July 02,2020 Country Reports

Country Report: South Korea (July 2020)

Foremost on the minds of South Korean media writers was the intensifying competition between the United States and China and its impact on their country. Pressure has been mounting to join in exclusive economic arrangements, to make clear Seoul’s position on the PRC national security law for Hong Kong, to meet with the G7 to address concerns over China, and to coordinate as a US ally to..

Hong Sang Hwa , Kim Seonkyung
comfort women , COVID-19 , Fighters for Free North Korea , G7 , Inter-Korean Cooperation and Exchange Act , Kunsem , US-ROK alliance , Yoon Mi-hyang
June 01,2020 Country Reports

Country Report: Japan (June 2020)

The spring of 2020 saw a downturn in Sino-Japanese relations, which were now embroiled in the pandemic war of words, with little else on the foreign policy radar. Some warnings about North Korea and Russia were heard, while wishful thinking about South Korea also appeared. Some raised the puzzle of why Abe’s poll numbers were falling even as Japan was controlling the pandemic comparat..

Editorial Staff
"Belt and Road" Initiative , Cold War , COVID-19 , Northern Territories , Senkaku Islands , Wolf Warrior Diplomacy
May 25,2020 Country Reports

Country Report: Russia (May 2020)

One message stood apart in Russian coverage of international relations in the Indo-Pacific in the early spring of 2020: what is the impact of the pandemic on China and on Sino-US relations? In the background is the question: what will be the impact on Russian foreign policy? As for China, numerous questions are raised about its xenophobia, speed of recovery, political psychology, and altern..

Editorial Staff
"Belt and Road" Initiative , Cold War , COVID-19 , Eurasian Economic Union , Wolf Warrior Diplomacy
May 09,2020 Open Forum

The Coronavirus Pandemic and the Russo-Chinese Border

The pandemic has already changed the course of world history, and its future consequences, such as how and when it finishes, remain unknown to us amidst a dynamic situation. However, it is possible and necessary to draw some conclusions based on what is now known on how the situation is unfolding in concrete arenas of international relations. One of the most significant of these is the Washin..

Ivan Zuenko
China-Russia relations , COVID-19 , Eurasian Economic Union , New Silk Road , turn to the East
April 22,2020 Country Reports

Country Report: China (April 2020)

As 2020 began, Chinese authors were busy not only summing up the far-reaching results of 2019 but also putting them in broad analytical perspective. China’s other bilateral relations had slipped as a focus, secondary to the telling impact of the transformative core of the international order—the Sino-US nexus. Sino-Russian relations paled in significance. Relations with both Japan and..

Editorial Staff (with the assistance of Dong Jiaxin*)
"Belt and Road" Initiative , Cold War , community of common destiny , COVID-19 , Six-Party Talks , Xi Jinping
April 13,2020 Country Reports

Country Report: Japan (April 2020)

Geopolitics were not high on the media’s attention list in the first months of 2020; we need to look back a little to capture the state of the Japanese debate before it was put on hold. The pandemic saw people look inward, but China, its source, and the United States, soon to become its epicenter, always loomed in the background. Given the troubled state of Japan-ROK ties, the impact ..

Editorial Staff
Abe-Putin summit , COVID-19 , GSOMIA , Senkakus , Shinzo Abe , Tokyo Olympics
March 30,2020 Country Reports

Country Report: Russia (March 2020)

Russians agree that this is a period of transformation, but there are differences regarding the nature of the changes. Essentially, three schools of thought can be discerned in recent articles. The variables differentiating them are not always fully apparent, but we can assume that three matter most: 1) attitudes toward the authoritarian and censorship drift inside Russia, as Putin has the ..

Editorial Staff (with the assistance of Olga Puzanova)
"Belt and Road" Initiative , community of common destiny , Coronavirus , COVID-19 , Eurasian Economic Union , Vladimir Putin , Xi Jinping
March 19,2020 Special Forum

Introduction

As we awaken to alarm bells that this year has the potential to be transformative—a pandemic, a jolt to energy markets amidst climate change, the arrival of 5G, and far-reaching domestic political realignment—we should not lose sight of historical memories poised to be revived in a year of commemorations. Should 2020 be seen as a turning point to a new era to replace the post-Cold War er..

Editorial Staff
Abe Shinzo , Cold War , COVID-19 , Donald Trump , Moon Jae-in , Vladmir Putin , WWII , Xi Jinping
March 19,2020 Special Forum

Putin and Xi Eye the Soviet Collapse

When commemorating the 75th anniversary of the end of World War II in the months ahead, Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping will find it difficult to recapture the spirit exhibited in 2015 when they stood together in Red Square and then in Tiananmen to proclaim shared support for a world order they insisted was established through that victory and had not been overturned by the way the Cold War had..

Sergey Radchenko
"Belt and Road" Initiative , Cold War , COVID-19 , European Economic Union , Socialism with Chinese Characteristics , Vladmir Putin , WWII , Xi Jinping
March 19,2020 Special Forum

Japan-US Relations with Extension to Japan’s Ties to Russia and China

The narratives of the end of the Cold War naturally start with the question of “what was the Cold War for Japan,” which, in turn, raises the question “what was WWII for Japan,” because in Northeast Asia, it was precisely Japan which became the major actor in waging this war. Thus, this analysis starts with the “trauma of defeat in WWII as the Pacific War,&rdquo..

Kazuhiko Togo
Abe Shinzo , Cold War , COVID-19 , Donald Trump , Senkaku Islands , Vladmir Putin , WWII , Xi Jinping , Yasukuni Shrine