1st Edition

Negotiating the U.S.–Japan Alliance Japan Confidential

By Yukinori Komine Copyright 2017
    280 Pages
    by Routledge

    280 Pages
    by Routledge

    In recent years, the U.S.–Japan alliance has marked several anniversaries, including 40 years since the 1969 decision on the reversion of Okinawa. These occasions have provided crucial opportunities to reassess the continuing significance of U.S.–Japan security and diplomatic relations, prompting this investigation into major issues in negotiations between the two countries.

    This book is the first comprehensive and comparative analysis of the U.S. and Japanese foreign policy formulation and implementation processes from 1961 to 1978, which also explores the long-term strategic significance of the U.S. deterrence in East Asia. It is based on numerous declassified and previously unused U.S. and Japanese documents, oral histories, and the author’s interviews with former officials. The book traces the origins of contemporary security and diplomatic issues back to the 1961–1978 U.S.–Japan negotiations involving secret arrangements in the reversion of Okinawa, Japan’s defense build-up, including the question of Japan’s nuclear option, and U.S.–Japan defense cooperation. Through a systematic assessment of the behind-the-scenes discussions, Dr Yukinori Komine demonstrates that external security calculations were consistently primary factors in U.S.–Japan relations. The book concludes by making policy-relevant suggestions, important for the "Pacific Century".

    This book offers crucial contributions to the ongoing debate regarding the increasing need for greater transparency and burden-sharing in the U.S.–Japan alliance. It will appeal to scholars and students of International Relations of the Asia-Pacific region, East Asia–U.S. relations, U.S. Politics and Japanese Politics, as well as Foreign Policy.

    Introduction

    Part I. The Foundations of U.S.-Japan Security Arrangements

    1. The Kennedy-Reischauer Line, 1961-1963

    2. The Vietnam War and the U.S.-Japan Alliance, 1964-1968

    Part II. Secrecy in the U.S.-Japan Alliance

    3. U.S. Foreign Policy Formulation

    4. Japanese Foreign Policy Formulation

    5. U.S.-Japan Negotiations

    6. The November 1969 U.S.-Japan Summit

    Part III. Where is Japan Heading?

    7. Japan’s Defense Build-up

    8. Impact of U.S. Rapprochement with China on the U.S.-Japan Alliance

    9. The U.S.-Japan Defense Cooperation

    Conclusion

    Biography

    Yukinori Komine, PhD, is an Associate in Research of the Edwin O. Reischauer Institute of Japanese Studies at Harvard University USA and an Associate Professor of International Relations at the School of Security and Global Studies in American Public University. He is the author of Secrecy in US Foreign Policy: Nixon, Kissinger and the Rapprochement with China (2008).

    "This book is essential reading for anyone interested in postwar U.S.–Japan relations. Meticulously researched from Japanese and English-language sources, many only recently declassified, it greatly enhances our understanding of events during the critical and sometimes tumultuous period of the 1960s and 1970s that have continuing effects on both nations to this day. The organization is solid, and the explanations are clear and lucid of complex diplomatic, military, and political issues making it easily accessible to a general audience." - Steve Rabson, Brown University, USA

    "Dr Komine’s book sheds light anew on the evolution of the U.S.–Japan security relations during the cold war era from 1961 to 1978. Using de-classified diplomatic documents from Japan and the U.S, this book vividly explains how the two countries’ security cooperation had been evolved after the revision of mutual security treaty in 1960. It is useful to understand in depth not only the development of the U.S.–Japan security relations but also the overall security environment of the East Asia surrounding Korean peninsula during the cold war era." - Park Young-June, Korea National Defense University

    "Negotiating the U.S.–Japan Alliance is an impressive work of political archaeology. The author spent countless hours in archives from Okinawa to Washington, uncovering a number of otherwise unknown documents. These nuggets alone are eye-opening. But Yuki Komine also applies a thoughtful analysis to his findings, showing how the U.S. has been able to win concessions on contentious issues like the reintroduction of nuclear weapons into Japan. The reader ends up with a stronger understanding of this bilateral relationship." - Walter Hatch, Colby College, USA