Managing Chinese Threat

[SSridhar]

China slams Japan's Plan to Ramp Up Defence Spending - Straits Times

China has denounced Japan's plans to boost military purchases, accusing it of playing up regional tensions as an "excuse" to ramp up defence spending.

The cabinet of hawkish Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe agreed Tuesday to spend 24.7 trillion yen (S$300 billion) between 2014 and 2019 - a five per cent boost to the military budget over five years.

Japan plans to purchase stealth fighters, drones and submarines as part of its efforts to boost military hardware that will beef up defence of far-flung islands amid a simmering territorial row with China.

China is "firmly opposed" to Japan's spending plans, defence ministry spokesman Geng Yansheng said {Why ?} in a statement released late on Friday.

[Karan M]

RS, China has economic power. Its military is a paper dragon. However it can launch a cyber attack and a Treasury sell attack that will tkae down everyone.

Its ballistic missile capabilities can be a serious pain. Militarily, its enhancing its capabilities significantly. I mean, its has ~300 Flanker class airframes, ~200 J-10 class and around 70-80 JH-7s. These combined with IFR, and AWACS, can be a problem. Plus investments in other areas..

[Karan M]

China slams Japan's Plan to Ramp Up Defence Spending - Straits Times

China has denounced Japan's plans to boost military purchases, accusing it of playing up regional tensions as an "excuse" to ramp up defence spending.

The cabinet of hawkish Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe agreed Tuesday to spend 24.7 trillion yen (S$300 billion) between 2014 and 2019 - a five per cent boost to the military budget over five years.

Japan plans to purchase stealth fighters, drones and submarines as part of its efforts to boost military hardware that will beef up defence of far-flung islands amid a simmering territorial row with China.

China is "firmly opposed" to Japan's spending plans, defence ministry spokesman Geng Yansheng said {Why ?} in a statement released late on Friday.

China is behaving just as the Khan does...opposing, criticizing every nations spending while ramping up its own.

[SSridhar]

Japan Seeks Cyberwarfare Capability - Japan Times

Abe is firing on all cylinders.

Discussions are under way to decide if Japan should have the ability to counter cyberattacks by a foreign nation, according to a government source.

This would include being able to attack a server in self-defense if government computer systems were attacked, the source said.

Japan is looking for deterrents to cyberattacks, which have become increasingly sophisticated in recent years, the source said, adding the government plans to cooperate with the United States, which has sophisticated counterattack technology.

The government plans to set up a “cyberdefense task force” within the Self-Defense Forces next March, the source said.

The midterm defense capability buildup outline adopted this week by the Cabinet of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe states that the government will “examine a policy option for obtaining a capability to obstruct an enemy’s cyberspace use.”

The Defense Ministry and other government agencies have begun compiling concrete measures to wage a counterattack, the source said.

As one technique, they are considering waging distributed denial-of-service attacks that send huge amounts of data to offending servers, the source said.

For this, a senior defense official said, U.S. cooperation is indispensable because identifying the source of a cyberattack requires very sophisticated computer technology.

But counterattacks might also violate a Japanese law banning unauthorized access to servers and computers.

And if a server were in a foreign country or if Japan waged a counterattack pre-emptively, such action might be viewed as violating the key constitutional principle of limiting Japan’s responses to foreign aggression only to defensive actions.

So the government plans to scrutinize the legal problems that might arise in obtaining counterattack capability, the source said.

A cyberattack refers to enemy intrusions into the computer systems of a government agency, military installation or private company online that cause disruptions to the functions of the systems or tamper with the data held at such targets.

After the government bought several of the Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea from their Japanese owner in September 2012, the home pages of some ministries and agencies were attacked and defaced by intruders.

Unauthorized access from Chinese sources was later found to account for a major portion of the cyberattacks.

[SSridhar]

AVP demands replacement of ITBP by Army on Arunachal Border - The Hindu

A delegation of the Arunachal Pradesh Vikas Parishad met Defence Minister A K Antony in New Delhi to demand deployment of the Army on the India-China border replacing the ITBP force.

A 13-member delegation of tribal leaders from the State called on Mr. Antony and submitted a 14-point memorandum with the demand on Saturday, a party release said on Monday.

It also demanded construction of roads and other infrastructure in border areas and increase in number of surveillance and patrol posts along Tibet, it said.

The delegation also raised the issue of intrusion by Chinese troops in Chaklagam area of the State in August this year. It demanded improvement and strengthening of the ITBP and BSF in all respects and raising of a Arunachal Scouts Regiment on par with the Ladakh Scouts.

The delegation also met Vice-President Hamid Ansari, leaders of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha and the Lok Sabha, Arun Jaitley and Sushma Swaraj respectively. — PTI

[DavidD]

Japan Seeks Cyberwarfare Capability - Japan Times

Abe is firing on all cylinders.

More like setting Japan on fire. When Abenomics comes crashing down within the next 2 years we'll see where all that bombast coming from Japan is gonna go.

[SSridhar]

Japan Seeks Cyberwarfare Capability - Japan Times

Abe is firing on all cylinders.

More like setting Japan on fire. When Abenomics comes crashing down within the next 2 years we'll see where all that bombast coming from Japan is gonna go.

Are you suggesting that seeking cyber warfare capability and enhanced defence posture would somehow crush Abenomics ? Is it your contention that PRC is dragging Japan into a competitive race and sink it a la USSR ?

[SSridhar]

China Defends Nuclear Ties with Pak - Ananth Krishnan, The Hindu

China on Monday indicated it will continue providing support for civilian nuclear energy projects in Pakistan, despite concerns voiced by some countries that recent agreements have violated international guidelines governing nuclear trade.

The Foreign Ministry here said, referring to a new nuclear power project inaugurated last month in Karachi, that “relevant cooperation between China and Pakistan helps alleviate power shortage in Pakistan and serves the interests of local people”.

“China will continue to help Pakistan tackle the shortage of power as its capacity allows,” said spokesperson Hua Chunying.

Last month, Pakistan formally inaugurated two 1,100 MW projects at the second and third phases of the Karachi nuclear power project. The deals follow Chinese support to the nuclear complex at Chashma, where two reactors have been constructed with Beijing’s assistance,

The agreements for third and fourth reactors in Chashma, signed in 2009, triggered controversy as they were the first deals signed by China following its joining of the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG). The nuclear trade body forbids members from transferring technology to countries that have not signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). India obtained a waiver from the body only after undertaking various commitments.

While Chinese officials defended the deals by arguing they had been “grandfathered” under the earlier Chashma agreement that predated China’s membership of the NSG, even some strategic analysts in Beijing privately acknowledge that it is far more difficult to make a case for the new Karachi agreements.

Ms. Hua, the spokesperson, however, defended the deals, saying the two countries’ “relevant cooperation, which is totally for peaceful purposes, meets their respective international obligations and is subject to the safeguards of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)”.

“I also want to point out”, she added, “that China takes issues concerning the peaceful use of nuclear energy seriously. Under the precondition of nuclear non-proliferation, we carry out active cooperation and communication with relevant countries and the IAEA in the peaceful use of nuclear energy and provide assistance for other developing countries in developing nuclear energy.”

[DavidD]

More like setting Japan on fire. When Abenomics comes crashing down within the next 2 years we'll see where all that bombast coming from Japan is gonna go.

Are you suggesting that seeking cyber warfare capability and enhanced defence posture would somehow crush Abenomics ? Is it your contention that PRC is dragging Japan into a competitive race and sink it a la USSR ?

No, I'm suggesting that Abenomics is gonna crush Abenomics. By then all the talk about enhanced defense posture will be little more than empty talk.

[Christopher Sidor]

The day is not far when PRC will enforce a ADIZ over the Himalayas and SCS. This will have implications for India as far as its trade with the Pacific Region is concerned as well as its survival.

[DavidD]

The day is not far when PRC will enforce a ADIZ over the Himalayas and SCS. This will have implications for India as far as its trade with the Pacific Region is concerned as well as its survival.

Good chance for the SCS, but the Himalayas? How would that even work? There's a reason why no ADIZ's exist over land boundaries.

[SSridhar]

No, I'm suggesting that Abenomics is gonna crush Abenomics. By then all the talk about enhanced defense posture will be little more than empty talk.

Oh, OK. So, you are saying that the 2.8% increase in defence expenditure cannot be absorbed by the Japanese economy when you expect Abenomics to crash soon under its own weight. What about China's official double-digit increase in defence expenditure (which also hides several other defence related expenses under other heads) in these difficult times ?

[Victor]

It is in the world's best interest, certainly in India's, for China to keep egging Asia-Pacific countries with its bullsh!t. The next logical step is for Japan to go nuclear followed soon after by Vietnam.

[SSridhar]

From an Indian interest PoV, Japan & Vietnam going nuclear can and should be welcomed. But, Japan's case would most certainly not happen.

[Suraj]

Oh, the irony of a Chinese accusing the Japanese of bombastic talk. Did I just wake up in a parallel universe ? One of those two countries claims territory on the basis of 800 year old shipwrecks, and it is not Japan.

[svinayak]

From an Indian interest PoV, Japan & Vietnam going nuclear can and should be welcomed. But, Japan's case would most certainly not happen.

Vietnam will be the first one. It is located at the junction of the south China sea and all other oceans.
Viet Nam faces the Eastern Sea to the East and the Gulf of Thailand to the South and Southwest. The country has a long coastline of 3,260 km running from Mong Cai in the North to Ha Tien in the Southwest. Viet Nam’s territorial waters in the Eastern Sea extend to the East and Southeast, including the continental shelf, islands and archipelagoes. There is a group of around 3,000 islets belonging to Viet Nam in the Tonkin Gulf, including Ha Long Bay, Bai Tu Long Bay, Cat Hai, Cat Ba and Bach Long Vi Island. Farther in the Eastern Sea are Hoang Sa Archipelago (Paracel Islands) and Truong Sa Archipelago (Spratly Islands). To the West and the Southwest, there are groups of islands including Con Son, Phu Quoc and Tho Chu.

It is the primary nation which should go nuclear to be primary security guarantee of the south China Sea.

[DavidD]

No, I'm suggesting that Abenomics is gonna crush Abenomics. By then all the talk about enhanced defense posture will be little more than empty talk.

Oh, OK. So, you are saying that the 2.8% increase in defence expenditure cannot be absorbed by the Japanese economy when you expect Abenomics to crash soon under its own weight. What about China's official double-digit increase in defence expenditure (which also hides several other defence related expenses under other heads) in these difficult times ?

As you can see, China's defense expenditure has been roughly in line with its GDP for decades now. Japan's economy isn't gonna grow at 2.8% for any sustainable period. Even at the height of Abenomics it only grew at 2.6% this year, and it's only forecasted to grow at half of that, 1.4%, for 2014.

All countries have hidden defense expenditures. For example, the U.S. doesn't include it's expenditures in wars into its defense budget. That means the costly wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are actually not part of the U.S. defense budget and they amount to well over $100 billion a year (very, very conservative estimate since I don't feel like looking up the actual numbers). Japan also recently passed the secrecy bill, which essentially legalized the hiding of defense budget which they've probably been doing anyway.

But really, the issue isn't the money. The Japanese military budget is only at about 1% of GDP and can afford to go much higher without becoming a burden on the economy. The issue here is that with the upcoming collapse of Abenomics, does Shinzo Abe have the political capital to hold onto power if he's facing external pressure as well? You Indians like Japan because they're so far away, but Japan has no friends in its own neighborhood. You think China has plenty of territorial disputes? Japan literally has territorial disputes with every single neighbor possible: Russia, SK, China, and Taiwan. Can Japan still afford to antagonize every single one of them by raising military spending, visiting the Yasukuni shrine, and making light of Japanese crimes during the second world war, when the economy is tanking?

[DavidD]

Oh, the irony of a Chinese accusing the Japanese of bombastic talk. Did I just wake up in a parallel universe ? One of those two countries claims territory on the basis of 800 year old shipwrecks, and it is not Japan.

Shipwreck is lip service, China claims territory the way all nations claim territory, by power. Does anyone debate America's sovereignty over North America? Is anyone clamoring for the native Americans to take their land back? Is anyone lobbying for Mexico to get California back? I saw people illustrate how ridiculous the Chinese claims in the Spratlys are by drawing how close those islands are to the Philippines, but how far are the Falklands from the UK vis-a-vis Argentina?

[Suraj]

Despite mischaracterization by DavidD, Taiwanese are far more practical about Japan than PRC is. You do not see them ransacking Honda and Toyota dealerships in Taipei. THSR is modified Shinkansen. I know older generation Taiwanese who can understand or speak Japanese and do so without any rancor, while corresponding age mainlanders will not as much as buy a Japanese made car. Strangely enough though, the same person has a Sony Bravia TV.

Japan has leftover baggage of history, but not any current enmity. Their history of investing in ASEAN and PacRim gains them substantial goodwill. PRC on the other hand, does not have the benefit of that - they're increasingly a problem due to their overarching territorial claims made on the flimsiest of excuses, like locations of shipwrecks.

Doubling defence spending is not going to hurt Japan as much as is suggested. It's not really spending - as in an outgo - as a stimulus measure, since Japan is capable of developing and manufacturing most of what's needed. It's probably a far better outlet to Abenomics than inflating the stock and real estate markets and pursuing US-style 'wealth effect' strategies that will just distort both with more bubbles. On the other hand, a much more productive Japanese military-industrial complex, including one that exports its output, will benefit them.

[Suraj]

Oh, the irony of a Chinese accusing the Japanese of bombastic talk. Did I just wake up in a parallel universe ? One of those two countries claims territory on the basis of 800 year old shipwrecks, and it is not Japan.

Shipwreck is lip service, China claims territory the way all nations claim territory, by power.

Thank you for making the point that China does indeed resort to bombastic talk, or 'lip service' as you prefer to term it. Japan is the status quo-ist power here. China is the one that seeks change. Ergo, China will always be the one to resort to bombastic language and attempt to force change, not others.

[Cosmo_R]

@Suraj +1

[DavidD]

No current enmity? Here's the first link popped up on google when searching "South Korea Japan", from today. Look at how the Japanese media deride South Korean disdain for the Japanese even as they deny the abhorrent practice of forcibly recruiting "comfort women". Think this article's gonna go well with the Koreans?

http://the-japan-news.com/news/article/0000846065

South Korea—chilly ties— / ROK media fanning anti-Japan sentiment

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The Yomiuri Shimbun

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe aboard a practice plane of the Blue Impulse on May 12. The South Korean media blasted it as it bears the number 731.

December 25, 2013

The Yomiuri ShimbunSouth Korean mass media reports on Japan have had undeniably grave ramifications on bilateral relations.

For example, take Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s visit to Matsushima Air Base in Higashi-Matsushima, Miyagi Prefecture, on May 12. Abe’s visit was intended to offer words of encouragement to Air Self-Defense Force personnel at the base, which had been damaged by the Great East Japan Earthquake and ensuing tsunami in 2011.

During the visit, Abe was photographed aboard a practice plane of the Blue Impulse, the ASDF’s aerobatic demonstration team.

Two days later, however, The Munhwa Ilbo, a South Korean evening paper, criticized Abe in an article with the headline, “Is he awakening the specter of militarism?” The article accused Abe of provoking the ire of countries that were drawn into World War II as the practice plane happened to be numbered 731, which the paper said reminded people of the Imperial Japanese Army’s Unit 731. The unit allegedly conducted covert research on biological weapons during the war.

Other members of the South Korean media followed suit.

“I was ordered to write a similar story by my boss,” a South Korean reporter admitted. In protest, he asserted that The Munhwa Ilbo’s report was comparable to a false accusation against Abe, but was overridden by his boss who said to him: “Are you pro-Japan?” He said he reluctantly wrote the story as instructed.

About a week after the media frenzy, the JoongAng Ilbo, the second-largest newspaper in South Korea in terms of circulation, carried a column written by an editorial writer that labeled the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki as “revenge” for the “human beings used in experiments by a covert biological warfare research team in China called Unit 731.”

Apparently with Abe in mind, the column said, “Some leaders deny the history of aggression and hurt their Asian neighbors with such denials.” It ended with “But God, too, is at liberty...God may feel that retaliation against Japan hasn’t been complete.”
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The Yomiuri Shimbun

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga replied by saying, “We’ll never tolerate such perceptions about the atomic bombings” at a press conference before the Japanese government lodged a protest with the JoonAng Ilbo. In a reply, the newspaper said the column contains the personal views of the writer, not the daily’s official stance.

The column served to pour cold water on Japan-South Korean relations: Some survivors of the bombings were devastated to learn about the column and said the columnist should not have written the article while he was carried away by his emotions.

In another instance, Abe’s speech at an annual memorial service to mark the 68th anniversary of the end of World War II on Aug. 15 drew criticism from South Korea—this time not for a verbal gaffe, but for not making an apology for its militarist past. “We will carve out the future of this country as one full of hope, as we face history with humility and engrave deeply into our hearts the lessons that we should learn,” Abe said in his speech.

The Dong-A Ilbo ran an article titled “Abe ditches last conscience of war criminal nation,” which said the prime minister failed to mention the damage the country inflicted on Asian nations and failed to show remorse. It then said the prime minister aims to change Japan into an ordinary nation that can fight a war.

“South Korean newspapers tend to arbitrarily assume that readers want to read anti-Japanese stories,” said a Japanese journalist residing in South Korea, adding that they often end up fanning anti-Japanese sentiment among the public.

Recently, however, there have been a number of stories that warned against running excessively anti-Japanese reports.

The Kyunghyang Shinmum carried a bylined story from its Tokyo correspondent on Aug. 1, saying the attitude that “you can get away with doing anything as long as your slogan is anti-Japanese” will only make an enemy out of even Japanese who see South Korea in a favorable light.

The Chosun Ilbo’s Yang Sang Hoon, chief of the editorial board, questioned why Japanese are more trusted than South Koreans in the world in his column on Nov. 13. “We have only ourselves to blame for this ironic outcome. As long as we turn to our emotions first and fail to deal with matters logically, all the while refusing to see how our emotional behavior may be perceived by others, we will never be able to beat Japan at anything.”

Whether such a call on South Korea to begin soul-searching would resonate with the South Korean public remains to be seen—and this is what the Japanese government is watching with keen interest.

Japan media fuel reaction

Japanese media reports have ignited anti-Japanese sentiment in South Korea in a number of cases. Issues related to so-called comfort women are a case in point.

On Jan. 11, 1992, The Asahi Shimbun sensationally reported that “The Japanese military supervised and controlled the establishment of comfort stations and recruitment of comfort women.”

The article also indicated that “joshi teishin-tai,” women aged 14 to 24 who were recruited to work at such places as factories during World War II, were forced to serve as comfort women.

The report infuriated the South Korean public, prompting Prime Minister Kiichi Miyazawa to apologize to South Korean President Roh Tae Woo when he visited Seoul shortly after the report. It also led to Chief Cabinet Secretary Yohei Kono to issue a statement that expressed “apologies and remorse” over comfort women on Aug. 4, 1993.

But investigations by the Japanese government have found no evidence to back up the allegation that comfort women were forcibly recruited by the Imperial Japanese Army.

“It is a major sin for reports to suggest that comfort women were forcibly recruited,” said modern historian Ikuhiko Hata.

[Suraj]

SoKo-Japan is exactly what I said - their baggage of history. For all their recent screaming, they were still happy to take Japanese money and build POSCO with it back in the 1960s under Park Chung-Hee. Where was their indignation about the comfort women then ? How about a 'No! we will not take your money until you apologize' ? How about something like that from Beijing ? No, Deng was happy to welcome the Japanese investment.

SoKo, PRC, Taiwan and the rest of ASEAN have all benefited from Japanese capital and technology, a lot of it invested as an act of goodwill to make amends for the past. Modern day cheap politics in Seoul and Beijing ignore that, just to keep the matter in the foreground for their own domestic political compulsions. It's hard to give credence to latter day moralizing and posturing about the past, after decades of happily gaining from Japanese capital and technology.

[member_19686]

A Han imperialist speaking about Japanese "crimes" lol. If Axis won the war, all the Allied leaders would have been the ones hung for war crimes.

Taiwan has no serious enmity with Japan & pays lip service to keep up with PRC's bombastic talk. Lee Teng-hui former president of Taiwan even visited Yasukuni to pay his respect to his fallen elder brother.

As Taiwan was Japan's first overseas colony, Japanese intentions were to turn the island into a showpiece "model colony".[3] As a result, much effort was made to improve the island's economy, industry, public works and to change its culture.
The relative failures of immediate post–World War II rule by the Kuomintang led to a certain degree of nostalgia amongst the older generation of Taiwanese who experienced both. This has affected, to some degree, issues such as national identity, ethnic identity and the Taiwan independence movement. Partly as a result, the people of Taiwan in general feel much less antipathy towards the legacy of Japanese rule than other countries in Asia.[4]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiwan_under_Japanese_rule

It is PRC & the 2 Korea's that have a serious problem.

Even the Russians realize that one day the Chinese imperialists will target their Far East not Japan.

[Suraj]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiwan_under_Japanese_rule
It is PRC & the 2 Korea's that have a serious problem.

Which is bizarre because the two largest immigrant communities in Japan are the mainlanders and Koreans, both of whom have been coming for decades. In fact the mainland population in Japan has quintupled in the past quarter of a century from ~125K to ~650K the last time I checked, while the Korean population has remained stable at around 500-600K. Hardly the behavior of a people who are supposed to be extremely upset with Japan.

[DavidD]

Thank you for making the point that China does indeed resort to bombastic talk, or 'lip service' as you prefer to term it. Japan is the status quo-ist power here. China is the one that seeks change. Ergo, China will always be the one to resort to bombastic language and attempt to force change, not others.

I don't think you understand what bombastic means, but that doesn't really matter. Bombastic language never forced any change, it's power that does. Take the Diaoyutai/Senkakkus for example, the status quo has been changed from one which the Japanese exerted de facto control over the islands to equal control between the Chinese and the Japanese.

Bet you guys didn't even notice that. Bet you guys thought the ADIZ was just another example of provocative "bombastic" talk by China. But the fact is that those islands are uninhabited and have no useable structures on them, Japanese de facto control of the islands have stemmed solely from the naval and aerial patrols over the islands. Chinese naval/coast guard ships have been patrolling the area since 2012, and now with the establishment of the ADIZ the Chinese has begun aerial patrols as well. The Chinese now have equal de facto control over the islands as the Japanese, and that's the new status quo.

When the time comes to pay more lip service in international courts, de facto control will be a deciding factor as it has been shown repeatedly, but really the work was done through hard power a long time ago.

[DavidD]

SoKo-Japan is exactly what I said - their baggage of history. For all their recent screaming, they were still happy to take Japanese money and build POSCO with it back in the 1960s under Park Chung-Hee. Where was their indignation about the comfort women then ? How about a 'No! we will not take your money until you apologize' ? How about something like that from Beijing ? No, Deng was happy to welcome the Japanese investment.

SoKo, PRC, Taiwan and the rest of ASEAN have all benefited from Japanese capital and technology, a lot of it invested as an act of goodwill to make amends for the past. Modern day cheap politics in Seoul and Beijing ignore that, just to keep the matter in the foreground for their own domestic political compulsions. It's hard to give credence to latter day moralizing and posturing about the past, after decades of happily gaining from Japanese capital and technology.

And for all the Indian indignation over 1962 and the current territorial disputes, China is still your biggest trading partner, no? Enmity can exist even with economic cooperation.

[Suraj]

I don't think you understand what bombastic means, but that doesn't really matter. Bombastic language never forced any change, it's power that does. Take the Diaoyutai/Senkakkus for example, the status quo has been changed from one which the Japanese exerted de facto control over the islands to equal control between the Chinese and the Japanese.

Here's an example of bombastic language on your part. There's no 'equal control' of the Senkakus. Japan controls them and has de facto ownership. PRC has no defacto control, and in fact it never has. The control passed from the US post WW2 to Japan in 1971. Sending boats full of hong qi flag waving loudmouths is not control.

What PRC has is its own name for someone else's islands. That's not a claim of ownership, de facto or otherwise. A bombastic claim, for sure.

Did China sign the Treaty of Shimonoseki or not ? It did. With that signature, you lost those islands to Japan in 1894. The San Francisco Peace Treaty did not hand over those islands to PRC or ROC, but kept them in US hands. The US later handed them over to Japan in 1971.

[DavidD]

A Han imperialist speaking about Japanese "crimes" lol. If Axis won the war, all the Allied leaders would have been the ones hung for war crimes.

Taiwan has no serious enmity with Japan & pays lip service to keep up with PRC's bombastic talk. Lee Teng-hui former president of Taiwan even visited Yasukuni to pay his respect to his fallen elder brother.

As Taiwan was Japan's first overseas colony, Japanese intentions were to turn the island into a showpiece "model colony".[3] As a result, much effort was made to improve the island's economy, industry, public works and to change its culture.
The relative failures of immediate post–World War II rule by the Kuomintang led to a certain degree of nostalgia amongst the older generation of Taiwanese who experienced both. This has affected, to some degree, issues such as national identity, ethnic identity and the Taiwan independence movement. Partly as a result, the people of Taiwan in general feel much less antipathy towards the legacy of Japanese rule than other countries in Asia.[4]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiwan_under_Japanese_rule

It is PRC & the 2 Korea's that have a serious problem.

Even the Russians realize that one day the Chinese imperialists will target their Far East not Japan.

Taiwan has two populations. One comes from descendents of the indigenous population whose ancestors were ruled by the Japanese for half a century and experienced the relative affluence under their rule. The other comes from descendents of mainlanders who moved to Taiwan after 1949 and experienced the horrors of Japanese occupation. It's just like how the Indians don't mind the Japanese' past crimes because you were never slaughtered by the millions by the Japanese, the descendents of natives like Lee Teng Hui are much more tolerant of the Japanese. The rest, not so much, as exemplified by Lee's expulsion from the KMT after his presidency. The KMT, of course, is mainly composed of mainlanders who moved to Taiwan after 1949.

[member_19686]

Which is bizarre because the two largest immigrant communities in Japan are the mainlanders and Koreans, both of whom have been coming for decades. In fact the mainland population in Japan has quintupled in the past quarter of a century from ~125K to ~650K the last time I checked, while the Korean population has remained stable at around 500-600K. Hardly the behavior of a people who are supposed to be extremely upset with Japan.

When their mainland Korean bro's brutally crushed the Jeju uprising (as much as 20% of the island's pop was said to have died) with US backing the country thousands of them ran to was Japan not NK or PRC. Some of them sit there in Japan even now and sing peans to the Dear Leader in NK after being made refugees by their fellow Koreans.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeju_Uprising

Investigate the comfort women narrative closely and you will find find very uncomfortable facts, for e.g. see the 1944 US Army's report on comfort women captured in the Philippines. SK hasn't paid a dime in compensation for the deeds of its soldiers in Vietnam BTW.

[DavidD]

I don't think you understand what bombastic means, but that doesn't really matter. Bombastic language never forced any change, it's power that does. Take the Diaoyutai/Senkakkus for example, the status quo has been changed from one which the Japanese exerted de facto control over the islands to equal control between the Chinese and the Japanese.

Here's an example of bombastic language on your part. There's no 'equal control' of the Senkakus. Japan controls them and has de facto ownership. PRC has no defacto control, and in fact it never has. The control passed from the US post WW2 to Japan in 1971. Sending boats full of hong qi flag waving loudmouths is not control.

What PRC has is its own name for someone else's islands. That's not a claim of ownership, de facto or otherwise. A bombastic claim, for sure.

Did China sign the Treaty of Shimonoseki or not ? It did. With that signature, you lost those islands to Japan in 1894. The San Francisco Peace Treaty did not hand over those islands to PRC or ROC, but kept them in US hands. The US later handed them over to Japan in 1971.

I think you're confusing de jure with de facto. De facto needs no "lip service" like laws and treaties to justify it, only power. In the case of the Diaoyutai islands, the power would be naval and aerial since neither side has ground presence.

[Suraj]

And for all the Indian indignation over 1962 and the current territorial disputes, China is still your biggest trading partner, no? Enmity can exist even with economic cooperation.

But India does not ask you to apologize for 1962. We see the episode as a lesson in being prepared, and being aware of Chinese expansionist tendencies, they have only worsened lately. Despite that, the volume of trade continues to grow, and the the nature of your threat focusses on the present, and not some matter of face dating back from the early 1900s.

When was the last time Japan threatened the PRC or SoKo ? SoKo is rich today, in large part due to their access to Japanese capital and technology. Their use of the comfort women topic today is a cynical political ploy to win domestic elections, just as it is in PRC for the sake of buttressing the communist party's credentials in the eyes of the population.

[member_19686]

Taiwan has two populations. One comes from descendents of the indigenous population whose ancestors were ruled by the Japanese for half a century and experienced the relative affluence under their rule. The other comes from descendents of mainlanders who moved to Taiwan after 1949 and experienced the horrors of Japanese occupation. It's just like how the Indians don't mind the Japanese' past crimes because you were never slaughtered by the millions by the Japanese, the descendents of natives like Lee Teng Hui are much more tolerant of the Japanese. The rest, not so much, as exemplified by Lee's expulsion from the KMT after his presidency. The KMT, of course, is mainly composed of mainlanders who moved to Taiwan after 1949.

I know the Taiwanese population split & the old Han population is the majority.

Considering Chinese imperialists have always been brutal towards Uighurs, Mongols, & Tibetans its a bit rich of you to use events of 70+ years ago to score points. First look at what your kind is doing in Tibet & East Turkestan NOW.

[svinayak]

And for all the Indian indignation over 1962 and the current territorial disputes, China is still your biggest trading partner, no? Enmity can exist even with economic cooperation.

China is the only country still claiming the largest territory from India. It is the only country which feels that Indian border is up for grabs

[svinayak]

It's just like how the Indians don't mind the Japanese' past crimes because you were never slaughtered by the millions by the Japanese, the descendents of natives like Lee Teng Hui are much more tolerant of the Japanese.

The War which India was thrust into was essentialy a British colonial war for their interest and Indian leaders even protested and refused to join. The true intention of the Indians were clear not to help the British.
After that things changed and once the Japanese army landed in Malaysia and Singapore then situation changed. Indian national Army got the largest support from Imperial Japan.

[Suraj]

Taiwan has two populations. One comes from descendents of the indigenous population whose ancestors were ruled by the Japanese for half a century and experienced the relative affluence under their rule. The other comes from descendents of mainlanders who moved to Taiwan after 1949 and experienced the horrors of Japanese occupation.

Sorry, there's nowhere near as clean a division as you claim. Every one of the older generation Japanese-speaking Taiwanese (all of them mainland born) I know is a KMT supporting pan-blue type. How do I know ? I've attended fundraising banquets where there were keen to have some 'exotic faces' from their circle of friends, so a few white folks and me had a nice time learning about their politics. These folks may have fought the IJA, but on the other hand studied in Japanese academies and do not maintain the level of rancor the modern day revisionists do. Scorched earth tactics are not alien to China.

[DavidD]

And for all the Indian indignation over 1962 and the current territorial disputes, China is still your biggest trading partner, no? Enmity can exist even with economic cooperation.

But India does not ask you to apologize for 1962. We see the episode as a lesson in being prepared, and being aware of Chinese expansionist tendencies, they have only worsened lately. Despite that, the volume of trade continues to grow, and the the nature of your threat focusses on the present, and not some matter of face dating back from the early 1900s.

When was the last time Japan threatened the PRC or SoKo ? SoKo is rich today, in large part due to their access to Japanese capital and technology. Their use of the comfort women topic today is a cynical political ploy to win domestic elections, just as it is in PRC for the sake of buttressing the communist party's credentials in the eyes of the population.

I'm debating enough people simultaneously so I won't reply to you fully. The only point of my post was the last sentence, "enmity can exist even with economic cooperation." As to what nature the enmity or economic cooperation or whether or not an apology is demanded is not relevant as every instance of enmity is different.

[DavidD]

Taiwan has two populations. One comes from descendents of the indigenous population whose ancestors were ruled by the Japanese for half a century and experienced the relative affluence under their rule. The other comes from descendents of mainlanders who moved to Taiwan after 1949 and experienced the horrors of Japanese occupation.

Sorry, there's nowhere near as clean a division as you claim. Every one of the older generation Japanese-speaking Taiwanese (all of them mainland born) I know is a KMT supporting pan-blue type. How do I know ? I've attended fundraising banquets where there were keen to have some 'exotic faces' from their circle of friends, so a few white folks and me had a nice time learning about their politics. These folks may have fought the IJA, but on the other hand studied in Japanese academies and do not maintain the level of rancor the modern day revisionists do. Scorched earth tactics are not alien to China.

Of course divisions are never that clear, of course there are plenty of descendents of either side that have opposite feelings. I simply presented them as a rough rule not a strict one. It's like if I say the Japanese don't like the Chinese and you say "well I have a couple of Japanese friends who love Chinese people and can even speak Chinese!" Heck, that's probably true for the majority of Chinese and Japanese people (not the language part, but the friendly part). I know plenty of Japanese people and I love working with them, and presumably the opposite is true (I hope ). But I digress, this dichotomy between disliking a people/culture vs. disliking a government is quite another topic of conversation.

[Suraj]

I think you're confusing de jure with de facto. De facto needs no "lip service" like laws and treaties to justify it, only power. In the case of the Diaoyutai islands, the power would be naval and aerial since neither side has ground presence.

PRC has neither de facto nor de jure claim on the Senkakus and never has, considering PRC existed since 1949, and the islands transferred to USA hands in 1945 and then into Japanese hands in 1971.

Proclaiming an ADIZ does not give you any manner of de facto control unless you consistently demonstrate your ability to enforce it. PRC has not been able to do that - others like Japan and SoKo not only violate your ADIZ, but maintain their own overlapping ones as a basis for claiming that they have no need to identify themselves within what they consider their own ADIZ.

[Suraj]

But I digress, this dichotomy between disliking a people/culture vs. disliking a government is quite another topic of conversation.

No, the point is that this entire modern day PRC enmity towards Japan is an artificially sustained construct primarily meant for local PRC political consumption, whether it be demonstrating nationalism or pride. There is no similar record by the Taiwanese government. None of the KMT folks have an issue with the Japanese government; their ire is directed at the mainland government, whom they see as illegitimate usurpers of political control over their ancestral land, or 'their beautiful country controlled by barbarians' to paraphrase someone who spoke about it.

The ones who actually fought in war and take pride in their knowledge of Chinese history also recognize scorched earth tactics for what they are - a tactic of warfare that has been used throughout Chinese history by its own rulers, quite brutally even compared to the Japanese. They instead have an issue with Beijing - whom they see as illegitimate rulers of the mainland, not worth of succeeding ROC.