Phatic Communion has today started a Monday China-watch page. It’s a welcome addition to a good blog. The initial post - an argument that China and Japan risk war over energy, nationalism and offshore energy resources - seems to be a touch over-the-top.
Even if Americans can’t stomach the idea of going to war over resources, it would appear that China and Japan have another focus. Chinese citizens, already irate over Japanese revisionism are treated to a barrage of nationalistic encomiums about China’s growing economic influence in the world, and oil is needed to run that engine. Japan fears the explosive growth in China’s economy. Japan continues to steam ahead on plans to drill in the East China Sea, angering China, and is losing to China in the search for oil abroad.
The East China Sea may become the tipping point between these two nations, and, if so, between China and Japan’s most ardent supporter, the U.S.
Rising tensions and nationalism over energy… certainly! But economic integration, the size of Japan’s self-defense force, and Japan’s pacifist constitution would likely deter any adventurism on either side.
July 6th, 2005 at 4:33 am
Sea of Conflict
Hostilities between the U.S. and China, now largely behind-the-scenes, might reach a tipping-point not because of Taiwan or human rights violations in China or China’s support of such world leaders as Hugo Chavez and Robert Mugabe, but because of oil….
October 26th, 2005 at 1:49 am
Sea of Conflict
Hostilities between the U.S. and China, now largely behind-the-scenes, might reach a tipping-point not because of Taiwan or human rights violations in China or China’s support of such world leaders as Hugo Chavez and Robert Mugabe, but because of oil….