The Asia-Pacific Journal has a very interesting piece out reviewing rumors that China and Japan may strengthen ties in a dramatic fashion later this year. According to Le Figaro, the article says,
China had proposed that Japanese Prime Minister Hatoyama Yukio begin the process by going to Nanjing, where a mass killing of Chinese civilians by the Japanese Imperial Army took place in December 1937 and subsequently. …
In return, some months later, on August 15, the anniversary of the Japanese surrender in 1945, Chinese President Hu Jintao would go to Hiroshima, the first city to experience atomic bombing, and declare the three non-nuclear principles: China will not make a nuclear first strike, will not attack any non-nuclear country and will not export nuclear arms.
It would be extremely heartening to see Japan and China bury their smoldering, decades-old enmity if that were to actually come about, and of great significance for East Asia. The various versions of the script for this reconciliation leaked so far are conflicting in places and have been given lukewarm denials by officials, suggesting this idea is real but the details have not been hammered out. The grand pageantry and important official gestures contemplated are certainly about as good a start as you could want to truly setting the China-Japan relationship on a new, “future-oriented” footing, as it would seem the governments of both countries want to do.
The article also highlights the grumblings from some in the U.S. policy establishment over the general prospect of a Sino-Japanese rapprochement. While it may be disappointing and dismaying for Americans that such an important diplomatic event is brokered without a central role by the U.S. and comes amid a rocky period in the U.S.-Japan relationship, fears of a realignment of Japanese interests away from Washington and towards Beijing seem overblown. I haven’t heard of any reports of the Japanese electorate warming up to authoritarianism; rather, it seems pretty reasonable to merely want your giant, powerful neighbor to effectively end their 60-year old propaganda project of cultivating hatred against you.
