Japan's Foreign Policy Servitude

Last week, Japan and the United States reached an agreement to relocate around 4,700 American marines from Okinawa to Guam in the Western Pacific in what appears to be a pivotal event in Japanese-US relations. Since the early 1950s, political analysts have often identified subservience to the US as a key trait of Japanese foreign policy, but in light of recent events, has this power model become redundant as we enter the second decade of the 21st century?

The Traditional Model

As Japan rebuilt itself from the rubble of Tokyo in the late 1940s, nobody could predict how powerful the yen would become within just a couple of decades. Yet despite extraordinary achievements in the economic sector, Japanese foreign policy has often been characterised as passive, flimsy and Americocentric. At least five interrelated post-war factors contribute to the popular image of Japan as a ‘do-nothing’ power – democratisation, demilitarisation, the ‘Yoshida Doctrine’, fear of communism and trade policy.

Following Japan’s surrender on August 14, 1945, pre-existing plans to divide power between the Allied nations, as happened in Germany, were abandoned and the bulk of control was allocated to the Americans. General Douglas MacArthur was appointed as Supreme Commander of the Allied Powers (SCAP), a dictator-like role rendering him as the most powerful man in Japan. MacArthur’s legacy in Asia is a contentious issue, but in many respects he proved surprisingly liberal during the occupation of Japan. Punishing the crippled nation would not have served American interests, and MacArthur’s main agenda was to promote democracy from within – the appetite for reform rather than a force-feeding of foreign legislation. The Japanese embraced the opportunity, relishing an unprecedented level of influence on their government, with universal suffrage as a key ingredient of the 1947 Constitution.

While the Constitution was considered empowering to ordinary civilians, one clause proved emasculating on a state level. The final line of Article 9 translates as, “the right of belligerency of the state will not be recognized”, banning the resolution of international disputes through use of force. Armed only with a guard-like ‘self-defence force’, from 1947 onwards Japan’s international security arrangements lay securely in American hands.

Under the leadership of Shigeru Yoshida, the first Prime Minister to govern under the newly formed constitution, Japan followed a principle of ‘economic growth and political passivity’. This so-called ‘Yoshida Doctrine’ proved a source of immense frustration to American policymakers, many of whom had been pushing, somewhat ironically, for a full-scale Japanese re-militarization to battle the threat of communism in the region. With the military strength of the US on its side, Japan did not feel any necessity to re-arm, and through a focus on economic expansion, grew to become the world’s second largest economy in 1968.

While the Japanese proved disappointing militarily to the US, a certain degree of ideological solidarity had been attained by the 1950s. A fervent fear of communism, China and the Soviet Union had tightened this bond, and between 1949 and 1959, support for the Japanese communist party plummeted from a significant minority status of 10 percent to a lowly and utterly insignificant 3 percent. Indeed, even on a popular level, Japan appeared to be following the American precedent. This unity endured for several decades, and after the Soviet deployment of cruise missiles on the Chinese border in 1978, a thawing of the Cold War in Asia seemed a very real possibility.

Japanese subservience in the trade world is similarly evident throughout the post-War period. When Khrushchev abruptly withdrew Soviet technical experts from Beijing in the early 1960s, China instantly became the most obvious potential trading partner for the Japanese. In line with US-Taiwanese agreements however, Japan obediently refrained from engaging with China until Nixon’s visit to China in 1972. The US supposedly gave Japan only one day's notice of this policy reversal in a clear statement of American dominance.

The Reticent Revolt

A quick glance at power politics in contemporary East Asia might suggest that the Japanese are only now starting to distance themselves from the Americans, but this shift is not as sudden as it might appear.

Within the last thirty years, Japan has realised the necessity to develop a foreign policy distinct from the American line in a number of areas. As Japanese industrialisation flourished, resources for energy production became increasingly essential. While the US was only semi-dependent on Middle East oil for energy in the 1970s, having significant reserves of its own in the Gulf of Mexico and the Chukchi Sea in Alaska, 99.7% of Japan’s oil was imported, mostly from the Middle East. Following the Arab-Israeli War of 1973, countries linked to Israel had their oil supplies cut off by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC). Through intense diplomacy, trade was resumed but oil prices rose considerably. For the US, these increased costs were manageable, but for the Japanese the effects were far more damaging, prompting policymakers to reevaluate their special relationship with the Americans.

Political changes are equally apparent. The conception of America as the world’s police force has softened significantly over the last twenty years, with the Japanese increasingly turning to pan-national groups for security. By 2000, Japan had become the second largest financial contributor to the UN, and as part of the G4 alliance (with Brazil, Germany and India), Japan has hoped for a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council, finding strong support from both the United Kingdom and the US in its bid. Perhaps most significantly however, the Anti-Terrorist Bill of October 2001 and subsequent deployment of military personnel in Iraq and the Gulf of Aden suggest Article 9’s significance may be waning.

In 2012, the traditional model no longer applies. Within the last decade, globalisation and the ‘war on terror’ have reshaped world politics irreparably, and Japan has adapted accordingly. Far from the passivity of the 1950s, the dominant characteristics of contemporary Japanese foreign policy are restlessness and volatility, perhaps born from an attempt to form a new identity in the 21st Century. As the Okinawans finalise the relocation of several thousand U.S. marines out of Japan, the American military’s role in East Asia is becoming increasingly unclear. With a larger military budget than India, Italy and Saudi Arabia, the increasingly active Self-Defence Forces appear to be rallying unprecedented levels of support within Japan as the perceived threats from North Korea, China and international terrorism continue to intensify.

Posted on February 16, 2012

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