CDR SALAMANDER: Understanding Japan’s Military Expansion.

While Beijing may not be able to get over WWII, almost everyone else is. As the WWII generation is almost gone, so are their ghosts and phobias. In their place, natural and enduring concerns are rising to the surface and exerting themselves.

In the Western Pacific, the rise of China, a society of representative government taking root, nationalism, reliance of the free flow of goods at market prices, and geography—all are shaping modern relationships.

The last few decades’ increasingly positive relationship between Japan and Taiwan is just one manifestation of this growing movement.

Taiwan’s memory of its colonial rule by Japan is, well…complicated…more positive than the Korean-Japanese history. A friend of mine recently moved to Japan. He and his Japanese girlfriend vacationed in Taiwan recently. The one thing he noticed was that without fail, if they were trying to talk to someone who could not speak English, his girlfriend would switch to Japanese and, sure enough, they were off and running. To a person, everyone was happy to meet an American and a Japanese.

I don’t think this is just one or many anecdotal reports.

As both nations face the same primary enemy, that should drive the relationship closer.

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