I was startled to hear Chinese President Xi
Jingping’s controversial speech of “Asia for Asians” at CICA (Conference on
Interaction and Confidence-Building Measures in Asia) this May (“Chinapresident speaks out on security ties in Asia “; BBC News; 21 May 2014). The
underlying idea of this speech overlaps the Greater East Asia Co-prosperity
Sphere, insisted by wartime Japan. In view of regional concerns with Chinese
maritime expansionism and growing self-assertiveness, Xi’s “Leave Asia for
Asians” speech is understood negatively in the global community. There are so
many points in common between wartime and current Asian powers. Let me talk of
them.
In terms of geopolitics, both wartime Japan
and current China are anti-West. Wartime Japan tried to expel European and
American influence from Asia in the name of decolonization and liberation from
White dominance. However, the Imperial Japan, itself was a colonial empire, and
Asians found no fundamental differences between White sahibs and a Yellow
sahib. Today, China also explores to establish their sphere of influence in
Asia by ousting US presence in the region.
More importantly, both wartime Japan and present
day China are autocracies to defy liberal world order, and exploring to found
an axis against democratic nations. Japan allied with fascist Germany and
Italy, while China plots to make the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, BRICS,
and CICA raise voices against Western democracies. Japan’s wartime axis with
Germany and Italy was not well coordinated for joint strategy and operations,
and China has not made successful axis to stand against the United States and
its democratic allies. Nor do both Asian powers advocate universally acceptable
values for global public interest.
It is quite noteworthy that Asians do not
welcome the rise or advance of both anti-West autocracies. The fall of
Singapore may have impressed Asian people, but when the Allied forces launched
counter offense under Douglas MacArthur and Lord Louis Mountbatten, they did
not fight side by side with Japanese troops to bounce back white sahibs.
Likewise, China’s “Asia for Asians” initiative causes high alert among Asian
neighbors, particularly those having territorial clashes over the East China
and the South China seas. Also, a Asia is politically and culturally diversified,
none of regional organizations will be platforms for Chinese predominance (“Don'tbet on China's 'Asia for Asians only' vision yet”; Strait Times; 30 May 2014).
Today, white ruled colonial empires have gone, and Asian nations shall not be
interested in a Chinese-led Asia to oust American influence.
Rather than well being of Asian nations, both
autocracies are expanding southwards, in quest of natural resource. Wartime
Japan wanted oil, tin, rubber, and other mineral and plantation products in South
East Asia. Today, it is widely understood that China’s territorial claims in
the East China Sea and the South China Sea are based on its quest for oil and
gas in those waters. Their calls for Asian unity to expel the West are strongly
associated with their appetite for natural resource.
Quite ironically, Chinese fishery boats dash
themselves to attack Coast Guard ships of their maritime neighbors to claim Chinese
territorial rights on south sea islands. Attacks like these are pre-modern like
Kamikaze raids to US warships by the Imperial Japan. Is China really a carbon
copy of wartime Japan? Interestingly, Former US Ambassador to the Asian Development
Bank Curtis Chin also compares current Chin to wartime Japan (“Xi Jinping's'Asia for Asians' mantra evokes imperial Japan”; South China Morning Post; 14 July2014).
In view of Asian alert
to China’s aggressive behavior, I have to cast doubt whether China has any
credential to make complaints over Japan’s understanding of wartime history. In
my eyes, it is China that acts unprecedentedly similar ways to those of the
Imperial Japan. China may want to behave as a winner of World War II
continually, but remember the vital point. It is not the Japanese public that lost
the war, but wartime fascism. If China really were to act as a winner of the
war, bear this in mind!
Debate Magazine
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