. Shortly after the SFPT was ratified, John Dulles, the Treaty’s main architect, made it no big secret that the United States wished to mold Japan into a reliable anti-Communist ally, and that it was a necessity for which the Treaty itself owed its very existence (Dulles 1952, 175–187). The importance of securing the alliance was such that one political scientist has even argued that “unconditional surrender” was deliberately designed to ban any discussions about territorial arrangements and render such issues as auxiliary and even unimportant (Chase 1955, 268, 279). Put differently, the United States did not clarify Dokdo’s status and agreed to cede the Kuriles to the Soviet Union because these choices would prevent Japan from being overly distracted with sorting out its post-colonial controversies with Korea,

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appease the Soviets by presenting them with a prize from the spoils of war, which would in turn buy time for the United States concentrate building up Japan’s defense system against the Soviets to enable Japan to contain the spread of Soviet Communism in the Pacific with Japan’s own initiative (Miller 2019, 138). Therefore, despite the fact that the United States had insufficient information on Dokdo to confidently judge Korean or Japanese sovereignty over the territory, it was still advantageous for America to leave the status of Dokdo indeterminate at the expense of clearly declaring Japan’s need to cede the Kuriles to the Soviet Union because doing so would expedite America’s more important problem of quickly directing Japan’s focus and energies toward containing the Soviet Union. The primacy of geopolitical stability in East Asia by offering Japan as a main pivot in the region to balance America’s influence with that of the Soviet Union in world affairs was such that a specifically Japanese content of “unconditional surrender” was less important than determining the fact that Japan’s surrender to the United States would enable the latter to direct the former to countering Communism on the latter’s behalf. In short, Japan’s principal challenge concerning its interpretation of Article 2 lies in the question of whether Japan would be ready to “unconditionally” accept even implicit arguments in Article 2 that Dokdo and the Kuriles had to be forfeited, regardless of the question of what constitutes “Dokdo” and the “Kuriles.” Considering America’s goal of securing Japan as the primary antiCommunist base in the Pacific and the Japanese goal of securing American military protection of Japan ultimately proved to be useful to both Washington and Tokyo as it allowed for the United States and Japan to concentrate on formulating a security alliance in preparation for the Cold War. Therefore, “unconditional surrender” was a mutually beneficial token for both countries to maintain a simultaneous grip on the regional stability of the Asia–Pacific and Japanese national security. However, with regard to the ongoing territorial disputes, providing a precise definition to “unconditional surrender” may hold the ultimate key to reconciling Japan’s different and conflicting uses of the SFPT despite the fact that both the “silence” of Article 2 regarding Dokdo and the Article’s explicit instruction to forfeit the Kuriles are consequences of unconditional surrender. Japan’s invocation of the SFPT as historical evidence for territorial sovereignty for Dokdo but does not bestow the same status on the SFPT regarding the Kuriles despite the fact that both issues emerge from the same Article does not simply reflect realpolitik and a pursuit

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of national interests, but is a symptom and a consequence of America’s original failure to sufficiently and clearly deal with the task of concretely specifying a uniquely Japanese content of “unconditional surrender.” Article 2’s real and most critical shortcoming is not simply its failure to clarify whether Dokdo is unequivocally Korean or Japanese territory, but a failure to resolve Article 2’s inherent logical contradiction between designating Japan’s forfeiture of the Kuriles as a consequence of Japan’s surrender to the Allies despite the Truman Administration’s belief that the Kuriles were Japanese territories and leaving Dokdo’s status ambiguous despite acknowledging that Ulleungdo, the directly adjacent island to Dokdo and the latter’s representative livable space, is Korean territory. Therefore, the relationship between the previous section and the current one can be summarized in the following way: the previous section reinforces a crucial need for Japan to specify burden of “unconditional surrender” because the failure to do so created two major repercussions— transforming the territorial disputes into bargaining chips for the United States to create an anti-Communist Pacific and Japan, and on unleashing a heated debate of nationalist passions and a competition over the control of untapped yet highly valuable natural resources to serve as major engines for a national economy. The current section demonstrates that the original American failure to provide a concrete definition was the root cause of ambiguity and Japan’s two different usages of Article 2 can be seen as a symptom of that very failure.

Conclusion Dokdo and the Kuriles are representative examples illustrating how complicated and thorny territorial sovereignty is as a post-colonial and post-war issue. The complexity is such that Japan utilizes the SFPT in two radically different ways. On Dokdo, Japan uses the document as a legitimate piece of historical evidence for its claim of territorial sovereignty while rejecting Korean historical documents prior to the signing of the SFPT, but with regard to the Kuriles, she rejects the very identity she ascribes to the Treaty during the Dokdo dispute and rejects that identity, inscribing it instead to the Shimoda Treaty and the Treaty of St. Petersburg. While such a strategy may be conceived as proper in pursuit of national interests, Japan’s strategy is a symptom of the United States’ original failure to define and clarify the extent of “unconditional surrender,” the very concept which the SFPT was meant to embody to the Allies.

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More specifically, because the United States had failed to clarify whether “unconditional surrender” only applied to the Japanese military or a reorganization of Japanese territory as a reflection of its surrender, the issue of whether the SFPT could be used as evidence for territorial sovereignty was also left unanswered. The ambiguity concerning “unconditional surrender” was a useful expedient for the United States to prevent regionalism in East Asia by rendering Japan into a major anti-Communist base against potential Soviet and Chinese aggression. The ambiguity was also beneficial for Japan to prepare a solid strategy for national security by obtaining American military protection. However, with regard to Japan’s ongoing disputes over Dokdo and the Kuriles, the ambiguity has proven to be a considerable impediment, for the inconclusive status of Dokdo and binding power of surrender has continued to obstruct the possibility of smoothening Japan’s relations with South Korea and Russia. The need for Japan to clearly define what exactly constitutes as “historical evidence” is essential, for it will not only clarify whether the SFPT embodies a burden of “unconditional surrender,” but also determine the precise status of Dokdo and the Kuriles in relation to “unconditional surrender.” The gravity of this issue is compounded by the fact that while the United States believed that the transformation of Japan into an antiCommunist ally was imperative, it quickly compromised its original belief by contradictorily allowing for the existence of “residual sovereignty,” which essentially conflated the American objective of enhancing security in the Asia–Pacific with Japan’s desire to acquire additional territories such as Okinawa and Senkaku Islands. What was originally intended to be a mutual benefit for Japan and the United States in producing a firm national security strategy and a regional security policy also proved to be a clear repudiation of the SFPT’s clear expression of Japan’s obligation to forfeit territories such as the Kuriles as a consequence of her surrender to the Allies. Providing a clear definition to “unconditional surrender” might spell at least a beginning to the end of a seemingly endless spiral of debates and conflicts surrounding the two territories which continue to intensify into the twenty-first century, caught between nationalist passions and a recently arising competition for natural resources found around the disputed territories. In short, this paper has shown the precise “weight” of “unconditional surrender” and how the lack of clarity behind the concept manifests itself in the form of Japan’s two different uses of the SFPT regarding Dokdo

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and the Kuriles. Although the ambiguity of “unconditional surrender” might have been useful for the United States to direct Japan’s full attention to transforming itself into an anti-Communist bastion in the Asia–Pacific, the ambiguity of “unconditional surrender” has bred the ambiguity of Japan’s conception of what exactly counts as historical evidence and what Japan’s singular perception of the SFPT is with regard to territorial sovereignty as a general topic. Precisely defining “unconditional surrender” might not be sufficient to completely cut the Gordian Knot of territorial sovereignty as a problem, but it might prove to be a good starting point, for clarifying the relationship between “unconditional surrender” and the SFPT would at least clearly show what Japan considers proper historical evidence and the SFPT to be and ascertain that the SFPT was originally intended to only be a consequence or a reflection of the Allies’ effort to ascertain Japan’s complete capitulation and bring a conclusive end to World War II and nothing further.

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Implications of the San Francisco Treaty on Paracel and Spratly Disputes: A Vietnamese Perspective Hai Dang Vu

Introduction The Treaty of Peace with Japan or San Francisco Treaty was signed on 8 September 1951 in San Francisco, United States between Japan and the Allied Powers to terminate the state of war and re-establish the relations between Japan and the international community. The Treaty deals with issues such as territorial claims, security, relations with applied powers and reparation of war damage. With regards to territorial claims, article 2 stipulates that Japan renounces all right, title and claim to, inter alia, the Spratly and Paracel Islands in the South China Sea.

H. D. Vu (B) Centre for International Law, National University of Singapore, Singapore, Singapore e-mail: [email protected]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2022 Y. Sugita and V. Teo (eds.), Rethinking the San Francisco System in Indo-Pacific Security, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-1231-3_9

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For background, Paracels1 (or Paracel Islands) and Spratlys2 (or Spratly Islands) are two mid-ocean archipelagos in the South China Sea. At the beginning, the two archipelagos are thought to be one. It is only from the nineteenth century that navigators considered that they are two separate group of islands (Nguy˜ên and Tri.nh 2009; Hancox and Prescott 1995, 15; V˜ u 1988, 4–5). The Paracels, located between 16 and 17º latitude North and 111 and 113º longitude East, has more than 30 islands, reefs, and banks occupying about 15,000 km2 ocean surface. The biggest feature of the Paracels is Woody Island with about 4 km in length and 2–3 km in wide (Chemillier-Gendreau 1996, 21). The Spratlys, located between 6.50 and 12º latitude North and 111.30 and 117.20º longitude East, comprises more than one hundred features occupying up to 180,000 km2 ocean surface. The biggest feature of the Spratlys is Itu Aba, which has an area u 1988, 8). of 0.6 km2 (V˜ The Paracels and Spratlys are currently objects of overlapping claims between China, Taiwan, Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia, and Viet Nam. China, Taiwan, and Vietnam claim sovereignty over the Paracels Islands, entirely occupied by China after taking by force from South Vietnam in 1974. The Spratlys are claimed entirely by China, Taiwan, and Vietnam, almost entirely by Philippines, and partly by Malaysia. Brunei also claims that two of the Spratly’s rocks lie on its extended continental shelf. Except for Brunei, all six claimants of the Spratlys have occupied and raised different structures in various features of the islands (Valencia et al. 1997; Prescott and Schoffield 2005, 273–276).3 Among them, China undertook a massive land reclamation of a number of features in the Paracels and Spratlys, transforming some from barely above water sand

1 The names of Paracel, Pracel, or Parcel were first used to name the Paracels in Western maps of the South China Sea, which is thought to derive from the same word meaning shallow sandy seas or submerged banks in Portugese. 2 Spratly is named after the Richard Spratly, captain of the whaler Cyprus, who thought to be the first one who discovered the Spratly Island, a feature of the Spratlys. 3 For the situation of occupation in the Paracels and Spratlys, see online: Asian Transparency Maritime Initiative, https://amti.csis.org/island-tracker/, accessed 15 July 2021.

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cays into large islands able to house long military airstrips (China Island Tracker 2019).4 Besides these active claimants, France, Japan, United Kingdom (Tønnesson 2006, 5–6), and Netherlands once claimed the features of these two archipelagos but have now stopped pursuing their claims (Samuels 1982). The renouncement by Japan of its claim over the Paracels and Spratlys as stipulated in article 2 of the San Francisco Treaty has implications on the sovereignty dispute relating to these two archipelagos. This chapter of the book aims to evaluate the consequences of the San Francisco Treaty on the status of the Paracels and Spratlys from an international law’s perspective (2). It also tries to explain the Vietnamese position relating to the sovereignty over these two archipelagos (3). First and foremost, the development of the sovereignty dispute over the Paracels and Spratlys and the involvement of Japan before the San Francisco Treaty is discussed (1).

Paracels and Spratlys and Involvement of Japan Before the San Francisco Treaty Before the San Francisco Conference in 1951, the Paracels and Spratlys were subjected to territorial claims made by China, France, Japan, Viet Nam, the United Kingdom and to some extent, the Philippines (only the Spratlys). This section provides a summarised account of important developments relating to the two archipelagos in a chronological order leading to the signature of the San Francisco Treaty and the involvement of Japan in the disputes. Main Developments Relating to the Two Archipelagos Until the San Francisco Treaty The knowledge about the Paracels and Spartlys were dated from the ancient time. They were visited frequently by fishermen in the region.

4 From late 2013 to mid-2017, China undertook massive land reclamation activities on

number of disputed features in the South China Sea, namely Subi Reef, Fiery Cross Reef, Mischief Reef, Gaven Reef, Hughes Reef, Johnson South Reef, Cuarteron Reef, North Cay, and Tree Island. According to the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative, China’s land reclamation in the Spratlys alone has created almost 1300 hectares of new land in these islands.

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Navigators from outside the region (Indians, Arabs, Persians, Portuguese, Spanish, and Dutch) also talked about their existence during their journeys through the South China Sea. The two archipelagos were equally mentioned in various ancient books and maps (Chemillier-Gendreau 1996, 38). Since early XVIIth century, the Nguyen Lords of Viet Nam organised maritime militia companies (Hoang Sa company and Bac Hai company) to exploit Paracels and Spratlys. In March every year, these companies set sail to the archipelagos to collect natural resources and goods from wrecked ships (MOFA Viet Nam 2013a, 9). During the period between 1815–1816, Emperor of Gia Long of Viet Nam ordered the Hoang Sa company to go the Paracels to study, measure, and chart maritime routes (Lu,u 1996, 40). During the period between 1833–1834, Gia Long’s successor, Emperor Minh Mang of Dai Nam (official name of Viet Nam then) ordered the construction of steles and temples, planting of trees in and drawing maps of the Paracels. These works continue under ulterior emperors (Chemillier-Gendreau 1996, 40). In 1884, the Treaty of Protectorate5 is signed between the Kingdom of Annam (name used by France to designate the central part of Viet Nam where is located the Vietnamese Court) and France in Hue. Pursuant the Article 1 of the Treaty, France would represent Viet Nam in foreign affairs (Nguy˜ên 2014, 80; Chemillier-Gendreau 1996, 39). In 1895, Japan acquired Taiwan from China (Tønnesson 2006, 2). During 1895–1896, German vessel Bellona and Japanese vessel Imezi Maru sank near the Paracels. Their wrecks were looted by Chinese fishermen. Assurance companies tried to ask Chinese government to be responsible for the activities of the fishermen but the Governor of Liang Guang (Canton and Guangxi at that time) declined all responsibility, stating that the Paracels were abandoned islands under the authority of no one (Chemillier-Gendreau 1996, 40). In 1899, Governor General of Indochina suggested the French Government to build a lighthouse on the Paracels. Surveys were undertaken by the colonial technical services. However, the project was not able to be implemented due to the lack of funding (Chemillier-Gendreau 1996, 40).

5 Treaty of Hue or Treaty of Patenôtre (after Jules Patenôtre, the French Minister to China).

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In 1909, Viceroy of Liang Guang (Canton and Guangxi) Zhang Runjun sent two battle ships commanded by Commander Li Zhun to undertake a 24 h-landing on certain islands in the Paracels, holding flag and shooting canons. No protest registered from France, who considered these acts normal naval proceedings during a visit not amounting to declaring ownership (Chemillier-Gendreau 1996, 40). In 1920, France established a station to control shipping and collect tax in the Paracels (Nguy˜ên 2008, 163). In 1921, the Government of Canton (which was not recognised by China nor other countries) decided to submit the Paracels under the administration of Yai Hien prefecture, Hainan province. No protest registered from France (Nguy˜ên 2014, 92; Chemillier-Gendreau 1996, 40). In 1930, the Governor General of Indochina sent information ship Malicieuse to the Spratlys. The ship planted the French flag there. After the trip of Malicieuse, France notified other Powers of its occupation of the Spratlys (Chemillier-Gendreau 1996, 41; Nguy˜ên 2014, 99). The same year, the Embassy of the United Kingdom in Paris stated that Mr. Graham, American citizen and Mrs. Simpson and John, British citizens, registered their claim of the Spratlys in Labuan, Borneo in 1877. According to the Embassy, in 1878, the Government of United Kingdom informed the Consult General of Great Britain in Borneo that the United Kingdom did not oppose the registration of these people and the fact that they hold the British flag in these territories. The Embassy concluded that these territories thus belong to the United Kingdom, unless the British Court abandoned them explicitly (Nguy˜ên 2014, 99). In 1931, Canton launched a bid for the exploitation of guano in the Paracels. France protested (Nguy˜ên 2014, 99; Chemillier-Gendreau 1996, 41). In 1932, the French Government sent a note to the Chinese Legation in Paris affirming historic rights and current rights of France over the Paracels. During the same year, France proposed to China to submit their dispute to an arbitral tribunal. China replied in affirming Chinese sovereignty over this archipelago and refusing to go to arbitration (Nguy˜ên 2014, 101). In 1933, the French Far East Naval Forces (Forces Navales Françaises d’Extreme Orient) dispatched a fleet to the Spratlys. They proceeded to take possession of the Spratlys “in accordance with the ancient ceremony”

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(Chemillier-Gendreau 1996, 41). Few months later, the French Government declared that the French Navy had taken possession of the islands of Spratly, Amboyna, Itu Aba, Southeast Cay, Southwest Cay, Loaita, Thitu as well as other features of the Spratlys (Official Journal of the French Republic 1933, 7887). The same year, the Governor of Conchinchina issued a decree placing the Spratlys administratively under Ba Ria province (MOFA Viet Nam 1979, 30). France also proceeded to the construction of lighthouse and radio-transmission station on Itu Aba. No protest registered from China nor the United Kingdom (who seems to change from its position in 1930) but Japan (Tønnesson 2006, 6). In 1938, Japan sent troops stationing in Woody Island and Lincoln Island, Paracels (Tønnesson 2006, 11). The same year, Emperor of Annam Bao Dai issued a decree6 placing the Paracels administratively under the province of Thua Thien (MOFA Viet Nam 1979, 30). The Governor General of Indochina Jules Brévié also established an administrative delegation in the Paracels (MOFA Viet Nam 1979, 32). A lighthouse, meteorologic station, and teletext transmission station were built by France on Pattle Island of the Paracels. A police unit was also stationed here and in Woody Island where there is also a heavy Japanese presence (Nguy˜ên 2014, 106; Tønnesson 2006, 12). In 1938, Vice-President of the Philippines Elpidio Quirino tried to convince the United States to occupy the Spratlys on behalf of the Philippines without success (Tønnesson 2006, 21). In 1939, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan announced Japan would control the Paracels and the Spratlys, under the name of Shinnan Gunto (Southern Islands), which would be placed under the jurisdiction of the Governor General of Japan in Taiwan. The United States, France, and the United Kingdom protested. It was reported that during a meeting with the Japanese representative, the United Kingdom Foreign Office said the United Kingdom has never abandoned its claim to the Spratlys (Chemillier-Gendreau 1996, 42; Tønnesson 2006, 12). In 1940, Japan took over Itu Aba island, Spratlys, cut off the radio communications of the French mission there and repatriated its personnel to Indochina (Tønnesson 2006, 15).

6 Decree No. 10 dated 29 February in the 13th Bao Dai year (30 March 1938), published in Official Journal in National Language of the Court of An Nam (in ` Công Báo Quôc ´ Ngu˜,) No. 8/1938, p. 233. Vietnamese: Nam Triêu

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In 1943, President Franklin Roosevelt of the United States, Generalissimo Chiang Kai-Shek of the Republic of China, and Prime Minister Winston Churchill of the United Kingdom adopted the Cairo communiqué which stated, among other things: “Japan shall be stripped of all the islands in the Pacific which she has seized or occupied since the beginning of the first World War in 1914, and all the territories Japan has stolen from the Chinese, such as Manchuria, Formosa, and the Pescadores shall be restored to the Republic of China. Japan will also be expelled from all other territories which she has taken by violence and greed” (Cairo Communiqué 1943). In 1945, the President Harry Truman of the United States, Prime Minister Winston Churchill of the United Kingdom, and the President of the Republic of China Chiang Kai-shek issued the Potsdam Declaration or the Proclamation Declaration Defining the Terms for Japanese Surrender, which states, among other things: “Japanese sovereignty shall be limited to the islands of Honshu, Hokkaido, Kyushu, Shikoku and such minor islands as we determine” (Potsdam Declaration 1945). During the same year, Japan surrendered, and the Democratic Republic of Viet Nam under Ho Chi Minh was founded (Nguy˜ên 2014, 110). In 1946, France sent ships to Paracels and Spratlys. A unit stationed in the Paracels for few months and a stele was raised in Itu Aba, Spratlys. During the same year, the Republic of China also sent ships to Paracels and Spratlys (Nguy˜ên 2014, 110). Vice-President of the Philippines Quirino stated in a press conference that the Philippines would claim the “island group west of Palawan” is essential for its security (Nguy˜ên 2014, 110). In 1947, Republic of China send troops to land and station on Woody Island, Paracels and its Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced that it had took back the Paracels. Chiang Kai-shek issued a decree naming the features of the Paracels and Spratlys. During this same year, the South China Sea Islands Map (Nanhai Chudao) with an eleven dotted line was issued (Zou 1999, 33). This line was the origin of the current nine-dotted line claim of the People’s Republic of China. During the same year, France protested the move of the Republic of China and sent a group of soldiers to station in Pattle Island, Paracels. During the bilateral negotiations to resolve the issue in Paris this year, France again proposed to submit the dispute to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) but China still refused (Nguy˜ên 2014, 113).

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In 1948, the Governments of France and Emperor Bao Dai of Annam signed the Accords of Ha Long Bay recognising the independence of the State of Viet Nam, a member of the French Union (Nguy˜ên 2014, 115). In 1949, the People’s Republic of China was founded (Nguy˜ên 2014, 115). In 1950, France officially transferred the administration and protection of Paracels and Spratlys to State of Viet Nam (MOFA Republic of Viet Nam 1975, 52). The Nationalist Government of China withdraw from mainland China to Taiwan; evacuating its troops stationed the Paracels (Chemillier-Gendreau 1996, 43). In 1951, Mr. Quirino, then President of the Philippines, declared in a press conference that the Spratlys belong to the Philippines because of the proximity of the archipelago to the Philippines (Chemillier-Gendreau 1996, 43). China protested (Nguy˜ên 2014, 117–118). During the same period, the draft Treaty of Peace of Japan was circulated by the United States and United Kingdom. With regards to the draft, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China Zhou Enlai stated, among other things (Samuels 1982, 79): The draft (Peace Treaty) stipulated that Japan shall renounce all claims to Nan-wei (Spratly) Island and to the Hsisha (Paracel) Archipelago but does not mention the problem of restitution of sovereignty. In fact, the Paracel Archipelago and Spratly Island as well all whole Spratly Archipelago and the Chungsha (Macclefields Bank), and Tung-sha (Pratas) Archipelagos have always been Chinese territory. Though occupied for some time during the war of aggression unleashed by Japanese Imperialism, they were taken over by the Chinese government following Japan’s surrender. The Central People’s Government of the People’s Republic of China declares herewith: the inviolable sovereignty of the People’s Republic of China over Spratly Island and the Paracel Archipelago will by no means be impaired, irrespective of whether the British-American draft for a peace treaty with Japan should make any stipulations or of the nature of any such stipulations.

From 4 to 8 September of the same year, the Conference on the Conclusion and Signature of the Treaty of Japan took place in San Francisco, United States. Neither China nor Taiwan was invited (Valero 1993, 40). During the Conference, the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Soviet Union, Andrei Gromyko, proposed an amendment of the Peace Treaty of Japan, stating “Japan recognises the full sovereignty

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of the People’s Republic of China on Manchuria, the Island of Taiwan (Formosa) with all the islands adjacent to it, the Penhuletao Islands (the Pescadores), the Tunshatsuntao Island (Pratas) as well as the islands of Sishatsuntao and Chunshatsuntao (the Paracel Islands, the group of Amphitrites, the shoal of Maxfield7 and Nanshatsuntao including the Spratly, and renounce all rights, title and claim to the territories named herein” (Record of San Francisco Conference 1951, 119). The proposal was rejected by a vote of the Conference (46 vote against, 3 vote for, and one abstention). During the 7th session of the Conference, the Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs of the State of Viet Nam Tran Van Huu stated “As we must frankly profit from all the opportunities offered to us to stifle the germs of discord, we affirm our right to the Spratly and Paracel Islands which have always belonged to Viet Nam” (Record of San Francisco Conference 1951, 263). On 8 September 1951, the Peace Treaty of Japan or San Francisco Treaty was signed. The article 2 of the Treaty stipulates that Japan renounces all right, title, and claim to, inter alia, “the Spratly and Paracel Islands in the South China Sea” (San Francisco Treaty 1951, article 2). The Begin and End of the Involvement of Japan in Paracels and Spratlys Dispute Since early XXth century, Japan started to be interested in the islands of the South China Sea, which are located on the way of its expansion of influence Southwards. The marine area encompassing Southeast Asian countries is called by Japan Outer Southern Sea (Granados 2008, 121– 123). At first, the primary interest of Japan in the Paracels and Spratlys mainly comes from its nationals for the sake of exploitation of natural resources. Between February and August 1917, Komatsu Shigetoshi and Iked Kinzo surveyed the Paracels and Spratlys and claimed to discover some islands. In 1921, this “discovery” was used as reference by Kamiyama Keiji and Hashimoto Keizaburo to request the Japanese government to incorporate twenty-four islands of the Paracels into the territory of the Empire. Applications for the exploitation of guano and phosphate were

7 I.e. Macclefields.

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also submitted to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Trade, and Ministry of Agriculture (Granados 2008, 124). During the same year, Hirata Sueji started to undertake surveys in the Paracels and Spratlys. He claimed the Paracels to be without ownership and renaming it Hirata Archipelago. He also raised Japanese flag on various islands in the Spratlys. In 1918, he submitted an application for phosphate exploitation in the Paracels and undertook the operation (Granados 2008, 124). In April 1920, Saito Eikichi, Nozawa Senzo, and Yamazaki Takeshi surveyed the Spratlys and claimed to discover 12 islands. After surveying them for the second time this year, they requested a certificate of discovery and a permit for engaging in economic activities in this area. The most important effort undertaken by Japanese nationals in the Spratlys were from Lhasa Phosphate Company, an enterprise from Ryuku and Osaka. The head of the company, Tsunefugi Norikata, undertook two surveys of different islands in the Spratlys in 1918 and 1920, leaving sovereign marking each time. He named the archipelago “Shinnan Gunto” (New South Archipelago) (Granados 2008, 126). In 1921, the company registered activities of guano and phosphate collection in the archipelago and later requested the incorporation of the Spratlys into Japan. Lhasa Phosphate Company obtained a phosphate transportation permit in 1922 and it was reported that, by 1924, the company constructed dormitories for as many as 200 workers engaging in fisheries and guano collection in Itu Aba Island alone (Granados 2008, 128). While the Japanese government at that time generally allowed these resources exploitation activities; it abstained from making any official proclamation of sovereignty of Japan over the Paracels and Spartlys. At the same time, it undertook studies into the claims of other countries with regards to these two archipelagos (Granados 2008, 128). In 1927, the Consult General of Japan in Hanoi, Jiro Kurosawa, requested the Government of Indochina to provide documents relating to the ownership status of the Spratlys “on a personal title” (Tønnesson 2006, 4; Chen 2001, 10). He reportedly said the Government of Japan was not interested in the Paracels (Chemillier-Gendreau 1996, 41; Nguy˜ên 2014, 96). In the early 1930s, while the Japanese government became more active in protecting its interests in the Paracels and Spratlys; it still had not entered into the dispute on the sovereignty over these archipelagos. As mentioned above, Japan protested against French announcement of occupying the Spratlys in 1933. After negotiations, France and Japan reached an agreement in 1934 in which France declared the islands not to be used

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for military purpose and that economic interests of Japanese companies would be respected (Granados 2008, 133). Japan officially entered the sovereignty dispute in 1938 where the country sent troops to occupy Woody Island, Paracels as mentioned earlier. At the same time, Japan protested against the deployment of troops by France in the Paracels, insisting that France did not have sovereignty there (Nguy˜ên 2017, 85). On 12 July 1938, the D¯omei News Agency accused France of sending six warships to the Paracels carrying a large amount of arms, equipment, and provisions to prepare for war (Nguy˜ên 2017, 86). Japan’s allies in Europe, German, and Italian press, accused France of violating Japanese sovereignty over the Paracels (Nguy˜ên 2017, 86). During the same year, Japan also sent ships to Itu Aba Island, Spratlys multiple times (Granados 2008, 137). As stated earlier, in 1939, Japan decided to annex Paracels and Spratlys into the jurisdiction of the Governor General of Taiwan under the name of Shinan Gunto. The main basis of Japanese claim was that Japan was the first country to send patrol boats to the Spratlys in 1917 and since then these islands had been without owners (Nguy˜ên 2017, 87). The past economic activities by Japanese nationals were also used as another basis for Japanese claim (Granados 2008, 139). During the same year, France also proposed to Japan to take the Spratly matter to international arbitration; but Japan refused (Granados 2008, 137). It was opined that the decision of Japan to annex the Paracels and Spratlys in 1939 was motived by military and geopolitical reasons: the Paracels serving as basis to blockade China while Spratlys, to support Japan’s Southward offensive (Tønnesson 2006, 15). Until 1940, there were French/Annamite and Japanese/Taiwanese garrisons stationing on the same island (such as on Woody Island of the Paracels and Itu Aba Island of the Spratlys). They never seem to fight with each other (Tønnesson 2006, 13; Nguy˜ên 2017, 88). By 1940, the Japanese evicted the French mission in Itu Aba and fully occupied the island. But on Woody Island, the French garrison was allowed to stay until 1945 when Japan took over France in Indochina (Tønnesson 2006, 15). From 1942 to 1945, the South China Sea become a Japanese lake with Malaya, Singapore, Borneo, the Philippine islands, Taiwan, Hainan, Hong Kong and most of the Chinese coastal area under Japanese administration; as well as French Indochina under its occupation (Tønnesson 2006, 16). Japan used both Paracels and Spratlys as weather stations

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and listening posts and built a submarine base in Itu Aba (Tønnesson 2006, 16). During the 2nd World War, Japanese structures in the two archipelagos seem to suffer heavy bombardment by the Allies (Tønnesson 2006, 19). In 1951, with the San Francisco Treaty, Japan renounced its sovereignty claim to the Paracels and Spratlys.

Consequences of the San Francisco Treaty Relating to the Paracels and Spratlys from an International Law’s Perspective This part of the Chapter explains what the renouncement of Japan of all its claims to the Paracels and Spratlys would entail from a legal point of view. The San Francisco Treaty Did Not “Return” the Paracels and Spratlys to Any Claimant The common position of Taiwan (MOFA Republic of China 2015) and China (MOFA People’s Republic of China 2000) has been that the provisions of the San Francisco Treaty, together with the Cairo Communiqué, Potsdam Declaration and Treaty of Peace between Japan and the Republic of China, 1952 (Treaty of Taipei) support the return the Paracels and Spratlys to China. Relevant content in the San Francisco Treaty, Cairo Communiqué and Potsdam Declaration was mentioned earlier.8 Article II of the Treaty of Taipei stipulates that (Treaty of Taipei 1952): It is recognized that under Article 2 of the Treaty of Peace with Japan signed at the city of San Francisco in the United States of America on September 8, 19512 (hereinafter referred to as the San Francisco Treaty), Japan has renounced all right, title and claim to Taiwan (Formosa) and Penghu (the Pescadores) as well as the Spratly Islands and the Paracel Islands.

From a common sense perspective, this position is objectionable and has been refuted (Hayton 2021; Carpio 2020). It is clear that all these instruments did not mention anything about returning the Paracels and 8 See above Main Developments relating to the Two Archipelagos until the San Francisco Treaty.

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Spratlys to China. Defendants of the “return to China” thesis also put emphasis on the Treaty of Taipei, arguing that the fact of including the names of Paracels of Spratlys into a bilateral treaty between Japan and the Republic of China seems to indicate that these two archipelagos were renounced by Japan in favour of the latter (Chiu and Pak 1975, 14; Samuels 1982, 80). However, according to Tønnesson, right after the signature of the treaty, France undertook to enquire Japan about this provision. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan responded that Japan had only confirmed the same renouncement it made at San Francisco and did in no way take position as to the legal status or future devolution of the island groups (Tønnesson 2006, 43). They even sent a formal exchange letter to France dated on 23 May 1952 (Tønnesson 2006, footnote 133) to confirm Japanese position, which reads: I concur with your understanding that Article 2 of the Peace Treaty between Japan and the Republic of China signed on April 28, 1952, should not be construed as having any special significance or meaning other than that implied by Article 2, paragraph (f), of the Treaty of San Francisco.

This way of understanding the meaning of relevant provisions in the above-mentioned documents is supported by the rules of international law concerning the interpretation of treaties. Pursuant to article 31(1) of the Vienna Convention on the law of treaties, 1969 which reads “A treaty shall be interpreted in good faith in accordance with the ordinary meaning to be given to the terms of the treaty in their context and in the light of its object and purpose” (Vienna Convention 1969). The International Court of Justice (ICJ) further states that this article reflects international customary law (Territorial Dispute 1999, para. 41); which is binding to all States. According to this rule of interpretation, the phrase “Japan has renounced all right, title and claim to Taiwan (Formosa) and Penghu (the Pescadores) as well as the Spratly Islands and the Paracel Islands” in the San Francisco Treaty and Treaty of Taipei clearly does not support the return of the Paracels and Spratlys to any claimant. The San Francisco Treaty Did Not Make the Paracels and Spratlys Trust Territories One of the arguments put forward by the Philippines to claim the Spratlys was that after the San Francisco Treaty, the Spratlys, a group

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which comprises seven islands,9 are under “de facto trusteeship” of the Second World Ward Allied Powers. Since the treaty did not resolve the issue of ownership of these territories, they are open to exploitation and settlement by any individual and country member (which include the Philippines) (Samuels 1982, 82–83; Granados, 280). However, from an international law’s perspective, while the Paracels and Spratlys could become an international trusteeship after the San Francisco Treaty; they simply did not. For background, the international trusteeship was established to administer a non-self-governing territory in accordance with Chapters XII and XIII of the United Nations Charter. The main objective of an international trusteeship is to govern the territories placed thereunder (“trust territories”) for the benefit of their inhabitants and promote their progressive development toward self-governance or independence (Melnyk 2013). Pursuant to Article 77 of the UN Charter, three types of territories can be placed under international trusteeship: (i) territories held under mandate; (ii) territories which may be detached from enemy States as a result of the Second World War and (iii) territories voluntarily placed under the system by States responsible for their administration (UN Charter 1945). The establishment of an trusteeship is not automatic but depend upon the conclusion of trusteeship agreements which will lay out the specific terms of the trusteeship (UN Charter 1945). Based on Article 77 of the UN Charter, the archipelagos Paracels and Spratlys can be considered “territories which may be detached from enemy states as a result of the Second World War”. However, no trusteeship agreement has ever been concluded with regards to these two archipelagos. In fact, from 1945, the signature of the UN Charter until 1993, the end of the trusteeship regime, a total of 11 trust territories were established, including the Pacific Islands10 which were placed under Japanese mandate after the First World War (Wojcik 2021, 312). All 9 The seven islands referred to by the Philippines are Spratly, Itu Aba, Southeast Cay, Southwest Cay, Loaita, and Thitu. 10 Namely Western Samoa, Tanganyika, Rwanda-Urundi, Cameroons under British mandate, Cameroons under French mandate, Togoland under British mandate, Togoland under French mandate, New Guinea, Nauru, Italian Somaliland and the Strategic Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands.

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these trusteeships were established by trusteeship agreements approved by the United Nations General Assembly or United Nations Council Security resolutions (see UNGA 1946 for New Guinea, Rwanda-Urundi, Cameroons under French mandate, Togoland under French mandate, Western Somoa, Tanganyika, Togoland under British mandate; UNGA 1947 for Nauru; UNGA 19501950 for the Territory of Somaliland under Italian Administration; UNSC 1947 for Pacific Islands). Determining Sovereignty Over the Paracels and Spratlys After San Franciso Treaty While the San Francisco Treaty did not support the claim to Paracels and Spratlys by any claimant; it had taken Japan out of the competition to the sovereignty over these territories. The race was then played between China, France, Philippines, United Kingdom, and Viet Nam. Later, France and United Kingdom stopped their claim while Malaysia and Brunei joined the Spratly contest. International law provides specific rules to determine sovereignty over a territory which are applicable to the case of the Paracels and Sprartlys. Pursuant to international law, the discovery11 (Shaw 2008, 504) of a territory which does not belong to any State (terra nullius ) can give the discovering State an “inchoate title” that is, an option to occupy the territory within a reasonable time (Malanczuk 1997, 149). In order to establish its sovereignty on this territory, the State must then proceed to an effective occupation (Hillier 1998, 228). The occupation must be by government authorities and not by private individuals (Shaw 2008, 503). With regards to territories which are not terra nullius or which a State did not know whether it already belong to other States or not; it can still establish sovereignty by prescription. It means the acquisition of sovereignty over a territory by a “long-continued and undisturbed possession” of this territory (Jennings 1963, 20). Similar to occupation, prescription requires that the possession must be done by a State authority and not individuals. It must also be public so that all interested States are aware (Shaw 2008, 505). Besides, for prescription to lead to sovereignty, there must be an acquiescence (implied consent) from the former owner of the territory. A protest by this State may block the acquisition of 11 The mere realisation or sighting is not considered sufficient, but some symbolic acts are required such as raising flags or solemn declarations.

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sovereignty (Malancsuk 1997, 150). In the Island of Palmas arbitration, the arbitrator, judge Max Hubert, found that Netherlands has sovereignty over Palmas because of a continuous and peaceful display of authority without protest from Spain even if the latter first discovered this island (Island of Palmas 1928, 868). While the distinction between occupation and prescription may not be clear; both means require the exercise of effective control or possession of the territory. It means the State must exercise sovereign activities (effectivités) over it. The level of control depends on the relevant circumstance of the case, including the nature of the territory involved. With regards to remote islands or inhospitable areas, a limited exercise of sovereignty may suffice. For instance, in the Eastern Greenland case, the ICJ accepts that minimal acts of administration are sufficient (Eastern Greenland 1933, 46). A number of elements are important in the determination of sovereignty. First, according to the intertemporal law doctrine, an act or situation relevant to a sovereignty claim must be examined in accordance with the rules of law as they existed at the time (Malanczuk 1997, 150; Klabbers 2017, 70). Second, resolving cases of sovereignty dispute often requires the determination of a “critical date”, the moment when the potential rights of the parties were manifested to the extent to which posterior acts can no longer alter their legal positions (Shaw 2008, 511). Finally, the acquisition of territory by force is considered illegal. Article 2(4) of the UN Charter states that “All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state” (UN Charter 1945). The 1970 Declaration of Principles of International Law concerning Friendly Relations and Cooperation among States in Accordance with the Charter of the United Nations also provides that “the territory of a state shall not be the object of acquisition by another state resulting from the threat or use of force. No territorial acquisition resulting from the threat or use of force shall be recognised as legal” (Declaration of Principles of International Law concerning Friendly Relations and Cooperation among States 1970). Based on these rules of international law on the acquisition of sovereignty, the last section of the chapter will explain the position of Viet Nam with regards to the sovereignty on the Paracels and Spratlys with the San Francisco Treaty as point of reference.

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Sovereignty on the Paracels and Spratlys from the Perspective of Viet Nam Before and After San Francisco Treaty According to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Viet Nam, Viet Nam is the first country that established sovereignty on the Paracels and Spratlys and is the only country that continuously and peacefully administrates ` 2010, these two archipelagos in accordance with international law (Trân 53). This section explains the position of Viet Nam using the San Francisco Treaty as the point of reference. Thus, the activities of establishing and maintaining its sovereignty by Viet Nam over these two archipelagos before the San Francisco Treaty and their continuation and consolidation thereafter are discussed. Before San Francisco Treaty: Establishment of Sovereignty and Effective Occupation As stated earlier, since the XVIIth century when Paracels and Spratlys were still terra nullius ; the rulers of Viet Nam had already organised maritime militia companies Hoang Sa and Bac Hai to journey to the two archipelagos every year to exploit natural resources, shipwrecks in these areas.12 They were also in charge of undertaking different administration activities such as surveying, planting trees, erecting steles, building constructions (such as well and temples). Later, the emperor’s officials also proceeded to collect taxes and provide search and rescue to foreign ships in these features (Nguy˜ên 2013, 81). These activities were recorded in many Vietnamese and foreign documents at that time. The administration of these maritime militia companies is subject to a number of official documents of the Nguyen dynasty. These documents convey direct order from the emperor relating to the administration of the country in different aspects (MOFA Viet Nam 2013b, 9). For instance, an official report from the Ministry of Public Works to the King dated 21 June 1838 (19th year of the reign of Ming Mang emperor) wrote (MOFA Viet Nam 2013b, 146):

12 See above Main Developments relating to the Two Archipelagos until the San Francisco Treaty.

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We now receive Do Mau Thuong and Imperial Guard Le Trong Ba, who are our Ministry’s officers, and returned from a mission to Paracels. Our Ministry have been informed by these two officers that this time, the surveying team reached 25 islands in 3 groups of island (The team revisited 12 islands and landed on other 13 islands for the very first time). According to the pilot Vu Van Hung, the entire region of Paracels comprises four groups, and this time, the team conducted the survey in 3 groups, the remaining group in the South is rather far away, and strong Southern wind blew so powerfully so it was unfavourable to go there; it would be late to wait for favourable wind, therefore, ships should be sent there next year. Considering four maps brought back (three of them depicted individual group and the fourth one depicted all three areas as a whole) together with a yet edited logbook, our Ministry would like to request for a thorough examination and modification to the maps before submission. According to the report by these two officers, they had collected one bronze-covered cannon, red corals, some seabirds and turtles. Now they had brought them all back home.

Besides, the activities of these companies were also mentioned in historical records of Vietnamese dynasties13 (Nguy˜ên 2012, 174). For instance, in ` biên (Accounts of Dai Nam’s Former Dynasties Ða.i Nam thu.,c lu.c tiên 1600–1775), published in 1884, it was written (Nguy˜ên 2012, 175): During the early days of the dynasty, the Hoang Sa detachment was created and it was made up of 70 men recruited from among An Vinh villagers. It set out every year in the third month and used to reach the islands after a three days and nights voyage. There the men collected articles from wrecked ships. Its home trip would normally begin in the eighth month of the year. In addition, there was a Bac Hai team whose members were recruited from Tu Chinh commune in Binh Thuan province or from Canh Duong village.

13 Such as Toàn Tâp Thiên Nam Tu ´, Chí Lô. Ðô` Thu, (Route Map from the Capital . ` Biên (Accounts of Dai Nam’s to the Four Directions), 1686; Ða.i Nam Thu.,c Lu.c Tiên Former Dynasties), 1600–1775; Ða.i Nam Thu.,c Lu.c Chính Biên (Accounts of Dai Nam’s ´ ´ Thông Present Dynasty), 1865–1882; Ða.i Nam Nhât Chí (Geography of Reunified Dai ij ij Nam), 1865–1882; Khâm Ði.nh Ða.i Nam Hô.i Ðiên Su, Lê. (The Dai Nam Administrative ` Hiên ´ Chu,o,ng Loa.i Chí (Regulations of Successive Repertory), 1843–1851, Li.ch Triêu Dynasties by Subject-Matter), 1821; Hoàng Viê.t Ði.a Du, Chí (Geographical Treatise ij of Imperial Viet Nam), 1833 and Viê.t Su, Cu,o,ng Giám Khaij o Lu,o.,c (Brief History of Vietnam) 1876.

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The team was sent to Bac Hai areas and the island of Con Lon to gather articles from wrecked ships. The Bac Hai team was placed under the Hoang Sa detachment commander.

The activities of Vietnamese kings over Paracels and Spratlys were also mentioned in foreign documents14 (Nguy˜ên 2012, 182–183). For instance, in Geography of the Cochin-Chinese Empire, 1849, it was written (Nguy˜ên 2012, 182): We should not mention here the Paracels (Katvang) which approach 15-20 leagues to the coast of Annam, and extend between 15º-17º N. Latitude and 111º-113º E. Longitude, if the King of Cochin-China did not claim these as his property, and many isles and reefs, so dangerous to navigators. From time immemorial, junks in large number from Hainan, have annually visited all these shoals, and proceeded in their excursions as far as the coast of Borneo. The Annam government, perceiving the advantages which it might derive if atoll were raised, keeps revenue cutters and a small garrison on the spot to collect the duty on all visitors, and to ensure protection to its own fishermen.

It should be noted that among the claimants to the Paracels and Spratlys, besides Viet Nam, China and Taiwan also claim sovereignty over the Paracels and Spratlys based on historical evidence (their claims are similar and can be treated as one). As such, supporters of China claim of sovereignty over these two archipelagos argue that China discovered the Paracels and Spratlys since around 700–476 BC and that the country has administrated these islands continuously until the colonisers arrive (Wu, 2013). Many Chinese ancient documents were cited to support this claim (Shen 1997–1998, 15–29). A close examination of these documents reveals two important issues. First, they show that since ancient time Chinese people knows that there were rocks and islands in the South China Sea, without providing precise information on which these islands and rocks they referred to. Second, they show that Chinese fishermen, explorers and merchants had gone through the Paracels and Spratlys during their journeys in the South China Sea. However, these documents did not show any act of effective occupation by Chinese dynasties over 14 Such as in Geography of the Cochin-chinese Empire by J. Gutzlaff, 1849; 海外 紀事/ Hˇaiwài jìshì (Story Overseas) written by the high monk Shi Dashan, 1699; and Le Mémoire sur la Cochichine (Memories on Cochinchina) by Jean Baptiste Chaigneau, 1923.

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these two archipelagos which is the requirement pursuant to international law to establish sovereignty over them.15 As a matter of fact, the first recorded event which might show China’s intention to claim sovereignty over the Paracels was the landing by Commander Li Zhun on some of its islands in 1909 as mentioned earlier.16 During the colonial period, the French colonial authority in Indochina which was responsible for external relations and defence of sovereignty and territorial integrity of Viet Nam had maintained and strengthened the sovereignty of Viet Nam over Paracels and Spratlys through different activities. These include building infrastructures (lighthouses, meteorological station and radio-transmitting station), patrolling, surveying, stationing of troupes and establishment of administrative unit (MOFA of Viet Nam 1984, 20). In particular, France repeatedly protested and undertook concrete actions against the attempts from China and Japan to establish sovereignty to these two archipelagos.17 After San Francisco Treaty: Continuity and Consolidation According to the Geneva Agreements, 1954, the territory of Viet Nam was divided into two parts with the 17th parallel as the division line: the Northern part was governed by the Democratic Republic of Viet Nam and the Southern part, including the Paracels and Spartlys, by State of Viet Nam (which become later the Republic of Viet Nam) (Geneva Agreements 1954). In 1956, with the complete withdrawal of France from Indochina, the Republic of Viet Nam or South Viet Nam had continued to administrate the two archipelagos. (MOFA Viet Nam 1988, 5). They sent troupes to station, built sovereignty markers on the main islands, undertook scientific surveys, granted licence to prospect and exploit guano in the two archipelagos and reorganised their administrative management (MOFA Viet Nam 1984, 13–14; Nguy˜ên 2013, 151–152). The government of the Republic of Viet Nam also resolutely defended the sovereignty over the two Archipelagos whenever there is an attempt 15 See above Determining Sovereignty over the Paracels and Spratlys after San Franciso Treaty. 16 See above Determining Sovereignty over the Paracels and Spratlys after San Franciso Treaty. 17 See above Main Developments relating to the Two Archipelagos until the San Francisco Treaty.

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from a foreign State to dispute it or to occupy any of its feature (MOFA Viet Nam 1984, 13–14). In particular, when China used force to take over the Paracels in 1974, the Republic of Viet Nam sent protests to the UN Security Council and the Secretary-General (V˜ u 1988, 54). As stated earlier, the use of force against the territorial integrity of another State is illegal according to international law.18 After the reunification of Viet Nam in 1976, the government of the Republic Socialist of Viet Nam has continued to reaffirm Viet Nam’s sovereignty over the Paracels and Spratlys. It has also taken over the military posts of Republic of Viet Nam in the Spratlys while continuing ` 2010, to provide administrative management to both archipelagos (Trân 23). Currently the two archipelagos are administrated as two districts under Viet Nam’s local government systems19 : the district of Paracels under the Da Nang city and the district of Truong Sa under Khanh Hoa province. As the Paracels is currently occupied by China, the headquarters of its administration unit (Hoang Sa district People’s Committee) is in Da Nang city.20 At the same time, Viet Nam has continued to protect its sovereignty and rights against all acts considered violating its sovereignty, territorial integrity and interests over Paracels and Spratlys (MOFA Viet Nam 2013b, 38). For instance, in 1988 when China used force to gain its first foothold in the Spratlys, Viet Nam tried to prevent it on the ground (Koh and Ngo 2018) while protesting diplomatically (MOFA Viet Nam 1988). Finally, Viet Nam has been seeking to resolve disputes relating to sovereignty, sovereign rights and jurisdiction in the South China Sea through diplomatic and legal processes without use of force or threat to use force and through peaceful means in accordance with the UN Charter and the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, 1982 (Remarks by Spokesperson of MOFA Viet Nam 2021).

18 See above Determining Sovereignty over the Paracels and Spratlys after San Franciso

Treaty. 19 Under Viet Nam’s local government system, there are three basic levels of administration with at its head a People’s Committee (from the highest to the lowest): province/central city, district, and commune. 20 For details see the official website of Hoang Sa (Paracels) district’s People Committee: https://hoangsa.danang.gov.vn/ [in Vietnamese].

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Conclusion This chapter of the book evaluates of the consequences of the Treaty of San Francisco, 1951 on the Paracels and Spratlys dispute from an international law’s perspective. There have been some misunderstandings about the implications of Article 2(f) of the treaty with regards to the status of these two archipelagos. It is quite clear from the content of this article as well as the developments during the Conference that this treaty only concerns with the renunciation of Japan of its “rights, titles and claims” with regards to these archipelagos without implying on to whose sovereignty these should go to. With relevant misunderstanding cleared and the role of the San Francisco Treaty clarified, it is clear that the question of finding to whom the Paracels and Spratlys belong should be answered based on the rules of international law relating to the acquisition of sovereignty. From this perspective, the book chapter has also analysed the position of Viet Nam according to which, Viet Nam is the first country that established sovereignty on the Paracels and Spratlys. Viet Nam has also been able to provide evidence pursuant to international law, namely ancient official documents issued by the Court or Châu Ban, to demonstrate the country’s administration and exploitation activities over these two archipelagos since as early as the fifteenth century. Other claimants to the Paracels and Spratlys are strongly encouraged to undertake the same approach of Viet Nam, i.e. formulating their claims and providing supporting evidences based on the rules relating to the acquisition of sovereignty under international law. This could be a first step towards the resolution of sovereignty dispute over these two archipelagos in a peaceful and legal manner. ij

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U.S. Bilateral Alliances in the San Francisco System: Going Strong at Seventy Jocelyn D. Roberts and Scott A. Wicker

Introduction The signing of the Treaty of San Francisco, the U.S.-Japan Mutual Security Treaty, and the security alliance that ensued, fostered the development of significant economic relationships in the region because they removed the potential for destabilizing military competition. This chapter focuses

The views contained in this chapter are the personal views of the authors and do not represent or aim to represent any policy or position of the U.S. Government or Kentucky State University. J. D. Roberts (B) · S. A. Wicker U.S. Department of State, Washington, DC, USA e-mail: [email protected] S. A. Wicker School of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics, Kentucky State University, Frankfort, KY, USA e-mail: [email protected]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2022 Y. Sugita and V. Teo (eds.), Rethinking the San Francisco System in Indo-Pacific Security, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-1231-3_10

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on the opportunities and challenges of U.S.-Japan patterns of economic cooperation, the impacts on Southeast Asia, and the influence of a rising People’s Republic of China (PRC). This chapter highlights the economic influence of major powers in pursuing strategic objectives for engagement with the ASEAN sub-region, while touching upon military and political influence. Economic influence supporting Southeast Asian economic development is seen through provision of official development assistance, other official flows, and support through multilateral development banks; trade relationships, access, and multilateral trade agreements; and foreign direct investment (FDI). To demonstrate that the rise of the PRC has not eclipsed the influence of the United States and Japan in Southeast Asia, this chapter characterizes: (1) impacts of San Francisco System alliances on economic relationships with ASEAN member states; (2) advantages of U.S.-Japan economic engagement with ASEAN; (3) the rise of the PRC and its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) as a geopolitical engagement strategy; and (4) President Trump’s response, containment of the PRC, and impacts on the U.S. and Southeast Asian economic relations.

The San Francisco System in Southeast Asia: Multilateral Peace Builds the Foundation for Economic Growth The San Francisco Treaty of Amity with Japan, signed by 49 nations, established all signatories as “sovereign equals,” which shall “cooperate in friendly association to promote their common welfare and to maintain international peace and security” (Treaty of Peace 1951).The United States used the Treaty and associated subsequent security alliances to establish a new regional order, the San Francisco System, reducing the opportunity for military conflict. The San Francisco System thus fostered an environment for regional economic growth and integration. The treaty created divisions among signatories and non-signatories, leading to many on-going territorial disputes. Despite these territorial disputes, the San Francisco System established the political stability necessary to support economic liberalization measures, which in turn supported economic growth. After contrasting the San Francisco System to analogous arrangements elsewhere, the origins of this remarkably durable political–economic entity focus on complementary domestic political– economic interests on both sides of the Pacific, and reinforcing the

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Japan-centric design by John Foster Dulles, which accounts for its persistence, while forces for change center on the dynamic emerging role of the PRC (Calder 2004). Evolution of the U.S.-Japan Alliance The U.S.-Japan alliance started as a security arrangement and evolved over the decades into a trusting political and economic partnership. Senator Mike Mansfield, the longest-serving U.S. Ambassador to Japan from 1977 to 1989, emphasized that the U.S.-Japan relationship was more important than any other, “bar none” (Oberdorfer 2003). Over the decades since WWII and the evolution of the U.S.-Japan bilateral relationship, much of the gains made by both countries in the form of deepening relationships with Southeast Asian states, increased trade with the region, and economic prosperity stemmed from the benefits of the San Francisco System. The existence of the System allowed Japan to keep its defense budget very low even during the Cold War, at or around 1% of GDP, compared to approximately 5% of GDP for the United States and 2.5% of GDP for the PRC (SIPRI 2021). Low defense expenditures allowed Japan to focus resources on commercial opportunities abroad, including boosting trade with Southeast Asian nations, and creating economic influence through the provision of significant official development assistance (ODA) (Ciorciari and Tsutsui 2021). Southeast Asian countries also benefited economically from the San Francisco System through increased foreign assistance, trade, and FDI. Increased FDI brought new versions of networked FDI, which engaged Southeast Asian states in aspects of complex manufacturing supply chains sometimes in the place of the PRC or its provinces. U.S., Japan, and PRC Objectives in Southeast Asia: U.S. objectives for engagement with Asia are to maintain open sea lines of communication (SLOCs), and later focused on multilateral cooperation and maintaining regional order. Possessing the world’s most powerful navy and as the preeminent global maritime trader, the United States aims to maintain the freedom of the sealines of communication (SLOCs). Free trade is a key element of liberal democratic capitalism—the international system promoted by the United States at Bretton Woods. The bilateral U.S.–Asian alliances provided bases and partners for U.S. forces that buttressed their regional deployments. In the last two decades, as Asian states matured economically, Washington became more interested

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in multilateral cooperation and recently in sharing responsibility for maintaining regional order. Although not ostensibly designed to contain the PRC, the Rebalance to Asia under President Obama provides Southeast Asia with hedging options against more aggressive PRC actions in the West Philippine Sea (Simon 2015). Stimulating Japanese economic growth through investment in largescale infrastructure abroad and supporting regional maritime domain awareness to protect Japan’s own long-term maritime security drive Japan’s increasing engagement with Southeast Asia. Tokyo officially denies any suggestion of checking the PRC with these policies, however, the number of “first-ever” Japanese defense initiatives with Southeast Asian countries in 2015, particularly with the Philippines and Vietnam, corresponding to rising concern in the region over PRC moves in the West Philippine Sea suggest otherwise. Tokyo has matched these policy measures with a diplomatic strategy to urge peaceful resolution of territorial disputes in the West Philippine Sea. New developments in regional security relations reflect a revision of Japanese defense guidelines and of the U.S.-Japan alliance, both of which emphasize greater interaction with regional partners (Dalpino 2016). Despite the rise of the PRC, Japan “maintains a surprising ability to influence the preferences of Southeast Asian nations and responses to exercises of PRC power, which in turn has allowed Japan to influence PRC regional strategy” (Wallace 2019: 863). Japan used reparations, followed by foreign assistance, and increasingly strong trade relations to become a key economic and strategic actor in Southeast Asia (Llewelyn 2014: 86). PRC’s objectives in engaging with Southeast Asia are to design a new regional order with the PRC at the center and address domestic oversupply through trade with foreign markets. The PRC was able to advance its diplomacy with Southeast Asian nations by providing economic alternatives to dependence on their former colonial powers (Wallace 2019: 863). Combatting communism, however, was part of the impetus for the launch of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Williams 2018: 509–512). As such, a rift between Beijing and Southeast Asian capitals existed for decades as a result of Beijing’s support for local communist movements. The PRC utilizes a two-pronged approach of both offering “rewards” or inducements to Southeast Asia states while threatening coercion as “punishment” to divide ASEAN states on the issue of disputed territories and weaken ASEAN as an institution (Le Thu 2019: 20). In a perceived gap of U.S. regional leadership, the PRC has proposed the

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ASEAN-China Community of Common Destiny to reinforce an on-going power shift to a PRC-centered regional order (Ha Hoang Thi 2019: 223). U.S., Japan, and PRC Economic Competition and Interdependence: Access to the U.S. market during the post-World War II period and later normalization of trade relations with the PRC set the stage for the rise of Japan. Normalization of relations with the United States and Japan in 1972 and accession to the WTO in 2001 became the platform for the rise of the PRC. Japan had to wait until President Nixon decided to engage with the PRC to normalize relations. Once diplomatic relations were established with both countries, economic engagement commenced in earnest, and the PRC was newly able to benefit from the advantages of the San Francisco System. Since 1972, Japan, the PRC, and Southeast Asia have seen extraordinary growth in international trade and the creation of regional and global trading frameworks spearheaded by the United States and the World Trade Organization (WTO). Regional trade has increased dramatically since the PRC joined the WTO in 2001 (IMF n.d). As it established itself as the dominant power in the region, Chinese ambitions have often clashed with the interests of other powers, especially Japan and the United States (Dower 2014) (Fig. 1). The PRC’s economic trajectory, its activities across the Indo-Pacific, and trade tensions are major variables for U.S.-Japan-PRC economic relationships. The PRC’s level of productivity, however, is likely to slow as its working population age peaks, its wages increase, the technology gap between high-income countries narrows, and with the associated risks of the PRC scaling-back efforts to privatize its industries (Harding and Tran 2019). The enduring strength of the U.S.-Japan economic partnership can be seen in high mutual FDI levels. Japan was the top source of inward FDI flows to the United States in 2020, providing $647.7 billion USD of investment in the U.S. economy, representing 14% of the U.S. annual total, and 31% of Japan’s total outward FDI. The United States was the top source of FDI for Japan at 27% of total inward FDI and $232 billion USD. The second-highest amount of Japan’s outward FDI went to the PRC, at 8% of Japan’s total and $138.6 billion USD. Japan and the United States were the third and fifth highest sources of inward FDI for the PRC in 2020, providing 6% of total FDI or $193.3 billion USD and 3% of the total or $86.9 billion USD, respectively, in 2020. The United States was the fourth-largest destination for PRC outward FDI at

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1980-2020: Japan Exports to the United States and PRC (USD Billions) IMF DOTS 160 140

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Fig. 1 The U.S.-Japan trade relationship fostered Japan’s development in the 1980s and 1990s. Japan’s trade with the PRC developed slowly after normalization of relations, surpassed exports to the United States shortly after PRC’s accession to the WTO in 2001 and grew exponentially. Data from IMF Direction of Trade Statistics (DOTS) with the author’s calculations

3% of the total and $80 billion USD in 2020 (IMF, Coordinated Direct Investment Survey n.d.) (Figs. 2, 3 and 4). Since a pilot in 2009, the PRC has actively sought to expand the type and number of transactions that can be settled in renminbi (RMB) with the objective to reduce dependence on the U.S. dollar as a medium of exchange (Marconi 2018: 150–152). According to the Federal Reserve and U.S. Department of the Treasury, in March 2021, foreign countries held a total of $7 trillion USD in U.S. Treasury securities, with Japan and the PRC holding the greatest portions (Duff 2021). Japan held $1.24 trillion USD worth to the PRC’s $1.1 trillion USD. While official figures show the PRC in second place, it’s possible that the PRC holds more securities than Japan as a result of purchases through off-shore financial centers (U.S. Library of Congress 2021). These figures show to some extent how integrated the economies of the United States, Japan, and the PRC have become (Fig. 5).

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2009-2020: Japan, Singapore, and PRC FDI Positions in the United States (USD Billions) IMF CDIS 700

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Fig. 3 United States, Singapore, and PRC outward FDI positions in Japan from 2009 to 2020. The United States far outpaces PRC investment, which does not reach even $5 billion annually by 2020. Singapore’s investment grew in 2019 and 2020. Data are from the IMF CDIS database with the author’s calculations

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2009-2020: Japan, Singapore, & United States FDI Positions in PRC (USD Billions) IMF CDIS 250

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Fig. 4 Japan, Singapore, and U.S. outward FDI positions in the PRC over the period from 2009 to 2020. This graph shows the United States and Japan’s significant contributions to the PRC’s economy through FDI. FDI positions of all three countries had nominal changes from 2017 to 2018, dipped in 2019, and grew substantially in 2020. Data are from the IMF CDIS database with the author’s calculations Japan & PRC Holdings of U.S. Treasury Securities (USD Billions) U.S. Department of the Treasury 1400

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Fig. 5 Japan leading the PRC in holdings of U.S. Treasury securities from 2020 to 2021. Data are from the U.S. Department of the Treasury with the author’s calculations

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U.S.-Japan Economic Influence in Southeast Asia The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) has been a successful example of regionalism for several reasons, but the most important has been its ability to affirm a commitment to regional order based upon the territorial status quo (Williams 2018: 509–512). ASEAN is considered the most successful multilateral organization in the Global South owing to its resilience, durability, incredible growth, ability to draw in international resources, and the benefits it has brought to member states, including peace and stability which has laid the groundwork for regional prosperity (Stubbs 2019). Over the global economic recession in 2009, emerging market and developing economies did better, in fact, than the developed economies that were the “epicenter” of the crisis. In addition, emerging markets recovered stronger than in previous global economic recessions (Kose et al. 2020: 2). With support from major powers, and in particular the United States and Japan, and while developing ASEAN’s capabilities, economic growth in Southeast Asian nations, due to trade, FDI, and liberalizing economies, began to structurally change economies and societies. Governments in formerly planned economies in Asia embarked on sweeping economic reforms in the last part of the twentieth century, including the PRC, Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia (Booth 2019: 16–17). This section of the chapter highlights U.S.-Japan engagement with Southeast Asia and the resulting economic benefits for all parties. Japan and Southeast Asia The critical role of Japan’s post-World War II engagement to the development of Post-War Asia has been underestimated, in part as a result of Tokyo’s own policies not to flout its accomplishments. Japan has long played a more active, autonomous, and multi-dimensional role in Southeast Asia through multilateral diplomacy, maritime security, private investment, development assistance, civil society engagement, and educational and cultural initiatives conducive to the cultivation of “soft power” than is generally appreciated. Through this multi-faceted engagement, Japan stands shoulder-to-shoulder with the United States on some issues while

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carving out its own space for engagement and influence on others. Japan’s unique status as a close strategic ally of the United States with some of the world’s most formidable economic, technological, diplomatic, and even military capabilities of its own is one key to its ability to play this pivotal role. Another is its dual identity as an Asian country and a wealthy established democracy. Japan enables ASEAN members to diversify their international engagement in many respects, and it gives the regional order a more complex, adaptive, and resilient character than popular references to a new Sino-American Cold War suggests (Ciorciari and Tsutsui 2021: 2–7). Japan has emerged as the prime external actor enabling ASEAN members to pursue diversification strategies—a core component of each Southeast Asian government’s foreign policy and key to preserving ASEAN’s central position in the regional order (ibid.: 17–26). Trade with ASEAN From 2015 through 2020, the PRC, the United States, and Japan have been the top partners for total trade with ASEAN every year, in that order. From 2019 to 2020, the PRC’s total trade with ASEAN increased 1.7%, U.S. total trade with ASEAN increased 4.6%, and Japan’s total trade with ASEAN decreased by 9.7% (ASEANStatsDataPortal) likely due to supply chain impacts from the COVID-19 pandemic (ASEAN Investment Report 2021). ASEAN is the fourth-largest trading partner for the United States, with exports to ASEAN supporting almost 500,000 U.S. jobs in 2013. In 2018, the United States exported USD $80 billion and $30 billion worth of goods and services, respectively, to ASEAN, an increase of 81% since 2005 (Aslam 2019: 339–344). U.S. goods and services trade with ASEAN totaled an estimated $362.2 billion in 2020. U.S. goods imports from ASEAN totaled $231.3 billion in 2020, up 12.3 percent ($25.4 billion) from 2019, despite supply chain challenges due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The top export markets in the region for 2020 were Singapore ($26.9 billion), Malaysia ($12.3 billion), Thailand ($11.3 billion), Vietnam ($9.9 billion), and the Philippines ($7.7. billion) with the top import markets being the same, except that Indonesia edges out the Philippines in imports. The U.S. goods trade deficit with ASEAN was $154.9 billion in 2020, a 29.2 percent increase ($35.1 billion) over 2019 (United States Trade Representative [USTR], n.d.), perhaps showing how

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ASEAN countries benefited from trade war-caused trade diversion from the PRC (Fig. 6). During the Trump Administration all countries suffered setbacks in trade due to supply chain challenges from the onset of the COVID19 pandemic. The graphs below show that (Fig. 7) while Japan already imported more goods from Thailand than from other ASEAN partners, PRC, U.S., and Japan Exports of Goods to ASEAN (USD Billions) ASEANStatsDataPortal 250

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Fig. 7 Imports (CIF) and exports (FOB) of goods from the IMF DOTS database with the author’s calculations

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PRC Goods Imports from Key ASEAN Member States (USD Billions) IMF DOTS 12

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Fig. 8 Imports (CIF) and exports (FOB) of goods from the IMF DOTS database with the author’s calculations

Japan’s imports from Malaysia, Singapore, and Viet Nam grew, even after the pandemic, and imports from Thailand, while taking the largest hit, recovered previous levels. The PRC was importing $2–$4 billion USD per month from half the ASEAN states in late 2016. Over the course of the next four years, the PRC increased imports from Viet Nam from $4 billion USD to almost $10 billion USD (Fig. 8). The United States traditionally has imported more from Singapore than from its neighbors, and this trend continued over the period (Fig. 9). Imports from Singapore took the biggest hit during the COVID-19 pandemic and were able to recover in 2021. U.S. exports to Viet Nam grew steadily over the same period, from over $3 billion to over $8 billion monthly (Fig. 10). Foreign Direct Investment in ASEAN The United States and Japan have long been top sources of FDI to ASEAN countries. U.S. and Japanese companies began relocating some of their operations from the PRC to ASEAN member states as a result of the rising cost of doing business in the PRC. This trend was accelerated due to U.S.-PRC trade tensions and reinforced by COVID-19 pandemic supply chain disruptions and efforts by both countries to diversify their

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Fig. 10 Imports (CIF) and exports (FOB) of goods from the IMF DOTS database with the author’s calculations

supply chains (ASEAN Secretariat 2021: 37). ASEAN’s largest sources of FDI in 2019 were the United States, Japan, Singapore, Hong Kong, and Canada with total FDI outflows to ASEAN of $97.2 billion USD. In 2020, they were the United States, Singapore, Hong Kong, Japan, and the PRC, with total outflows to ASEAN of $77 billion USD, a 20% drop year-on-year in the top 5 sources (ibid.: 5). U.S. FDI in ASEAN (stock) was $328.5 billion in 2020, a 3.2 percent increase from 2019

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2018-2020: Outward FDI Positions in ASEAN (USD Billions) IMF CDIS 1,000 800 600 400 200 PRC

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Fig. 11 U.S. outward FDI position in ASEAN nations dominates contributions from Japan and the PRC. The chart shows the years comparable data for the PRC are available. Looking farther back in history, the U.S. outward FDI position in ASEAN only grows. Data are from the IMF CDIS database with the author’s calculations

(USTR, n.d.). U.S. FDI flows to ASEAN were $34.5 billion in 2019 and increased to $35 billion in 2020, compared to the PRC’s flows of FDI to ASEAN of $8.8 billion in 2019, dropping to $7.7 billion in 2020. The United States provided almost four times as much FDI flows to ASEAN countries in 2019 as the PRC did, and almost five times the PRC’s FDI flows to ASEAN in 2020. The increase in U.S. FDI occurred despite the region’s overall 25% decrease in FDI inflows in 2020 due to economic disruption caused by the COVID-19 pandemic (ASEAN Secretariat 2021). The increase in U.S. FDI to ASEAN shows the resilience of the relationship and enduring nature of U.S. contributions to the ASEAN economy (Fig. 11).

PRC Efforts to Influence ASEAN, and Continued Challenges This section discusses the PRC’s rise over the last 20 years, its launch of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) in the last decade as a geopolitical engagement strategy, and its impacts. Despite the vast finance commitments the PRC is offering ASEAN member states, the infrastructure projects, and its great increase in trade with the region, the PRC has failed to build trust with ASEAN member states as a result of its

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actions in both the economic and security spheres. While the 99-year lease of Hambantota Port in Sri Lanka to China Merchants Port Company Limited (CM Port) was not a debt for equity swap as widely reported in the media, the lease covered balance of payments issues resulting from Sri Lanka’s soaring debt servicing cost. CM Port now controls 70% of the port’s profits during the term of its lease while the government repays its loans partially through the marginally revenue-generating port operations (Moramudali 2020). The lease, however, caused widespread concerns about the potential for a loss of sovereignty through economic coercion. Consequently, ASEAN members continue to prefer engaging with the United States and Japan for their long-term benefit. Launch of the BRI The first decade of the twentieth century saw a transformation in the PRC’s global position since its accession to the WTO, its rapid rise as a major power accompanied by its essential participation in progress on economic stability, environmental protection, development assistance, and other matters. Given its prominence, the PRC prefers to make the rules, rather than follow those of others (Florini 2011: 25). That began to become clear when PRC President, Xi Jinping, launched the BRI in 2013. The PRC’s model of state-led capitalism and its authoritarian governance are competing against the free market system. While the PRC government hoped that over time, it would also be considered a market economy, its recent loss in its suit against the EU in order to be labeled as such by the WTO was an embarrassing set-back for this cause (Miles 2019). Various Chinese scholars commented during interviews that the PRC’s primary objective was to focus on domestic economic development. With the launch of its island-making enterprise in the West Philippine Sea, however, the launch of the BRI to connect additional markets to the PRC, and the great increases in its offers of other financial flows and development assistance, the PRC began to show the world its idea of a Chinese global order (Florini 2011). PRC Development Finance While the PRC has significantly increased its overseas development finance since the launch of the BRI, the finance is primarily in the form of loans (in contrast to that of G7 members) and has created severe impacts for borrowers in terms of increased debt-to-GDP ratios and follow-on effects. The PRC provides only a limited amount of its international development

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finance in the form of official development assistance (ODA). The PRC provides a 31:1 ratio of loans to grants globally and a 9:1 ratio of other official flows to ODA. From 2000 to 2012, the United States led international development finance globally among G7 members with an average of almost $34 billion USD annually to the PRC’s $32 billion USD. From 2013 to 2017, however, with the launch of the BRI, there was a significant increase in PRC overseas development finance to $85.1 billion USD on average annually to the United States’ $37 billion USD. The PRC also provided only 12% of its finance globally from 2000 to 2017 through ODA, while the United States provided 73% of its finance through ODA during the same period (Malik et al. 2021). Public Debt The difference in approach has significant implications for the debt burdens of PRC development finance recipient countries. Laos is an example, with an existing public debt-to-GDP ratio of approximately 55–60%, and the contingent liability of the China-Laos Railway project representing potentially another 35% of GDP. This is one of the reasons ASEAN member states continue to engage with the United States and Japan despite PRC offers of a prolific amount of finance available (sometimes) in record speeds. In addition, Chinese projects, and particularly those under the BRI, have a high rate of protests, implementation delays, and other complications, including significant negative environmental and social impacts. Other G7 members follow the U.S. pattern of providing primarily ODA rather than other official flows (OOF) including semi-concessional and non-concessional loans as well as export credits. Indonesia, Myanmar, Cambodia, and Viet Nam are among the top 25 recipients of ODA from the PRC during the period 2000–2017 with a total of $10.71 billion USD received. Indonesia, Viet Nam, Laos, Malaysia, and Cambodia are among the top 25 global recipients of OOF from the PRC from 2000 to 2017, with a total of $76.1 billion USD (ibid.) (Fig. 12). Multilateral Trade Agreements Engagement through the BRI could have benefits both for ASEAN countries and the PRC in terms of increased trade flows and projects that the BRI could facilitate for years to come (Foo et al. 2020: 24).

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1970-2019: Total ODA & OOF (USD Billions) OECD.Stat 35 30 25 20 15 10 5 0

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Fig. 12 Total historical provision of overseas development assistance (ODA) and other official flows (OOF) from Japan and the United States to most ASEAN member states and the PRC for the period 1970–2019. Data is from OECD. Stat with the author’s calculations

The China-ASEAN Framework Agreement reduced regional trade policy uncertainty, which had a significant positive effect on PRC firms’ FDI in ASEAN over the period from 2001 to 2013. Since the PRC joined the WTO, intra-regional trade with the PRC has nearly doubled as a share of trade in Asia, primarily at the expense of Japan. The China-ASEAN FTA (CAFTA), launched in 2010 on the development of the previous Framework Agreement, provides opportunities for Chinese companies to access new markets while domestic demand is waning and firms face over-capacity. The CAFTA (1) “lowered the threshold for Chinese companies to invest in ASEAN countries”; (2) strengthened Chinese management experience, allowing Chinese enterprises to accelerate FDI in labor-intensive industries; and (3) reduced the cost of trade in intermediate goods, “effectively promoting the pace of Chinese companies’ investments in ASEAN countries” (Sun et al. 2020: 128–142). Over the long term, however, the ASEAN-China FTA (ACFTA) may lead to more competition among the PRC and ASEAN countries since they produce and export some of the same products and would compete in international markets. The overall effect of the ACFTA will be to slow ASEAN’s trade growth. “…Before ACFTA was signed, ASEAN’s trade deficit with

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the PRC was…$3.9 billion in 2000. It worsened after ACFTA was implemented to…$13.4 billion in 2010 and $92.2 billion in 2018” partly because of the PRC’s lower costs of production (Aslam 2019: 339–344). Multilateral Responses to BRI In contrast to the PRC’s efforts to engage ASEAN through multilateral efforts, Japan’s Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe, launched the Partnership for Quality Infrastructure: Investment for Asia’s Future initiative in 2015, one year before the Principles for Promoting Quality Infrastructure were adopted by the G7 in its leaders’ declaration at Ise-Shima. The G7 Ise-Shima Principles to Promote Quality Infrastructure are (1) ensuring effective governance of resilient infrastructure, (2) ensuring job creation and capacity building for local communities; (3) addressing social and environmental impacts; (4) aligning with national and regional economic development strategies; and (5) enhancing resource mobilization, including through public–private partnerships (White House 2016).Japan continued to promote the principles, including through partnership with the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), G20, and the World Bank Group as both a counter-weight to the PRC’s offers of finance through the BRI and to set an alternative, sustainable model for infrastructure investment. The United States responded two years later by re-framing the Overseas Private Investment Corporation to create the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation (DFC) through the Better Utilization of Investments Leading to Development (BUILD) Act of 2018. The BUILD Act defines U.S. policy “to facilitate market-based…economic growth…[among other reasons] to provide countries a robust alternative to state-directed investments by authoritarian governments and United States strategic competitors using high standards of transparency and environmental and social safeguards, and which take into account the debt sustainability of partner countries” (U.S. Congress 2018). The BUILD Act provided new authorities to the DFC, including the ability to provide equity investments, technical assistance, folding the U.S. Agency for International Development’s prior Development Credit Authority into the new agency, almost doubling its exposure cap to $60 billion USD, and removing the U.S. nexus requirement. The DFC is empowered to engage with any private sector partner that meets its eligibility criteria in all countries where it is authorized to operate.

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The challenge of applying high standards, however, is that appropriate time and resources need to be dedicated to their implementation. One of the attractive aspects of Chinese development finance for developing countries is that it can be made available relatively more quickly than finance of other major donors. In 2019, the United States, Japan, and Australia announced the Blue Dot Network to certify quality projects that meet robust international standards. Blue Dot Network certification would serve as a globally recognized symbol of open and inclusive, transparent, Paris Agreement-aligned, and financially, socially, and environmentally sustainable infrastructure projects and is being developed in collaboration with the OECD (U.S. Department of State, Oct. 2021). In June, 2021, after discussing strategic competition with the PRC with G7 leaders, President Biden and G7 leaders launched the Build Back Better World (B3W) Partnership to meet infrastructure needs, catalyze finance for infrastructure investment that is values-driven, promote good governance and strong standards, develop climate-friendly infrastructure, create strong strategic partnerships, mobilize private capital, and enhance the impact of multilateral public finance. The Fact Sheet on the launch lists the DFC in the lead of U.S. agencies that will contribute to mobilizing the full potential of U.S. development finance tools (White House 2021). Japan’s launch and promotion of its Quality Infrastructure Initiative through the G7, G20, OECD, and World Bank and the U.S. launch and promotion of B3W and Blue Dot Network through the G7, OECD, and with bilateral partners show how both countries are strengthening their approaches to the region through bilateral and multilateral efforts. This is a hallmark of the approach of the United States and Japan that cannot be replicated by the PRC. Asian Perspectives on BRI There are a variety of Asian perspectives on the PRC’s BRI. Japan and the Republic of Korea, for example, seem to be cooperating with the BRI, despite critical voices in each nation that could become louder, depending on future developments with Beijing. While South Koreans tend to be more optimistic about the economic opportunities the BRI could bring and political leaders have launched complementary visions of regional connectivity, some see Japan’s response of slowly moving closer to the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), launched to realize the vision of the BRI, and BRI with the caveats that it support free, fair,

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and transparent economic opportunities for the region, as hedging while it also engages with India to develop the Free and Open Indo-Pacific concept it launched originally in 2007. Some Japanese politicians see BRI as a challenge to U.S. global influence. Southeast Asian attitudes toward the BRI are far more reserved than those of Central Asian nations. The reasons include (1) the many nations with close economic and security relations with the United States, such as Thailand, the Philippines, Singapore, and Indonesia; (2) the region’s close military ties with Japan and Australia; (3) the desire to protect their respective strategic autonomy; (4) the view that the BRI is a potential source of worsening geopolitical tensions. While Cambodia and Lao PDR have been seen to welcome the BRI with open arms; Myanmar and Brunei have welcomed specific economic opportunities that will advance national development objectives. The countries more welcoming to BRI also have no territorial disputes with the PRC. Viet Nam and others view U.S. presence in the region as a positive balance against growing PRC influence (Heiduk, Sakaki 2019: 100–105). Singapore’s warm response to collaboration with the PRC on the BRI shows its main concern is strategic relevance. While it has developed its economy on global trade flows, the PRC’s BRI effort has complementary aims from which Singapore stands to benefit. In addition, Singapore uses its engagement to share its perspective on regional multilateral architecture and balances its collaboration with the BRI through strengthening economic relations with the United States (Chan 2019: 185).

U.S.-PRC Engagement, Trade Wars, and Their Fallout for Southeast Asia Indo-Pacific Policies Japan’s initial introduction of the Free and Open Indo-Pacific (FOIP) concept in 2007 was an attempt to strengthen relationships with the United States, India, and Australia while demonstrating Japan’s brand as a democracy in light of concerns about the PRC’s rise. The updated Free and Open Indo-Pacific policy under Abe launched in 2016 is “less confrontational, less divisive, and more cooperative toward the PRC…” (Hosoya 2019: 18–19). The United States took at least five years before President Obama instituted the Rebalance to Asia in 2012, and later administrations picked up on the Indo-Pacific concept and approach

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of fellow Quad members Japan, Australia, and later India. The Trump Administration eventually endorsed both the FOIP vision of Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and Australia’s 2017 Defence White Paper concept on the Indo-Pacific. The Indo-Pacific policies promoted by Quad members (including Prime Minister Modi’s “Act East” policy in India) are effectively a reconceptualization of the region to address deficiencies in Asia’s maritime security and institutional architecture, which, under the Trump administration, were being simultaneously influenced by a more aggressive PRC posture and waning U.S. influence. The utilization of maritime mini-lateralism by Quad members supplements the San Francisco system’s bilateral American security alliances (with Japan, the ROK, Taiwan, the Philippines, Thailand, Singapore, Australia, and New Zealand) with multiple trilateral security dialogues (Lee-Brown 2018: 163). If the focus was initially on security, however, the increased collaboration, diplomatic engagement, and progress on security affairs opened the door to deeper economic partnerships. The Indo-Pacific policies of Quad members, multilateral trade agreements, and multilateral security agreements and exercises are the multilateral successors of the San Francisco System’s bilateral alliance network. U.S.-PRC Trade and Investment In the U.S.-PRC trade relationship, exports from the PRC grew exponentially due to heavy inflow of FDI between the 1980s and 1990s, with foreign firms accounting for the largest contributions. U.S. exports to the PRC increased by 527% from 2001 (pre-WTO accession) while the PRC remains the main source of U.S. imports. The PRC was the United States’ third-largest export market in 2018 and its imports increased from 10.8% of total imports in 2002 to over 21% from 2015 through 2018. The PRC’s exports to the United States have grown from USD $28.1 billion in 2001 to USD $323.7 billion in 2018. The PRC’s imports, however, from the United States increased from USD $20.2 billion in 2001 to USD $156 billion in 2018. The trade balance has therefore very much remained in favor of the PRC with U.S. deficits increasing sharply annually. The 427% increase in imports from the PRC between 2001 and 2018 and the fact that in 2018, U.S. imports from the PRC accounted for over 21% of overall imports, show the importance of Chinese imports in the U.S. markets for goods. U.S. Department of Commerce data show that U.S. exports of goods and services to the PRC created an estimated

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911,000 American jobs in 2015 (601,000 supported by goods exports and the rest supported by service exports) (Aslam 2019: 332–339). ASEAN Balancing Act Scholars note the complementarity of an Obama Administration leading the U.S. Government to hedge against the PRC’s rise by extending diplomatic engagement to a group of Southeast Asian governments that want to hedge against the uncertainty of PRC regional aims by welcoming strengthened collaboration with the United States. These corresponding positions, however, are juxtaposed by a desire not to confront the PRC unnecessarily and yet the need to counter-balance when the PRC takes threatening actions (Kuik et al. 2012: 315). San Francisco System alliances and the long history of engagement make this mutual outreach possible. This complementary positioning would likely continue except when the PRC poses too great a threat, which we later see in PRC advances on disputed territories in the West Philippine Sea. Origins of the Trade War President Trump initiated what came to be called the “trade war with China” in 2017 by asking U.S. agencies to investigate PRC trade practices under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974. The trade war proceeded with investigations, several rounds of tariff applications, exemptions for companies and some countries that objected or provided appropriate justifications, subsidies for U.S. farmers (Brown and Zhang 2018), executive orders to ban certain companies, adding companies to Commerce’s entity list, development of new regulations (including restricting PRC investment in U.S. tech companies), and visa restrictions (Houser 2020; Brown and Kolb 2021). Some scholars blame the United States for its record-busting trade deficit with the PRC (up to $615 billion USD in 2018). They also note with concern how entangled the United States and PRC monetary policy and trade relations are (Long et al. 2020: 14) (Fig. 13).

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Current Account Balance as a % of GDP (OECD.stat) 10.00 8.00

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Fig. 13 Current account balances for the United States, Japan, and the PRC as a percentage of gross domestic product from 1996 to 2020. Data is from OECD.stat with the author’s calculations

President Trump set aside the known advantages of operating through the San Francisco System when he began the trade war unilaterally and escalated terms numerous times. The trade war negatively impacted U.S. allies and the U.S. economy in addition to reducing imports from the PRC. Decoupling the U.S. and PRC economies would have “disastrous” political and economic impacts and the Biden administration should take less provocative approaches and encourage the PRC to become a full member of the international trading system through additional liberalization (Lester and Zhu 2020: 23). Based on the U.S. track record of failure to restrict Japan’s exports to the United States to reduce its trade deficit over many decades of bilateral trade frictions, the United States cannot hopefully expect to reduce the bilateral trade deficit with the PRC through Trump’s trade war. The United States would be more likely to achieve its secondary objective in the trade war with the PRC to stop unfair trade practices if it collaborated with allies Japan and the European Union (Urata 2020: 141), instead of conspicuously applying the same tariffs globally to all nations, friend or foe.

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U.S. Trade War Impacts The impacts, while putting a damper on the PRC’s GDP growth (Hanson 2020), negatively affected the U.S. economy and many U.S. allies, including Canada, Mexico, the European Union, and the Republic of Korea. The trade war tariffs imposed by both the United States and PRC have an unusual effect of having a one-for-one impact on prices in each country, respectively. For example, average tariffs going up to 25% are showing a pass-through into prices of about the same amount increase for wholesale goods. Usually, the impact is less. In addition, U.S. tariffs targeted at the PRC have resulted in supply chain adjustments that diverted imports from the PRC to regional economies such as Vietnam, Bangladesh, and other countries. Previous research verifies that U.S. sectors and regions specialized in goods that compete with imports from the PRC have seen substantial job losses, primarily from plant closures; reductions in earnings in those industries; and persistent declines in employment rates (Hanson 2020: 69–71). Other impacts include that 30% of U.S. firms in the PRC had negative financial results in 2018 and the tariff measures imposed hurt U.S. consumers more than PRC consumers (Aslam 2019: 339–344). Tariffs (1) undermine the global liberal trade order, (2) weaken the U.S. position and alienate U.S. allies; and (3) escalate economic issues into an existential crisis (Pempel 2019: 996) (Fig. 14). Trade War Impacts on Digital Technology While evaluating the impacts of the U.S-PRC trade wars on innovation, the refusal of both countries to acknowledge their interdependence in the development of 5G systems threatens the future of artificial intelligence. Without coordinated 5G system development and international standards, there is a real risk of forcing the world to “pick a side” between the United States and the PRC and the two potentially bifurcated internets with divergent standards they may develop. The list of negative impacts of the trade war on digital technology is long and includes: (a) potential reduction in FDI by PRC companies in U.S. tech start-ups, (b) a slowed installation of 5G equipment in the United States and increased costs; (c) slowed development of AI tech globally; (d) decline in PRC exports to the United States and the PRC purchasing billions of dollars’ worth of semi-conductor chips from Taiwan and the ROK to reduce reliance on

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Sep 2021

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Fig. 14 The significant decline in U.S. imports from the PRC starting in early 2018 and persisting until May 2020. Data are from IMF DOTS database with the author’s calculations

U.S. chips prohibited for export; (e) a reduction of predictability in the global economy; (f) a decline in U.S. goods exported to the PRC; (g) U.S. layoffs by Huawei; (h) loss of $162 billion in revenue from the top five U.S. tech companies; (i) cost to consumers of $68 billion of tariffs; and finally, (j) the use of unilateral actions by both countries instead of utilizing WTO international dispute resolution mechanisms undermines the WTO and with it the democratic process (Houser 2020: 550–596). The overall affect also was to push the PRC to rely less on the United States both as a trade partner and for other economic reasons and to strengthen its relationship with Japan. Trade War Impacts on ASEAN In the short term, ASEAN nations may benefit from trade diversion for companies seeking to avoid tariffs on Chinese goods; in the long term, however, since the PRC imports a large amount of intermediate goods from ASEAN countries through networked FDI to finish and sell on the U.S. market, the tariffs would also have a negative impact on ASEAN economies by reducing ASEAN exports. Other impacts of the tariffs include (1) potential disturbances in regional production networks; (2) negative impacts in the electrical and electronic equipment, machinery,

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and components sector; (3) Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand being hurt by the U.S.-PRC trade war, with Malaysia the most vulnerable; (4) Cambodia, Indonesia, and Viet Nam having more limited effects as a result of their low participation in Chinese-led global value chains; and (5) Viet Nam could benefit by increasing trade with the United States (Aslam 2019: 339–344). Some countries benefited from increased trade with both the PRC and the United States to replace some of the U.S.-PRC trade that has stalled. In Thailand’s case, the PRC’s economic slowdown will adversely affect its output and exports to key markets (Nidhiprabha 2019: 166). Lao PDR may benefit from diversion of Chinese FDI to avoid U.S. tariffs. Increased PRC FDI may come at the cost, however, of reduced exports to the United States (Yuvejwattana 2019). Despite the impacts of the trade war, the United States continues to engage with ASEAN member states and in October 2021, President Biden announced new initiatives to expand the U.S.-ASEAN Strategic Partnership (White House, Oct. 2021).Japan, meanwhile, is planning a special summit for leaders to commemorate the 50th anniversary of ASEAN-Japan Friendship and Cooperation in 2023 (MOFA 2021). Despite a distracting focus on strategic competition with the PRC, the U.S.-Japan alliance, and the entire San Francisco System built around it, will continue to strengthen long into the future.

Conclusions This chapter analyzes the impacts of the San Francisco System on economic relationships among Treaty signatories and non-signatories, in particular the United States, Japan, Southeast Asian countries, and the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and finds that despite the PRC’s rise, it has not been able to surpass the economic influence of the United States and Japan in Southeast Asia for a number of reasons. The San Francisco System created a unique relationship between the United States and Japan, allowing Japan to focus its resources on its own economic rehabilitation, which quickly translated into spillover effects for Southeast Asian nations and the PRC. Both the United States and Japan, and the PRC in its own way, are contributing to the economic development of Southeast Asian nations. The scale of investment and assistance demonstrates the deep relationship among the United States, Japan, and Southeast Asia, while the volume of trade, trade (im)balances, and development of new supply chains that have responded to the recent trade war illuminate

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the integral role of the PRC in the global economy. Given the ability of the United States and Japan to collaborate toward shared goals, and to engage multilateral institutions to advance the same, this partnership approach strengthens their influence in the region in a way that the PRC cannot exploit. Despite shifting power dynamics, Southeast Asian nations will benefit by continuing to engage both major and emerging partners.

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Reshaping the San Francisco System Through Alignment Cooperation: Japan’s Security Partnerships in the Asia-Indo-Pacific Elena Atanassova-Cornelis

Introduction The US-led system of bilateral security alliances, also known as the San Francisco System or the “hub-and-spokes” security system, has been a central pillar of the Asia–Pacific security order. Anxious about China’s future strategic objectives in the region, Japan continues to support America’s regional security presence and has pursued policies designed to reinforce its security alliance with the US. At the same time, Japan has played a key role in promoting alignment cooperation in the region, which has included reinforcing the existing, or establishing new, bilateral and minilateral security agreements. Tokyo has pursued bilateral security partnerships with US allies and close friends in both Asia and Europe, notably Australia, India, the United Kingdom, France and the EU, as well as promoted minilateral configurations with these “like-minded”

E. Atanassova-Cornelis (B) University of Antwerp, Antwerp, Belgium e-mail: [email protected] Catholic University of Louvain, Ottignies-Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2022 Y. Sugita and V. Teo (eds.), Rethinking the San Francisco System in Indo-Pacific Security, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-1231-3_11

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countries. Japan’s alignments have been centred on the Indo-Pacific conceptualisation of the region and prioritised various non-traditional security (NTS) challenges, such as those related to maritime security. At the same time, war-fighting and increased interoperability via joint military drills has become a more prominent feature in some of these partnerships. The key objective of this chapter is to find out how Tokyo’s IndoPacific alignments are transforming the San Francisco System and the associated with it conceptualisation of regional order, known as “the Asia–Pacific”. While the original San Francisco Treaty remains a key pillar of the Asia–Pacific system, its relevance for the emerging IndoPacific order is not that clear cut. Indeed, Japan’s post-Cold security partnerships seek not only to maintain the US-centric order, but also to address the deficiencies of the formal alliance system. The chapter assesses the strategic significance of alignments for Japan and the impact of Japan’s alignments on regional order-building in the wider Indo-Pacific. To this end, the chapter explores in a comparative perspective the strategic goals and key areas of security cooperation between Japan and regional (Australia, India) and extra-regional, notably, European (the UK, France, and the EU) players with an emphasis on the existing and emerging minilateral configurations that may or may not include the US. On a more general level, all five players share with Japan a commitment to maintaining a rules-based maritime order in the Indo-Pacific, as well as varying degrees of concern about the sustainability of the US regional security commitments and China’s challenge to the existing order. There are some further differences, however. India is not part of the formal San Francisco System, whereas Australia is. For its part, France, after the UK’s departure from the EU, remains the only EU member state with an extensive presence and strategic interests in the Indo-Pacific. France’s interests in the region stem from its overseas territories and population in the South Pacific and the Indian Ocean, the large exclusive economic zone that these territories generate, and the permanent military presence there. Finally, the EU’s strategic importance to Japan as a like-minded partner has increased over the past decade, especially, following the signing in 2018 of two binding bilateral agreements: a political, Strategic Partnership Agreement (SPA) and an Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA). Tokyo sees vast potential to cooperate with Brussels on a range of issues in the Indo-Pacific, which include both politico-security and economic ones. For Brussels, on the other hand,

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the EU-Japan partnership provides an opportunity to bolster its political and security credentials in the region. The EU’s image in that part of the world remains largely defined in economic terms, while it has been all but excluded from the region’s security architecture associated with the US-centric hub-and-spokes system. The chapter’s main contribution to the existing literature on the San Fransisco System is two-fold: firstly, it seeks to assess the ongoing transformation of this system by engaging with the concept of “alignment”, and, secondly, the chapter illustrates the redefinition of the system away from the “Asia–Pacific” through a comparative examination of Japan’s intraand extra-regional partnerships in the Indo-Pacific. This chapter employs Wilkins’ definition of alignment, which refers to formal or informal agreements between two or more states for security cooperation based on shared security goals (2019, 13). In contrast to formal alliances, which are typically formed against specific threats, the raison d’etre for alignments are shared interests (Mukherjee 2018). Mutual defence commitments are an exception in alignments rather than the rule. Unlike the militarystrategic focus and formalised nature of alliances, alignments are low-cost partnerships that primarily (but not exclusively) focus on tackling NTS threats. One variation of alignment is minilateralism. This refers mostly to ad hoc groupings of three or four participants that seek to address specific security issues—either by supplementing existing multilateral institutions or emerging as “functional coalitions of the willing” outside multilaterals—or to more formalised mechanisms of “like-minded” states that may or may not cover broad security agendas (Paik and Park 2021, 37–38). The Indo-Pacific alignments can be defined as problem-solving groupings that provide needs-based mechanisms for collaboration in specific issue areas (Lee-Brown 2018; Singh and Teo 2020). These frameworks are inclusive and extend beyond the San Francisco System in terms of both participants and issues. By contrast, the Asia–Pacific term remains exclusive due to its explicit link with the US-led hub-and-spokes system, which is largely perceived as anti-China and, geographically, does not include the Indian Ocean region. The Indo-Pacific alignments include countries that are not formal US allies, such as India, or are extra-regional players, such as the UK and France. Japan’s strategic partnership with the EU also falls within the scope of alignment cooperation. From Japan’s perspective, these partnerships provide an opportunity for Tokyo to carve out a more independent role in order-building that is less contested than

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in the, more narrowly conceptualised, Asia–Pacific associated with the growing Sino-US competition. The chapter proceeds as follows. It first examines the Indo-Pacific perspectives of Japan and its intra- and extra-regional partners with an emphasis on the key convergences and divergences. The chapter then explores the evolution of Japan’s Indo-Pacific alignments both at the bilateral level with the five players and the minilateral level, and zooms in the strategic goals and key areas of cooperation in the various partnerships. In the final section, the chapter assesses whether and how these strategic alignments may be reshaping the security order associated with the San Fransisco System leading thereby to the emergence of an Indo-Pacific order.

Perspectives on the Indo-Pacific: Japan and Its Partners The “China threat” discourse has become central in Japanese strategic thinking since the 2000s, manifested in perceptions of Beijing’s challenge to the rules-based international, and especially, maritime order (Atanassova-Cornelis 2018). Already during his first term in office in the mid-2000s (2006–2007), Prime Minister Abe Shinzo played a key role in attempting to shift the conceptualisation of the region from the Asia–Pacific to the Indo-Pacific (Lee-Brown 2018). Abe sought a strategic redefinition of the region by means of connecting the Indian and Pacific Oceans and giving more prominence to India’s role in countering the PRC’s growing power (ibid.). In the mid-2000s, Japan’s “selective mobilisation” of countries with shared values and interests gave birth to the so-called “democratic security diamond” consisting of four maritime democracies (US-Australia-Japan-India), known as the Quad (Katagiri 2019, 16). Japan’s Free and Open Indo-Pacific (FOIP) vision has gradually developed and evolved since the 2000s. It has become more inclusive in terms of potential partners, which are no longer limited to the initial Quad states and may also include non-democratic countries as long as they share Japan’s vision (Koga 2020). As a concept, FOIP was first announced in 2016 during Abe’s second term in office (2012–2020). FOIP integrated the “value-based notions” of “free and “open” into the

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geographic reference of the Indo-Pacific, creating thereby “a diplomatically flexible, yet rules-based” perspective on regional order (Bradford 2021, 90). Currently, FOIP includes three key objectives: promotion and establishment of the rule of law, freedom of navigation, free trade; pursuit of economic prosperity through regional connectivity, and, finally, commitment to peace and stability through, for example, maritime lawenforcement capacity-building and humanitarian assistance and disaster relief (HADR) missions (Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Japan 2019b). US and Japanese perspectives largely converge on their understanding of FOIP—a conceptualisation rooted in open, democratic political systems, good governance and shared values (Gyngell 2018; Acharya 2019), such as the rule of law and freedom of navigation. At the same time, US and Japanese perspectives differ in that Washington under Trump placed a strong emphasis on “power dynamics” and geopolitical competition, while Tokyo under Abe gradually shifted FOIP’s narrative to the promotion of regional economic prosperity for all countries that were said to adhere to established norms and standards of behaviour (Hussain 2018). While the convergence of US and Japanese views under Joe Biden and Suga Yoshihide seems to be more pronounced, Japanese interpretation of FOIP still remains closer to that of many regional and extra-regional players than is the US view. In particular, as will be illustrated below, Japan’s inclusive conceptualisation has facilitated its alignments with both Asian and European partners, as well as with the EU itself, for all these players have been wary of being drawn into exclusive, or explicitly anti-China, groupings. Australia’s vision of the Indo-Pacific is one of an “open, inclusive and rules-based region” in which Canberra envisages close cooperation with the region’s “major democracies, bilaterally and in small groupings” in order to promote economic growth and prosperity, and ensure that “the rights of all states are respected” (Government of Australia 2017, 4). Japan—defined as a “Special Strategic Partner” of Australia—is ranked just second after the US as a country with which Canberra seeks to support “a balance” in the Indo-Pacific favourable to Australia’s interests. The recognition of the shifting “distribution of power” between the US and China strongly converges with Tokyo’s view. Australia, similarly to Japan, is part of the San Fransisco System and depends on its alliance with America for security protection, while the PRC remains its largest trading partner. Canberra’s inclusive conceptualisation of the Indo-Pacific means that, despite its concerns about China’s growing power, its policy towards

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Beijing remains one of “positive and active engagement” and cooperation on a diverse set of (NTS) issues (ibid., 40). Inclusivity is also the defining feature of India’s Indo-Pacific vision (Choong 2019). New Delhi calls for a “free, open and inclusive” region, and seeks to promote economic development and connectivity—much in line with Tokyo’s FOIP concept. India shares Japan’s security concerns about the PRC’s maritime advances in the Indo-Pacific. In particular, New Delhi worries about China’s growing naval expansion in the Indian Ocean, as it may destabilise the vital trade routes converging in the region, including in the South China Sea, on which both Japan and India depend for their economic prosperity (Mukherjee 2018; Rajagopalan 2020). However, unlike Japan, India is not a formal “spoke” in the US-led alliance system in the Asia–Pacific, which does not extend to the Indian Ocean. On the one hand, New Delhi’s Indo-Pacific perspective reflects India’s non-alignment policy and unwillingness to isolate the PRC. On the other hand, India shares with Japan, the US and Australia a commitment to a rules-based international order, as well as geopolitical concerns about the PRC. From this perspective, India seems to position itself at the centre of the Indo-Pacific strategic conceptualisation, acting as a potential “swing state” that could determine the dominance of a more exclusive or more inclusive vision (Atanassova-Cornelis 2020b). Japan’s key extra-regional players, the UK, France and the EU, converge on an inclusive Indo-Pacific approach, although there is some variation. London’s vision does seem to place a stronger emphasis on competition with China, compared to France’s or the EU’s perspectives, and in this way tends to echo Japan’s earlier FOIP approach promoted before 2016. At the same time, while the UK recognises the “intensifying geopolitical competition” and the threats to the preservation of freedom of navigation in the region, as well as the challenge that China, an authoritarian state, presents “for the UK and its allies”, London sees Beijing as an “increasingly important partner in tackling global challenges” (UK Government 2021, 61–67). France defines the protection and promotion of a “rules-based multilateral order” (French Ministry for the Armed Forces, 2019, 7) as a key principle underpinning its policies, and the maintenance of a “free and open access to the commons, in cooperation with [our] partners” as one of the country’s strategic priorities in the Indo-Pacific (ibid., 8). Paris perceives the current global context as one of “strategic competition and challenging military environments” (ibid.), which converges with

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Japan’s perception of a “severe” regional environment in Asia. France’s conceptualisation promotes an open, inclusive and rules-based multilateral Indo-Pacific order, and the establishment of a network of economic and security partnerships with like-minded partners (Esteban and Armanini 2021). This, too, converges with Japan’s Indo-Pacific conceptualisation, and Tokyo’s own policy of strategic diversification that seeks to reduce Japan’s security and economic overreliance on the US and China, respectively. Finally, the EU’s Indo-Pacific vision converges with Japan’s FOIP in the emphasis placed on fostering a rules-based international order, ensuring free and open maritime supply routes, and promoting regional economic growth and sustainable connectivity. The Union’s approach is said to be “inclusive of all partners wishing to cooperate with the EU” provided there is a “common ground based on shared principles, values and mutual interest” (Council of the EU 2021, 3). This, too, echos Japan’s FOIP understanding. As the above analysis demonstrates, Japan has played a leading role in the redefinition of the region from the Asia–Pacific to the Indo-Pacific. The adoption in recent years by key regional and extra-regional players of common FOIP-associated discourse attests to this (Bradford 2021).

Strategic Goals and Areas of Cooperation in Japan’s Intra-regional Alignments Australia and India are the two most important security partners for Japan in the Indo-Pacific after the US. At the same time, both Japan and Australia are an inherent part of the San Fransisco system, whereas India is not. Tokyo’s alignment with Canberra is rooted in their respective alliances with the US and convergent concerns about China’s rise in times of increased uncertainty about the durability of Washington’s security commitments to the Asia–Pacific. Canberra, therefore, occupies a central place in Japan’s efforts to develop security partnerships with like-minded countries with the purpose of maintaining the hub-and-spokes system. In the context of Japan’s FOIP, Japan’s 2018 National Defence Programme Guidelines (NDPG) mention Australia in the first place, followed by India (Ministry of Defence, Japan 2018, 15–16). A strengthening of the respective trilateral security frameworks with the US is seen as key to the realisation of FOIP. While both Australia and India are emphasised to

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share “universal values and strategic interests” with Japan, Canberra is seen as an important partner in helping Japan shape a desirable regional order in the Asia–Pacific, whereas India is valued for its broader geopolitical importance, given its strategic location “in the centre of sea lanes of communication” (Prime Minister of Japan and His Cabinet 2013, 24). There is thus a clear difference between the two. Australia for Japan is largely associated with the continuity of the San Fransisco System and the central role played by the US in maintaining security in the region. India’s strategic importance, however, is contextualised in maritime terms and within the wider Indo-Pacific that extends beyond the US-led alliance network. Furthermore, as one of the main pillars of Japan’s FOIP is economic in nature, related notably to the energy and infrastructure sectors where Japan seeks to “displace China while creating regional security”, New Delhi is perceived as a key partner for Japan in regional infrastructure development cooperation given India’s own emphasis on the economic component in its Indo-Pacific approach (Paskal 2021, 26–27, 37–39). Japan’s development of alignment cooperation with both players has followed a similar pattern that has included the establishment of a 2+2 framework—a security dialogue, which includes the foreign and defence ministers of each country—joint trainings and drills, and defence equipment and technology cooperation, notably, in the area of maritime security. With both Australia and India the conclusion of a bilateral Joint Declaration on Security in the second half of the 2000s was the first step towards a security alignment: with Canberra in 2007, with New Delhi in 2008. At the same time, whereas the ministerial-level 2+2 meeting with Australia was initiated in 2007, with India it was only in 2019 (which had been held at the vice-ministerial level since 2010). The Acquisition and Cross-Servicing Agreement (ACSA), which enables the mutual provision of supplies and services between Japanese and foreign militaries, was signed with Australia in 2010 and updated in 2017; with India—ACSA was concluded only in 2020. The ACSA is perceived by Japan as a milestone in its cooperation with India. The agreement is said to “enable [India and Japan] to actively contribute to international peace and security” (Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Japan 2020). From Tokyo’s perspective, therefore, the bilateral partnership is expected to play a key role in the materialisation of Japan’s vision of regional order associated with FOIP, in particular, as it relates to the respect for the rule of law, freedom of navigation and the prevention of coercion. In 2012 and 2014, Japan signed

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a General Sharing of Military Information Agreement (GSOMIA) with Australia and India, respectively, to facilitate intelligence sharing. This has gone hand in hand with defence equipment and technology cooperation, which has enabled, for example, the manufacture and assembling of Japan’s US-2 short takeoff and landing amphibious aircraft in India (Bradford 2021). With Australia, the bilateral security relations were taken to the next level with the conclusion in 2020 of an agreement in principle on Reciprocal Access Agreement (RAA) designed to formalise the two militaries’ (short-term) stays and operations on one another’s territory. This agreement is regarded as “trailblazing”, for it paves the way for Japan to conclude similar agreements with countries such as the UK and France (Bosack 2019). Since 2009 Japan and Australia have conducted regularly the bilateral naval exercise Nichi-Go Trident. Joint training and exercises have expanded in scope and frequency over the past decade also within a trilateral framework with the US and in the context of multilateral engagements. The Australia-Japan bilateral personnel exchanges have increased and cooperation in Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief (HADR) missions, maritime security, peacekeeping and capacity-building has deepened. With India, Japan started to conduct annual naval military exercises (JIMEX) in 2012, which had been preceded by occasional bilateral and multilateral drills involving the two navies beginning in 2007. While naval engagement has remained the principal way to improve military interoperability between Japan and India, in 2018 the two partners took their security cooperation a step further by conducting their first joint landbased and first joint air military exercises, involving counter-terrorism and HADR operations, respectively. In 2020, Japanese and Indian coast guards conducted their 18th joint drill designed to improve the two countries’ capability to deal with pirates and carry out law-enforcement operations, such as on-site inspections of vessels. It should be noted that Japan’s respective bilateral security relations with Australia and India have been strongly encouraged by the US, especially visible at the operational level in terms of trilateral military exercises. In the case of Tokyo’s relations with Canberra it is their trilateral collaboration with the US that has been a key driver of the Japan-Australia alignment (Paik and Park 2021). For its part, Japan’s bilateral naval exercises with India have their roots in the 2007 edition of the US-India Malabar drill (Paul 2019). Malabar was briefly multilateralised in 2007 with the participation of Japan, Australia and Singapore. This led to open

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criticism by Beijing and New Delhi’s subsequent reluctance to expand the drill’s membership, and Australia’s own hesitation to rejoin the exercise and decision to pull out of the Quad altogether in 2008. In the meantime, Japan-India growing maritime security cooperation became a catalyst for the minilateralisation of Malabar in 2015 with the inclusion of Japan as a permanent member in this annual maritime exercise (ibid.). In 2020 India welcomed the return of the Australian navy to the Malabar exercise (which Canberra had been requesting since 2017) and so, after a 13-year break, the Quad members conducted joint drills in the Bay of Bengal and the Arabian Sea. In addition to the trilateral military-to-military engagements, both the US-Japan-Australia minilateral, known as the Trilateral Security Dialogue (TSD), and the US-Japan-India trilateral now include regular collaboration in the framework of the foreign ministerial-level meetings: held since 2006 for the TSD grouping and since 2015 for the India-US-Japan grouping. The Quad can be seen as a framework where the two trilaterals overlap, bringing together all four members. As the US-Japan alliance is central to both groupings, the Quad may be regarded as an extension of the San Francisco System into the Indo-Pacific region. Inaugurated in 2007 and initially based on the success of the four countries’ HADR cooperation after the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami disaster, the Quad was developed into a policy initiative by Abe during his first term in office (Satake and Hemmings 2018). As both Australia and India were wary of provoking a backlash from Beijing, the Quad summit meeting was suspended until the arrival of the Trump administration in 2017. Similarly to the Quad, the TSD has its roots in NTS cooperation, which emerged in the wake of the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the US. The TSD grouping promotes cooperation on diverse NTS challenges, such as terrorism, proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and natural disasters (HADR operations). Since 2013 this trilateral has noticeably prioritised maritime security as one of the key areas of its strategic policy coordination. In particular, the emphasis has been placed on the maintenance of the rules-based order and promotion of an “open and inclusive” Indo-Pacific region, as well as collaboration on maritime capacity-building and infrastructure development. Compared with the TSD, the US-India-Japan trilateral has a more narrow agenda, which partly overlaps with the TSD on issues such as maritime security, promotion of regional connectivity and maritime capacity-building in the Indo-Pacific (Paik and Park 2021). Another Indo-Pacific trilateral,

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which, however, excludes the US, is the Japan-India-Australia grouping. Ministerial-level meetings have been held since 2015, and have primarily focused on infrastructure development and maritime security in the IndoPacific. Most recently, the three players established a joint initiative for building resilient supply chains. Compared with the other two trilateral groupings, the Japan-India-Australia trilateral remains underdeveloped as far as military-to-military links are concerned. Finally, the Quad was reinvigorated during Trump’s term in office when this minilateral framework was primarily used by the US to promote FOIP as a way of pushing back against China. The foreign ministers of the four countries met twice, in 2019 and 2020, yet the actual cooperation on the ground remained limited. The new Biden administration has referred to the grouping as “a foundation”, upon which the US is intending to “build substantial American policy in the Indo-Pacific region” (The Japan Times 2021). This has been welcomed by the Suga administration. In March 2021, at the request of the US, the leaders of the four countries held a virtual summit meeting during which they expressed their shared commitment to pursuing a rules-based maritime order in the Indo-Pacific. On a more practical level, the Quad countries agreed to establish working groups in order to strengthen cooperation on various NTS and nonsecurity issues, notably, COVID-19 vaccine distribution, climate change, and standards and norms for emerging technologies such as 5G networks, alongside collaboration on maritime issues.

Strategic Goals and Areas of Cooperation in Japan’s Extra-Regional Alignments Tokyo has traditionally perceived London as Japan’s closest security partner in Europe and an entry point for Japan in the EU. The UK’s departure from the EU has left a void in Japan’s EU/Europe policy and hence provided incentives for Japan to further strengthen its ties with France—now the only EU member state with an extensive presence and strategic interests in the Indo-Pacific. The significance to Japan of the extra-regional partnerships stems from the shared “universal” democratic values and the “leading role” that European countries, including notably the UK and France, are said to take in ensuring global peace and stability, as well as in working with Japan to preserve the rules-based international order in times of a global power shift (Prime Minister of Japan and His Cabinet 2013, 26). Japan

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also sees a strong convergence with these players on the joint commitment to maintaining “a free and open maritime order based on the rule of law” and the strong opposition to “coercive or unilateral actions” especially in the East and South China Seas (Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Japan 2016, 2017, 2019a). The EU as a whole is perceived as a partner that both appreciates Japan’s expanded international security role and assists Japan in its pursuit of global responsibilities (Atanassova-Cornelis 2019). From Tokyo’s perspective, the tackling of various security challenges at the regional and global level necessitates a coordinated and multilateral approach, as these challenges can not be dealt with by a single country alone (Ministry of Defence, Japan 2018). It is in the context of this diverse array of threats, ranging from proliferation of WMD and stability of the Sea Lines of Communication (SLOCs) and supply chains, to climate change, environment and terrorism, that Tokyo seems to define the strategic significance of its extra-regional alignments. Among the European countries the UK and France are singled out as key partners to Japan in contributing “to the stability of maritime order in the Indo-Pacific region”, including by means of “bilateral collaboration on third-party engagement” (Ministry of Defence, Japan 2018, 16). The latter reference may be indicative of Tokyo’s possible intention to minilateralise its bilateral cooperation with London and Paris without the US—something that contrasts with Japan’s minilaterals with Australia and India (Atanassova-Cornelis 2020a). The shared perception of being “maritime nations” and convergence on the Indo-Pacific concept binds Japan with the UK and France. In the case of London it is the UK’s “Global Britain” vision and related strategic objective to re-emerge as a primary naval power in Europe, which will be able to deploy its navy in the Indo-Pacific (Paskal 2021). What concerns Paris, France’s overseas departments and territories in the Indian and Pacific Oceans provide it with a unique (among European countries) “residency status”, underpinning thereby Paris’ growing focus on maritime security in this part of the world (Scott 2017). France perceives Japan to be one of its priority partners in the Indo-Pacific, given Tokyo’s leading role in the promotion of FOIP, Japan’s economic weight and support for multilateral international order (ibid.). While Japan’s security cooperation with the UK and France is more recent than are its intra-regional alignments, enhanced policy coordination and the number of security-related agreements completed over the past 8 years denote a deeper level of strategic alignment. With the

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UK, Japan concluded a Memorandum Relating to Defence Cooperation in 2012, announced a Dynamic Strategic Partnership in 2014, established the ministerial-level 2+2 talks in 2015, and signed both an ACSA and a Joint Declaration on Security Cooperation in 2017. The declaration expressed joint commitment to “elevating” the bilateral strategic partnership to “the next level”, especially through strengthened JapanUK cooperation in “the Indo-Pacific region” and “vis-à-vis common strategic challenges to the rules-based international system” (UK Government 2017, 1–2). With France, the 2+2 meeting was initiated in 2014, which was followed in 2016 by an agreement concerning the transfer of defence equipment and technology, and an ACSA in 2018. To enhance maritime cooperation, an agreement for the establishment of a JapanFrance Comprehensive Maritime Dialogue was reached in 2019. Some of the key areas for maritime security cooperation include maritime domain awareness (MDA), and provision of capacity-building assistance to Southeast Asian and Pacific Island countries (Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Japan 2019a). What concerns military-to-military engagements, Japan’s security cooperation with the UK and France has been deepened, bilaterally and multilaterally, in several NTS areas with a focus on maritime security, including through joint HADR missions, anti-piracy and naval exercises, military personnel exchanges and maritime patrol trainings. In 2016 Japanese air forces hosted for the first time a military partner other than their US ally—the Royal air forces—for a joint exercise in Japan. In 2018, the ground forces of Japan and the UK conducted their first joint exercise in Japan, while Japan’s largest warship, the Kaga helicopter destroyer, participated in naval drills with Britain’s HMS Argyll in the Indian Ocean. Bilateral defence technology cooperation has deepened and since 2014 Tokyo and London have been co-developing the longrange Joint New Air-to-Air Missile (JNAAM). The UK has now become Japan’s second largest supplier of arms after the US (Bradford 2021). With France, Japan has embarked on a joint research on next-generation mine-countermeasure technology—the first cooperation project between the two countries in this area (Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Japan 2019a). Complementing its bilateral security engagements with the UK and France, Japan has promoted inter-regional minilateral initiatives with these European players. In addition to regular participation in the RIMPAC multilateral drills, the maritime forces of the US, Japan and the UK have recently started to conduct trilateral exercises. The first ones

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were anti-submarine warfare drills that took place in the Western Pacific in 2018 and 2019, and were designed to improve tactical skills in support of the “free and open Indo-Pacific”. In 2017, Japan, France, the UK and the US conducted their first joint exercise on the occasion of a French naval fleet’s visit to Japan. In another first, France, Japan, Australia and the US held a joint naval exercise in the Bay of Bengal in 2019, practising formation sailing, live fire drills and search and rescue operations. Contemporaneously, Japan has deepened its strategic alignment with the EU with whom it shares liberal democratic values and convergent interests for promoting a rules-based (maritime) order, free from domination and coercion. The extensive bilateral trade and security relations culminated in the signing in 2018 of the two EU-Japan partnership agreements mentioned earlier. A partnership on connectivity—the first of its kind—was announced in 2019. It heralded EU-Japan cooperation in various areas of connectivity, including digital, transport, energy and people-to-people exchanges, as well as on infrastructure development in the Indo-Pacific and beyond. It should be noted that Tokyo’s partnership with Brussels is qualitatively different from those with the UK and France, in particular, as with the EU, Japan’s military-to-military links remain limited. To be sure, in 2014, Japan and the EU carried out their first joint counterpiracy exercise between deployed units of the EU’s Naval Force (EU NAVFOR) Somalia—Operation ATALANTA and Japan’s Self-Defence Forces. Against this background, maritime security, especially capacitybuilding and anti-piracy collaboration, came to occupy a more significant place on the EU-Japan security agenda. Nevertheless, Tokyo’s partnership with Brussels remains largely focused on non-military and non-security areas, such as development, climate change and conflict prevention and peace-building. This does not, however, minimise the importance to Japan of the economic and soft security dimension of their bilateral cooperation, especially in the context of Japan’s reconceptualisation of the region as Indo-Pacific.

From the San Fransisco System Towards an Indo-Pacific Order-Building? Japan’s Indo-Pacific alignments with all five players examined in this chapter are rooted in perceptions of “like-mindedness” from the perspective of shared democratic values and strategic interests, as well as placed

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in the context of the promotion of a rules-based maritime and, broadly, international order. The convergence between Japan and its partners’ perspectives on the Indo-Pacific makes these alignments indispensable for Tokyo, as it seeks to achieve its FOIP vision, while maintaining the San Fransisco System. At the same time, Tokyo has different strategic expectations with regard to the different partners and hence their role in the shaping of an Indo-Pacific security order. Out of the five examined partnerships, it is Japan’s alignment with Australia that is driven primarily by the shared perception of a growing risk of US abandonment in times of China’s continuing strategic assent. Having achieved the highest level of institutionalisation among Japan’s other alignments, the key strategic objective of the US-Japan-Australia trilateral appears to be to maintain and supplement the San Francisco System with inter-spoke relations (Paik and Park 2021, 41). As observed by Wilkins (2019, 51–52), the war-fighting interoperability that is increasingly characterising this trilateral security cooperation is not merely a response to shared NTS challenges (which are typically a focus of alignments), but is largely driven by the more traditional strategic “China threat” and is, hence, representative of a joint effort to constrain the PRC’s maritime advances in the Asia–Pacific. While this is the only trilateral so far that may evolve in the future as a mechanism able to supplant the formal alliances in the area of traditional security, that is, “minilateralise” the US-led bilateral alliances (Atanassova-Cornelis and Sato 2019), the US-Japan-Australia grouping is unlikely to extend its operational role beyond the geographic areas associated with the San Fransisco System. In comparison with Tokyo’s alignment with Canberra its security cooperation with New Delhi has progressed slower, although the latest developments denote a deeper level of strategic engagement. India is wary of China’s advances into the Indian Ocean and policies in the South China Sea. At the same time, New Delhi is not part of the US-led alliance framework and remains the most reluctant of the Quad members to join any perceived anti-China coalitions. India has not participated in any freedom of navigation operations in the SCS and is conspicuously absent from the emerging inter-regional minilateralism involving Japan, the US, Australia and the European players. Although India invited Australia to participate in the 2020 Malabar exercise, New Delhi is unlikely to accept a formalisation of Malabar in a quadrilateral format out of concerns of provoking China. From Japan’s perspective, therefore, India’s “free, open and inclusive” definition of the Indo-Pacific, which largely converges with the

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UK’s, France’s and the EU’s perspectives, opens up a possible cooperation channel with Beijing, without requiring Japan to acquiesce to China’s increasingly dominant geopolitical and geoeconomic role in the region. Although the US-Japan-India maritime security cooperation, notably the Malabar exercise, increasingly emphasises power projection, its primary objective does not consist in sustaining the hub-and-spokes system—in contrast to the US-Japan-Australia grouping. The role of the US-Japan-India trilateral in addressing Japan’s direct hard security concerns is therefore limited. As discussed earlier, the core areas of US-Japan-India strategic policy coordination include the promotion of regional connectivity and maritime capacity-building of the coastal nations in the Indo-Pacific. In the area of maritime security, especially what concerns ensuring freedom of navigation in line with the FOIP’s concept, cooperation with Australia is important to Japan primarily with regard to the South China Sea, and less so in the Indian Ocean where India’s geopolitical role is seen as essential for countering China. Japan’s maritime partnerships with the UK and France, both bilaterally and as part of minilateral groupings with the US and Australia in the framework of naval exercises, can be seen as an additional vehicle for Tokyo to promote a rules-based maritime order in the Indo-Pacific (Atanassova-Cornelis 2020a). In contrast to India, the UK and France have in recent years participated in freedom of navigation operations in the South China Sea, although it is uncertain whether such operations will be regularised. At the same time, as both London and Paris are wary of provoking China, Japan’s alignments with these extra-regional partners are unlikely to evolve as mechanisms operating beyond the area of NTS. This is even less likely to occur in the case of Japan’s partnership with the EU, as bilateral military-to-military links remain underdeveloped and the Union’s contribution to traditional security in the Asia–Pacific is limited. In the field of infrastructure and connectivity, Japan’s trilateral partnership with the US and Australia is the most advanced so far. Cooperation with India at the bilateral level has been growing through the Asia-Africa Growth Corridor, as well as in the framework of the US-Japan-India trilateral and, recently, the Quad. The Japan-EU connectivity partnership is promising as well. While a key objective of these new initiatives has been to create an alternative to China’s BRI, Japan’s willingness to find

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ways to cooperate with Beijing and thereby introduce “free, open and transparent elements” of its FOIP concept into the BRI (Choong 2019, 422) indicates a search for an inclusive approach to the Indo-Pacific order. Interestingly, despite being one of the most vocal states in the Asia–Pacific to raise concerns about the PRC’s maritime activities in the Indo-Pacific, Japan is the only Quad member which, in 2019, decided to include China in its Indo-Pacific map. This attests to the strategic logic of inclusivity, which is centred on the duality of competition with the PRC in the maritime sphere and cooperation with Beijing on regional connectivity (ibid.). The alignments with the UK, France and the EU have a low strategic value to Japan from a more traditional security perspective, for example, regarding the East China dispute with China over the Senkaku/Diaoyu islands. Indeed, this may be a key limitation of Tokyo’s security partnerships with European players, which are not part of the San Fransisco System, and unable to provide direct support to Japan in order to maintain the system or to counter China. At the same time, these “non-aligned alliances” (Paskal 2021), most notably demonstrated by France’s growing ties with a diverse number of players in the Indo-Pacific, bring other strategic benefits to Japan. All these players share an interest with Tokyo in jointly supporting a rules-based maritime order and seek strategic diversification in their foreign policies without formalisation of ties in the form of an alliance. So these partnerships with like-minded extra-regional players are instrumental for Tokyo’s efforts to redefine the regional order away from the largely US-centric Asia–Pacific towards, what may be defined as, “an elastic” regional order (Feigenbaum and Schwemlein 2021). An Indo-Pacific order, which legitimises Japan’s more independent regional role and enables Tokyo to diversify away from both the US and China through problem-solving coalitions, while simultaneously keeping its alliance with America strong and opening up channels for engagement with China. As European countries and the EU itself are not part of the San Francisco System, their perceived role in Japan’s conceptualisation of the Indo-Pacific order constitutes primarily in helping Japan address the deficiencies of the hub-and-spokes system, which was not designed to tackle NTS threats. This is well illustrated by the JapanEU strategic partnership. While the 2018 bilateral political agreement has been less important to Japan at the regional level in the Asia–Pacific where

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the EU is not a major security player in traditional security, the SPA seems to have growing significance for Japan at the global level, especially what concerns upholding the rules-based international order in the Indo-Pacific and promoting NTS cooperation (Atanassova-Cornelis 2019).

Conclusion Differently from its alliance with the US, which emphasises competitive order-building and is associated with the San Fransisco System and the original San Francisco Treaty, alignments—being functional, informal and inclusive—have a different strategic value to Japan as it responds to China’s rise. In times of a perceived waning of American influence and uncertainties associated with the US-China competition, Tokyo considers these partnerships, in the first place, as channels for exercising regional leadership and shaping a sustainable rules-based order, free from domination and coercion. Secondly, as Tokyo seeks to maintain and sustain the rules-based order, it increasingly recognises the importance of inclusion and persuasion in order-building, alongside competition (Satake and Sahashi 2021, 22). For Tokyo, the strategic benefits of its partnerships, especially, with non-spokes (such as India) and the extra-regional European actors and the EU itself, consist in the opportunities they provide for redefining the region in more inclusive terms (Atanassova-Cornelis 2020b). This, with regard to the possibility of selectively pulling in partners (that remain outside of the San Francisco System) on an issueby-issue basis, as well as in tacking NTS and non-security issues, which are not the core focus of the US-led alliances. All the more so that the drivers of US-China competition are no longer limited to the traditional security area, but have now come to include economics, technology and global governance. In a less US- or China-centric regional order a certain degree of Japan’s leadership will be more acceptable (and less contested) than in the context of the more exclusive and competitive Asia–Pacific. As Japan’s Indo-Pacific alignments transcend the formal, and limited to the Asia–Pacific, US-led bilateral alliances, they may possibly lead to a more inclusive (of China) security system in the Indo-Pacific defined by a web of problem-solving alignments that do not target a specific state. However, the evolution of Indo-Pacific alignment cooperation may also reinforce the existing competitive dynamics of regional order associated with the San Fransisco System. A further formalisation of the minilaterals along the lines of a more explicit threat-based objectives

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is likely to deepen extant security dilemmas or drive power-balancing coalition-building, leading thereby to a more confrontational regional order. Japan’s ability to implement its FOIP vision in times of a growing strategic uncertainty associated with the trajectory of US-China relations is likely to be a critical factor that will determine the future contours of the emerging Asia-Indo-Pacific order.

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Preventing the Philippines from Pivoting Toward China: The Role of the U.S.–Japan Security Alliance Renato Cruz De Castro

Since he took office in June 2016, President Rodrigo Duterte has pursued an appeasement policy toward China. For the Duterte Administration, it was imperative to maintain an equilibrium between ensuring the country’s external security and addressing domestic concerns particularly with economic development. Thus, it sought to improve the Philippines’ diplomatic relations with China to increase economic cooperation through softening the country’s confrontational stance in the South China Sea dispute (The National Institute for Defense Studies 2017). This diplomatic strategy was predicated on a calculation that the Philippines’ better option is to foster economic interdependence with China and ease the tension and risks of an outright armed confrontation in the contested waters.

R. C. De Castro (B) De La Salle University, Manila, Philippines e-mail: [email protected]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2022 Y. Sugita and V. Teo (eds.), Rethinking the San Francisco System in Indo-Pacific Security, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-1231-3_12

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The Philippines’ appeasement strategy requires downplaying the contentious issues generated by the South China Sea dispute and agreeing with China’s preferred means of resolving the territorial row through the bilateral consultative mechanism and joint development (Zheng 2018). It meant undoing the Aquino Administration’s policy toward China. Furthermore, President Duterte downgraded Philippine–U.S. security arrangements and gave more weight to Philippine–China economic ties. All these efforts are aimed to enable the Philippines to secure Chinese loans for infrastructure projects under the government’s “Build, Build, Build” program. This development alarmed the U.S., the Philippines’ only formal treaty ally, and Japan, an important Philippine security partner. Hence, two allies have bolstered their respective defense ties with the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) to prevent the Duterte Administration from gravitating toward China. As members of the San Francisco System (also known as the “hub- and-spokes”) of bilateral alliances, they also share common interests with the Philippines especially in maritime security to ensure that the Western Pacific remains secure and accessible in the face of China’s maritime expansion. In fact, former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe pushed for continued maritime cooperation with the Philippines, even as President Duterte backed out from most military exercises between U.S. and Philippine armed services (Smith 2017). This chapter examines the joint and coordinated U.S. and Japanese moves to buttress their security relationships with the Philippines from 2016 to 2020. It assesses how their efforts have thwarted the Duterte Administration’s appeasement policy toward China. It poses this main problem: How did the U.S. and Japan use their respective defense ties with the AFP to prevent the Philippines from ingratiating itself with China? It also addresses these corollary questions. (1) What is the San Francisco system of bilateral alliance? (2) As members of this alliance network, how have Tokyo and Washington transformed their security relations? (3) What are the U.S. and Japanese interests in inhibiting the Philippines toward China? (4) How did the Duterte Administration implement its appeasement policy on China? (5) How did China react to the Philippines’ appeasement policy? And (6) how successful were the U.S. and Japan in restraining the Duterte Administration’s pro-China decisions and actions?

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The Expansion of the U.S.–Japan Security Treaty The U.S. forged security treaties separately with the Philippines and Japan before and during the San Francisco Peace Treaty, which became part of the San Francisco hub-and-spokes system of bilateral alliances. This system also includes the discrete pacts with the Republic of Korea, the Republic of China (Taiwan), Australia, and New Zealand. Each spoke was tightly linked to the U.S. hub separate from the other spokes in the perimeter. These treatises were initially aimed to constrain the military re-emergence of Japan, and to resist Soviet power and influence through coordinated actions between Washington and the allied capitals (Tellis 2014). Post-war American planners also designed these bilateral alliances to deter communist expansion as well as to advance American geopolitical interests in the Asia-Pacific region. Mirroring the American strategic priorities in the early 1950s, the San Francisco Peace Conference marked the beginning of U.S. bilateral alliances in Asia, and set the foundations of postwar regional order (Tellis 2014). During the Cold War, the alliance structure served as an instrument to contain a clearly designated communist-related threat (Park 2013). When the Cold War ended in 1991, these bilateral alliances have had an enduring effect on the U.S. Washington and the allies’ foreign policies. One of these alliances is the U.S.–Japan alliance. The U.S.–Japan alliance is regarded as the cornerstone of Japanese foreign policy and the linchpin of U.S. strategic posture in the Asia-Pacific region. This alliance has undergone several modifications over six decades amidst regional security challenges in the region, and domestic political developments. The original 1951 of the U.S.–Japan Security Treaty was revised in 1960, followed by the development of bilateral Guidelines for Defense Cooperation in the 1970s. These Defense Guidelines were further modified in the 1990s. Henceforth, there is increased military cooperation between the two allies’ armed services. After the Cold War, Tokyo and Washington reviewed the role of the Japanese Self-Defense Force (JSDF) and the U.S. Armed Forces in the Pacific as a deterrent to conflict and promoter of regional peace and stability (Smith 2017). Clearly, the transformation of the U.S.–Japan security relations shows a steady pattern of climbing a staircase, leading upward to a vaguely understood destination (Schoff 2007). Because of their ability to work well together, the U.S. and Japan have accelerated their cooperation with a third regional partner resulting in an

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informal trilateral relationship. This form of security collaboration of likeminded allies is viewed as a seen as an extension of the hub-and-spokes system and a counterpoint to an emergent China in the larger context of an evolving regional security configuration (A. Yeo, Asia’s Regional Architecture: Alliances and Institutions in the Pacific Century 2019). It rests on the process designed to strengthen the two bilateral alliances and help build connecting thread between them (A. Yeo, Asia’s Regional Architecture: Alliances and Institutions in the Pacific Century 2019). Adherents of this middle ground approach to regional security normally try to integrate and expand beyond their current association by pooling their resources and sharing information on widely diverse security challenges among them (Choi and Tow 2013). This new form of alliance is critical and essential to maritime cooperation and economic development in the region (Smith 2017). Examples of informal trilateral relationship include the U.S.–Japan–South Korea Trilateral Security Dialog that ensures the three countries’ military readiness in the face of unpredictable and belligerent North Korea.; the U.S. and Japan’s close with Australia to safeguard the security of the Western Pacific; and combined efforts of Japan and the U.S. to boost the Philippines’ naval capabilities relative to the South China Sea dispute. In October 2013, the U.S.–Japan Bilateral Security Consultative Committee reviewed the guidelines for bilateral cooperation and engaged other regional partners that support shared values and interests (Tellis 2014). Among the potential areas for U.S.–Japan cooperation are: maritime security, regional capacity-building, and HADR. Japan has vigorously promoted maritime cooperation in Southeast Asia as evidenced by its increased participation in joint military exercises and using its Official Development Assistance (ODA) to improve the maritime domain awareness in the South China Sea, like the Philippines (Tellis 2014). Tokyo and Washington’s motive in developing the Philippines’ naval capabilities is to counter the growing Chinese sea power that thwarts the U.S. Navy’s ability capabilities to protect the vital sea lanes of trade and communication in the South China Sea. Japan and the U.S. have observed that China has made aggressive incursions into the South China Sea that impinge on the territorial sovereignty, and maritime resources of littoral Southeast Asian states (The National Institute for Defense Studies 2019b). They have also taken note that these Chinese encroachments have stemmed from the “power vacuum” created in the strategic regional environment at the

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end of the Cold War, specifically when the U.S. pursued a policy of “disengagement” from Southeast Asia as exemplified by the withdrawal of its military bases from the Philippines (The National Institute for Defense Studies 2019a, b). Unfortunately, the naval capabilities of many Southeast Asian countries, including the Philippines, are domestically security-oriented and lagging behind those of the Northeast Asian navies. There is, therefore, vital to upgrade capabilities in coastal monitoring and defense which Japanese-made equipment can provide (Walker and Stirling-Woosley 2015).

The Philippine–U.S. Alliance The Philippines and the U.S. have maintained close historical ties that started with American colonization of the archipelago, and characterize by a long history of extensive military cooperation during and after World War II, common strategic and economic interests, shared democratic values, enduring cultural affinities, and close people-to-people relations (Lum and Dolven 2014). Prior to 1992, Philippine-U.S. security relations functioned through several bilateral defense arrangements. The two countries became formal treaty allies with the signing of the 1951 R.P.– U.S. Mutual Defense Treaty (MDT). In 1954, they also became members of the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO). However, the most important of these bilateral defense arrangements was the 1947 R.P.–U.S. Military Bases Agreement (MB) which stipulated the hosting of major American naval and air facilities in Philippine territory. Since the withdrawal of American forces from the Philippines in 1992, Philippine–U.S. alliance has been made operational by the several cooperative arrangements between the two countries defense departments and armed services. Among the important joint activities include (Angeles 2017): 1. The annual convening of the R.P.–U.S. Mutual Defense Board, which is tasked to: (a) set the conduct of periodic joint military exercises; (b) facilitate the temporary access arrangement for American forces deployed in the region; and (c) oversee the temporary deployment of American troops the assist the AFP to its counter-terrorism/counter-insurgency operations. 2. The Security Engagement Board (SEB) which was formed in March 2006 to provide the political/framework and mechanisms for direct

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liaison and consultation work to tackle non-traditional security concerns pertaining but not limited to terrorism, transnational crimes, maritime security and safety, and natural and man-made disasters. It proposes joint response activities ranging from consultations and military exercises to humanitarian and disaster relief operations. 3. The alliance is the conduct of joint military exercises. Prominent among these exercises is the annual “Balikatan” (Shoulder-toShoulder) military exercises to improve the two allies’ combined planning, combat readiness, and interoperability, and to demonstrate American support for the Philippines’ external security. This yearly military exercise consists of three major components: (a) humanitarian civic action/civil military operations (HCA/CMO); (b) field exercises (FTX); and (c) staff exercise (STAFFEX). Other military exercises include the multilateral Maritime Southeast Asia Exercise for search-and-rescue operations and the bilateral Handa (Readiness) to strengthen military-to-military cooperation in the event of an external attack against the Philippines. The name of the naval exercise is Cooperation Afloat Readiness and Training (CARAT), which was a Navy-to-Navy exercise complemented by amphibious operations-exercise. 4. The temporary deployment of the Joint Special Operation Task Force-Philippines (JSOT-P) in the southern Philippine island of Mindanao. This small unit of Special Forces from the U.S. Army, Marines, Navy, and Air Force was formed in 2002 by the Special Operations Command within the U.S. Pacific Command (PACOM) in Hawaii to provide long-term support to the AFP’s counterterrorism campaign in Mindanao. The JSOTF-P also undertakes humanitarian assistance projects in terrorist-infested villages, extends effective communication support to AFP operations, and shares intelligence and combat experience with selected AFP units through tactical training programs. 5. The conduct of an annual Philippine–U.S. strategic dialog started in 2010. The dialog provides an opportunity for the foreign and defense departments of the two countries “to affirm the strength of the Philippine–U.S. alliance and the dynamic [security] partnership for peace, security, and stability.”

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The Philippine–Japan Security Partnership Before 2012, Tokyo and Manila saw no need to forge a defense cooperation agreement. Both countries were wary that Beijing might misconstrue any security arrangement as an anti-Chinese alliance. This thinking, however, changed when the two countries were confronted by China’s heavy-handed behavior in the South and East China Seas in the second decade of the twenty-first century. In January 2013, then Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida announced the provision of essential communication system equipment to the PCG for maritime safety (Anonymous 2013a). On 27 June 2013, former Japanese Defense Minister Itsunori Onodera and Philippine Defense Secretary, Voltaire Gazmin, confirmed the continuous “exchanges of information aimed at strengthening Philippine-Japan defense relations and on working together to make U.S. strategic rebalancing a reality in Asia” (Anonymous 2013b). To further defense cooperation, the Asian allies regularly undertake these activities: (Embassy of Japan in Manila 2013) Reciprocal visits between the Chief of Staff of the JMSDF and the PN Flag Officer; the holding of JapanPhilippines Maritime Chief of Staff Meeting; port calls in the Philippines by JMSDF vessels; and active participation in the Pacific Partnership 2012. The two defense ministers also extended their countries’ security cooperation in the field of aviation which was highlighted by the visit to the Philippines of the chief-of-staff of the Japan Air Self-Defense Force (JASDF). During his state visit to Japan in early June 2015, the late President Noynoy Aquino and PM Abe issued a joint declaration entitled on “A Strengthened Strategic Partnership for Advancing the Shared Principles and Goals for Peace, Security, and Growth in the Region and beyond.” The communique encapsulated the Filipino and Japanese commitment to the safety and security of the South China Sea and condemnation of China’s unilateral moves to change the status quo in the disputed waters including the construction of artificial islands and military outposts on the land features (The Philippine News Agency [PNA] 2015). It also listed Japan’s pledges to: (1) enhance the capacity of the Philippine Coast Guard (PCG); (2) cooperate with the Philippines on maritime security and domain awareness, and (3) explore the possibility of transferring Japanese defense equipment and technology to the Philippines (Ministry of Foreign Affair 2015).

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The Duterte Administration’s Appeasement Policy Toward China The May 2016 electoral victory of Rodrigo Duterte soon after caused stir in the Philippines’ liberal-democratic regime that was reestablished more than three decades ago with the toppling of the authoritarian regime of President Ferdinand Marcos in February 1986. President Duterte launched a sustained war on illegal drugs to prevent the Philippines from a narco-state. This campaign entailed the Philippine National Police’s (PNP’s) physical elimination of drug peddlers and manufacturers. He also came out with policies—both internal and external—that adversely affected the democratic make-up of the Philippines and the geopolitical situation in the region. He overhauled Philippine foreign policy as he veered away from the U.S. and toward its major protagonist and cozied up to China. He also threatened to terminate joint Philippine–U.S. military exercises, and even the country’s long-standing alliance with the U.S. Appallingly, he dismissed perfunctorily the Philippines’ legal victory in the territorial dispute with China in the South China Sea. Four months into his six-year term, President Duterte implied that his policy toward the alliance in particular, and to the U.S. in general would do a 180-degree turn. Contradicting the previous administration’s balancing policy, he sought for rapprochement with China. This process was hastened in September 2016 after the Obama Administration expressed grave concerns over the Duterte Administration’s record of human rights violations, particularly extrajudicial killings of small-time drug manufacturers and peddlers. Before the Association of Southeast Asian (ASEAN) summit in Laos in 2016, then President Barrack Obama cautioned President Duterte that “the issues of how we approach fighting crime and drug trafficking is a serious one for all of us, and we’ve got to do it the right way” (Saighal 2017). President Duterte responded with tackles words about President Obama. The U.S. government canceled the Obama-Duterte meeting on the side of the September 2016 ASEAN meeting in Laos, revealing to other Southeast Asian countries and their dialog partners some apparent cracks in the once closed Philippine–U.S. security relations (The National Institute for Defense Studies 2017). Early in his term, President Duterte was not predisposed to prioritize relations with the U.S. Instead, he sought for more multi-faceted relations with Russia, and definitely with China. Upon his arrival in Manila from Laos, he informed Washington that he intended to visit Beijing and

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Moscow. He also pondered on crossing the Rubicon by ending the 1951 MDT to provide him the freedom to forge new defense agreements with Russia and China (Chang, May/June 2017). In October 2016, President Duterte announced that he would expel U.S. Special Forces who were supporting the AFP’s counter-terrorism and counter-insurgency operations in the Philippines. He commented that he was charting an independent foreign policy because according to him, “America has failed us” (Simon and Baker, Philippine Follies 2017). He then threatened to cancel Philippine–U.S. joint military exercises, arguing that, “The U.S. will not fight to die for us” (Simon and Baker, Philippine Follies 2017). As he tried to alienate his country from the U.S., Duterte pursued a rapprochement with China. He softened the Philippines’ confrontational posture in the South China Sea dispute to improve diplomatic relations with China and obtain its economic cooperation (The National Institute for Defense Studies 2019a, b). By paying no heed to the July 12 awards to the Philippines by the arbitral tribunal of the United Nations Law on the Sea (UNCLOS), he literally placed his country’s fate in the hands of China (Saighal 2017). Interestingly, he did not consult the military or the foreign affairs department when he made these major decisions which had serious geopolitical consequences (Saighal 2017). In October 2016, President Duterte chose China for his first official visit outside the ASEAN member states. During their first meeting, President Xi Jinping stressed to President Duterte them to cooperate and coordinate their development strategies and cooperate with each other within the framework of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) (The National Institute for Defense Studies 2017). Both leaders issued a joint communique that identified 13 areas for comprehensive cooperation that include, among others, economics and trade, investment, financing, and construction of infrastructure (The National Institute for Defense Studies 2017). Accordingly, the total amount of money committed by China to boost economic cooperation between the two countries amounted to US$13.5 billion, of which US$9 billion was allocated for infrastructure development in the Philippines (The National Institute for Defense Studies 2017). Not surprisingly, President Duterte ignored the continuing Chinese island-building activities in the South China Sea. Initially, he was lured by the Chinese promise of trade concessions, grants, loans, and investments. His administration adopted hook, line, and sinker Beijing’s official line “that after several years of disruption caused mainly by ‘non-regional

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countries (Japan and the U.S.),’ the South China Sea has calmed with China and Southeast Asian countries agreeing to peacefully resolve [their] disputes” (Sutter and Huang 2017). Observing the shift in Philippine foreign policy in late 2016, a Japanese think-tank noted: “The new administration is seeking to improve bilateral relations with China with an eye to increasing economic cooperation, so that it seems to be softening its confrontational stance in the South China Sea” (The National Institute for Defense Studies 2017).

The Trump Administration’s Policy of Strategic Patience In late 2016, President Duterte demonstrated his unpredictability when he threatened to terminate the Philippines–U.S. alliance while leaning on China. This raised serious concerns among decision-makers and analysts in Washington. Despite Duterte’s transgressions against the alliance, the Philippines remains the linchpin for U.S. regional strategy. As a thriving democracy, it is the only American formal treaty ally bordering the South China Sea, and until 2016, a critical voice for international law and in regional institutions (Ratner 2017). From a geostrategic point of view, the Philippines could become neutral or worse, friendly to China and create a strategic gap in the first-island-chain that runs from Japan through Okinawa to Taiwan, and the Philippines. Such a gap would hamper the effective implementation of the U.S. offshore balancing strategy that restricts Chinese maritime expansionism from the coast of China to the South China Sea and way into the Western Pacific (Roskin Autumn 2016). The Trump Administration’s grand strategy of a Free and Open IndoPacific would have been difficult to realize without the Philippines on board (Ratner 2017) Moreover, worsening Philippines–U.S. security ties would not only undermine America’s primacy in Southeast Asia but also usher in a Southeast Asia dominated by China and devoid of any institutions and norms that symbolize American principles, values, and interests. Confronted by Duterte’s hostility and efforts to dismiss the alliance, Washington maintained a calm demeanor and reminded its ally of the U.S.’s dependability as a security partner and the considerable military assistance it had extended in the past (Simon and Baker, Philippine Follies 2017).

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Conscious of President Duterte’s quirky disposition, U.S. policymakers stretched their patience and focused on the two allies’ long-term interests based on imposing a cost to Chinese military expansionism in the South China Sea (Wuthnow, July 2017; Przystup and Saunders 2017). The U.S. simply had no choice but to find ways to deal with difficult allies, such as the Philippines under Duterte, to deter Chinese expansionist efforts. Rather than pushing or punching Duterte into the Chinese corner, U.S. policymakers brought him back onside (Ratner 2017). Washington reinforced the inter-agency coordination to implement the strategy of doubling down U.S alliances in the Indo-Pacific region, including that with the Philippines. Specific to the Philippines, this action plan involved the application of a leader-level rapprochement to prop up the pro-American elements in the Philippine government and the military establishment, and to provide greater opportunities for them to influence Duterte and make him curb his excesses (Ratner 2017). In late May 2017, around 1000 Islamic militants waving the black flag of ISIS occupied the central financial district of Marawi City in Mindanao. The U.S. quickly deployed a P-3 Orion reconnaissance aircraft and surveillance drones to assist the AFP in subduing the Islamic militants in the city (Simon, Abandoning Leadership, January 2017a). It also provided grenade launchers, state-of-the-art machine guns, and automatic rifles to the Philippine Marines. American counter-terrorism operations in Iraq and Afghanistan proved valuable for the transfer of urban counterinsurgency/counter-terrorism skills from the U.S. Armed Forces to the AFP units fighting to retake the city. The battle for Marawi City exposed the AFP’s inadequacies. Despite its efforts to develop its territorial defense capabilities since 2010, the AFP is still deficient in intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance capabilities. It also lacks basic infantry ordnance such as bullet-proof vests, helmets, night-vision goggles, bullets, modern ground-attack aircraft, and even tanks. The urban warfare in Marawi confirmed the persistence of internal threats that not only altered the country’s security perceptions, but also imposed considerable demands on the Philippine defense establishment. To help address some of the AFP’s deficiencies, the US transferred 10 new surveillance aircraft to the Philippines, worth US$30 million, and sourced from the Obama Administration’s Maritime Security Initiative (Simon, Regional Skepticism, September 2017b). These patrol planes with intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance components could perform maritime patrols within the range of 1000 miles. The U.S. also

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transferred six units of the unmanned ScanEagle reconnaissance drones that were utilized during the siege of Marawi City, to the AFP in March 2018 (The National Institute for Defense Studies 2019a, b). Oddly, the five-month operation that cleared the embattled city of Islamic militants, President Duterte declared that he was now on “friendly” terms with the U.S. and ordered the resumption of joint military exercises with live-fire components. During his visit to Manila in 2017, President Trump commended the great relationship between the Philippines and the US but kept silent on President Duterte’s alleged human rights violations related to his anti-drug campaign (A. Yeo, Asia’s Regional Architecture: Alliances and Institutions in the Pacific Century 2019). He even praised the government’s anti-drug campaign and ignored international concerns about extrajudicial killings in the Philippines. By cultivating personal ties with President Duterte, President Trump hoped to stimulate bilateral relations with the Philippines that would redound to the benefit of U.S trade, investment, and regional security policy (Tow, Sea Change or More of the Same? Trump Security Policies in Asia 2017b). President Duterte, in turn, acknowledged the indispensability of U.S. military support both in the South China Sea and against the Islamic militants in Mindanao (Simon, Regional Skepticism, September 2017b). The Trump Administration endeavored to resolve the chronic problem of the MDT’s ambiguity on American treaty commitment to the Philippines. The treaty does not specify if the U.S. will respond militarily and automatically if the Philippines is attacked. As to the South China Sea issue, the U.S. is still mum about intervening in case of a Chinese armed aggression against Philippine forces (Wuthnow, July 2017). But during his March 2019 visit to Manila, then Secretary of State Michael Pompeo sounded reassuring: “As the South China Sea is part of the Pacific; any armed attack on Philippine forces, aircraft or public vessels in the South China Sea will trigger mutual defense obligations under Article 4 of our mutual defense treaty” (Panda 2019). His comment hinted that the U.S. would support the Philippine position against China’s island-building activities and the militarization of the land features in the South China Sea (Panda 2019). All these efforts were taken to prevent a long-time ally from currying favor with China. By April 2019, the Philippine–U.S. alliance had stabilized, as several units from all the branches of the U.S. Armed Forces and the AFP conducted 28 major exercises that tested and enhanced

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their skills and abilities in joint combat and humanitarian operations. During the two-week Balikatan 2019, Filipino, American, and a small number of Australian armed service personnel resumed the exercises on counter-terrorism, amphibious and aviation operations, bilateral planning and training, subject matter expert exchanges, and humanitarian and civic activities.

Enhancing Philippine–Japan Security Partnership The reorientation of Philippine foreign policy under President Duterte worried Japan. This directional change surely steers a traditional stalwart American ally toward becoming an economic satellite of China. President Duterte has disrupted the momentum in Philippine–U.S security relations by questioning the Philippine–U.S. Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA) signed by the two allies in 2014. Moreover, Japan was concerned that the prospects of forming a common association with the Philippines that adheres to a rules-based regional order, freedom of navigation, and support for America’s role as East Asia’s strategic offshore balancer will be thwarted by President Duterte’s increasingly independent foreign and strategic posture vis-à-vis the U.S. and its other Asian allies (Tow, Preisdent Trump and the Implications for the Australia–U.S. Alliance and Australia’s Role in Southeast Asia, April). Consequently, Japan harnesses all its foreign policy instruments—military, economic, diplomatic, etc.—to balance President Duterte’s policy of weaning away from the U.S. while leaning on to China. Japan’s pressing goal is to assist the Philippines in improving its maritime surveillance capabilities to counter Chinese maritime activities in the South China Sea. Thus, it solidifies its security relations with the Duterte Administration by fostering periodic consultations between the two countries, and buttressing the PN’s and PCG’s maritime domain awareness capabilities. For the Philippines, keeping the partnership intact is imperative because Japan remains the country’s most important trading partner, its largest investor, and the home of several thousands of Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) whose regular remittances boost the local economy (Rivera 2016). In September 2017, Japanese PM Abe met President Duterte in Laos for their first summit meeting. Both leaders agreed to improve maritime security through Japan’s provision of two large patrol vessels to the Philippines (The National Institute for Defense Studies 2017). During his

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previous working visit to Japan from October 25 to 27, 2016, President Duterte witnessed the signing for the lease of five JSDF’s TC-90 maritime reconnaissance planes to monitor Chinese activities in the South China Sea (The Ministry of Foreign Affairs 26 October 2016). The lease costing US$7000 per plane a year was one of the notable decisions of the Duterte Administration relative to territorial defense as the AFP lacks valuable assets for maritime domain awareness (Valente 2017). President Duterte also raised the prospects of the Philippines and Japan holding military exercises in the future (Anonymous 2016). From 12 to 13 January 2017, PM Abe went on a two-day state visit to Manila whose relations with the U.S. were strained. The Philippines was his first stop in a four-nation diplomatic swing to bolster Japan’s trade and security engagements amidst China’s increasing economic and diplomatic clout in Southeast Asia. The two leaders pledged to deepen their maritime security cooperation and help resolve the South China Sea dispute peacefully. Since both the Philippines and Japan are littoral states, PM Abe promised to support the Philippines’ capacity-building in maritime security (Valente 2017). Incidentally, President Duterte expressed hope for the speedy delivery to the Philippines of patrol vessels already in the pipeline and the acquisition of new boats (Valente 2017). Commenting on the high-profile visit by a Japanese head-of-state to the Philippines, an American analyst observed that PM Abe’s visit to the Philippines reflected “Japan’s goal to upset growing Chinese influence in the geopolitically strategic Southeast Asian country by ensuring the steady flow of (Japanese) aid and investment to the Philippines” (Jennings, Japan Seeks to Limit China as Abe Visits Philippines 2017b). In March 2018, Japan completed its delivery of five TC-90s to the PN. The five donated reconnaissance aircraft augmented the PN’s six 40year-old Britten-Norman Islanders used in maritime patrol, surveillance, HADR, and rapid assessment missions. The provision of the TC-90s alleviated the PN’s inadequacy to conduct regular and routine patrols in the South China Sea given its few and obsolete air assets and enabled it to cover wider maritime domain awareness operations. The PN plans to purchase more advanced maritime patrol aircraft under its Long-Range Patrol Aircraft acquisition program particularly two long range reconnaissance aircraft (M. Yeo 2017). Along with PM Abe’s promise of more grants and investment, the donation of the TC-90s PN was part of Tokyo’s efforts to assist the Philippines economically and militarily

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to counter-balance China’s political influence on the Duterte Administration. Interestingly, it also proved that maritime security cooperation between Japan and the Philippines is proceeding smoothly despite the Sino-Philippine rapprochement. Likewise, Japan delivered ten 44-meters Multi-role Response Vessels (MRRV) to the PCG. Six of these vessels were commissioned by the PCG and the last four were transferred to the Philippines at the end of 2018. The PCG stressed that these vessels would be used for routine search-and-rescue, and law-enforcement operations. However, Philippine defense officials also indicated that these MRRVs could also be deployed to combat piracy and provide the PN greater capacity to patrol the country’s extensive EZZ in the South China Sea (Paramesaran 2018). All the ten Japanese-made MRRV are currently in active service in the PCG. In accepting this security hardware, the Duterte Administration considers Japan as a balancer between the U.S. and China in its diplomatic gambit to diversify its foreign relations, including its ties with Japan, China, and even Russia (The National Institute for Defense Studies 2017). In August 2017, Japan announced that it would give the Philippines thousands of helicopter spare parts to keep the PAF fleet of UH-1 Iroquois (or Huey) helicopters operational (Kelly and Kubo, Japan Said to Offer Chooper Parts to the Philippines as Counter to China 2017b). The Japan Ground Self-Defense Force (JGSDF) retired its older H version of the Vietnam War-era Huey Helicopters in 2012, but kept its spare parts. These helicopters are still used by the PAF for transport and as gunships in counter-insurgency operations. This deal could be the first of a series of agreements that Japan wants to forge with some Southeast Asian states that are willing to accept second-hand Japanese patrol aircraft, ships, and other military equipment. This is a component of Japan’s military diplomacy to confound China’s growing political and economic influence in Southeast Asia (Kelly and Kubo, Japan Said to Offer Chooper Parts to the Philippines as Counter to China 2017b). Following immediately after the end of the battle of Marawi City, Japan installed PCG radar stations on the islands in the Sulu and Celebes Seas to monitor the movement of terrorist groups transiting between Indonesia and Mindanao (Kelly and Kubo, Japan to Build Four Rada Stations for the Philippines to Counter Piracy Surge, Sources Say 2017a). It also trained the local coast guard personnel operating these stations. PM Abe also offered US$2 million to help rebuild Marawi City, which was heavily damaged during the five months of fighting between the AFP and Islamic

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militants (Jennings, Japan Deepens Economic Support for Philippines in Rivalry with China 2017a). Japan’s provision of four radar stations is part of a substantial ODA package that includes helicopter parts for the PAF, funds for infrastructure projects such as railroads, and financial assistance for the rehabilitation of Marawi City. For Japan, the Philippines remains a key factor in preventing China’s political and diplomatic stranglehold from spreading into the Western Pacific (Kelly and Kubo, Japan to Build Four Rada Stations for the Philippines to Counter Piracy Surge, Sources Say 2017a).

Averting a Total Pivot to China Early on, top Philippine officials thought that the BRI would provide the necessary capital for the Philippines to improve its infrastructure and connectivity, thus creating an international context for the development plan of the Duterte Administration (Presidential Communication Office News Releases) (Xinhua News Agency 2017). In terms of the expected dividends, however, the Philippines has not received considerable so far from its appeasement policy. The country sought Chinese investments in the reclamation of the Davao coastline, construction of seaports and terminals in Davao, Cebu, and Manila, and the building of highways and railways amounting to US$9 billion (Caraballo 2018). Ongoing BRI projects in the Philippines include the construction of two bridges in Manila and a planned larger South Long Haul Railway that will connect ports and special economic zones in Luzon (Caraballo 2018). Nevertheless, there is no single major port development project that “would have been more in line with the BRI’s thrust of increasing regional connectivity and allow the Philippines to be linked to the Maritime Silk Road” (Klemensits 2018). Currently, the opposition to Chinese-funded infrastructure projects stems from the widespread perception of China as a security threat. This public apprehension of China outweighs the economic benefits of Chinese investments (Ordaniel and Camba 30). No wonder, the Chinese are also hesitant to finance huge infrastructure projects in the country because these “projects would also hinge on the developments in the South China Sea claims, which will depend on the next administration’s stance relative to China” (Caraballo 2018). The AFP is one of the important institutions in Philippine society that has been very critical of President Duterte’s pivot to China. Distrust

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of China runs deep in Philippines society, particularly in the military circles, where Beijing’s motives are viewed through the lens of the chronic territorial dispute in the South China Sea (Venzon 2019). Despite a proChina shift in Philippine foreign policy, the Philippine military generally considers Asia’s emerging hegemon, China, as a historical enemy (Robles, Why don’t Manila and Beijing Have Closer Military Ties, Despite Duterte’s Pivot to China 2019). Consequently, the military’s weariness of China, the stringent process of reviewing proposed Chinese-funded infrastructure projects, funding delays, project cancelations, and public opinion pose obstacles on a plan to build the country’s infrastructure, generate jobs, and cement his legacy (Venzon 2019). In addition, the AFP is skeptical of closer Philippine-China security relations as it is helpless in the face of Chinese occupations of several land features deep in the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone (EEZ). The military establishment is basically pro-U.S. and see the South China Sea imbroglio a major road block to regional peace and bilateral cooperation between the Philippines and China. Hence, it maintains close relations with the U.S. military and engages Japan through a security partnership. For seven decades, the U.S. armed services and the AFP have trained and consulted each other for combat and humanitarian operations. These military exercises have enabled the AFP to enhance the readiness of its forces across the various mission areas and to promote the interoperability between the Philippines and U.S. armed services (Angeles 2017). These cooperative relations extend not only in terms of equipment provision, intelligence sharing, navigation, and communications areas, but also in terms of military doctrines, common strategic outlook, and mindset (Ordaniel and Camba 30). Japan’s ties to the AFP operate within the framework of a security partnership. The Philippine–Japan security partnership was formalized in June 2015. Thereafter, Japan has provided the Philippines with patrol boats, reconnaissance planes, transport ships, and training on a grant basis. Its goal is to strengthen the Philippines’ political will and naval capabilities to confront China’s maritime expansion in the Western Pacific and prevent the resurgence of Islamic militancy in Southeast Asia. Nevertheless, Japan’s efforts to build up the Philippine military capability can never substitute for the sustained U.S. security engagement in East Asia and merely complement it. The AFP capitalized on American and Japanese security assistance in the Philippines’ vigorous response to the presence of 200 Chinese fishing

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vessels in Whitsun Reef stand-off. On March 20, 2021, DND Secretary Lorenzana officially informed the Filipino nation about the presence of around 220-blue hulled Chinese fishing vessels moored in line formation at Julian Felipe Reef, internationally known as Whitsun Reef) (Asia News Monitor 2021). According to him, the PCG sighted 220 Chinese fishing vessels, allegedly manned by the Chinese maritime militia, as early as March 7 (Manila Bulletin 2021). Filipino military officers and diplomats interpreted the gathering of Chinese fishing vessels in Whitsun Reef in early 2021 as a prelude to a gray zone operation similar to what happened in Mischief Reef in 1996, and again in Scarborough Shoal in 2012. Then AFP Chief Lieutenant General Cirilito Sobejana directed the PN to deploy immediately additional naval vessels to reinforced the country’s maritime sovereignty patrols” in the disputed waters (Manila Bulletin 2021). Former AFP spokesperson Major General Edgard Arevalo declared: “By increased naval presence in the area, we seek to reassure our people of the Armed Forces of the Philippines’ strong and unwavering commitment to protect and defend them from harassment and ensure that they can enjoy their rights over the country’s rich fishing grounds” (Manila Bulletin 2021). Earlier, Secretary Lorenzana ordered the PCG and PN to increase their sovereignty patrols near Whitsun Reef (Robles, Manila Defies Warnings in View to Keep up its Patrols: Pledge comes as Chinese Radio Operators Challenge plan at Least Five Timese as it Flies Low over Reefs 2021). The PAF’s American-made reconnaissance planes made several aerial reconnaissance flights over Chinese-controlled land features despite being challenged by the People Liberation Army’s Navy’s (PLAN) forces (Robles, Manila Defies Warnings in View to Keep up its Patrols: Pledge comes as Chinese Radio Operators Challenge plan at Least Five Timese as it Flies Low over Reefs 2021). The PCG activated its “Task Force Pagsasanay (Training)” to intensify the capacity-building of its personnel and assets to protect the Philippines’ EEZ amid during the tense and critical stand-off (Manila Bulletin 2021). The task force was composed of officers and crews of the PCG’s newly acquired Japanese-made MRRVs (Manila Bulletin 2021).

Conclusion After assuming office in mid-2016, President Duterte unraveled his predecessor’s policy of challenging China’s expansive claims in the South

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China Sea. He distanced his country from the U.S., its traditional treaty ally and gravitated toward China which is bent on reconfiguring the global commons in the East Asia. He also set aside the 2016 UNCLOS decision that legally invalidated China’s claims on the South China Sea dispute. President Duterte’s efforts to reorient Philippine foreign policy alarmed both the U.S., and Japan. Consequently, Washington and Tokyo boosted their respective security relations with the AFP to prevent the Philippines from leaning on China. On the one hand, the U.S. adeptly managed its alliance with the Philippines by addressing two key security issues—the South China Sea imbroglio and the persistent ISIS threat in Mindanao. Japan, on the other hand, strengthened its security partnership with the Philippines as it extended military assistance to the PCG, PN, and PAF. As members of the alliance system before and during the San Francisco Peace Conference in 1950, the U.S. and Japan demonstrate patience and persistence in dealing with the pro-China administration of President Duterte. Both countries share common interests with the Philippines— another treaty ally—particularly in their security concerns in the South China Sea. Despite President Duterte kowtowing to China, the U.S. and Japan, cooperate closely and resolutely with the Philippines to ensure that the sea lanes of the Western Pacific remain safe, open, and secure. Clearly, the current security situation in the region reflects the fact that the San Francisco System of alliances has proverbially stood the test of time. This network of bilateral pacts laid down the foundations of a regional order, security, and stability, and even outlive the ideologyoriented Cold War. More significantly, it has prevailed way beyond the second decade of the twenty-first century to face China’s maritime expansion in the Western Pacific.

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The Vexing China Question in Today’s San Francisco System: Moving Beyond the Cold War Framework Victor Teo

The San Francisco System in the Asia–Pacific1 The San Francisco Treaty has been lauded by many as one of the most significant development in the construction of the post War era in Asia– Pacific. This remarkable Treaty saw Japan in making peace with the United States and forty other signatories and Japan’s rehabilitation with into the international community. The Treaty was reached with Japan after six years of American Occupation and subjugation, but the signing of the Treaty heralded an era of reconstruction, rehabilitation, extraordinary economic growth and prosperity. From Occupation to becoming the world’s second largest economic power, the San Francisco Treaty 1 The author gratefully acknowledges the support of the Academy of Korean Studies (AKS-2016-LAB-2250005) for the Cold War Fellowship at the University of Cambridge which made the research of this project possible.

V. Teo (B) Center for Research in Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities (CRASSH), University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK e-mail: [email protected]; [email protected]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2022 Y. Sugita and V. Teo (eds.), Rethinking the San Francisco System in Indo-Pacific Security, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-1231-3_13

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has largely brought more benefits for Japan than any other countries in Asia. This treaty also heralded in a system which many International Relations scholars refer to as the “San Francisco System”, premised on the 1951 US-Japan Security Treaty signed contemporaneously with the San Francisco Peace Treaty. Along with other important bilateral treaties and partnerships in the region (such as with the Republic of Korea, the Philippines, Australia etc.), the Cold War system of bilateral alliances and partnerships that the US maintains in the region came to be described by some American and Australian scholars as the “San Francisco system’. This term is now commonly used to describe the system put in place since 1951, and today enjoys an almost cult status amongst Western/Japanese officials and scholars, who firmly believe in its ability to sustain peace and prosperity in the region. Three important aspects of the system must be highlighted. First, the character of the Asia–Pacific region is shaped by the San Francisco Treaty as much as it is by US bilateral alliance system. The peace and prosperity enjoyed by the region did not flow automatically following with the signing of the San Francisco Treaty, but came about as a result of the balance of power and hegemonic stability (after the collapse of the USSR) that the San Francisco system brought (Bagai 1995). This same system accorded the stable environment that saw the rise of both the US and Japan, and subsequently China over the last seven decades. Second, while many scholars highlight today the “normative” dimension of the US-Japan partnership by emphasizing the liberal and democratic values that both the US and Japan purportedly stand for within the San Francisco system, it is easier to overlook the fact that the system is not a region-wide system. It is crucial to understand and recognize the geopolitical power realities that belie the system. The San Francisco system is underpinned by a series of US defence alliances and partnerships to protect the region’s peace and prosperity. By definition, such alliances are held together by the singling out of a common enemy (real or perceived). At the same time, the US ascribe varying importance to her allies, creating a structural hierarchy of bilateral set of relations. Such a system would often mean that some powers are often privileged, while others ignored or suppressed. It is therefore important to appreciate that such a hierarchy is subject to challenge at anyone time when the attributes or capabilities of any state in the hierarchy changes. It is also important to recognize that even as the US and Japan argue that their foreign policy is premised to uphold liberal values and norms, more often than not,

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they are just nation states seeking to maximize their interests through realpolitik manoeuvers vis-à-vis their competitors. One will be foolish to believe or expect that liberal democratic states would always behave “liberally” or “democratically” in their practice of international relations, and that non-liberal democratic states are incapable of self restraint or the abiding by international norms and laws. Third, the cost–benefit distribution of the San Francisco system has been relatively quite different for countries in the region. The US has expended much blood and treasure to establish the bilateral alliances in the region. Like Japan, the United States has benefitted immeasurably from these arrangements. Not only is Washington able to maintain not only the Apex position in the regional hierarchy, but the system has allowed the US to have the dominant say in establishing the region’s agenda, rules and direction since 1951. At the same time, the need to maintain cordial relations with her allies in the region has prevented the US from stepping forward to provide a clearer proposition on contested historical and territorial disputes in the region. Japan herself too benefitted from the San Francisco system, having enjoyed the unparallel security protection, economic support for much of the Cold War and ultimately rose as an economic power during the 1970s onwards. Although the norms are changing (Schmidt 2014), Japan did faced six years of occupation and overcame enormous challenges associated with basing the US military presence. The emergence of a pacifist Japan in the post era saw the emergence of a class of conservative elites, some of whom were rehabilitated right-wing constituents involved in the Pacific War. Ironically, these elites became the staunchest advocates of USJapan alliance. Their symbiotic relationship with the United States exist to this day, and is the single most important reason for the longevity and strength of the US-Japan alliance. At the same time, this is the sole reason why Japan’s relations with her neighbours are marred by issues of history and territorial disputes, and the reason why Japan has been accused of becoming complicit in the maintenance of historic amnesia. (Clemons 2001) there is a perception that the US tolerates or even encourages historical amnesia and rightwing revisionism for realpolitik gains in contemporary Japan. There are therefore allegations that the San Francisco Treaty maintains a “one sided” peace, one where the US tolerates and even encourages historical amnesia and revisionism for realpolitik gains.

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As Hara (2001: 361) writing on the 50th anniversary of the San Francisco Treaty some two decades ago suggested, apart from the collapse of the USSR, the international environment surrounding Japan in the post Cold War era is not so different from 1951 when the Treaty is signed. The post Cold War then did not really look very “post”. Today, at the 70th anniversary of the San Francisco Treaty, the situation surrounding Japan arguably is much worse than it is in 1991. East Asia appears to be on the verge of a new Cold War, with the same but more capable antagonists in play. Stalinist North Korea is now more focused and energized, alongside a resurgent Russia and a rising China are now collectively facing off the United States. If the Western (and Japanese media) and social media posts on facebook are to be believed, there is no greater threat to the “peace and prosperity” to the region than in any other era before. The region is being terrified by a belligerent nuclear North Korea and staring down the abyss of great power conflict driven by an irredentist China in both the Taiwan Straits and the South China Sea. The erosion of the One Country, Two Systems principle in Hong Kong and the crushing of the nascent democratization movement, as well as Beijing’s securitization of Xinjiang have led many to argue that the US policy of engagement of China since the mid-1990s have failed. Decades of economic engagement have richened Beijing and emboldened the Chinese Communist on the verge of a global expansionist drive. In the San Francisco system camp— we see the emergence of Conservative politicians in the likes of Shinzo Abe in Japan, Narendra Modi in India (Bloomfield 2021; Chandra 2018) and Donald Trump in the United States coming forward and thumping their chest to “stop” the Chinese menace and protect liberal democratic values. The United States today is once again rallying her allies as she did in 1951, but this time the enemy is China. What are we to make of these developments against the backdrop of the anniversary of the San Francisco Treaty? Is this evidence that the peace from San Francisco Treaty is in fact a “one sided” peace, where the US-Japan relationship only thrives in troubled region where the bilateral relations draws meaning for its existence, or is as Braddick (2003: 363) suggests, a system that has achieved many-sided peace although not a complete one? This chapter acknowledges the San Francisco system has indeed brought about much peace and prosperity for the United States and her allies since its inception during the Cold War, albeit with heavy costs. Beyond the heavy toll inflicted on the Vietnamese and Korean people in the proxy wars fought between the US and the USSR, Korea remains

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divided today as it was in 1953. The struggle over Taiwan continues even though the Chinese Civil War technically ended in 1949. East Asia spends far more on national defence compared to other regions, and domestic political quarrels of unification and interstate territorial disputes are becoming more protracted by the infusion of identity politics. Many of these problems East and Southeast Asia face today have their roots in the San Francisco settlements. This chapter proposes to examine the development of US-China confrontation against the continued preponderance of American power in the region. The chapter then surveys three dominant challenges to the San Francisco System, and by extension the principal architect of the San Francisco system over the course of the last seven decades: the USSR, Japan and the Peoples Republic of China. It will conclude by making an assessment of the near-term trajectory of Sino-US relations. The chapter argues that while useful over the past seven decades, the San Francisco system has benefited some countries disproportionally than the other. While there is absolutely no incentive on the part of the United States (or arguably Japan) to make modifications to something that has served them well so far, an important and frank conversation must be had with regards to the role of China within the San Francisco System to prevent the further disintegration of the system. China, long a part of the system cannot be regarded as the “external” enemy if the San Francisco system is to be preserved. This is the fundamental reason why the United States has such difficulties dealing with China today.

The Privileged Position of the United States and the Contradictions of the San Francisco System As we celebrate the 70th anniversary of the San Francisco Treaty, it is also important that we appraise honestly what the San Francisco system has stood for and how it has grown and developed over the years. Scholars refer to the web of US bilateral alliances built over the years in Asia, anchored by the US-Japan alliance as the San Francisco system. There is no crystal clear definition, but most scholars have attributed it to refer to a regional order, a security bloc, as a US foreign policy strategy in Asia and a political community in Asia established since 1951. The term “San Francisco system” was popularized by some prominent academics, notably

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in Australia and the United States (Buszynski 2011; Calder 2010; Tow and Kasim 2020; Dower 2014; Hara 1999; Beazley 2003). In the Japan studies as well as strategic studies community, it would be very hard to any less than flattering narratives about the US-Japan security alliance. Like most Americans who seem to believe in democracy more than they do religion, Japanese people too swear by the US-Japan alliance as part of their identity and political consciousness. Most Western and Japanese writings sing praises of this arrangement. Naturally this is the case as most of the literature are authored by scholars and policymakers who have been educated and are working in the countries or entities that have formal or informal defence arrangements with the United States (e.g. United Kingdom, Australia, Philippines, Republic of Korea, Singapore or Taiwan). From the 1950s till today, at least three generations of politicians and officials have been entrenched in anti-Communist efforts in these countries. In some of these countries, the mere prospect of raising questions about the San Francisco system established seven decades ago brings shock and horror if not outright accusations of treason. Likewise generations of our students have studied in IR schools in Washington, DC or London or in Tokyo, only to read from texts written by the scholars and policy people that advocate to overwhelming merits of the system. In recent years, owning to the inflammation of tensions in Sino-Indian relations, we also see an increase in pieces that advocate for the containment of Chinese power by South Asian authors and specialists (Zahir 2021; Chellaney 2018; Iyer et al. 2021; Joshi and Pant 2015; Pant 2019; Puthan Purayil 2021; Vaughn 2004). The irony is of course if one lives in Moscow or Beijing or Pyongyang, one will encounter the same fervent but opposite narratives advocated by the Russians or Chinese or North Koreans, and for a time the Vietnamese. There are however a small handful of contemporary scholars who have highlighted issues with the San Francisco System (Kimie Hara, Garvin McCormack etc.) and their scholarship seems to have transcended their national identities and social expectations to provide deeper insights and critiques of the San Francisco Treaty/System. Their research is valuable for us as scholars, because their concerns would perhaps enable our work to enhance the existing system that we have, and enable us to avoid the pitfalls of global conflict.

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Accordingly, one important feature of the San Francisco system is a set of in-built contradictions that subsumes within the relations of various states in the system. The existence of these contradictions is a result of both careful design by the system’s principal architect, but also a result of historical coincidence and results of unintended consequences of policy decisions. All in these contradictions work together to perpetuate tensions between various bilateral or trilateral nations, and prevent more effective reconciliation between them to achieve better relations. These contradictions are often as a result of anti-communist considerations behind belie the thinking of policymakers’ decisions in Washington D.C at the time. They have probably the most bearing on Japan’s foreign relations. Today, in East Asia, Japan’s relations with China and North Korea can be best described as challenging, and relations with South Korea can be described as lacklustre. Tokyo probably finds more strategic solace strangely with Philippines and Vietnam than any other country from Asia. What might these contradictions be then? First, it is the grave differences in how Japan and her neighbours perceived whether the wrong was done during the colonial time and the subsequent imperial period has been righted. With the signing of the San Francisco Treaty and the establishment of the San Francisco system, Japan argues that the negative externalities owed to the colonial and imperial period have been fully and irretrievably settled—whether it is with the Koreas, Taiwan, China and Southeast Asia. At the very least, the Tokyo Trials and the San Francisco Treaty have put Japan in a position to say that dues have been repaid. Yet, the question of reparations, apologies, wartime responsibility, loosely known as the “burden of history” has surfaced time and again in Japan’s contemporary relations with her neighbours (Abe 2013; Dudden 2017; Bong 2010; Katada 2000; Lee 2001; Oh 2018; Price 2013; Shin 2010; Togo 2011; Trefalt 2007; Shen 2007). To be sure, the United States has urged her allies after the War to make good with Japan due to the Soviet threat, but just because the governments (or regimes) acquiesced (often under US pressure) to establish relations with Japan, it doesn’t naturally mean that grievances have dissipated. The disparity in the question of whether justice has been achieved and the finality of the San Francisco Treaty means that Japan’s foreign relations will always be overshadowed by the issues of war history. Rightly or wrongly, this has fueled and sustained neo-conservatism and revisionism in Japan. Today, the Liberal Democratic party argues that the dominance of pacifism has only suppressed but not eradicated the ideals

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of those who think the Pacific War is right, and that what was imposed on Japan subsequently is the Victor’s justice. The second set of contradictions revolves around the dispositions of Japan’s colonial and imperial territories (Hara 1999, 2001, 2004, 2006, 2015, 2016). Whether it is Senkaku/Diaoyu islands (Denk 2005; Hara 2004, 2015; Hook 2014) or Takeshima/Tokdo islands (Bong 2011; Hara 2016; Lee and Van Dyke 2010; Hosaka 2014; Schwartz and Yoo 2019), the island disputes continue to plague Japan’s relations with her neighbours. The island disputes have their roots in the San Francisco settlements. From Tokyo’s perspective, given that the Treaties were “hoisted” upon Japan after the Occupation, the Japanese government had little choice in the arrangements but had to staunchly and steadfastly live up to her hand of the obligations. Naturally it follows that the incessant talk about history, apologies and reparations are met with dismayed if not anger seventy years on in Japan. Today, these tiers of memories of talking about the wartime past are providing fuel for the nationalist cause in Japan, and are being taped upon by the Conservative right wingers to monopolize their discourse on the tone and direction of Japan’s security future. Ironically this has bolstered the Japanese public support for the US-Japan alliance even more. In the immediate post war period, the San Francisco Treaty and the subsequent security Treaties (such as ROK and ROC etc.) was perhaps the best mechanism the US could put in place to protect the region and their allies from falling to the Soviet Union, the evil empire. However, the important and pivotal role the United States could play in the region was not lost on the planners in the US strategic community. Take Senkaku/Diaoyu islands for instance. The United States could have returned the islands to the Republic of China but instead chose to revert administrative control, maintaining “neutrality” but stipulating that Article 5 of the US-Japan Security Treaty covers any attempts to recover the islands by force, from not only China, but presumably Taiwan as well (Manyin 2021). This ensures that the US will have a perpetual “balancing” role in the affairs of the region (McCormack 2007; McCormack and Norimatsu 2012; Teo 2019). While, the dominance of American military power and political sway has protected and kept the peace between Japan and her neighbours—the Koreas, China and Russia, this has also meant that for a larger part of the seven decades, Japan has had little room to manoeuver insofar when striving for better relations with her

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neighbours are concerned. Japan’s transformation as a leading democracy is ironically built on the bedrock of Japanese Conservatism. For the United States, the San Francisco System has been the principal mechanism by which it has assumed and maintained leadership in the Asia–Pacific region. Through these alliances, Washington had unparalleled access to influence the domestic politics of these allies, as well as the influence on the larger diplomatic environment each country operates in. The San Francisco system, therefore, accorded the United States with the strategic primacy that allowed the US to balance extremely well against the USSR for much of the cold war, and achieve hegemonic stability in the aftermath. American scholars would of course argue that this is a historical necessity and a welcome development: that the US has sacrificed much to attain a stature and apex position commensurate with her sacrifice and power. Beyond that, the attributes of American democracy and freedoms have made her the most welcome power in the region. If anything, the smaller countries in Southeast Asia are perhaps grateful to the United States for not only containing the spread of Communism in the region (via the Korea and Vietnam Wars), but to the United States for not acting as a conquering colonizer, but instead left them alone to fulfil their own nationalistic aspirations and self-determination. This pertains to a large tract of Asia not directly tied to the United States via the San Francisco system. Think India, Indonesia, Malaysia and most of Indochina—these countries however did gain from the political stability and the absence of warfare once the hegemonic struggle between the USSR and US stopped. Unmolested, they went on about rebuilding their countries and economies. Likewise, even after two tumultuous decades of Cold War confrontation, Communist regimes like Laos, Vietnam and the Peoples Republic of China too began to benefit from the stability brought about by the San Francisco system to build their economies from the mid-1970s onwards. The “peace” that the San Francisco system achieved was therefore premised on a “balance of power” situation where the US and her allies held back and contained the USSR for most of the Cold War (1944– 1989). This “peace” continued after the collapse of the USSR to one based on the American hegemonic stability (post 1990s). There are three important points to be made with regards to the region’s peace and prosperity. First, the absence of large-scale interstate warfare, and the desire of the regional countries to establish commercial ties regardless of regime type and get together despite contending nationalisms and

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divided domestic opinion is the singular most important driver of peace in the region. Second, the Cold War in Asia is strictly not over, which means that the United States in reality has not prevailed. Four of the five world’s Communist regimes today continues to thrive in Asia (Vietnam, Laos, North Korea and China). Third, it is important to note here that People’s Republic of China was very much part of the San Francisco system from 1972, particularly in the hegemonic struggle between US and USSR. China became a de-facto ally against the USSR from 1972, and played an instrumental role in weighing down the USSR along their 7000 km border for much of the Cold War. During the author’s affiliation at the Russian Academy of Sciences Institute of Far East Studies in the late 1990s, most of the elderly Professors who had lived through the Cold War years said the USSR singular fatal mistake was its choosing to confront the PRC. The herculean logistical task of facing the Chinese threat along the border sapped the Soviet Union’s strength away and contributed to its eventual collapse.

Three Challengers to the United States in Seven Decades In retrospect, over the course of the seventy years of the San Francisco Treaty, there have been only three challengers to the United States power in Asia: The USSR, Japan and the PRC. The rise of these three powers challenged the United States in different time periods, and in different ways—but they all represented a direct challenge to the pole position of the United States in the San Francisco system. The first was the USSR, an external challenger to the San Francisco system. If anything, the existence of the USSR was the very reason for the genesis of the San Francisco system in 1951. The USSR manifested its power through the confrontation of the United States throughout the Cold War, and fought two proxy wars via her proxies with the United States. Although the US did manage to hold the USSR at bay, it took three decades of warfare and confrontation in the Asia–Pacific region before a détente was called. The US did not actually “win” an outright victory, as much as it outlasted (and some argued bankrupted) the Soviet Union. Just as the Soviets “entrapped” the US in Indochina, the Americans turned things around when it persuaded China to switch sides. For the next decade and half, the US weighed down the Soviet Union with China’s help, and enticed Moscow into an economic race that finally bankrupted the Soviet Union.

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The USSR imploded largely because of its own structural weakness and economic model, but up till today, its successor, the Russian Federation remains the most formidable military adversary the United States ever faced (or at least until the 2016 when the Trump Administration decided “officially” it was China). The second challenger to the United States’ during the Cold War was ironically Japan. Unlike the USSR, Japan was not an external competitor, but the central ally of the United States in the San Francisco system. Despite this, Japan’s economic ascendance in the 1980s appeared to have threatened Washington all the same. Tokyo’s challenge to the United States was a subtle political confrontation coupled with economic and technological competition. Tokyo’s rapid ascendance as the world’s second largest economic power closed the gap substantially between Washington and Japan, but it created feelings of nationalistic sentiments in both Japan and the United States as both powers were competing on the basis of economic dominance, technological innovation and soft power influence. If one scan the popular writings (magazines, editorial etc.), the “Japan threat” was very real, and the strategic climate in the United States focused on what can be done to tame Japanese power. In the end, the United States imposed its will on Tokyo, and Washington “persuaded” Japan (and Germany) to sign the Plaza Accords in the name of alliance preservation. With the currency re-evaluation, and the subsequent stagnation of the Japanese economy, the economic threat Tokyo posed dissipated. Of course, Japan was to a certain extent a willing partner, for its acquiescence to the United States was in some way a price Tokyo was willing to pay in the preservation of the US-Japan alliance partnership. But the complaints that the Americans had against Japan were eerily similar to those of what the Americans say of the Chinese today. The third power is naturally the People’s Republic of China. During the first phase of the Cold War (1949–1972), the Chinese challenge manifested itself both politically and militarily. China’s alliance with the USSR, and its direct intervention in the Koreas, and support of the Vietnam provided the impetus for the United States to increase her military presence in East and Southeast Asia. Upon realizing the fallacy of a “monolithic” Communist entity, the Nixon administration sought to initiate rapprochement with the PRC in 1972. Beijing’s reconciliation with the United States meant that even though China was not formally inducted as an ally of the United States, China was at least arguably a de-facto partner in the United States’ (and Japan’s) containment of the

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USSR. With the opening and reform of China in 1978, the Chinese economy was in one way than one integrated with those countries within the San Francisco system. To a large extent, China and the US (and also Japan and the region) gained much from collaboration and cooperation from the 1980s till now. The region grew rich and prosperous from working with Japan, US and China. It was only after the collapse of the USSR that the strategic community in Washington, Tokyo and elsewhere began debating the China threat. Regardless of this, Sino-US relations remained on a relatively even keel as the United States became distracted by her military engagements in the Middle East. The micro survey of the three scenarios provides three important takeaways for understanding Sino-US interactions contextualized against the San Francisco system. First, in each of the scenarios listed, the United States has used the San Francisco system to great effect in ensuring and protecting her apex position in the Asia–Pacific region. Whether facing an external aggressor or an internal challenger, the system of alliances has been instrumental in ensuring that the regional order remains unchanged since 1951. Second, the two East Asian giants—Japan and China have both benefitted immeasurably from the San Francisco system, even though the cost–benefit calculus vis-à-vis the US alliance system is actually very different. Their respective relationships with the United States have always had elements of both competitiveness and complementarity, and in reality, the Sino-Japanese relationship is a lot less binary than commonly perceived. In other words, Japan is not always the staunch ally of the US outsiders often romanticize it is, and China is not always the strategic rival that is bent on confronting the United States that we assume it to be. Third, viewed from a long durée perspective, these labels have more to do with the prevailing domestic politics in these respective countries and the power parity the countries have in relation to each other at any given point. The United States has relied on China to curb both the USSR as well as Japan, just as the Japanese have utilized the US-Japan alliance to confront the Soviets and courted China politically and economically over the years. In 2017, after President Donald Trump has largely eradicated the possibility of a North Korean crisis through his meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jung-un, the Trump administration reoriented her foreign policy to confront China. Driven in a large part by his domestic political strategy, but also by Beijing’s rapidly changing capabilities, Trump instituted an across the government strategy to confront and

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contain China (Kuchins 2018). This policy did not dissipate with the victory of President Biden. The United States has now identified the PRC as its dominant peer adversary (sometimes called competitor). Kurt Campell, the architect of Obama’s “Pivot” to Asia, and now Biden’s Indo-Pacific Czar has publicly announced that “era of engagement” is over. The Biden administration has in fact up the ante on Trump’s offensive towards China, and in light of Russia’s attack on Ukraine, this is still continuing unabated.

The Sino-US Confrontation: A Hegemonic Struggle Seventy decades after the signing of the San Francisco Treaty, the Asia– Pacific region is at crossroads now. Amidst the global pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, all of us living in the Asia–Pacific region are finding ourselves at staring at the abyss of a possible, new renewed Cold War involving the United States and China. As the region undergoes seismic systemic and structural shifts today, the issues related to the “burden of history” and territorial conflicts would become more pronounced as these issues might become “contention areas” for the tussle between China and the United States. In Japan, public opinion has turned entirely against China at the time of writing, and even though Shinzo Abe has stepped down, his China policy is now the de-facto policy direction of Liberal Democratic Party and Japan. Tokyo has spent the better of the last two decades normalizing and building a more muscular foreign and strategy policy (Pyle 2007; Smith 2015; Teo 2019). Abe’s successor, Prime Minister Kishida, a wellknown dove has turned hawkish on China. Likewise the People Republic of China has too regressed on many aspects in the name of development. The increased tensions over the Senkaku/Diaoyu islands are a manifestation of the larger tensions in Sino-US and by extension Sino-Japan relations rather than any attempt by the Chinese to unilaterally “annex” the islands. Within China, rights protection, liberalizing freedoms seen in the first two decades after the Cold War are increasingly been eroded in the name of national security. If anything, the PRC has to become more nationalistic, more conservative and less tolerant of dissent, especially if complaints come from domestic constituents and Party insiders since 2012. This has of course to do with dynamics of internal political struggle as well as

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affected parties from China’s intensifying crackdown on corruption. It is clear that in the days ahead, US-China hegemonic struggle will become pronounced as Conservatism once again becomes more fashionable on both sides. In order to counter the rapidly rising China, the Biden White House has gone all out reinvigorate the San Francisco System. In the aftermath of Trump’s open disdain for foreign intervention and the costs of maintaining US alliances overseas, Biden’s mission has been more difficult. The United States has reaffirmed ties with Japan by openly declaring that the US alliance covers the protection of Senkaku islands (much to the surprise of Japan as they did not raise it). Likewise, the US has also sought to strengthen the US-ROK alliance, even as the US State Department pays lip service to President Moon’s declared plans to bring the Korean War to a formal end. The Americans have also substantially improved their relations with Australia in defence cooperation through the institution of the Quad (Panda 2021b) and AUKUS deal (to the detriment of US-France relations). Washington has also made strident efforts to boost US-Vietnam relations to a new level, and assiduously courted Jakarta, Kuala Lumpur and Bangkok for defence cooperation. As much as the US has given a measure of assurance Asian states would not be left to fend themselves off against an “irredentist” China, there are open questions as to the form and the extent that this support will take. The most recent example is when the US asked nations to join it in “boycott” of Beijing Olympics, but quietly made a decision to send 18 officials to Beijing for the Winter games (Wong 2021). Most elites in the region understand the remarkable gulf between rhetoric and actual commitment. Trump had neglected Southeast Asia during his term, and the Biden administration too did not appear too enthusiastic about the region despite the rhetoric until Spring 2022 when the US hosted the US-ASEAN summit in the White House. Be that as it may, it was still fraught with difficulties as the Biden administration had difficulties in dealing with certain Southeast Asian leaders. Even with the establishment of the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework, it is clear as day that the United States still has great difficulties in mobilizing its traditional allies and partners in the San Francisco system (with the exception of Japan) to confront China in a whole-hearted across the board manner. The reason for this is simple. Since 1972, the United States had enlisted the help of China to encircle and contain the USSR. In doing so, Washington had unwittingly allowed and accepted Beijing to become

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a de-facto member of the San Francisco system. Although China was not a US ally formally, Sino-US relations developed rapidly, leading to the astounding economic rejuvenation of China and its integration with regional economies. Today, China’s economic clout in Asia is quickly eclipsing as the PRC is now the number one trade partner of many countries in the region, far exceeding the United States or Japan. China’s asymmetrical economic influence, a desire to hedge both against China and the United States to stay out of big power conflict explains the American difficulty in rallying all her traditional allies against China. The United States has therefore undertaken a series of steps to supplement her alliance system to help check China’s growing power. This includes involving extra-regional powers (Richey et al. 2019) to work with regional actors to maintain a “open and free” Indo-Pacific. The United Kingdom, France, Germany as well as Australia (Pan and Korolev 2021) and New Zealand have all instituted “Indo-Pacific” strategies and participated in various sorties and exercises in the region in support of the United States and her allies. The second tier is the semi-formal organization such as Quad, where the US, Japan, India and Australia are working together to have a “dialogue” mechanism to create a possible mechanism to do what other Asian countries would not (or are reluctant) to do. The recent establishment of the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework in May 2022 is another example of Quad related or inspired activity. The third is the level of multilateral engagement involving ASEAN and extra-regional actors to build a complex web of support to ensure that the realpolitik nature of great power competition do not sway in China’s favour. For instance, the chorus of the Quad lobbying regional countries such as ROK and Vietnam to join in selected Quad activities has grown louder, regardless of the protests emanating out of Beijing. This development in Asia is particularly worrying given Russia’s violent reaction to Ukraine’s plans to join NATO. Asian countries how therefore need to become savvy in understanding the balance they need to cultivate not only in their foreign relations between China and the United States, but also in overall regional affairs to ensure that peace will always reign in Asia.

Regionalism and the San Francisco System: Going Beyond the Cold War According to the United Nations, the Indo-Pacific region is home to 60% of the world’s population, with some 4.3 billion living across Asia,

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including India and China. A world Bank report suggests that the ongoing pandemic has now pushed another 75–80 million people into poverty extreme poverty (defined as living below $1.90 per day). This is on top of the 203 million people or 5.2% of the region’s population who were living below the poverty line in 2017 (Venzon 2021). The USChina trade war and the on-going pandemic has now regressed much of the development over the last two decades, and consequently there has been much more suffering and blame apportioning in the region. Inflation is at an all time high, and the Russia-Ukraine War has now worsened the economic woes of countries the world over, with energy and food prices soaring. The rise of conservative parties and right wing parties in many democracies across the world is both a cause and a symptom of this deepening global security crisis. Three important developmental trends will accentuate US-China confrontation that will make the strategic climate more dangerous before. Widening disparity, the ill effects of fake news amplification via social media and generational change will only deepen misunderstanding, widen divisions and undo the progress and prosperity the region has seen over the past four decades. Scholars and professionals today therefore have an urgent responsibility to contend, curb and confront these divisive forces rather than free-ride on these forces out of professional or political reasons. Feel good conservative nationalism might provide temporary uplifting of mood, but in the long run, what Asians would probably need for a good life is stable development, poverty eradication, enhance education, health and social systems. A more accountable approach to politics and governance would be for Asian governments to become less dogmatic and have a clearer visions as to the way forward for each nation. Whether Americans, Japanese or Chinese, most people would agree that it is not in their interest to engage in a sustained and prolong the adverse relationship with each other. Needless to say, most Asian countries would be less thrilled to be caught up in a daily contention fight between the US and China. While some countries might lean towards either the United States (or China) for their own political or security goals, the overall region-wide approach should be calibrated so that all major powers would know what their smaller neighbours expect of their behaviour in the region. Many people in the region have problems with the basic essentials of life, with education and health care, particularly in these difficult times. Collectively, the regional governments’ interests should be focused on making lives of their citizens better. Great power contention

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diverts resources away from these developmental goals into funding escalating military costs and worse, lining the pickets of military-industrial complex located in the United States and Russia. The region’s prosperity and happiness should be made on choices that benefit the Asian people themselves. Political and strategic decisions in Asia should not be made to satisfy Biden’s democratic party members, Trump’s Republican base, Abe’s neo-Conservatives, the Chinese Communist party ideologues and most certainly, the military-industrial complex based in the United States and Europe. Within the region, some countries have benefitted from the fall out between China and the United States. This is so for those who compete with China for inward investment from the West. Vietnam for instance has seen a boom in the number of factories relocating from China, and an upswing in investments from Japan and elsewhere. While becoming severely dependent on any single country in any realm is hardly a good thing—whether it is in security, trade or natural resources, one needs to understand that such conditions came about as a result of capitalistic market forces. Of course, addressing such asymmetry is an important aspect of national security and a right for countries in the region. In Asia, almost all countries in the region will gain in terms of their security from reducing the asymmetricity in their economic relationship with China. This is easier said than done, and most effective when done quietly and gradually. Beyond that, most countries would gain if this asymmetricity is done by increasing investment and linkages from third parties to balance out the Chinese linkages as opposed to cutting ties with Beijing directly. If assymetricity is not a good thing, then surely becoming even more reliant on the United States or Japan is problematic as well. Regional countries should also understand they do have the prerogative of choosing not to be chain-ganged into an adversarial relationship by their (potential) defence partners. In this context, a bilateral alliance with the United States conceived during the Cold War is not without its disadvantages. The reality for most allies and partners in the San Francisco system today is a heighted sense of strategic anxiety as there is a real danger that Washington might chain-gang or force them into conflict with China. The Trump White House has shown a facet of the United States the region has never witnessed before. It laid bare the kind of raw, unrestrained and self-interested focus of a great power usually known for its “benevolence” without the usual veneer of political finesse and diplomatic niceties. For all the rhetoric of multilateralism and diplomatic talk the Biden White House

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has continued the same strategic tendencies of the Trump administration, even when a survey has shown that the Democrats consider China very different from the Republicans (Bader 2022). The United States has consistently accused the Chinese of intellectual property thefts, irredentism and bullying in the South China Sea, violating international law, human rights abuses, genocide in Xinjiang and rolling back the freedoms in Hong Kong. The Chinese have countered that the United States’ unreasonable assertions speak their own strategic insecurities and desperately clinging to power in an era of American decline. How should we make sense of this conversation? For most part, the Chinese government has largely been reactive to events in and outside of the country. Beijing certainly bears a large measure of responsibility for human rights abuses that occurred within its borders as well as the strategic anxieties over its rapid military modernization program. Even though the Chinese government has a sovereign right to address her own security concerns, the rights of her own citizens should be an item that it should pay more attention to in order to gain international respect. China should learn to calibrate her policies to make progress in human rights and fundamental freedoms for her citizens a priority, instead of regressing on them. Likewise, the hawkish rhetoric over the South China Seas, and her harsh exchanges with Republic of Korea, Japan and Southeast Asia are certainly worrying too. Diplomacy is based on persuasion, not harsh assertions or pointed warnings. Beijing officials should be made aware of this, even if the intention of the leaders was to issue these statements to rein in domestic opinion and to look tough. At the same time, as scholars, we should also be mindful that much of the reporting on China by the international press is skewed—either due to the Western media companies’ own priorities or the reporters’ ethnocentrism. Much of reality as conveyed to the Western world and Japan is not as accurately as it should be. Just as China should not expect that everything it does in the name of security or tradition would be tolerated by the international community or her neighbours, we too should also learn to adjust our policies to ensure that we all do the best to get along with Beijing and that that we do not enter into a state of prolong standoff or conflict. For many of the Asian countries, learning how to manage China

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has therefore become the most vexing item on their foreign relations agenda. It is important for us to realize that China has their own considerations and constraints as well—after all the Chinese government is responsible to the Chinese people for their well-being, not to the US Congress or Western Media and certainly not to people living in Facebook or Twitter. In reality, has the Chinese government grown so repressive to the extent it is actually conducting a “genocide” in Xinjiang or so ambitious that it is hell bent on “world domination”, on the verge of invading Taiwan? The answer to this question depends on the vantage point of the country. Tokyo’s answer will be very different from those of Seoul or Jakarta. The author’s opinion is that while China’s rhetoric is harsh, its actions are constrained by the necessities of her domestic politics and own modernization plans. Chinese leaders would likely askew conflict, particularly the ones that will offset decades of economic growth. Making a move on Taiwan for instance is just not something that could be undertaken without majorly damaging China’s own economic well-being. It is also however prudent to note that with the exception of the Hong Kong issue, most of these issues predated the Trump administration. They have their roots in the 1950s—a legacy of the San Francisco Treaty and the Cold War. Beyond that, security issues stem from China’s relatively immature governance in various respects (environmental, health etc.) as well as the unbridled capitalistic tendencies of the Chinese people. In the latter category, this would include all sorts of illicit and unethical practices outside of China globally in various host societies. The conflict in Hong Kong and other societies receiving Chinese migrants (e.g. such as inflating real estate prices; running underground casinos in Cambodia or scams worldwide etc., and resource exploitation issues e.g. over fishing in other territorial waters; governance issues such as manufacturing and export of fake drugs or pharmaceuticals / medicine) are indications of the entrepreneurial but often unethical nature of some Chinese entrepreneurs. sToday, the security issues over Taiwan, East and South China Seas (Granados 2008; Mccoy 2016; Heritage and Lee 2020) are perceived by Chinese leaders to be central to the survival of the Communist Party and their own political fortune. While they would like to resolve these issues, it has become almost impossible given the current political climate in Asia. The best they could hope is to ensure that they do not “lose” control of these items. Given the intimate involvement of the United States in these issues, these security issues have become even more important than

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before to the Chinese leadership. While these issues have their roots in San Francisco settlement period, they have now grown and escalated to become even more protracted, interlinked and dangerous than anytime before. The intensification in various disputes are really manifestations of the fundamental cause: the China’s (perceived or real) hegemonic struggle with the United States, with local actors taking advantage of this to push their agenda. From an International Relations perspective, the “hegemonic stability” that has prevailed in the region since the 1980s is being eroded by a rising China. The growth in China’s comprehensive power and influence has closed the power parity gap between China on one hand and the West and Japan on the other. This closing of capabilities is multi-dimensional. Unlike the USSR or Japan, China’s economic growth and independent political posture threatens the United States even if Beijing had never intended for PRC to overtake or replace the US. Needless to say, this imagery of China’s uncontrolled and rapid ascendance to knock the Americans off the apex position in the region brings outrage, horror or disbelief to many. To that extent, the numerous op-eds and magazine pieces as well as discussions on social media do nothing except to exaggerate and create more misperceptions and misunderstanding. The fact remains that in many respects PRC remains a developing country. This is particularly so if the statistics are viewed on a per capita basis. Trump’s high-profile rhetoric targeting China (or Mexico or Japan or DPRK for that matter) is made more for domestic political purposes and often, with the aim of extracting certain kinds of concessions (regardless from allies or enemies) alike. The “target” country’s political leaders can never afford to let such high-profile comments stand. In the case of PRC, this certainly is the case. Like Washington, Chinese leaders are now convinced that the US and her allies are determined to thwart China’s development and encourage “peaceful revolution” in China to overthrow the Chinese Communist Party political leadership. The danger now comes from the overconfidence on the part of both US and China’s calculations that they would prevail. The United States has shown far more nimbleness and foresight in her diplomacy and strategic planning historically. With an open system and an extremely strong international media, the US far exceeds China’s ability to explain her own actions. To that end Washington has been quite persistent in persuading persuade other nations to bandwagon with her (or join hands) to contain China. So far, the Americans have not been very successful. The San Francisco System today consists of not only the

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United States and her allies, but also many other Asian countries that have co-existed with the system. These countries too have a stake in the peace and prosperity of the region. It is therefore vital that the allies, partners and concerned countries help bridge this perceptual gulf between US and China to prevent this confrontation from escalating. Hegemonic contention is zero sum because advocates of transnational cooperation and rational thinking are sidelined by nationalistic cries of betrayal and disloyalty. The pre-World War II era and the Russia-Ukraine War stand as the best examples today. The region needs to go beyond the Cold War mentality and strive to build a community predicated on facing common challenges that the region faces, as opposed to just blind dogmatic belief in a Cold War institution built seventy years would always bring peace.

Calibrating Our Approach to US-China Hegemonic Struggle While Americans complaining of China are not new, what is new however attitude of unrelenting animosity and containment that has reinvigorated the Cold War. Asian countries however should be aware that getting too caught up with American rhetoric about China is an inherent dangerous proposition. For the past seven decades, the region has tried to build some sort of multilateral regional organization that goes beyond US bilateral alliances. The San Francisco system is part of, but not the entirety of the region’s security architecture. A history of good cordial interaction and cooperation, the principles of non-intervention and the culture of mutual consultation and dialogue have existed since the founding of ASEAN. These practices form an important part of the region’s ideational security architecture. What is good for the San Francisco system is good for the United States, and probably for Japan but this might not necessary be in the best interest of the rest of the Asian countries. The Vietnam War stands as an important reminder of what happens when Great Powers fight in the neighborhood. Regional countries should take heel of their future prospects of planning for a rising China, but at the same time, they should also consider how to manage the other powers in the region too. Regional countries should also do their best to steer the region into a true “post” Cold War period where there is peaceful coexistence and tolerance. As much as the United States likes to promote democracy worldwide, she seems to have forgotten that many of the countries in the region are not full fledge countries (even though all the

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regimes claim to have democratic legitimacy). In Biden’s recent Summit for Democracy, only the Philippines and Indonesia attended out of the eleven Southeast Asian countries. Even as regional countries take measures to strengthen their security, it’s best to do so quietly and steadily as a matter of routine. Loud public pronouncements to score political points without corresponding effective policies and adequate resource commitment would only aggravate the tensions and compound regional security dilemma. Domestic bureaucratic jostling, the nature of free speech in democratic societies, runaway sensationalistic nationalism and the amplifying nature of modern day social media all provide additional impetus for confrontation. One may consider perhaps under some circumstances, doing less might be more. Labeling, isolating and targeting a country would only create greater resolve in your “enemy” and generate a greater security dilemma. If we are in agreement that San Francisco Treaty and the system work for the betterment of Asia–Pacific region ( as opposed to just American interests), then we should consider making adjustments to the existing architectural structure to achieve real peace in the region. Today, US trying to get “like-minded” friends to act in concert against China to uphold “free and open” Indo-Pacific. In all fairness, the PRC has never said that Indo-Pacific should not be “closed and/or unfree”. This label is latched onto China because of her contention with areas of US interests in the region. The other related issue is this: how like-minded exactly is India, Vietnam, Indonesia really to the “democracies” of the US and Europe? Most of us will agree it’s they are not because of their regime types and human rights record. The commonality of this coalition of likeminded is therefore not in values or regime type but rather as a coalition that confronts, contains and suppresses China. sIt is of no surprise that regional countries are not lining up to jump on the containment bandwagon eagerly. This is not only because of China’s economic clout (Murugesan 2018; Panda 2021a, b; Zhao 2019), but also because of the nature of their own political systems as well as a sense of propriety about whether such confrontation is called for. Particularly after Ukraine, there is also an insecurity in the region if the US would actually do what they say. Opinion polls in Taiwan have suggested a drop in the number of Taiwanese believing that the United States would come to their rescue in the event of a war with China. Any blind faith in the US today would be presumptuous and dangerous. Just as the China today is

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not the China of 1980s, there is no reasonable expectation to believe that the US or Japan today would continue to behave like they did decades ago too. ASEAN’s reluctance to go out and join the American bandwagon is indicative of the internal division in Southeast Asia over their respective approaches to China and the United States. If anything, recent history has shown that there is no doubt that the United States would do anything to ensure it remains the dominant hegemon. The maintenance of US interests and power is the principal goal US foreign policy worldwide, not the welfare of the people living in the Asian region. From 2016, Washington has cleverly baited and manoeuvered China into adopting an increasingly hostile posture. The writing on the wall for the rest of us who live in Asia is grim. Whether it is South China Seas, the Taiwan Straits or the Korean Peninsula, a conflict no matter how short-lived, will set Asia’s progress back by decades, particular with the power of today’s weapons and the strength of the combatants. The relentless pursuit of hegemony via calls for democracy and the promotion of liberal values will threaten rather than preserve the San Francisco system—even if US and allies believe to the contrary. Chinese leaders would go all out to defend themselves and their system. At the same time, since the PRC has since 1978 been a de-facto alliance partner of the US—and continues to be the case even in the post Tiananmen era, it would not be possible for US or any Asian countries to shield themselves from the consequences of this conflict of their intimate ties with Beijing. China is tied intimately in so many ways economically to almost every country in the world, not just Asia. A US-led war will bring disastrous consequences to the Asian neighbourhood regardless of who prevails. Boris Johnson or any of the European leaders probably won’t lose a lot of sleep if hostilities breakout in East Asia or South China Sea, but leaders in Asia, including Japan and South Korea, should be very cautious about this, especially if they are involved in the tensions directly or their country is at the frontline of the Great Power struggle. Today, Japan is single-mindedly working towards a more muscular role (Chellaney 2018) in the region’s security architecture. This is, of course within Japan’s sovereign right and interests. Having said that, there are some within Japan who are mindful that should chart a more independent position vis-à-vis the United States to protect her own interests (Satake 2018). The question for many in the region is if the nationalistic impulses within Japan would allow for the LDP to take their political

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agenda further—including the final step of removing the Constitutional constraints imposed by Article 9. There are even those that suggest the acquisition of nuclear weapons might be prudent move for Tokyo. China here has long served as an important political tool in this long-running political exercise in Japan. There is an intense debate raging in Japan, but given the difficulties that Shinzo Abe had in pushing through this during his tenure, it is clear that the spirit of the San Francisco Peace Treaty continues to exercise a deep and profound impact on the Japanese polity. What is clear too however is that the LDP government would continue to erode Article 9 through interpretation as long as the legal means of Constitutional revision (Bix 2015) remains out of reach. The efforts to enhance multilateralism in the region (Bong 2010) and Japan’s own democratic impulses however will effectively help moderate state nationalism. Japan could help the region by not only balancing and engaging China as Yoshida did in the post war years (Ferretti 2003: 425–427), but also in moderating the United States’ military adventurism and overzealous tendencies. An alliance partner can rally, assist but also constrain. For sure it is in Japan’s interest to “normalize”, but at the same time, it is in her interest to preserve peace and prevent outright hostilities in the region too. Japan could reconsider if it might be prudent for her to adjust her “lean hard to balance” posture to one that helps “ameliorate” tensions between the US and China. It would also be important for other Asian nations too to take into account the geopolitical realities in the region, and work together to constrain both China and the United States and ensure they behave appropriately in the region (Paul 2018). One possible idea is that the regional governments could persuade US politicians to reconsider US postwar intellectual Walter Lippman’s suggestion in 1945 that American task was not to secure worldwide democracy, but to make communism and democracy co-exist, to the extent that competitive coexistence is possible (Porter 2011). In doing so, the US would benefit from a reconsideration of the limits of their power, and refine their national interests and strategy. Singapore’s Prime Minister has openly called out to Beijing and Washington that she does not want to be forced into choosing between China or US (Lee 2020). Most of Southeast Asia agrees with Singapore. The Republic of Korea does too. Smaller countries do have normative power to tell the bigger countries to behave, even as the great powers jostle for realpolitik gains. At the same time, there should be

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normative calls for authoritarian countries (not just China) to continually clean up their act in terms of human rights and work to ensure greater democratic accountability. In Southeast Asia, the USA, Japan and China are welcomed to continue their investment into the region to help the region prosper. Southeast Asia would also welcome their continued engagement to provide development and humanitarian assistance as well as international public goods. Even as the countries in the region forges ahead to make their own connections with extra-regional powers such as India, Russia or European powers (Iyer et al. 2021; Joshi and Pant 2015; Kukreja 2020; Maniyar 2020; Pant 2019; Paramonov and Puzanova 2018; Smith and Kartha 2018; Zahir 2021) to increase their multilateral engagement (Easley and Kim 2019; Bong 2010; Ahmad 2020), they should be mindful whether their actual goal is the reinforcement of their own security or the containment of China. These two goals are not the same (at least for most of the countries in the region). If the former, they should seek to deepen their engagement with US and China, and ensure that their connections not be misinterpreted in Beijing or Washington. Collectively, the region’s longer term focus should be to go beyond the Cold War framework, and try to ensure that the problems plaguing the region for the past seven decades be resolved. While courting extra-regional powers, they should act with regards to the sensitivity of all the countries in the region (as opposed just in the name of the alliances). A blind faith in what has worked in the past is not a solution, particularly as the nature of the competition has changed drastically. The inability of our leaders to think and innovate during these politically challenging times means that we are much closer to war and disaster than we think. The chapter argues that the only way forward is for us and our governments to recognize our antiquated the regional institutions are, and Asian states should adjust to ensure that everyone’s interests are recognized and negotiated in order to seek the path forward for perpetual peace and stability forward. The region should help enhance the institutions and regimes that could research, understand and ameliorate interstate tensions and conflict in both the East and South China Seas (Hong 2018; Manicom 2008). The region should also double down on regionalism, particular in building up institutions that bind everyone together. The growing Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) is an excellent example of what the region can achieve. Politicians might be surprised how much can be

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done by just listening and reaching out as opposed to posturing and talking up a threat. There are enough problems in the region waiting to be solved—pandemics, food insecurity & fishery disputes (Smith 2008), environmental degradation, transnational crime and it requires our collective wisdom and effort. China should be included in this community as part of the solution (since many problems originate from within her borders) rather than excluded as part of the problem. The San Francisco Treaty and the system have preserved geopolitical tensions and historical injustices that need addressing (Alessio 2014; Wihns 2013; Xin 2013). The Asia–Pacific (or Indo-Pacific really now) should move forward to become a more accommodating, forward looking and inclusive community. Calibrating a balanced approach towards China and the United States is therefore extremely important task ahead for countries in the region, Japan included.

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Index

A Abe, Shinzo, 264, 269, 275–277 Acheson, Dean, 64, 65, 74 Acquisition of sovereignty, 195, 196, 202 Akao, Bin, 46, 52 Albania, 137, 143 Alignment, 13, 241–245, 247–249, 251, 252, 254–258 Alliance, 12, 13, 89, 95, 98, 100, 241–243, 245–248, 255, 257, 258, 265–270, 272–274, 281 Ally(ies), 3, 4, 7, 13, 92, 95, 99, 100, 158–161, 165–167, 169, 171, 172, 174–176, 264–269, 272–275, 281 Ambiguity, 11, 155, 156, 160–162, 167, 168, 171, 174–176 Amnesia, 291 An Nam, 186 Annexation, 135, 136 Anti-colonialism, 111, 117

Anti-communism, 108, 109, 113, 114, 119, 125 Appeasement policy, 263, 264, 270, 278 Aquino, Benigno, 264, 269 Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP), 264, 267, 268, 271, 273, 274, 276–281 Article 3, 23 Article Nine, 63, 65 Ashida, Hitoshi, 41–58 Asia, 8, 12, 13, 86, 89, 90, 96, 97, 265–269, 272, 276, 277, 279 Asian Development Fund (ADF), 114, 120, 121, 123, 125–127 Asian nationalism, 126 Asia-Pacific, 1, 3, 6, 13, 85, 156, 158, 160, 173, 175, 176, 241–244, 246–248, 255–258, 265 Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), 210, 212, 217–226, 230, 233, 234, 270, 271

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2022 Y. Sugita and V. Teo (eds.), Rethinking the San Francisco System in Indo-Pacific Security, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-1231-3

321

322

INDEX

Asymmetry, 6, 305 Australia, 13, 241, 242, 245–252, 254–256, 265, 266 B Bac Hai company, 184, 197 Balance of power, 290, 297 Balancing policy, 270 Bandung Conference, 87–89, 112, 113, 117, 119, 120, 125, 126 Bank of Japan, 67, 71 Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), 271, 278 Benevolence, 305 Bilateral alliance, 3, 12, 13, 264–266 Bilateralism, 1, 2, 9, 94, 97, 98, 101, 102, 241, 242, 244, 248, 249, 252–258 “Bridge” role of Japan between Asia and the West, 120, 125 Britain (United Kingdom), 93, 133, 137, 138, 140–142, 147, 148 Burden of history, 10, 301 Burma, 138, 144, 149 C Capabilities, 94, 290, 300, 308 The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), 21, 64, 93 Challenge, 11, 86, 157, 159, 173 Challengers, 298–300 China, 4–6, 8, 9, 13, 45–47, 55, 58, 96, 97, 135, 138, 143–145, 182–188, 192, 195, 199–201, 263–266, 269–272, 274–281 China-Japan, 10, 200, 293, 300 China-Southeast Asia, 272, 295 Chinese expansionism, 272, 273 Civil administrator, 28 Cold War, 2, 3, 5, 7, 10, 13, 86, 90, 93, 94, 96, 99, 143

Colombo Group, 116 Commitment, 7, 11, 302, 310 Communism/communist, 2, 4, 7, 8, 86–89, 92–101, 156, 158, 172, 173, 292, 297–299, 312 Connectivity, 245–247, 250, 254, 256, 257 Conservative, 291, 292, 296, 301, 304 Constrain, 312 Cost-benefit, 291, 300 Course of study, 32, 33, 36 Critical date, 196 Curriculum, 17, 31–34, 36, 37

D Demilitarization, 61, 63, 66 Department of National Defense (DND), 280 Diplomacy, 1, 7, 12, 277 Diplomatic autonomy, 113 Discovery, 189, 195 Dodge, Joseph M., 65, 67, 68, 70, 71 Dodge Line, 67, 70, 71, 76 Dokdo, 10, 11, 155–165, 168–175 Dulles, John Foster, 65, 102, 141 Duterte, Rodrigo, 13, 263, 264, 270–278, 280, 281

E East Asia, 2, 10, 11, 86, 96, 275, 279, 281 Economic development, 90, 100, 210, 223, 226, 234 Economic engagement, 210, 213 Economic integration, 8, 108–110, 114, 117, 120, 121, 123–127 Economic policy, 110, 117, 121, 126 Economic relations, 93, 210, 228

INDEX

Economy, 4, 86, 87, 94–96, 98–100, 103, 213, 214, 216, 217, 222, 223, 228, 231–233, 235 Education policy, 24 Effective occupation, 195, 197, 199 Effectivités, 196 Elementary school English language education, 18, 29, 36 The European Union (EU), 12, 13, 241–243, 245–247, 251, 252, 254, 256–258 Evidence, 156, 157, 175 Extra-regional cooperation, 242 Extra-regional powers, 303, 313 Extraterritoriality, 23, 37

F Federation of Economic Organizations (Keidanren), 71 Finance Ministry, 71 Foreign affairs, 271 Foreign direct investment (FDI), 210, 211, 213, 215–217, 220–222, 225, 229, 232–234 Foreign policy, 7, 12, 93, 100, 101, 265, 270–272, 275, 279, 281 France, 13, 93, 141, 142, 148, 183–188, 190, 191, 195, 200, 241–243, 246, 247, 249, 251–254, 256, 257 Free and Open Indo-Pacific (FOIP), 12, 244–248, 251, 252, 254–257, 259

G General Headquarters (GHQ), 24–26 Germany, 137, 141, 142 Governor Ridgeway, 28 Grievances, 9, 10, 295

323

H Hegemonic stability/hegemonic struggle, 12, 290, 297, 298, 301, 302, 308, 309 Hisato, Ichimada, 67, 70 Historical evidence, 156–160, 169, 173–176 History issue, 133, 134, 150 Hoang Sa company, 184, 197 Holland, William L., 70 Hub-and-spokes, 265, 266 Hub-and-spokes system, 13, 241, 243, 247, 256, 257 I Ikeda, Hayato, 65, 67, 71 India, 9, 12, 13, 89, 94, 97, 102, 138, 144, 241–244, 246–250, 252, 255, 256, 258 Indonesia, 9, 88, 89, 97, 102, 138, 144, 148, 149, 277 Indo-Pacific, 13, 242–248, 250–258, 273 Inflammation, 294 Initial Steps for a Rearmament Program, 73 International law, 11, 157, 158, 183, 192–197, 200–202 International trade, 213 Intertemporal law, 196 Intra-regional cooperation, 247, 252 Italian peace treaty, 143 Italy, 137, 143 J Japan, 1–13, 85, 86, 88–92, 94–103, 133–150, 155–176, 181, 183, 184, 186–193, 195, 202, 210–229, 231, 233, 234, 241–259, 264–266, 269, 272, 275–279, 281

324

INDEX

Japanese Communist Party (JCP), 44, 45, 49, 54, 56, 67 Japanese Constitution, 63, 65 Japan Self-Defense Force (JSDF), 265, 276 Japan Socialist Party, 48, 101 Japan-Southeast Asia, 210, 217, 234 Japan-US Security Treaty, 21, 36, 37, 41, 43, 52, 57, 58, 61, 73 Johnson, Louis, 64, 66, 69 The Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS), 19–21, 23, 36, 64, 65

K Kaishinto (Reformative Progressive Party), 42, 57 Kennan, George, 64, 68, 92–94 Kitaoka, Jyuitsu, 44, 45, 50, 53, 54 Korea, 8, 9, 157–160, 162–165, 168, 169, 171, 172 Korean War, 9, 43, 44, 47, 100, 137, 145 Kurile Islands, 10, 11, 155–158, 160, 161, 165–167, 170

L Legal reasoning, 157 Liberal Party, 42, 53, 54, 57, 58 Like-minded, 310 Like-mindedness, 254 Logic, 157, 158

M MacArthur, Douglas, 64–66, 68, 69 Maritime capacity-building, 250, 256 Minilateralism, 243, 255 Multilateralism, 9, 12, 100, 102, 268 Mutual Defense Aid Program (MDAP), 71

N National Advisory Council on International Monetary Affairs, 66 Nationalism, 297, 304, 310, 312 Nationalist China (Republic of China, ROC), 136 National Security Council (NSC), 66, 69, 74, 75, 99 Negative externalities, 295 Netherlands, 148, 149 Neutralism, 101, 112, 117, 120, 125, 127 New Armament Promotion Association, 44–46, 50, 52, 53, 56 Nguyen dynasty, 197 Non-traditional security (NTS), 242, 243, 246, 250, 251, 253, 255–258 Norms or Normative, 290, 291, 312 O Our View, 72 Overseas development assistance (ODA), 211, 224 P Pacific War, 2, 133, 142 Paracels, 11, 182–202 People’s Republic of China (PRC, China), 4, 9, 10, 12, 96, 187–189, 192, 210–220, 222–235 Philippine Coast Guard (PCG), 269, 275, 277, 280, 281 Philippines, 2, 9, 13, 88, 136, 143–149, 182, 183, 186–188, 193–195, 263–281 Poland, 86, 137 Police Reserve Force, 68

INDEX

Policy Planning Staff (PPS), 64, 68, 69 Potsdam Declaration, 11, 142 Prescription, 195, 196 Problem-solving coalition, 257 Psychological Strategy Board, 74

Q The Quad, 244, 250, 251, 255–257, 302, 303

R Realpolitik, 291, 303, 312 Rearmament, 6, 41–48, 50–52, 54, 55, 57, 58 Regional development, 109, 113, 119, 121, 123, 125, 126 Regionalism, 12, 303, 313 Reparations, 9, 88, 108, 115–117, 119, 125, 133, 134, 136, 140–149 Representation, 9, 133, 135, 138, 139 Republic of China (ROC), 10, 187, 192, 193 Republic of Viet Nam, 188, 200, 201 Residual sovereignty, 11, 23, 29, 36 Reverse course, 136, 143 The rise of China, 12, 210, 212, 213 Rhee, Syngman, 138, 149 Rules-based order, 250, 258 Russia, 10, 92, 158, 159, 161, 165–169, 171, 175 The Ryukyu Islands, 5, 18, 19, 21, 23, 28, 30

S Sakisaka, Itsuro, 47, 48 San Francisco settlement, 293, 296

325

System, 3, 4, 6–8, 12, 13, 85, 91, 94, 290–295, 297–300, 302, 303, 305, 308, 309, 311 Treaty, 1–3, 5, 6, 8, 9, 12, 86, 89, 102, 289–296, 301, 310, 312, 314 San Francisco Peace Treaty (SFPT), 6, 7, 9, 11, 13, 17, 18, 23, 24, 27, 29, 30, 35–37, 85, 87, 88, 155–176, 265 San Francisco System, 3, 4, 6–8, 12, 13, 85, 91, 94, 210, 211, 213, 229–231, 234, 290–295, 297–300, 302, 303, 305, 308, 309, 311 San Francisco System of alliances, 281 San Francisco Treaty, 1–3, 5, 6, 9, 12, 86, 102, 181, 183, 189, 192–197, 200, 202 San Peace Francisco Treaty, 290 Sea of Japan, 46, 47, 57 Security cooperation, 242, 243, 249, 250, 252, 253, 255, 256 Security order, 241, 244, 255 Sino-Japan, 300, 301 Socialist Republic of Viet Nam, 186 South China Sea, 11, 212, 223, 230, 266, 269–279, 281 South China Sea dispute, 263, 264, 266, 271, 276, 281 Southeast Asia, 4, 8, 12, 98, 100, 107–127, 210, 212, 213, 217, 228, 234 Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO), 112, 117, 126 South Korea (Republic of Korea, ROK), 4, 9, 133–140, 149 Sovereignty, 1, 2, 10, 11, 100, 101, 182, 183, 185, 187, 188, 190–192, 195–197, 199–202

326

INDEX

Soviet, 2, 4, 7, 9, 11, 43, 44, 46–49, 58, 86, 87, 90–94, 96–101, 103 Spratlys, 11, 182–197, 199–202 The State Department, 19–21, 36 State of Viet Nam, 188, 189, 200 The State-War-Navy Coordinating Committee (SWNCC), 19, 22, 63 Strategic partnership, 243, 253, 257 Structural hierarchy of bilateral relations, 290 Subversive Activities Prevention Act, 54, 56 Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers (SCAP), 64, 65, 68 T Takeshima, 10, 158, 164, 168 Terra nullius , 195, 197 Territorial disputes, 3, 10, 11, 156, 158–161, 168–170, 173, 174, 291, 293 Territorial sovereignty, 156–160, 162, 164, 166–170, 173–176 Threat, 2, 7, 87, 292, 295, 298, 300, 314 Trade balance, 229 Trade policy, 225 Trade war, 219, 228, 230–234 Treaty of Taipei, 11, 192, 193 Trilateralism, 247, 249–251, 253, 255, 256 The Trilateral Security Dialogue (TSD), 250 Truman, Harry, 2, 65, 67, 69, 72, 93 Tsuru, Shigeto, 48, 50 U Unconditional surrender, 11, 155, 156, 158–162, 165–168, 170–176

The United Kingdom (UK), 13, 85, 91, 97, 183, 185–188, 195, 241–243, 246, 249, 251–254, 256, 257 United States (US, USA), 1–13, 85–87, 92–102, 156, 158–160, 165, 170–176, 210–224, 226–234, 241–243, 245–258 The United States Civil Administration of the Ryukyu Islands (USCAR), 18, 22, 29, 31, 34–36 US-China, 259, 293, 302, 304, 309 US-China competition, 258 US economic strategy in Southeast Asia, 110 U.S. Initial Post-Surrender Policy for Japan, 63 US-Japan, 1, 3, 13, 210–214, 217, 234 US-Japan alliance, 2, 7, 8, 12, 108, 109, 113, 116, 122, 125, 127, 250 US-Japan Security Treaty, 10, 290, 296 US military bases, 21, 23, 29, 36, 37 US military government, 17, 18, 22, 30, 34, 37 US policy toward Japan and Okinawa, 17, 18, 37 US-Southeast Asia, 210, 234 V Values, 2, 93, 99, 290, 292, 310 Versailles peace treaty, 141 Viet Nam, 11, 182–184, 186, 189, 195–197, 199–202 W Watanabe, Tetsuzo, 44, 46, 52, 53, 56

INDEX

Y Yamakawa, Hitoshi, 48 Yoshida Doctrine, 6–8, 61, 62, 76, 77, 96

327

Yoshida Government, 115 Yoshida, Shigeru, 6, 7, 42, 43, 51–54, 56–58, 96, 99