Improved ROK-Japan relations also serve U.S. long-term security interests and appear critical to the revitalization of the U.S.-Japan alliance. In many respects, Korea is the Achilles' heel of the U.S.-Japan security relationship. That alliance has a significant impact on, and can be seriously affected by, Korean Peninsula events.
Of primary importance, Japanese support, including but not limited to unrestricted use of U.S. Japan-based forces and facilities, is crucial to the defense of the ROK in the event of hostilities on the peninsula. The failure of Japan to adequately support any U.S. effort to defend the ROK in the face of North Korean aggression could be an alliance breaker. U.S. public support for the alliance would quickly evaporate and it is doubtful the alliance could be sustained.
Until Prime Minister Hashimoto's ground-breaking April 1996 summit meeting in Tokyo with President Clinton, Japan had been reluctant even to discuss what "adequate support" would entail, much less make commitments regarding the nature and scope of support it would agree to provide.
In reality, one would anticipate very little in the way of direct combat support from Japan in the event of a Korean contingency, beyond surveillance and sea lane security and defense of U.S. bases and facilities in Japan. But it is important, in peacetime, to begin to define these roles and develop procedures for overcoming the obstacles to performing them; a mature relationship requires nothing less.
The April 1996 Clinton-Hashimoto Joint Declaration at least opens the door for such discussions. The joint declaration identified close bilateral defense cooperation as a "central element" in the security relationship, not just for the defense of Japan but for "dealing with situations that may emerge in the areas surrounding Japan and which will have an important influence on the peace and security of Japan." Both leaders made it clear that they were talking about Korean Peninsula contingencies.
The joint declaration was generally well-received in the United States and Japan and positively endorsed throughout most of the Asia-Pacific region. However, many in Korea have expressed concern about the U.S. desire for an "expanded Japanese regional security role." These Koreans fear (incorrectly) that the joint declaration foreshadows Japanese remilitarization.
As a result, the Seoul government has offered only a lukewarm endorsement of the accord, with the caveat that it should be implemented with an eye toward "contributing to peace and security on the Korean Peninsula." Others in the ROK, and especially the ROK media, have been much more suspicious regarding what "appropriate roles" the United States will ask Japan to play.
One extreme, but not atypical concern, expressed by a leading ROK Japan specialist, is that the United States may have "deputized part of its role as policeman in the region to Japan." While not objecting to the pact per se, this specialist feared the "momentum" such an action created toward "the unshackling of devices put in place to prevent (Japan) from becoming a military power."
Such Korean concerns about the joint declaration seem ironic since it has as one of its primary objectives (at least in the eyes of U.S. military planners), improving U.S. ability to defend Korea, with appropriate (limited) Japanese support. Japanese remilitarization or a Japanese offensive military role are the furthest things from U.S. and Japanese defense planners' minds. Hashimoto, in particular, has gone to great lengths to assure Japan's neighbors of this fact.
Nonetheless, Japan clearly has a long way to go before overcoming deep-seated historical ROK suspicions about its future intentions. This is especially true since the Chinese, for their own strategic reasons, are working hard to keep anti-Japanese sentiments alive in Korea - witness the heavy anti-Japanese theme prevalent during Chinese President Jiang Zemin's visit to Seoul last fall.
The Hashimoto-Kim summit can be an important step in putting relations between Japan and Korea on a more positive track. While ostensibly arranged to permit both leaders to discuss how best to arrange for the co-hosting of the 2002 World Cup, both leaders should issue a strong endorsement of the U.S.-Japan Joint Declaration as an important contribution to peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula and elsewhere in Asia.
The two leaders should seize this opportunity to educate their respective publics on the importance of improved ROK-Japan relations and the role the U.S.-Japan security alliance plays in safeguarding peninsula security.