Going all-in on Washington, foolish bet by Tokyo

This is an editorial from China Daily.

The first China-Japan security dialogue in four years, hosted by Japan in Tokyo on Wednesday, was regrettably talk for talk's sake, due to Tokyo choosing to use it as an occasion to lecture Beijing with Washington's textbook, as a report by Reuters indicated.

While the Chinese side wanted to focus on the bilateral aspects that are conducive to regional peace and stability, the Japanese side was intent on parroting Washington's "China threat" narrative — from an "invasion" of Taiwan, support for Russia in the Ukraine crisis to "spy balloons" — which it is using to justify its military buildup.

Fabricating a "threat" from China is what the Japanese militarists did before and during the First Sino-Japanese War in 1894 and Japan's invasion of China in 1931. With its deep entanglement in the region's historical legacy that is still being straightened out, Japan is a country that undoubtedly has a clear knowledge of the Taiwan question being China's internal affair and it being essentially different from the US-orchestrated Ukraine crisis, although it seeks to portray it otherwise to serve its own agenda. Likewise, the Diaoyu Islands in East China Sea belong to China, as stipulated by the Potsdam Proclamation, and have become a dispute only because of the US' intentional mishandling of the issue after the war.

Japan is the only country to have had no qualms in picking up the baton of the US scaremongering about "malicious Chinese surveillance", echoing its depiction of meteorological research blimps as "spy balloons". Given its opportunist all-in with Washington as the means to realize remilitarization, it came as no surprise that almost at the same time as US President Joe Biden visited Kyiv on Monday calling for allies' support to Ukraine, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida announced a further $5.5 billion in financial aid for Ukraine.

Although alienating its two largest neighbors does not serve Japan's interests, it seems recklessly ready to blindly side with the US. It should beware being the EU-style stooge for the US in the Far East.

Tokyo surrendering its autonomy to Washington in order to take advantage of the window of tense Sino-US relations in pursuit of its Japan's remilitarization is narrow-sighted.

It is also doomed to failure, as not only will countries in the region be reluctant to let that happen, but the US will also be wary of allowing one of its guard dogs to bite its keeper. As such, no matter how willing Tokyo is to dance to Washington's tune, it will not raise Japan's status as a respected player on the world stage, but only reveal it as clown making a foolish gamble.