Just as China's state news agency was berating Japan for its "wild behavior" in joining the US to express their "common strategic objectives" in Taiwan, the news came on Monday that Japanese trade with China jumped 27 percent last year, hitting a record high of US$168 billion.
It was only the latest example of a troubling dynamic in the countries' relations: white hot economics and deep freeze politics.
The joint US-Japan declaration on Taiwan, buried last week in a long, seemingly bland statement of cooperative security objectives, left many Chinese analysts outraged.
"Japan colonized Taiwan for half a century," one Chinese expert based in Tokyo said on Monday, hardly containing his anger. "When Japan talks about Taiwan, we think they have no right to talk."
He asked to remain unidentified because he did not want to publicly criticize Japan.
But others say Japan's mention of Taiwan in its list of goals for a safer Asia was part of a larger effort to stand up to China's expanding power. Japan's growing economic dependence on China would seem to point toward a greater deference from Tokyo.
But political and military affairs have risen in importance in the region, and for Japan's government may now be edging out economic concerns. As a result, many here say, it makes sense for Tokyo to bolster Taiwan, a convenient buffer state that absorbs the military hostility and expansive energy of its rival.
To the east of Taiwan, Japanese islands already feel Chinese pressure: drilling last fall for gas in an area claimed by Japan; a Chinese submarine caught in November trying to slip through Japanese territorial waters; and a continuing effort by China to have a Japanese island declared a rock, a legal strategy that would deprive Japan of thousands of square miles of economic rights.
Discarding the language of diplomacy, Hatsuhisa Takashima, the spokesman for Japan's Foreign Ministry, said in an interview on Monday that the inclusion of Taiwan in the security list was a consequence of these actions. China has been increasing its military budget by 10 percent annually in the past 10 years, said Takashima, whose government is actually cutting its defense spending this year.
Fear of a rising China prompted Hiroyuki Hosoda, the government's chief Cabinet secretary, to ask the EU on Monday to retain its embargo on arm sales to China.
"The sale of advanced weaponry would fuel tensions and is a concern for Japan," he said.
Chinese argue that Japan must adapt to a new reality in Asia. Recalling Japan's occupation of Taiwan and its depredations in China, the Chinese analyst, a graduate of US and Chinese universities, said, "For almost two centuries, Japan had a weak and divided China. Now we have a nearly integrated, strong China. The Japanese are not ready for that."
For Taiwan, the best long-term strategy is to form a democratic alliance to check China. Taiwanese officials note that South Korea recently renewed direct flights by national carriers between Seoul and Taipei, a link broken over a decade ago. And they eagerly endorse the stalled six-party talks on North Korea's nuclear weapons.
"With regards to China, we hope that there is a military encirclement so China will not go for a military adventure as well," Koh Se-kai (
"The United States and Japan announced their interest in the Taiwan Strait issue. We welcome it for it seems to be the first step for such an encirclement," he said.
The Japanese see themselves as moving cautiously. The statement on Taiwan may have set off fire alarms in Chinese newsrooms, but to Japanese eyes it was so subtle that it received light mention on Monday in the Japanese press.
Briefing reporters in Washington on Saturday, Takashima said that in the event of war between Taiwan and China, Japan would limit itself to providing logistical support.
"Surely, Japan would support American action, but we wouldn't join the military action itself -- it is prohibited by the Constitution," he said.
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