Abstract
East Asia is today one of the most economically dynamic regions in the world, the region which provides both a competitive edge and an economic challenge to the West. East Asia is becoming the world’s most productive region whose goods, technology, and services are outcompeting the West in many instances.1 East Asia, however, is also a conflict-ridden region, as subsequent discussion in this book will amply demonstrate. It is a region heavily armed militarily, a region where the interests of four major world powers—the United States, the Soviet Union, China, and Japan—converge and crisscross. The nuclear buildup in the Soviet Far East has accelerated in the recent decade, thereby posing serious policy dilemmas for the United States and its allies in Asia.2
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Notes
See, for example, Roy Hofheinz, Jr., and Kent E. Calder, The Eastasia Edge (New York: Basic Books, 1982).
Richard H. Solomon and Masataka Kosaka, eds., The Soviet Far East Military Buildup: Nuclear Dilemmas and Asian Security (Dover, Mass.: Auburn House Publishing Co., 1986).
Michael H. Armacost, “The Asia-Pacific Region: A Forward Look,” U.S. Department of State, Current Policy, No. 653, 29 January 1985. See also Gaston J. Sigur, Jr., “U.S. and East Asia-Pacific Relations: The Challenges Ahead,” U.S. Department of State, Current Policy, No. 859, 14 July 1986.
George P. Shultz, “Challenges Facing the U.S. and ASEAN,” U.S. Department of State, Current Policy, No. 597, 13 July 1984. See also George P. Shultz, “Pacific Tides Are Rising,” address to the World Affairs Council of Northern California in San Francisco on 5 March 1983; George P. Shultz, “The U.S. and ASEAN: Partners for Peace and Development,” U.S. Department of State, Current Policy, No. 722, 12 July 1985.
T. B. Millar, “Introduction: Asia in the Global Balance,” in Donald Hugh McMillen, ed., Asian Perspectives on International Security (London: Macmillan, 1964), p.3.
Ibid., p. 7.
Ibid., pp. 5–6.
For details, see Young Whan Kihl and Lawrence E. Grinter, “New Security Realities in the Asian-Pacific,” in Young Whan Kihl and Lawrence E. Grinter, eds., Asian-Pacific Security: Emerging Challenges and Responses (Boulder, Colo.: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1986), pp. 4–6. See also Alan D. Romberg, “New Stirrings in Asia,” Foreign Affairs, Vol. 64, No. 3 (1986), pp. 517.
Solomon and Kosaka, eds., The Soviet Far East Military Buildup, p. 272; Harry Gelman, “The Soviet Far East Military Buildup: Motives and Prospects,” ibid., pp. 41–42.
Solomon and Kosaka, eds., ibid., p. 272; Kihl and Grinter, eds., Asian-Pacific Security, pp. 4, 54.
The notion of a Soviet “comeback” in Asia is from Donald Zagoria. See Donald Zagoria, ed., Soviet Policy in East Asia (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1982). See also his “The USSR and Asia in 1985: The First Year of Gorbachev,” Asian Survey, Vol. 26, No. 1 (January 1986), pp. 15–29, and Romberg, “New Stirrings in Asia,” op. cit., pp. 525–526.
This material draws on Lawrence E. Grinter, “The United States in East Asia: Coping with the Soviet Build Up and Alliance Dilemmas,” in Kihl and Grinter, eds., Asian-Pacific Security. See also Secretary of Defense Caspar W. Weinberger, “The Five Pillars of Our Defense Policy in East Asia and the Pacific,” Asia-Pacific Defense Forum, Vol. 9, No. 3 (Winter 1984–85), pp. 2–8.
With about 160,000 U.S. combat forces on shore and afloat in the region, only Brunei, Singapore, Laos, Kampuchea, Malaysia, New Zealand, and Australia have fewer forces in East Asia. See The Military Balance, 1984–1985, as reprinted in Pacific Defense Reporter, 1985 Annual Reference Edition (December 1984–January 1985), pp. 137–147. The 160,000 U.S. combat, or combat support, troops in the Asian-Pacific area are composed mainly of Army divisions in Korea and Hawaii, a Marine division and brigade in Okinawa and Hawaii, Seventh Fleet assets, and U.S. Air Force strategic and tactical fighter squadrons. See Caspar W. Weinberger, Annual Report to the Congress, Fiscal Year 1986 (Washington, D.C.: GPO, 4 February 1985), pp. 237–240.
See, for example, Zhang Jia-Lin, “The New Romanticism in the Reagan Administration’s Asian Policy: Illusions and Reality,” Asian Survey, Vol. 24, 10 November (October 1984), pp. 1008–1009.
In particular, see Alexander M. Haig, Jr., Caveat: Realism, Reagan, and Foreign Policy (New York: Macmillan, 1984), pp. 194–217.
It is also obvious, however, that neither side will be taken for granted as, for example, the thorny issues of ship visits, Taiwan, and abortion policy indicate. See Richard Baum, “China in 1985: The Greening of the Revolution,” Asian Survey, Vol. 26, No. 1 (January 1986), pp. 48–51, and Romberg, “New Stirrings in Asia,” op. cit., pp. 526–529.
Prime Minister Nakasone, while working to eliminate the 1 percent of GNP defense expenditure ceiling, continues to be blocked by LDP senior leaders and the inertia of public opinion. Susan J. Pharr, “Japan in 1985: The Nakasone Era Peaks,” Asian Survey, Vol. 26, No. 1 (January, 1986), p. 61.
Frank Langdon, “Japan and North America,” in Robert S. Ozaki and Walter Arnold, eds., Japan’s Foreign Relations (Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1985), p. 29.
Japanese Defense Agency (JDA), Defense of Japan, 1984 (Tokyo: Japan Times, 1984), pp. 31–37, and JDA, Defense of Japan, 1985 (Tokyo: Japan Times, 1985), pp. 24–32.
Tai Sung An, North Korea in Transition: From Dictatorship to Dynasty (London: Greenwood, 1983), p. 81, and C. I. Eugene Kim, “Civil-Military Relations in the Two Koreas,” Armed Forces and Society, Vol. 11, No. 1 (Fall 1984), p. 12. See also The Military Balance, 1985–1986 (London: International Institute for Strategic Studies, August 1985), pp. 126–127.
See C. I. Eugene Kim, “South Korea in 1985: An Eventual Year Amidst Uncertainty,” Asian Survey, Vol. 26, No. 1 (January 1986), pp. 67–72.
For background, see Young Whan Kihl, Politics and Policies in Divided Korea: Regimes in Contest (Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1984).
Young Whan Kihl, “The ‘Hermit Kingdom’ Turns Outward,” Asian Survey, Vol. 25, No. 1 (January 1985), pp. 65–79, and Young Whan Kihl, “North Korea’s New Pragmatism,” Current History, Vol. 5, No. 510 (April 1986), pp. 164–167, 198.
William J. Duiker, “Vietnam in 1985: Searching for Solution,” Asian Survey, Vol. 26, No. 1 (January 1986), pp. 103–104.
Asia Week, 19 January 1986, pp. 27, 33. See also Michael Eiland, “Cambodia in 1985: From Stalemate to Ambiguity,” Asian Survey, Vol. 26, No. 1 (January 1986), pp. 120–121.
Bradley Hahn, “South-East Asia’s Miniature Naval Arms Race,” Pacific Defence Report, September 1985, p. 22.
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© 1987 Lawrence E. Grinter and Young Whan Kihl
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Grinter, L.E., Kihl, Y.W. (1987). Conflict Patterns in East Asia and the Western Pacific. In: Grinter, L.E., Kihl, Y.W. (eds) East Asian Conflict Zones. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-10053-8_1
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