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Dr. David Robinson, Edith Cowan University (Australia)
Force beyond minimal requirements. In this context Japan’s
membership of the UN Security Council should not be
supported, and references to past Japanese atrocities remain
relevant and appropriate in discussions of Japan’s
international role.
The pacifist Yoshida Doctrine, which advocated the devotion
of Japan’s national resources to economic development and
an almost total reliance on the United States for defence,
dominated Japanese foreign policy thinking throughout the
Cold War. Henry Kissinger thought those “Japanese
decisions [were] the most farsighted and intelligent of any
major nation in the post-World War Two era” [Pyle, 1998,
pp123-124]. Under the Yoshida Doctrine Japan resisted
Western pressure to rearm and instead traded military bases
to the US for protection. Japan was thus largely relieved of
the burden of maintaining a military, and also benefited
economically by supplying American forces in both the
Korean and Vietnam Wars [Pyle, 1998, pp123-124]. Of
course, the historical context of this pacifism was Japan’s
destruction in World War Two, following more than half a
century of imperialist Japanese foreign policy. Japan had
fought wars in East Asia against China in 1894-95 and
against Russia in 1905; annexed the Korean Peninsula in
1910, and devoted 70,000 troops to the allied invasion of
Russia following the Bolshevik Revolution. They were
subsequently the main imperialists in Asia during the 1930s
and 40s, invading Manchuria in 1931, and sparking the
Second Sino-Japanese War from July 1937 onwards through
their continued encroachment into Chinese territory. The
aim of conquering Chinese territory and creating a ‘Greater
East Asia Co-prosperity Sphere’ led to Japanese military
expansion throughout the region, and World War Two in the
Pacific [Mackerras, 1998, pp37-38].
After the war the United States occupied Japan, and secured
their long-term military presence through the 1951 Security
Treaty [Mackerras, 1998, p41]. In these circumstances the
sublimation of Japanese energies into economic activity was
both appropriate and welcomed by a region who feared them,
and a Japan who could be said to fear itself [Matthews,
2003, p76]. With this new focus Japan re-emerged as a
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