The results of the US presidential race 2016 might become a formidable challenge for the US-Japanese Alliance. It concerns not only the bilateral relations of the allies in the field of defense enshrined in a number of agreements, including the 1960 Treaty of Mutual Cooperation and Security, but their cooperation in other domains.
In a number of its previous articles, NEO remarked that Japan had been “keeping a wary eye” on Donald Trump from the first days of the presidential race. In fact, strong pronouncements made by the candidate for President of the United States (Japan’s key ally) were giving Japan good reasons to become increasingly alert.
Donald Trump’s key statement “America first” (with all its implications, including in the fields of economy and defense), being a response to the demands of the American people to shift the focus from the foreign political squabbles to increased domestic affairs, had taken the charming “signature smile” off the Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s face and not once.
Unlike Barak Obama, who was urging to enter into the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), Donald Trump strongly believes that NAFTA (the North American Free Trade Agreement), which he sees as being a nuisance, is all America can handle. Mr. Trump’s position on the issue of defense is pretty straightforward, as well: if European and Japanese politicians are reluctant to pay for their own defense, the US should withdraw its troops from their territories.
Despite the US presidential debates resembled some sort of an entertainment show, the possibility of the US pursuing such political trends in the future was grim enough to send shivers down the spines of the European and Japanese establishments.
Besides, PM Abe had to exert a lot of effort to overcome the resistance of his opponents protesting Japan’s participation in TPP. It took many years for the TPP participants to resolve all the controversial issues. Finally, in October 2015, 12 TPP participants signed statutory documents of the new organization, which are now awaiting for ratification.
But all the troubles will be for nothing if the key participant of the project decides to pull out of the deal. Since the position of the US on TPP remains unclear, Japanese government decided to debate TPP ratification at an extraordinary session of the Parliament rather than wait till the next ordinary session, which is usually held anywhere between January and July. Japan apparently did it in hope that Hillary Clinton, who is somewhat sympathetic with the idea of TPP, would take office.
On November 10, Japan’s lower house ratified the draft law on TPP. In accordance with the effective Japanese legislation, its upper house has 30 days to consider a draft law. If for some reason it fails to do so, the draft law will become effective by default.
But now, after the victory of Donald Trump in the presidential race and of the Republican Party in the congress election, TPP will transform into a long pending project (in the best-case scenario). There is a slim hope that Barack Obama will try to get the current Congress to ratify TPP in the two remaining months of his presidency. This is highly unlikely, though.
It is a known fact that promises made during election campaigns usually have little value. The current situation in the United States can, however, be characterized by an increased involvement of those strata of the American society, which had remained indifferent to the affairs of the country’s elite.
The American “laborers,” whose strong support has, basically, brought Trump to power, will most likely express their discontent if Trump decides to make drastic changes to his election campaign program, especially to his economic platform. This shift in the domestic political situation will, for the first time in decades, “tie hands” of the newly elected American leadership.
Donald Trump’s escapades of the type “take care of your defense and, if necessary, develop nuclear weapons yourself” have been stirring angst in the ranks of Japanese leadership, as well.
Though this message did not come as a total surprise for the Japanese elite planning the future of their country, it came at an inappropriate time. It is especially true for the issue with nuclear weapons, which was previously discussed in NEO.
Readers have to keep in mind that one of the key objectives of the Japanese foreign policy is to derive maximum benefit while Japan is still surviving the image of a “peaceful country, third largest global economy opposing nuclear weapons, one of the main UN patrons aiding developing countries.” And Japan will continue living up to this image, including for the sake of obtaining the status of a permanent member in the future “restructured” UN Security Council.
However, this image has been fading. The process began in the middle of the last decade when Donald Trump was not even in the picture. One of the major “milestones” in this process was reached last fall, when Japanese Parliament passed a raft of defense laws.
Today, i.e. a year later, the country’s “upgraded” defense legislation is being put to test: Japan is conducting large-scale military exercises in alliance with the US and is getting ready to participate in the UN peacekeeping mission in South Sudan.
If the US really turns into actions Donald Trump’s neo-isolationism rhetoric voiced during his election campaign, the image of a “peaceful Japan” will be ruined much faster. Let us hope that Japan at least will not end up developing its own nuclear weapons as a result.
But, such acceleration would contradict the “sequence of steps” developed by the Japanese elite: from permanent membership in the UN Security Council to further “normalization” of Japan through the abolition of Art.9 of the post-war 1947 Constitution.
Both PM Abe’s congratulatory message to Donald Trump and first commentaries made by major Japanese newspapers on the occasion demonstrated that Japan has mixed feelings about Donald Trump’s victory and that it is still looking to “further strengthen the US-Japanese alliance for the good of the Asia-Pacific Region.”
As for the Russia-Japan relations, Russia will, most probably, demonstrate a higher degree of uncertainty in the upcoming talks of the Russian President and the Prime Minister of Japan, not least because during PM Abe’s visit to New York, where he attended a regular session of the United Nations General Assembly, he met with Hillary Clinton, but not with Donald Trump, to discuss Japan’s relations with Russia.
And the “American factor” will have to be accounted for in the Russia-Japan negotiations in any case.
A summit between Russia and Japan is tentatively scheduled for this year, which means that the newly elected President of the United States will not have enough time to fully reshape the US foreign policy.
Same is true for Japan, which will need more time to modify its responses to the new (and so far hypothetical) trends in the US foreign policy.
What we will most likely see in the upcoming weeks is an intensified mutual probing of positions on the key aspects of international situation and bilateral relations between Donald Trump’s entourage and the US allies, partners and opponents.
And the fate of the US-Japanese alliance will be among the first and central issues subject to such probing.
Vladimir Terekhov, expert on the Asia-Pacific Region, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook.”
