偵察
From the Japan Defense Agency:
The Japan Defense Agency and the Self-Defense Forces are adding muscle to their defense preparations designed to respond to a hypothetical attack by the PRC’s People’s Liberation Army on, for example, Ishigaki Island or the Senkaku Islands in Okinawa Prefecture. In January, the Ground Self-Defense Force will conduct its first joint remote island defense training with with United States Marine Corps. The Maritime Self-Defense Force will set its hand to developing Advanced Lightweight Torpedos in order to boost its response capabilities toward Chinese submarines.
The G-SDF will dispatch 125 personnel from the Western Army infantry regiment [link] (Sasebo City, Nagasaki Prefecture) to San Diego, CA, from 9 – 27 January. It will conduct reconnaissance training to facilitate landing and information gathering on a remote island that could conceivably be occupied. In addition to studying swim-based reconnaissance at the USMC reconnaissance school, the G-SDF will undergo ground training and acquire know-how for planning on-land assaults that incorporate complex conditions such as climate.
For its part, the SDF has (at least as of 2004, presumably the last year for which finalized records exist) increased the amount of assistance–supplies, equipment, transportation–it gives to the US military:
The number of cases in which the Self-Defense Forces provided supplies or support for the U.S. military more than tripled in fiscal 2004 from the previous year, the Defense Agency said.
The increase stems from a 2004 revision to the acquisition and cross-servicing agreement (ACSA), enabling the SDF to provide such assistance to the U.S. military even during routine training drills.
The agreement was originally intended only for U.N. peacekeeping operations or joint training drills.
But Tokyo and Washington have become increasingly interdependent in terms of military cooperation. In addition, enhancing Japan’s role in logistics support for U.S. troops is part of an interim report on U.S. military realignment.
According to the Defense Agency, the SDF provided goods and services to the U.S. military in response to requests 212 times between April and December 2004.
For all of fiscal 2003, the figure was 67.
BTW, specifically regarding PRC-Japan relations, the latest conflict is over the suicide of a Japanese consul stationed in Shanghai. The Japanese government says Chinese officials pressed him to reveal information about Japan’s policies regarding disputed islands. That incident was not, BTW, a factor in the results of a recent cabinet poll:
Fewer Japanese than ever feel well disposed toward China, with a Cabinet Office survey finding only about one-third of respondents had positive feelings about the country and a record-high 63.4 percent did not, according to the poll released Saturday.
The favorable response toward China fell 5.2 percentage points from the previous survey in 2004 to 32.4 percent, marking its lowest level since such questions were first asked in 1978.
The percentage of respondents who did not have positive feelings about China was up 5.2 percentage points from the 2004 survey, surpassing the 60 percent line for the first time.
A Cabinet Office official commented, “It may have been affected by large-scale anti-Japanese demonstrations across China and disputes between the two nations over the development of gas fields in the East China Sea and other issues.”
The survey was conducted on 3,000 people aged 20 or older nationwide in early to mid-October. The response rate was 58.5 percent.
Concerning Japan-China ties, 71.2 percent, up 10.2 points from last year, said relations were not good, with 19.7 percent, down 8.4 points, saying relations were positive.
Figures for the ROK dropped also, but they remained above 50 percent.
Finally, apropos of nothing: the compound that means “torpedo” is 魚雷 (gyorai: “fish” + “thunder”), which I think is just about the coolest thing ever. Land mines are known as 地雷 (jirai: “earth” + “thunder”).
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Only a Japanese diplomat would commit suicide under diplomatic pressure.
It makes me wonder how much of the story hasn’t come out yet. Does it seem like that to you, too? Maybe he was getting conflicting orders from different superiors about how to deal with the Chinese, or something? After all, suicide is considered an honorable thing to do if you’ve disgraced yourself, but Japanese people who are just under plain old pressure can have truly astonishing reserves of grit and strength.
Oh, and Happy New Year to you and the family, Zak.
Happy new year to you, too.
And, as for grit under pressure, although I agree with you that some few Japanese people are capable of displaying such grit, I think the general trend is the exact opposite.
Here’s an old post of mine:
old post of mine that is relevant.
Well, when societies get rich, that’s what happens. One thing I find surprising is that the diplomat in question reacted that way to someone who was NON-Japanese. It’s one thing to accept bullying from your in-group, but outsiders have conventionally been a different matter.
I don’t understand your point about societies getting rich. The US is just as rich as Japan, and hasn’t gone through the same changes. The US has other things wrong with it, but certainly not the succeptibility to bullying we’re dealing with here.
Oh, yeah, I guess I should have made that clearer. What I meant was that, while I think everything you were observing was pretty accurate, I don’t know that framing things in terms of responses to bullies is the most helpful approach, and I don’t know that what you’re talking about is really a change.
After the War, Japan needed rebuilding. There was a national project that everyone could feel good about and that produced obvious and almost immediate returns. Now that Japan is rich, people see less and less reason to work themselves to death for the greater glory of the company…or just to push themselves in general. Some of that is probably just the laziness that comes with affluence, but part of it also is that there’s a lot that Japan just no longer has to worry about because it’s not a war-ravaged country anymore.
I know that the non-confrontational response to bullying didn’t just start out of nowhere after the War, but the need for lots of workers who could divide big projects into lots of tedious little jobs without complaining certainly helped to strengthen the imperative to maintain social harmony. People who were being trained to be interchangeable parts in the Japan machine didn’t stand up to bullies in school because it would mean sticking out further. And once they had jobs…well, Japan was becoming so rich so fast, they probably figured, what’s an extra 1000000 yen or so from the municipal coffers to keep some uncouth jerk quiet? People weren’t taught to stand up for themselves, and they didn’t have to because there was enough to go around.
See what I mean? I’m not sure when you’re saying Japanese people used to have a spine, but the sokaiya problem is hardly new, and neither are school problems with bullies that spiral out of control because the teachers don’t do anything about them, so I don’t think you can really say that those things have changed much. Not that that makes them unworthy of criticism. (Grisly murders by schoolkids, unlike suicides, do seem to be a post-Bubble phenomenon, though, if my understanding is correct.)