THE UNITED STATES AND JAPAN IN GLOBAL CONTEXT: 2020 THE EDWIN O. REISCHAUER CENTER FOR EAST ASIAN STUDIES Established in 1984, with the explicit support of the Reischauer family, the Edwin O. Reischauer Center for East Asian Studies at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) actively supports the research and study of trans-Pacific and intra-Asian relations to advance mutual understanding between Northeast Asia and the United States. The first Japanese-born and Japanese-speaking U.S. Ambassador to Japan, Edwin O. Reischauer (serv. 1961–66) later served as the center’s Honorary Chair from its founding until 1990. His wife Haru Matsukata Reischauer followed as Honorary Chair from 1991 to 1998. They both exemplified the deep commitment that the Reischauer Center aspires to perpetuate in its scholarly and cultural activities today. Edwin O. Reischauer October 15, 1910 – September 1, 1990 TABLE OF CONTENTS The Year at the Reischauer Center (Dr. Kent E. Calder) 1 Reischauer Center Events 2019-2020 7 Introduction (Dr. William L. Brooks) 13 Cut the Gordian Knot to Resolve the Okinawa Basing Issue (Kyoka Nakayama) 31 Japan’s Evolving Security Policies (Charles Kissling, Michael Kuiper, and Toshi Nakanishi) 57 U.S.-Japan Crisis Cooperation (Neave Denny) 101 The Elusive Goal of Trilateral U.S.- Japan-South Korea Cooperation (Lizhong Yang) 127 Japan-North Korea Relations (Yu Young Kim) 159 Poles Apart: Arctic Policies of the United States and Japan (Madeline Wiltse) 183 Is a Free and Open Indo-Pacific a Strategy or Illusion? (Yu Inagaki) 209 The Abe Doctrine: “Proactive Pacifism” in Security and Diplomacy (Zian He) 235 Japan’s Complex Relationship with Iran Strains U.S. Ties (Amber Murakami-Fester) 263 Can Japan Solve Its Demographic Crisis Before It Is Too Late? (Zhanping Ling) 281 Japan Takes the Lead in Mega-Trade Deals (Guo Chen) 305 Japan’s Economic Statecraft in the Technology Field (Mariko Togashi) 327 Japan Strives to Become a Cultural Export Superpower (Rui Rong) 347 Highlights from Reischauer Center Events 371 THE YEAR AT THE REISCHAUER CENTER Thirty-six years has now passed since the foundation of the Reischauer Center in 1984. The world has changed tremendously, but US-Japan relations remain our core focus, as has been true since the foundation of our Center. As a former student of Edwin O. Reischauer myself, I have always believed that we owe it to his memory, and to the stability of global affairs, to retain that central concern. We are a research institution, located in the capital of the United States, and our central intellectual commitment is to objective, non-partisan policy research. That is the spirit in which this Yearbook—entirely student-produced, and the oldest continuous US-Japan annual publication in the United States, is presented to its readers. The Yearbook is produced under the leadership of an accomplished policy-research scholar, Professor William Brooks. Following his Columbia University Ph.D. and his early teaching career at SAIS, Brooks began what was to become a distinguished U.S. government career, including fifteen years directing translations and in-house research at US Embassy Tokyo. We could not find a finer editor for this Yearbook. Dr. Calder and the Reischauer Policy Research Fellows celebrating the 75th anniversary of the founding of SAIS The Yearbook, however, is only part of the Reischauer Center’s research operation. That also includes a classical scholarly component, in which Coordinator Neave Denny plays an important administrative role, supported by Marina Dickson and, following their term as full-time researchers, Vivian Chen, Sam Frost, and Monica Weller. The classical research dimension of the 1 Center completed a major book and four monographs this year, while sponsoring 33 research- related events. It also engaged quietly in several long-term research projects that will bear fruit in the future. Apart from the MA and MIPP students who prepared this Yearbook in expert fashion, our research staff also included a broad variety of other participants. There were ten Visiting Scholars from academic and professional backgrounds, including several from Japan; five post-graduate Reischauer Policy Research Fellows; four pre-doctoral fellows; and several undergraduate interns. We are deeply grateful for the contributions of all these researchers. Affiliated faculty also participated actively in Reischauer Center seminars, conferences, and working groups. One major development for the Reischauer Center during this past year was the appointment of Ambassador David Shear as Senior Fellow, to complement the continuing senior advisory roles of Ambassador Rust Deming and Dr. William Brooks. Ambassador Shear, a well- known defense specialist with 32 years of diplomatic experience, served as Assistant Secretary of Defense for Asian and Pacific Security Affairs in the US Defense Department under President Barack Obama, following his tour as US Ambassador to Vietnam. Ambassador Shear, himself a SAIS graduate, teaches in the Japan Studies program at SAIS, in addition to his role as Senior Advisor to the Reischauer Center. Ambassador Shear speaking at the Reischauer Center’s annual fall reception 2 On the research side, one major development this past year was the publication of Super Continent: The Logic of Eurasian Integration. Produced with the strong support of our Reischauer Center research team, including Reischauer Fellows Evan Sankey, Rachel Xian, Jonathan Hall- Eastman, and Yuki Numata, as well as PhD candidates Yun Han and Jaehan Park, among others, this volume was published by Stanford University Press in May 2019. My second book exploring the political-economic transformation of the Eurasian continent and the surrounding Indo-Pacific seas, Super Continent, was also published in Japanese translation (November 2019), followed by a publication party hosted by Hungarian Ambassador to Japan, Norbert Palanovics, a former Reischauer Center Visiting Fellow. The book is also scheduled to be published in Chinese and Greek, and received the 2019 Book of the Year in Politics Award from the Financial Times of London. The Japanese translation also received the 2020 Okakura Tenshin Prize of the International Society for the East Asian Community in Japan. Dr. Calder with former Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda and Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Hungary Dr. Norbert Palanovics at the Hungarian Embassy in Japan celebrating “Super Continent’s” publication in Japanese 3 The 33 research events at the Reischauer Center pursued three major themes. The most important, of course, was US-Japan relations. Former US Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Danny Russel set a central, policy-relevant keynote in his Reischauer Memorial Lecture on “The US-Japan Alliance and America First: Coping with the Changing Indo- Pacific”. Other major US-Japan events this past year included participation from myself and David Shear in the Tokyo sixtieth anniversary commemoration of the current US-Japan Security Treaty, keynoted by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in January 2020; as well as a major Reischauer Center conference on US-Japan sea-lane security issues in October 2020, generously supported by the Japan Foundation Center for Global Partnership. During the academic year, the Center sponsored seven individual US-Japan events, including a major US-Japan-Southeast Asia conference, organized by Ambassador Shear. Cybersecurity, Okinawa, and US-Japan trade relations were other major bilateral issues considered, with Reischauer Center Visiting Scholars and researchers from Japan providing important input. A second central area of research focus this past year was the ongoing transformation of the Eurasian continent, with a special focus on the Indo-Pacific region. Indeed, the Reischauer Memorial Lecture by Daniel Russel in November 2019, dealing with the American policy response to emerging strategic challenges within Eurasia, marked the beginning of the Reischauer Center’s new Indo-Pacific Research Initiative. Across the academic year, the Center hosted nine events relating to the Indo-Pacific, including a publication lecture on Super Continent; a dialogue among senior former US diplomats on Afghanistan and East Asia; a seminar on India and Northeast Asian geopolitics; and a major conference on the US, Japan, and Southeast Asia. Dr. Calder and other panelists at the Afghanistan and East Asia dialogue 4 A third research priority for the Reischauer Center this year was “Global Political Cities”. Reischauer Policy Research Fellows Evan Sankey, Rachel Xian, Yuki Numata, Marina Dickson, and Tom Ramage, together with interns Luke Chen and Mizuki Yamamoto, met weekly with Professor Calder in informal seminars, to debate the rising role in international affairs of global cities, including Washington, New York, Tokyo, and Beijing. This research will be published as Global Political Cities: Actors and Arenas for Influence in International Relations, by the Brookings Institution Press, in January 2021. Two-thirds of the way through the 2019-2020 academic year, the COVID-19 pandemic exploded on Washington, D.C., in the course of its meteoric spread around the world. In the middle of March 2020, like most academic institutions worldwide, SAIS went virtual, and we convened the last ten events of our academic year online. Responding to the pandemic challenge, and drawing on the intellectual resources of our parent institution, Johns Hopkins University, the Reischauer Center launched