The future and the past are never far apart in modern Asia, where both the Middle Kingdom and the Land of the Rising Sun are, as never before, great powers at the same time.
The future and the past are never far apart in modern Asia, where both the Middle Kingdom and the Land of the Rising Sun are, as never before, great powers at the same time. This week, on the 70th anniversary of Japan's defeat in World War II, tensions simmered as Prime Minister Shinzo Abe once again stopped shortof an apology for the suffering Japan inflicted during the war. Meanwhile, a newly assertive China prepares fora reportedly unprecedented military display in early September to mark the formal end of the historic war.
After repeated calls from the International Monetary Fund and the U.S. Treasury to let the market determine exchange rates, China this week devaluedits currency. That, in turn, set off fears of beggar-thy-neighbor currency wars in a slack global economy. Taking this sudden move now, even as state intervention continues to prop up China's ailing stock market, has shaken confidence in the Communist Party's lauded ability to master events.
Herbert Bix, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan , says Abe aspires to make Japan a great power while sanitizing his nation's history. We excerpt key passagesfrom the report just submitted to Abe by the Japanese government's "Advisory Panel on the History of the 20th Century and on Japan's Role and World Order in the 21st Century," which controversially concludes that Japan committed "aggression" in World War II. In a reflection on the anniversary of Japan's defeat, I arguethat it is time for Japan to re-Asianize and stop being an American protectorate and political dwarf. But to rejoin the neighborhood in the future, Japan must first come to terms with its past.