August 12,2016 Country Reports

Country Report: Russia (July 2016)

Articles in the spring and early summer of 2016 were split between two categories: those on Sino-Russian relations, affirming or refuting charges that they have failed to meet expectations; and those praising Russia’s ability to remain aloof from the major disputes in the Asia-Pacific while maintaining its great power role. The former tended to draw analogies between conditions faced i..

Editorial Staff (with the assistance of Olga Puzanova)
ASEAN , Asia-Pacific region , East and South China Seas , Eurasian Economic Union , Silk Road Economic Belt , Sochi Russia-ASEAN summit
August 12,2016 Country Reports

Country Report: Japan (August 2016)

In late spring and early summer, the focus of the Japanese media shifted from the G7 and Obama’s visit to Hiroshima to the South China Sea ruling and China’s angry response, followed by intensified pressure on ASEAN. The overall impact was for Japan to strengthen relations with the United States (despite nervousness about Trump) and polarize against China (despite wanting to a..

Editorial Staff
comfort women , Donald Trump , EEU-ASEAN , G7 Summit , Hashimoto-Yeltsin plan , Senkaku Islands , South China Sea , Takeshima , THAAD
July 27,2016 Country Reports

Country Report: South Korea (July 2016)

Three international thunderbolts of late June and early July drew intense responses in the South Korean media. The decision to deploy THAAD in South Korea was recognized as destabilizing relations with China and Russia, affecting the diplomatic balance that Seoul had been striving to cultivate since the end of the Cold War. The international court ruling on the South China Sea was perceived ..

Editorial Staff (prepared by Han Minjeong)
Cold War , Russia-China-North Korea , South China Sea , THAAD , US-Japan-South Korea
June 30,2016 Special Forum

Introduction to the Special Forum: Urgent Calls for a Common Agenda between Europe and Asia

The G7 summit in late May brought to the fore the question of cooperation across two continents under US leadership in the face of intensifying challenges from China in Asia and Russia in Europe with both of those great powers resisting the toughest sanctions on North Korea. During the late Cold War, in the face of a Soviet threat to both Europe and Asia, the G7 presented a common front. Toda..

Editorial Staff
16 + 1 , Chinese FDI , EAS , Extended deterrence , Great-power revanchism , Institution-building
June 30,2016 Special Forum

The NATO vs. East Asian Models of Extended Nuclear Deterrence? Seeking a Synergy beyond Dichotomy

Amid North Korea’s apparent progress in its nuclear weapons program and China’s military build-up, including the modernization of its nuclear arsenal, experts and officials in East Asia, particularly those in Japan and the Republic of Korea, are nowadays discussing more frequently the issues related to extended deterrence, not least its nuclear elements called extended nuclear det..

Michito Tsuruoka
DCA , DSC , EDD , NATO model , NPG , Nuclear allergy , Nuclear burden-sharing , Nuclear deterrence , Saber-rattling
June 24,2016 Open Forum

The Pivot vs. the “Progressives”

For more than a decade the two most divisive issues in East Asia have been the gap over how to deal with: 1) the Sino-US relationship and which side is responsible for damaging it and endangering regional stability; and 2) North Korea’s nuclear weapons and missile threats and how best to resolve them. In recent commentaries we find misleading talk of both China’s limited aspiratio..

Gilbert Rozman
Asia for the Asians , China first , G2 , hegemonism , Kurt Campbell , Six-Party Talks , Sunshine Policy
June 22,2016 Open Forum

China and the Evolving World Order: A Stakeholder or a Revolutionary Power?

China’s rapid rise has raised the question if China is a stakeholder or a dissatisfied revolutionary power to advance its alternative visions. This article argues that although China is not a simple rule-taker content to preserve the existing order, it is not yet a revolutionary power discontent with and willing to undermine the existing order. Not only is China far from the position to..

Suisheng Zhao
AIIB , Bretton Woods , Institution-building , OBOR , Reformist , Revisionist , sovereignty , Tianxia
June 15,2016 Country Reports

Country Report: China (June 2016)

In the spring of 2016, Chinese analysts considered the repercussions of North Korea’s latest nuclear test. They assessed the prospects for China’s “One Belt, One Road” (OBOR) policy, with particular attention to its implementation in Iran and Afghanistan. They also evaluated the prospects for Sino–Russian cooperative relations, and sharply criticized Japan’s intervention in the South C..

Danielle F. S. Cohen (assisted by Dong Jiaxin)
Afghan reconstruction , Cuban missile crisis , enuclearization , Japanese intervention , Sino-Iranian relations , SLOC , Sustainable security , THAAD
June 07,2016 Country Reports

Country Report: Japan (June 2016)

Kawakami Takashi in the March Kaigai Jijo assessed the Obama presidency, faulting him for high-sounding language on a non-nuclear world while doing nothing to stop North Korea from possessing nuclear weapons. He calls this “leading from behind” or “talk without action,” creating a vacuum by thinking that the United States is no longer the world policeman. On Asian polic..

Editorial Staff
G7 , GSOMIA , Ise-Shima summit , Japanese-Russian relations , Minsk Accord , Northern Territories , Nuclear threat
June 03,2016 Open Forum

Chinese Interpretations of Japan and Its Role in the Indo-Pacific Region in 2016

In April, Kishida Fumio made the first official visit by a Japanese foreign minister to China in more than four years. Sino–Japanese relations had deteriorated over the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands dispute in the early 2010s and have yet to recover. They overcame one hurdle when Xi Jinping agreed to meet Abe Shinzo during Abe’s visit for the November 2014 Beijing Asia-Pacific Economic Coope..

Danielle F. S. Cohen (assisted by Dong Jiaxin)
Article 9 , China threat theory , Expansionist history , India-Japan relations , Japanese Air Self-Defense Force , proactive pacifism , Quadrilateral initiative , South China Sea , UNCLOS