The Northeast Asian (NEA) countries have remained unconnected for decades without having a formal multi-lateral security cooperation mechanism to pursue their common interests. One of the major reasons for why NEA cannot seem to form a unifying security system is because of the conflicting interest of each of the member countries. Each member country wants to protect their own interests and is not ready to compromise on the ground of finding a common ground to solve regional security issues.
Regional security interests of NEA member countries
China, being an emerging global power in the East Asian region wants to maintain its stable position and continuously enhances its military capacities to protrude as a strong nation. China has remained resolute in its realist ambition to reacquire Taiwan and unify it with the Mainland. To fulfill that purpose, China would not hesitate to use force on Taiwan if required, which is why China continues to expand its military capacities. Taiwan, on the other hand wants to remain an independent nation and shun away from the authoritarian government. U.S. plays a vital role in Taiwan by helping the nation retain its independence from being absorbed by China.
According to Article 9 in the constitution of Japan, the country is prohibited from the use of force or creating a military. Thus, Japan remains heavily dependent on the U.S. for its security purposes and has allowed the U.S. to set up its military base in Tokyo. How long can the U.S. continue to protect Japan considering the fact that the U.S. is currently running tremendous deficits and will no longer be able to protect a country that is rich and capable enough to protect itself?
As far as South Korea is concerned, their only...
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In 1972, President Richard Nixon was quoted as stating that his visit to the People’s Republic of China (PRC) “changed the world…to build a bridge across sixteen thousand miles and twenty-two years of hostilities.” By meeting with Chairman Mao Zedong in Beijing, Nixon took groundbreaking first steps to opening relations and formally recognizing the People’s Republic of China. The history of the aforementioned hostilities between the United States and the PRC dates back to the Chinese Communist Party’s takeover of mainland China following its civil war in the post-World War II era. When the PRC was formally proclaimed in 1949 towards the close of the Chinese Civil War, the United States decided against recognizing its establishment and instead chose to back Taiwan, also known as the Republic of China. This decision was a product of its political environment, as President Harry Truman had just established the Truman Doctrine, which sought to check presumed Communist and Soviet aims to expand. In order to remain consistent and credible with its containment policy, a precedent was set and relations between the United States and the PRC remained closed. Tensions were only exacerbated during the Korean War in the 1950’s as the PRC intervened on behalf of the North Koreans and during the War in Vietnam in the 1970’s in their support of the North Vietnamese. Thus it is understandable that to the public eye, Nixon’s meeting with Mao Zedong in 1972 seemed to come out of the blue and was difficult to interpret given the context of Sino-US relations in the two deca...
International organizations such as NATO and the UN are essential not only for global peace, but also as a place where middle powers can exert their influence. It is understandable that since the inception of such organizations that many crises have been averted, resolved, or dealt with in some way thro...
...feat of Japan in World War 2). With the changes of the nature of power, Japan by balancing out aggressive economic policies and a quiet military buildup, was able to build herself up to become a prominent player in the international sphere today. In closing, while Japan’s policies today in general have been skewered towards the arguments of the ‘Gentleman’, increasingly Japan has considered more realist concerns of security in the escalation of tensions of the East Asian geopolitical sphere. Chomin’s Discourse has nonetheless served as a prophetic blueprint for more than a century of Japan policy-making.
A few years before the conflict in Korea, US President Truman set forth an international policy known as the Truman Doctrine. The Truman Doctrine stated that the United States would aid countries that were fighting communist takeover. Combined with the ideological differences between the US and the USSR, the Soviet Union’s development of an atomic bomb pushed tensions past the breaking point, moving both countries into an arms race during which each attempted to amass more weapons than the other nation. Around the same time, over in Asia, the Communist Party banished Chinese Nationalists, the local democratic party, and began taking hold under Mao Zedong. This sparked fear within the Americans, for China was a large, influential country in Asia; Americans began to believe that China’s communistic society would influence its smaller surrounding countries to adopt communism as well. That series of events, along with the perceived threat of communism spreading, led to a tim...
方玥雯[Fang Yue Wen] (2009). 北韓核武研發與東北亞安全：2002-2007. [The North Korea’s Nuclear Weapons and the Security in Northeast Asia: 2002-2007] in台灣[Taiwan]: 國立政治大學[National Cheungchi University] Retrieved 18 July, 2013 from http://nccuir.lib.nccu.edu.tw/handle/140.119/37029
The Web. The Web. 27 May 2014. http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2307/1354343?ref=search-gateway:1c7b5d35c756095be3255402d85e5e3f>. Nathan, Andrew J. "U.S.-China Relations Since 1949."
This paper aims to focus on the effect of the rise of China within the context of its neighbor states, to asses that China is not a threat to Asian stability and also, to highlight some of the challenges of China's ascension to what might be called a relatively foreseeable future.
INTRODUCTION : a brief overview of the current situation regarding the security issue in the Pacific region
Abstract: Since the end of the Cold War, the United States has been the world’s only unquestioned superpower. How the United States evaluates its position as global hegemon has important consequences for American foreign policy, particularly with regards to the potential for future policy constraints. Thus, this paper seeks to consider the question: How durable is American hegemony? The paper first defines the state of American hegemony and then considers the primary challengers: Europe, Russia, China, Japan and imperial overstretch. It will conclude that in the long-term, East Asian geopolitical instability poses the greatest threat to American hegemony, but that in the short-term, the hegemony will prove to be quite durable as long as the United States can counteract the phenomenon of imperial overstretch. In order to diffuse both internal and international threats to hegemony, American leaders should work to pursue national interests within a framework of consensus and legitimacy as much as possible.
Additionally, in the book US FOREIGN POLICY, Michael Cox (2012) concluded that “China’s peaceful rise has largely consoled its neighbors and the United States that it remains a status quo power. However, as it has risen, there are some (perhaps an expanding number) who predict this will lead to increased regional and global competition” (p.266). Clearly, Michael Cox indicated the point that there might be more competitions in the future relation between China and the rest of the world no matter China rises peacefully or not. In particular, China and the United States will face many intense issues since they are the two giants in th...
Given these sets of circumstances, china, Taiwan and United States have much to gain and even more to lose if an armed conflict erupts in the Taiwan Strait. All three countries have political, economic, and national security issues involved and united states and china are both in competition economic...
78, no. 1, pp. 137-146. 5 (3), 27-45, http://www.politicalperspectives.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/Sino-US-relations1.pdf 9. Wang, Hui, “U.S.-China: Bonds and Tensions”, RAND Corporation, 257-288, n.d., http://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/monograph_reports/MR1300/MR1300.ch12.pdf 10. Yuan, Jing- Dong, “Sino-US Military Relations Since Tiananmen: Restoration, Progress, and Pitfalls”, Spring 2003, http://strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/pubs/parameters/articles/03spring/yuan.pdf 11. Yan, Xuetong. "
Since the initial warming of U.S.-China relations in the early 1970’s, policymakers have had difficulty balancing conflicting U.S. policy concerns in the People’s Republic of China. In the strange world of diplomacy between the two, nothing is predictable. From Nixon to Clinton, presidents have had to reconcile security and human rights concerns with the corporate desire for expanded economic relations between the two countries. Nixon established ties with Mao Zedong’s brutal regime in 1972. And today Clinton’s administration is trying to influence China’s course from within a close economic and diplomatic relationship.
Geissmann, Hans J. 2001. “The Underrated OSCE” Working paper presented for Consultation on NATO Nuclear Policy, National Missile Defence & Alternative Security Arrangements in Ottowa, Canada. http://www.ploughshares.ca/libraries/WorkingPapers/Simons%20Conf%20Ottawa/Giessmann.html
Inkenberry, John. “The Rise of China and the Future of the West.” Foreign Affairs. The Council of Foreign Relations. Jan 2008. Web. 9 Mar 2014.