Courcy’s Intelligence Brief

On 30 August, former finance minister Yoshihiko Noda became Japan’s sixth prime minister in five years.  He was met with a lecture from China, published in the official news agency Xinhua, on how he should conduct himself.  Given the prominence we have been giving to the poor state of China-Japan relations in recent months, and given the extraordinary forthrightness of Xinhua’s commentary, it is worth quoting extensively from the official news agency’s ‘welcoming’ message to Noda.

Xinhua began by saying that the new prime minister “should take concrete and substantial steps to promote [Japan's] relations with China and respect China’s core interests”, adding that his predecessors had managed Japan’s relationship with Beijing “without due respect for China’s core interests and legitimate demands for development, trumpeting a ‘China threat’ theory for ulterior motives”.

Referring to the Japanese-controlled Senkaku Islands, which China calls the Diaoyu Islands, the commentary called on Japan “to show enough respect for China’s national sovereignty and territorial integrity, especially when it comes to matters concerning the Diaoyu Islands, which are an integral part of China’s territory”.  It said that that Beijing is willing to enter joint exploration of resources with Japan, but only “on condition that Tokyo recognizes China’s complete sovereignty over the archipelago”.

On the wider question of China’s military modernization, the commentary said that Japan “should acknowledge China’s legitimate requirement for military modernization to defend its growing national interests”.  On the other hand, it said that Japan should “call off its dangerous practice of invoking China’s rise as an excuse to discard the defence-oriented policy after World War II for its own military expansion”.  The agency ended by saying: “Now the keys to better relations are in the hands of Japan as substantial measures are expected from its new government.”

Nothing about this Chinese welcome to the new Japanese prime minister is comforting, but perhaps the most worrying is that Xinhua openly admitted that disputes between the two countries are “threatening the peace and stability of the region”, yet it acknowledged no fault at all on China’s part or duty to help alleviate the tension.  “Japan has to be blamed”, it said, and Noda (it might as well have said) must kowtow.