Foreign Correspondence

[Amaunet]

China's proliferation serves to rouse Japan

By ROBYN LIM
Special to The Japan Times

China's support for North Korea has backfired. What would China prefer to see -- a Japan armed with nuclear weapons, or Japan's alliance with the United States strengthened by its participation in missile defense? In Beijing, neither option has much appeal. But in relation to Japan, China has been hoisted with its own petard.

That's because a sea change in Japan's security outlook is being wrought by China's quasi-ally, North Korea. North Korean leader Kim Jong Il is rattling his missiles and bragging that he has nuclear weapons. Not surprisingly, Japan is rapidly abandoning its long-standing delusion that its security problems can be ignored, or left to others to resolve.

No doubt, China would prefer a neutral Japan that it could dominate by virtue of size, proximity and demographic weight. Indeed, immediately after the Cold War, that outcome seemed possible. Many Japanese were inclined to think that "it's all economics now," and thus saw no danger in deferring to China as East Asia's rapidly rising economic power. Moreover, "multilateralism" became the code word for those who urged greater independence from America. That played into Beijing's hands by suggesting that U.S. alliances in East Asia were no longer needed.

At the end of the Cold War, China also benefited from Japan's optimism that nuclear weapons could be abolished. Many countries that had been attracted to nuclear weapons were now abandoning their ambitions. In 1994, for example, Ukraine agreed to give up the nuclear weapons it inherited when the Soviet Union collapsed.

Then in 1995, Japan played an active part in securing the permanent extension of the 1970 Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT), by which signatories pledged not to develop nuclear weapons. The flip side of that agreement was that the five "declared" nuclear-weapon states (United States, Russia, China, Britain and France) were to work toward abolishing their nuclear arsenals.

Few in Japan questioned whether the abolition of nuclear weapons would serve Japan's interests. In fact, the reverse was the case. In the unlikely event that the declared nuclear-weapon states agreed to abandon their arsenals, the U.S. would have abided by its commitments. But how could Japan trust China, a totalitarian state, to do what it pledged to do? After all, the history of arms control is that bad regimes lie and cheat.

Meanwhile, China's proliferation activities continued unabated. That helped usher in the "second nuclear age" after India tested nuclear weapons in 1998, and Pakistan followed. Japan was shocked, although it should not have been. The collapse of the Soviet Union had deprived India of its great power protector, while India was confronted by a rising China that proliferated missile technology to India's archrival Pakistan. For China, such proliferation was a means of containing India. That policy backfired when India sought security, as well as great-power status, in flaunting nuclear weapons.

China also indirectly threatened Japan by proliferating missile technology to North Korea. Worse, we now know that China winked when Pakistan proliferated nuclear technology to North Korea in return for missile technology. And North Korea steadily built up its arsenal of medium-range missiles that threatened Japan. (So did China.) Then in 1998, North Korea tested its long-range Taepodong missile over Japan without warning.

China proliferated to North Korea partly to secure advantage over the U.S. and Japan, with a Taiwan contingency in mind. In a future confrontation with America over Taiwan, Beijing seemed to calculate, China might gain leverage if North Korea precipitated a simultaneous crisis. But China has miscalculated, especially in relation to Japan.

North Korea's provocations are making it easier for Shigeru Ishiba, the head of Japan's Defense Agency, to secure support for participation with the U.S. in the development of missile defenses.

China has long railed against such defenses because they might nullify China's small nuclear arsenal, and would also create a shield behind which Taiwan could be emboldened to declare independence. But in today's Japan, China's complaints cut little ice. Missile defense is nonnuclear and defensive. Most Japanese will vastly prefer that to the development of offensive capabilities such as nuclear weapons.

Thus China's proliferation policies are backfiring in relation to Japan, as they did with India. China has not been able to stop North Korea from behaving in ways that undercut China's own interests. Now the stakes are growing even higher because North Korea's belligerence risks a new Korean war.

The U.S., while continuing to urge diplomatic solutions, cannot tolerate North Korea's acquiring and selling nuclear weapons. The Bush administration keeps the military card on the table because it must. Will China now rein in or overthrow Kim before further miscalculation leads to war?

Robyn Lim is a professor of international relations at Nanzan University, Nagoya.

The Japan Times: May 15, 2004
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