On Japan-China Relations

I've intentionally avoided any writing about Japan-China, or the War in the Pacific (WWII), or security issues in the region because I wanted to find the right feel for this story and to read more and understand better the moment in history that I am entering.

I have a friend living in Sichuan, China as a Peace Corps volunteer and it's begun some interesting conversation. My studies include a lot about Classical Chinese philosophies as well as East Asia and politics in general. As I learn more about the history of this beautiful little island I understand better the forces at work in the world over the past 150 years. If you know the history of Okinawa, you know an-awful-lot about the trajectory of the history of the world in these 150 years.

Recently he and I were discussing the constant call from China (particularly) for the Japanese to apologize for the war crimes committed by the Japanese during the War in the Pacific. The Chinese (as well as Koreans and Taiwanese) feel the Japanese haven't apologized enough - even though there have been at least 45 official apologies from the Japanese. And this got me thinking about that dog of a documentary, Yakusuni.

Below is an excerpt from my email to my friend in China:

Of course, some might like an apology a la Australia's apology to the Aborigines; but what we want and what we need are two different things. There was a recent documentary that was released here called Yasukuni which was hyped as this controversial take on the Meiji Era shrine to the war dead. But it was pretty terrible and offered nothing illuminating on the subject. The central issue, clearly, being that Yasukuni was created in a spirit not so disimilar to the West's adoption of fireworks: after the West had cracked open the region, the Japanese decided they'd better start following the West's lead. They saw that the West had perfected the use of the God-King-State Complex with its various Official Organs. By reinstating the Emperor, they needed the pomp of rituals to whup the poor into a frenzy and literally created the myth of the Emperor-God and what we think of Shinto today. Fortunately for Shinto there are some good books in English being written. Hopefully this message will become clearer in our lifetime.

The war between China and Japan was a long time coming and at the beginning of the 20th century this war was seen as expedient for both countries because China clearly was being crippled by the West and hoped to rally its people once more by beating the Japanese. The Japanese, having watched for millennia, accurately assessed the weakness of China and, just like China, hoping to demonstrate to the West who was the top of the pops, waged a war to create the most favorable conditions for them in the face of the West's world domination plans. Immediately it was the conquering of Okinawa and Taiwan, but by taking Hokkaido, Korea, and Manchuria they hoped to keep Russia, France, Britain, and the U.S. at bay. Of course, the West would have none of that.