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The debate started earlier this week when a kingpin of Japan's ruling Liberal Democratic Party said that the country could eventually become "a Chinese province." In a speech in Japan's third-largest city Nagoya Monday, the LDP's policy research council chairman Shoichi Nakagawa said that China's military expenditure "is going up 15 percent, 18 percent each year. If in 15 years' time something happens over Taiwan, (Japan) could become one of China's provinces."
Nakagawa argued that "China does not account for research and development or imported weapons in its military budget," and added that "if Japan is to prosper in peace, this issue cannot be avoided."
He later told reporters that if Taiwan comes under direct Chinese rule, then Japan may be next, as the country seeks to expand its power across East Asia, as reported by a number of Japanese media outlets.
Japan's official defense spending is estimated at $42 billion, while China's official budget is said to be $35 billion, but many analysts argue that Chinese spending is significantly higher. Indeed, U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney recently said that China's military build-up and in particular, last month's testing of anti-satellite weapons is "not consistent with China's stated goal of peaceful rise."
For its part, according to Jiji Press, China's Foreign Ministry Spokesman Qin Gang said that "Japan is a smaller country both in terms of population and territorial size, and yet it has a huge military budget, as it continues to scream about the Chinese threat. I think everyone is finding it strange," and added that China too wants Japan to be more transparent about its military spending.
With these differences, hostility over military capabilities is only likely to aggravate tensions between the two countries even as they remain mostly united in their stand against North Korea. While China has become more openly hostile toward Japan over the past few years as protesters attack the Japanese embassy and consulates in China, Japan too has seen a rise in nationalism recently.
Japan's political relations with neighboring countries, most notably South Korea and China, have been uneasy at times, particularly in light of the country's colonial past until the end of World War II, even as economic ties among the three nations have become increasingly tighter.
But while Japanese leaders in the past have tried to play down the country's history as an aggressor, many leading politicians have recently been playing the nationalist card and have garnered considerable support for it, Nakagawa being one of them. Other lawmakers too have been riding the wave of rising nationalism, including defense minister Fumio Kyuma, who last week declined to meet with Cheney during his Tokyo visit, in a move which many Japanese commentators saw as his way to snub the United States over its Iraq policy.
In a country where singing the national anthem was banned at public events until a decade ago in an effort to shed its militaristic past, Japan is no longer afraid of expressing national pride or promoting its national identity. The question remains, however, whether rapidly rising China and economic giant Japan will be able to resolve any tensions between them through diplomatic means, rather than resorting to an arms race.
Speaking to reporters at his residence Tuesday evening, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe pointed out that "in the past, we used to talk about how Japan would be a U.S. state, the 51st state. I don't think there's much meaning in debating about just one part of a speech."
