Defenders of Japan
Defenders of Japan

Author: Garren Mulloy

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2021-12-01

Total Pages: 259

ISBN-13: 0197644074

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Japan's post-war armed forces are a paradox, both embarrassing remnants of the past and valuable repositories of experience. This book charts the development of the Japan Self-Defense Forces (JSDF) from 1954 as both unorthodox military institutions and servants of a civil society that decries militarism. Investigating JSDF contributions to Japanese and global security, the evolution of such contributions during and after the Cold War, and their possible reconfiguration for Japan's security needs ahead, Garren Mulloy offers insight into the Forces' past, present and future. He explores the characteristics and contradictions of Japanese policy, including novel approaches in response to an increasingly assertive China, the latent threat of North Korea and contributory pressure from the US. Though the American alliance remains the core of Japanese security, new partnerships and international overtures will also shape the Forces' place in Prime Minister Abe's new vision of 'proactive contributions to peace'. Defenders of Japan deconstructs how the JSDF have adapted and will continue to adapt within domestic norms, caught between unresolved legacies of Japan's imperial past and a dynamically shifting balance of future global power.

Cooperative Security in Northeast Asia
Cooperative Security in Northeast Asia

Author: R. Mark Bean

Publisher:

Published: 1990

Total Pages: 224

ISBN-13:

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Relations among China, Japan, and South Korea, as well as Soviet and American interests in Northeast Asia provide the basic material for this study. Traces the historical relations through to the present. Points out cultural links between Chinese, Japanese, and Koreans. A reasoned, balanced examination of relationships in a region whose future is increasingly important to America's own security. Bibliography and index.

China and the Major Powers in East Asia
China and the Major Powers in East Asia

Author: A. Doak Barnett

Publisher: Brookings Institution Press

Published: 2001-09-19

Total Pages: 516

ISBN-13: 9780815723059

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The foreign policy of the People's Republic of China has been dominated in recent decades by the problems of dealing with the other major powers in East Asia. Although many ideological, political, and economic aims have shaped particular Chinese policies, Peking's dominant concern has been national security. Since the late 1960s, its leaders have viewed the Soviet Union as the primary threat to China and have pursued a distinctive, Maoist, balance-of-power strategy against it. China's post-Mao leaders continue to give priority to strategic considerations and the problems of relations with the other major powers. It cannot be assumed, however, that they will simply continue past policies. The recent changes both within China and in the broad pattern of international relations in East Asia have created a new situation. In this study, A. Doak Barnett analyzes in detail China's bilateral relations with the Soviet Union, Japan, and the United States. He also examines the changing nature of the four-power relationship in East Asia. On this basis, he discusses possible future trends in Chinese policy and the prospects for achieving a more stable regional equilibrium.

At the Edge of the Nation
At the Edge of the Nation

Author: Paul B. Richardson

Publisher: University of Hawaii Press

Published: 2018-06-30

Total Pages: 265

ISBN-13: 0824872622

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Debates over the remote and beguiling Southern Kuril Islands have revealed a kaleidoscope of divergent and contradictory ideas, convictions, and beliefs on what constitutes the “national” identity of post-Soviet Russia. Forming part of an archipelago stretching from Kamchatka to Hokkaido, administered by Russia but claimed by Japan, these disputed islands offer new perspectives on the ways in which territorial visions of the nation are refracted, inverted, and remade in a myriad of different ways. At the Edge of the Nation provides a unique account of how the Southern Kurils have shaped the parameters of the Russian state and framed debates on the politics of identity in the post-Soviet era. By shifting the debate beyond a proliferation of Eurocentric and Moscow-focused writings, Paul B. Richardson reveals broad alternatives and possibilities for Russian identity in Asia. After the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, when Russia was suffering the fragmentation of empire and a sudden decline in its international standing, these disputed islands became symbolic of a much larger debate on self-image, nationalism, national space, and Russia’s place in world politics. When viewed through the prism of the Southern Kurils, ideas associated with the “border,” “state,” and “nation” become destabilized, uncovering new insights into state-society relations in modern Russia. At the Edge of the Nation explores how disparate groups of political elites have attempted to use these islands to negotiate enduring tensions within Russia’s identity, and traces how the destiny of these isolated yet evocative islands became irrecoverably bound to the destiny of Russia itself.

Chang Ch’un-ch’iao and Shanghai’s January Revolution
Chang Ch’un-ch’iao and Shanghai’s January Revolution

Author: Andrew G. Walder

Publisher: U OF M CENTER FOR CHINESE STUDIES

Published: 2021-01-19

Total Pages: 165

ISBN-13: 0472038257

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Shanghai’s January Revolution was a highly visible and, by all accounts, crucially important event in China’s Cultural Revolution. Its occurrence, along with the subsequent attempt to establish a “commune” form of municipal government, has greatly shaped our understanding both of the goals originally envisaged for the Cultural Revolution by its leaders and of the political positions held by the new corps of Party leaders thrust upward during its course—most notably Chang Ch’un ch’iao. At this interpretive level, the events in Shanghai seem to embody in microcosm the issues and conflicts in Chinese politics during the Cultural Revolution as a whole, while at the same time shaping our conception of what these larger issues and conflicts were. At the more general, theoretical level, however, the events in Shanghai provide us with an unusual opportunity (thanks to Red Guard raids on Party offices) to view the internal workings of the Party organization under a period of stress and to observe unrestrained interest group formation and mass political conflict through the press accounts provided by these unofficial groups themselves. The January Revolution thus provides us with an opportunity to develop better our more abstract, theoretical understanding of the functioning of the Chinese political system and the dynamics of the social system in which it operates. [1]

The Soviet Navy
The Soviet Navy

Author: Bruce W. Watson

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2020-01-09

Total Pages: 364

ISBN-13: 1000305759

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Since Admiral Sergei G. Gorshkov was appointed to the office of commander in chief of the Soviet Navy in 1956, the Soviet Union has made a massive investment in naval construction, training, and operations. As a result, the Soviet Navy has grown from a coastal defense force to one of the world's two strongest navies. This book offers a detailed assessment of every major aspect of the Soviet Navy, from fleet structure and training facilities to command and control procedures and warfare and intelligence collection capabilities.