Impact of Sino-U.S. ties on Japan

Impact of Sino-U.S. ties on Japan

Continuing with the fifth in a series of articles on President
Bill Clinton's recent visit to China, The Jakarta Post's Asia
correspondent Harvey Stockwin focuses on the current atmospherics
in the triangular relationship between Japan, China and the
United States. China's ambition to surpass Japan in American
affections became plain, and Clinton conveyed the image of going
along with it.

HONG KONG (JP): After the LDP lost 17 seats and won only 44 in
the upper house election on July 12, Ryutaro Hashimoto had to
write to U.S. President Bill Clinton and cancel his consolation
prize -- a state visit to Washington later this month.

Did Clinton, after receiving that message, pause to reflect on
the extent to which he may have recently contributed to
Hashimoto's downfall, by clearly making Japan, and therefore its
Prime Minister, appear less important in American eyes than it
actually is, or should be?

As he signed the letter, did Hashimoto stop to wryly blame
himself for not firmly insisting that the U.S. President at least
stopover in Tokyo, after or before his recent China trip, as his
predecessors had done? for not coupling that with a blunt private
message that the Prime Minister of Japan did not expect the
President of the United States to signal to Japanese voters, in
any way, just before an election, that he, Clinton, might have
diminished regard for the Japanese leadership?

These questions arise in part because a tiny incident in the
Shanghai Library during President Bill Clinton's visit to China
spoke volumes about the current state of play in the crucial
triangular relationship between the United States, Japan and
China.

It rubbed home an essential truth about the present Sino-
Japanese-American triangle -- China is aggressively ambitious,
already seeing itself as the regional heavyweight, while Clinton
is plainly both naive and careless. The Japanese are, as ever,
resentful of American slights but remain passively on the
defensive, thereby probably adding to their frustrations.

In the Shanghai Library President and Mrs. Clinton were
conducting a roundtable discussion with the pretentious title of
Shaping China For the 21st Century.

The Clintons seemed to be under the illusion that they were
talking to ordinary Chinese academics and professionals, just as,
two days earlier Clinton had seemed to assume that random
students were asking questions after he spoke at Beijing
University.

A reading of both transcripts by anyone reasonably familiar
with Chinese methods quickly suggests that both the professionals
and the students were obviously chosen by the Chinese authorities
for their ability to express, subtly or bluntly, forcefully or
politely varying versions of the prevailing communist party line.

Ever the ingratiating professional politician, Clinton asks an
American studies specialist, a Professor Wu (the U.S. transcripts
provide everything except the full Chinese names), to talk about
Sino-American relations plus "what advice you could give us going
forward here".

The good Professor Wu, no doubt carefully primed for this
moment should it arise, does not miss a trick. He reminds Clinton
of the dangerous Taiwan Straits Crisis in 1996 but is generally
upbeat, concluding "there is good reason for us (China and the
U.S.) to become good friends, not enemies. I think the importance
of such relations will overpass that of the U.S.-Japan relations.
I am optimistic about that".

Amazingly, Clinton replies "Well, first let me thank you for
what you said. I do believe that my coming here and the work
we've done in the last two years, President Jiang Zemin's trip to
the U.S., has helped resolve some of the misunderstandings".

Clinton then himself becomes the first U.S. President to
repeat "three noes", the Chinese party line over Taiwan,
something which Presidents from Richard Nixon to George Bush
carefully resisted doing, even though Beijing has been
consistently insisting upon variations on the three noes theme
ever since Nixon's first precedent-setting visit in 1972 .

In their leadership compound in Zhongnanhai, the Chinese must
have been rubbing their hands in glee (and amazement) that, in
addition to their persistence being rewarded over Taiwan, they
had managed to be thanked by an American President for suggesting
that Sino-American relations would come first in future, rather
than being (as they probably expected) diplomatically contested
on this point.

If the President, and his advisers, knew anything about the
Chinese style of negotiating, then they would have known that it
was imperative that Clinton should have reacted by reminding
Professor Wu that while a "strategic partnership" with China is
highly important, a continuing alliance with Japan remains a
vital U.S. interest.

The Chinese -- whatever may be thought of their policies --
are consummate professionals, absolutely dedicated (as perhaps
only a highly authoritarian state can be) to the pursuit of
national interest as they perceive it. But sometimes that Chinese
pursuit can be exceedingly short- sighted. So it seems to be at
the moment, as far as the Sino-Japanese-American triangle is
concerned.

The Chinese ambition to try and make Sino-American relations
"overpass" the U.S.-Japan alliance was first made absolutely
explicit when President Jiang Zemin visited Hawaii during his
1997 visit to the U.S..

Jiang's visit to Pearl Harbor was carefully contrived as a
symbolic reminder of the days when China and the U.S. were allies
against Japan.

Jiang also then did something which postwar Japanese emperors
and prime ministers have, unwisely, refrained from doing -- he
placed a wreath at the USS Arizona memorial, over the spot where
the battleship was sunk by the Japanese during the first minutes
of the surprise attack on Dec. 7 1941.

At first sight, it seems absurd that the Chinese should even
think of trying to detach the U.S. from Japan, -- breaking up the
U.S.-Japan alliance in order to make it easier for Beijing to
deal separately with Tokyo and Washington. To date, China has
still to take U.S.-Japanese shared interests and policies into
account on a whole range of issues.

At second sight, the idea is not so ridiculous. An incident
just before the Clinton visit -- not small, since it involved the
U.S. and Japan spending billions of dollars in the foreign
exchange markets -- helps explain why this is so.

U.S. Treasury officials, wedded to strong dollar policies, did
nothing to help the slumping yen through intervention in the
foreign exchange markets.

Since the Hashimoto administration itself couldn't act
decisively to reactivate the slumping Japanese economy, it could
hardly call upon the U.S. for such market intervention.

As the yen first hit the 140 to 145 yen-to-dollar level last
month, the Chinese Minister of Finance and the Central Bank
Governor both let it be known that a further weakening of the yen
would put pressure on China to devalue the renminbi, despite its
pledges not to do so.

Clinton's current passion for appeasing China, though not
Japan, immediately surfaced. Clinton did not want a first class
financial crisis to disturb his 10-day trip to China. He wanted
to avoid another slump in Asia's downward economic spiral.

The U.S., together with Japan, then intervened heavily in the
markets and the yen briefly rose -- though it still hovers around
140 to the dollar.

Many have assumed that China had demonstrated its increasing
economic clout.

But what had also been illustrated was that no one in the
Clinton Administration forcefully reminded China that its
devaluation of the renminbi in 1994 had been among the factors
triggering the Asian financial crisis in the first place, and
that a further deflationary spiral, brought about by another
devaluation, could well be ruinous to China's economic and
political interests.

The Chinese gambled on displaying their political influence,
just before the Clinton visit, and won. The Japanese were left
wondering if the U.S. had acted out of concern for Japan, or for
China. The Americans, belatedly, were left denying that they had
acted because of China, not Japan.

As it happened, it was the second time the U.S. had recently
left Japan anxious over America's priorities regarding China --
and the second gamble the Chinese had won.

As the Clinton visit was arranged, the Chinese demanded strict
reciprocity. Since President Jiang had visited no other nation
when he visited the U.S., Beijing maintained that President
Clinton should not visit any other nation when he visited China.

It was a straight divide-and-rule gambit. The Americans fell
for it. What Clinton should have said, politely but firmly was
"Yes, I understand your position, but you are not a superpower,
the U.S. is, and I have to look after my alliances". The Chinese
would have respected such a viewpoint. But it was evidently not
expressed.

Of course, Hashimoto was invited to Washington in July.
Of course, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright went to Tokyo,
immediately after the Clinton's China visit was completed, to
deliver some bromides in person.

But Clinton himself appeased the Chinese, and flew straight
back home. This left the Japanese, who are also adept at
realpolitik in their own way, wondering: if the U.S. President
could accept Chinese dictation on appropriate U.S.-Japan
consultations -- in what other ways would the U.S. forego due
respect for the vital interests of an ally?

From another angle, since Hashimoto failed to assert himself,
the Japanese government was left looking impotent in foreign
policy at a time when it was already being viewed as inept in
economic policy. These were factors which undoubtedly affected
voters as they went to the polls in the House of Councilors
election.

There was deep irony in this. Another prime minister whose
(lengthy) tenure was cut short by a combination of American
thoughtlessness and Chinese machinations was Eisuke Sato --
Hashimoto's first faction leader when he entered the Diet in
1964.

Too much Japanese anxiety aroused too often in this way would
not appear to be in China's best interests. It is not beyond the
bounds of possibility that if China did succeed in "overpassing"
Japan, and ending the U.S.-Japan alliance, there could well be
several unfortunate as well as unforeseen consequences not
necessarily to China's advantage.

At one extreme, Beijing might awake one day to a far more
authoritarian Japan which, beset by profound feelings of
insecurity, had found it necessary to follow India down the
nuclear path.