COVER STORY • 2

PRoundtable with Shingo Ito, Prof. Yasuhiro Matsuda, Satoshi Morimoto & Masakazu Toyoda

ossible Taiwan War – How
Should Japan Deal with It Under
Intensified US-China Conflict?

By Japan SPOTLIGHT
Participants: Shingo Ito, Senior Researcher of Institute for International Economic Studies, expert on
economic relations between Japan and China, as well as Japan and Taiwan;
Yasuhiro Matsuda, Professor of the University of Tokyo, expert on Taiwan and China;
Satoshi Morimoto, Former Defense Minister, expert on military security;
Moderated by Masakazu Toyoda, Chairman of the Japan Economic Foundation (JEF).
(Online Roundtable on Jan. 20, 2023)
Participants

Shingo ItoProf. Yasuhiro Matsuda

Current Situation of Ukraine War
Toyoda: The Ukraine war has continued for more than one year,
following Russia’s invasion that violated international law. There
have been many victims on both sides. Japan as well as the UnitedStates and some European countries have imposed economic
sanctions on Russia and taken a wide range of measures to support
Ukraine.
Meanwhile, there has been a growing concern about Taiwan for
Asia-Pacific nations including Japan, in the sense that this Russian
attempt to change the status quo by military forces without
consideration for rules could be followed by China. Chinese
President Xi Jinping firmly declared in October 2022 at the 20th
Chinese Communist Party National Meeting that “China must achieve
unification with Taiwan and it is definitely possible.”On the other hand, the US has clarified its policy to support
Taiwan even by use of military force.
How should Japan face this situation? Though Japan is a US ally,
its economic dependency on China has been significantly growing,https://www.jef.or.jp/journal/

Satoshi Morimoto

Masakazu Toyoda

like many other major powers in the world. In this light, if militaryunification with Taiwan by China happens, Japan will face the need
for well-considered plans and preparations for its own survival.
At this critical moment, I would like the experts of this roundtable
to discuss the following three issues: How do you assess the current
Ukraine war? How could this war affect China’s attempt to unite with
Taiwan? And how should Japan deal with the confusion that such an
attempt would cause?
We have three distinguished experts to discuss these issues:
Satoshi Morimoto, a military expert and former Japanese defense
minister; Yasuhiro Matsuda, an expert on Taiwan and China issues
and professor at the University of Tokyo; and Shingo Ito, an expert
on the economic relations between Japan and China as well as Japanand Taiwan, and a senior researcher at the Institute for International
Economic Studies.
Let me start the discussion by asking Mr. Morimoto about the firstissue. Why do you think Russia violated international law and started
a military invasion of Ukraine? What do you think would be thebenefit of this for Russia? When do you think this war will mostJapan SPOTLIGHT • March / April 20239

likely come to an end, and what do the Russian people think about itall?
Morimoto: There is no definitive interpretation of the causes of thisRussia-Ukraine war. I just would like to mention that Russia
continues to maintain a strong grudge toward the US about being
demoted to an ordinary European power by a superpower following
the end of the Cold War between the US and the Soviet Union.
In addition, NATO has been expanding its membership to the East
since the Cold War ended and the territory of its member nations hascome closer to the Russian border. Among Russia’s neighbors, there
are only three non-NATO members: Belarus, Ukraine and Georgia. If
Ukraine joins NATO, Russia will view this as an even greater threat
from NATO. So in this regard, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine can beseen as a military strategy to bolster its national security byintegrating Ukraine into Russia. There is also a false perception in
the depths of the Russian mind that Ukraine was historically part ofRussian territory.
Anyhow, the views of both sides in the war on the territorial issue
differ so much that diplomatic negotiations between them have been
stopped since the fifth meeting for peace promotion on March 29 in
2022. Given that in any further talks for peace the nation which hastaken a military advantage over the other would be the beneficiary,
each of them has been trying to expand its territory by military force
and thus battles have been continuing for a year in the East andSouth of Ukraine, in the Crimean Peninsula and also in Kyiv, theUkrainian capital.
As most commentators on the war can see, neither of them has
ever thought of accepting defeat in diplomatic negotiations. For thetime being, from March to April, to achieve a great military successin a spring offensive, Russia appointed Chief of the General Staff
Valery Gerasimov as overall commander and shook up its militaryleadership, having now mobilized many soldiers to win the final
battle.
A key to this spring offensive, on the Ukrainian side, is military
support from the US and Europe. They want heavy tanks in order togive them an advantage in close combat when tanks can move atease in the melting snow in the spring. A definitive impact would be
provided to them by the German-made super tank Leopard 2.
10 Japan SPOTLIGHT • March / April 2023

Another key weapon is anti-aircraft missiles to counter groundattacks by the Russian air force. The center of the current battle is
the East of Ukraine, but it will be moved to the South. As the Russianarmy has retreated from Kherson, it would be a key to the entire war
for Ukraine if it could regain Zaporizhzhia and move to the South andthe Crimean Peninsula.
It will be difficult to reopen diplomatic negotiations, but the keys tothe future of this war will be the Victory Day in Russia in May and theNATO leaders meeting in July.
There will be two big issues at the NATO leaders meeting. The firstis the membership of Finland and Sweden. At this moment, Turkey
opposes Swedish membership. On this issue, the task will be how toachieve those nations’ membership while managing to maintain theunity of NATO. The other issue is whether NATO members could
unanimously support Ukraine with military forces.
The US and European nations are now divided into two groups.
The first one, including Germany, France and Italy, aims at
maintaining long-term European stability with ingenious
management of cooperation with Russia as much as possible, while
the second, including the US, the United Kingdom and Canada, arethinking about reducing Russia’s military capacity as much as
possible by exhaustive war and turning it into a state that could not
attack a European nation anymore. In this light, Japan, the hostcountry of the G7 meeting, is in a difficult position to achieve acompromise between these two groups.
Furthermore, I think US domestic politics will be another key
factor in the direction of the war. As is known, the US Congress,
which reopened from Jan. 3, 2023, after the November mid-term
elections, now sees the Republicans with a majority of seats in theHouse of Representatives, at 222, while the Democrats hold 212. In
this political situation, right-wing Republicans are now coming backto an “America First” foreign policy by saying they should strengthen
national borders instead of sparing military support for Ukraine andfinancial reconstruction. You cannot expect easily unanimous
support from the US for Ukraine.
As for Russian domestic politics, I think 60-70% of the nation still
support the war started by President Vladimir Putin. This is because
there have been very few ordinary citizens in Russia killed by thewar, even though 80,000 to 100,000 have been killed or injured onboth sides. In Russia, it is soldiers that have been killed in the war.
When the bodies of these Russian soldiers were returned to theirhome country, the union of their mothers protested and objected to
the war, but that was the main sources of opposition.
It is also true that many citizens were afraid of being called up as
soldiers, and last year when the Russian military tried to mobilize
another 300,000 soldiers, around 200,000 tried to escape overseas.
But in 2023, I believe the announcement of the mobilization of anadditional 1.5 million soldiers was made after tightening bordersecurity to prevent such escapes. The weakness of Russia is its
shortage of soldiers, a weakened industrial base and the possibilityof declining logistic support for the war.
On the Ukrainian side, the motivation of the soldiers is not an
issue but the damage suffered by the citizens is extremely serious.
Many Ukrainian citizens have been sacrificed. In spite of this, there is
still strong motivation for fighting among Ukrainians. The issues forthem are how to maintain their soldiers’ military skills and how muchsupport they can gain from the US and European countries.
As a matter of fact, the US had been hesitating to deliver weapons
to Ukraine to enable it to attack Russian territory directly, probably
out of concern that Russia might resort to using tactical nuclear
weapons. The US is thus trying to manage its military support for
Ukraine to avoid such a catastrophe. Ukrainian President Volodymyr
Zelenskyy has been extremely unhappy with US military support andat the end of 2022 he visited the US Congress and asked the US toprovide more weapons and ammunition to Ukraine as they were
shedding blood to protect democracy. I believe this is what the
Ukrainians truly believe.
Anyhow, I am afraid this war will continue for a long time. Someare saying it could finish by the end of 2023, but I do not think so.
The most important thing is for the G7 leaders meeting in May andNATO leaders meeting in July to think about how to achieve acompromise to end this war. How can Japan take a diplomatic
initiative in this work? I believe we must think about how a Japaneseinitiative in these diplomatic efforts could impact relations between
China and Taiwan and what implications it could have for stability in
the Indo-Pacific area.
Toyoda: I would like to ask Mr. Ito about the economic issues. Could

you tell us how the Ukraine war would affect the rest of the world
economy, excluding Ukraine and Russia, and what impacts could be
produced in different regions? I would also like to ask for your viewson the reasons why countries’ responses to economic sanctions
differ. Some countries have joined in the sanctions but some havenot.
Ito: First, the Ukraine war dampened the global economy which wasjust starting to recover from the pandemic. Together with developed
nations’ economic sanctions against Russia, the supply of energy,
food and fertilizers has become restricted, which raised the prices of
those commodities hugely and led to further price hikes on a wide
range of other goods.
Russia is the second-largest producer of natural gas in the worldin 2020 and the third-largest petroleum producer, as well as thelargest wheat producer in the world and the largest exporter of
fertilizers. Ukraine is the largest sunflower oil producer in the world
and one of the major exporters of corns and wheat. Since the major
developed nations have been engaged in large-scale monetaryloosening as well as expanded fiscal expenditures to soften theeconomic damage caused by the pandemic, such active macropolicy measures further raised commodity prices.
With such a significant rise in energy and food prices, the terms oftrade have been greatly worsened, mainly among nations with low
self-sufficiency in energy and food, and this provoked a flow ofnational income in those nations to overseas. Above all, the lowincome or middle-income nations with a high Engel coefficient(proportion of food consumption to total consumption) or a highpercentage of utility costs to disposable income suffer more fromsuch price hikes. Also, not only the Commonwealth of Independent
States (CIS) members but also African nations and Middle East
nations are in general highly dependent upon wheat and corn or
fertilizers provided by Russia and Ukraine.
It is to be noted that with the normalization of extremely loose
monetary policy to modify the damage from the pandemic bycurbing inflation and raising interest rates, for the newly emerging
economies suffering from tremendous external debts there would be
the additional burden of income outflows overseas due to worsening
terms of trade. For example, concerns have arisen about theJapan SPOTLIGHT • March / April 2023

11

reimbursement risk of external debts in nations like Turkey,
Argentine and South Africa. In nations like Egypt, Lebanon, Sri Lanka
and Pakistan, rising inflation caused by high increases in food prices
has provoked political unrest.
Among developed nations, European Union countries are sufferingmost. This is because EU nations’ energy dependency on Russia ishigh and their natural gas supply from Russia became restricted due
to economic sanctions and the destroyed pipeline with Russia. In
2020, for example, 55% of German imports of natural gas camefrom Russia and it is the same situation in Italy. Also in the case of
the EU, Russia occupies a certain share of its market, but in the lightof national security and maintaining international order, it imposed
economic sanctions on Russia and the cost has become enormous.
There has been not a small impact on the Japanese economy.
Inflation has been continuing, initiated by price hikes of food andenergy. With the yen’s depreciation against the US dollar due todiffering monetary policy directions, people are starting to sense a
decline of real income in their daily lives. The yen rate on a customs
declaration basis reached 131 yen to the dollar on average in 2022,
the lowest value since 1998, and with the drastic increase in imports
due to price hikes of fossil fuels, Japan’s trade deficit reachedaround 20 trillion yen, the largest in its history. Since the Ukraine
war, based on these observations, the IMF revised its outlook for real
GDP growth drastically downward for low and middle-income
nations with a low self-sufficiency rate of energy and food, as well as
for the EU and Japan. They lowered their estimated growth of thesecountries by around 1 percentage point after assessing the Ukraine
war impact on their economies.
On the question of different responses to the war, it is developed
nations and regions in general that have joined in economic
sanctions against Russia. To be more specific, these countries andregions are the US, Japan, the EU, the UK, New Zealand, South
Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, Canada, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway,
and Switzerland. Such nations and regions are considering theprevention of further threats to their national security rather than any
damage incurred by economic sanctions. In particular, the EU isafraid of threats to security and the other countries are all ready toaccept the economic cost of sanctions, believing it more important toprotect international norms as stated in the UN Charter.
12 Japan SPOTLIGHT • March / April 2023

However, I need to mention that those countries not joining ineconomic sanctions against Russia do not necessarily all approve of
the Russian invasion. As a matter of fact, on March 2, 2022, in the
UN National Assembly, the resolution of condemnation against
Russia was approved by 141 nations, while only five countries
objected and 35 abstained. So the overwhelming majority supported
the resolution. Many of the nations of what we call the Global South
condemned the Russian invasion as the “use of arms not consistent
with the objectives of the UN Charter” and considered it an
infringement of sovereign rights under international law.
Nonetheless, there are many reasons why so many countries have
not joined in the economic sanctions, and these seem to differ fromcountry to country. First, there is a group of nations that regard the
US and other nations in the West as a threat to their national security
and which have close military cooperation with Russia. Typicalexamples are those that objected to the UN Resolution on March 2,
2022.
Second, there is another group of nations that have purchased
Russian weapons, even though they do not consider the nations of
the West as a threat to their national security. India is one suchnation. It is said that 80% of the nations that objected to or abstainedin the vote in the UN National Assembly on the condemnation
resolution are those that have purchased Russian weapons.
Third, there are countries finding tensions with their neighbors
more imminent and in this regard thinking that decisively worsening
relations with Russia would not be to their advantage. Fourth, in thecase of newly emerging countries, they would find their economies
could be more seriously damaged by retaliation for economic
sanctions and thus they try to protect their economy by balancing
their relations with the major countries.
And fifth, there are cases of Western nations’ former colonies
where a lack of confidence in the West is the reason why they did notjoin economic sanctions against Russia. There are countries in thiscategory where the West supported their authoritarianadministrations in the Cold War and they could only manage to beliberated from such governments with the help of the Soviet Union.
Also there are nations who are resisting the dichotomy ofauthoritarian states versus democratic states. There is such a wide
range of historical contexts and views in the background of the many

countries that condemned Russia for invading Ukraine but whichhave not joined in economic sanctions.
Toyoda: I have a question for Prof. Matsuda on the similarities anddifferences between the Ukraine war and the Taiwan contingency.
Many nations see Ukraine as an independent state, whereas Taiwan
is viewed as a part of China. In this sense, could you clarify how theissue of reuniting Taiwan and China is to be interpreted ininternational law and what would be the legal basis for interpretationof the issue for the US and Japan?
Matsuda: At first glance, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine to try tointegrate it into Russia and China’s possible attempt in the future tounite with Taiwan by use of force resemble each other. These are
identical in the sense that dictatorial nations try to use force torestore their “lost territory”. Thus, our concern about Taiwan coming
under military attack from China has been exacerbated since theoutbreak of the Ukraine war. But though they look similar intuitively,
there are several differences between the two.
First, geographical difference. As Ukraine and Russia areconnected by land, an invasion is easier with a strong army. In thecase of Taiwan and mainland China, there is the more than
100-kilometer wide Taiwan Strait. They used to be both part of the
Qing Dynasty’s territory, but Taiwan was an outlier of Qing and is toolarge to be regarded merely as a remote island.
In addition, Russia and Ukraine were once part of the same
country in the 20th century, namely the Soviet Union, while Taiwan
and mainland China were parts of the territory under the samenation’s rule only from 1945 until 1949 following the Qing’s cedingof Taiwan to Japan in 1895. Thus for more than 120 years, bothpeoples have been educated differently in a different country andunder a different political regime. Even the letters they use for writing
are different. Therefore, they have a rather different cultural identity
from each other and the logic of both nations belonging to “the same
people, the same nation” is increasingly invalid.
China often claims to be “one China” as a principle. This is a threesteps logic, namely, “There is only one China”, “Taiwan is aninalienable part of China” and “the Government of the People’s
Republic of China as the sole legal Government of China”. However,in this logic, “China” and “the People’s Republic of China” do notnecessarily match. Whenever China concludes diplomatic relations
with another country, it refers to Taiwan as “a part of China” or “apart of the People’s Republic of China” and with such remarks tries
to make the issue ambiguous. But most nations do not approve of
Taiwan being a part of the People’s Republic of China, except forfriendly socialist nations such as North Korea.
In the case of the US, it acknowledges the Chinese position that
there is but one China and Taiwan is part of “China”. But this does
not mean that it recognizes that Taiwan is part of China. The US only
“acknowledges” the Chinese position. Other nations such as Canadaor the Philippines use the expression “take note” in response to thisChinese claim.
In the case of Japan, responding to this Chinese claim that Taiwan
is a part of the People’s Republic of China, it officially says that it“fully understands and respects this stand of the Government of thePeople’s Republic of China, and it firmly maintains its stand under
Article 8 of the Potsdam Proclamation.” This is meant to be “theterms of the Cairo Declaration shall be carried out, Formosa (Taiwan)
and the Pescadores (Penghu Islands) shall be restored to the
Republic of China.”
China made a compromise with Japan by having agreed upon thisexpression and signed the Joint Communique of the Government ofJapan and the Government of the People’s Republic of China in
1972. However, with this Japan said that it “firmly maintains its
stand to restore Taiwan and the Penghu Islands to the Republic ofChina” and it did not recognize that Taiwan was a part of China. In a
Diet session, the Japanese government publicly announced that it
did not naturally recognize it.
If Japan approves naturally the Chinese claim that Taiwan is a partof China, it would need to ask China to issue permissions and visas
to maintain economic relations and human exchanges with Taiwan.
The Chinese side as well understood that this issue was not resolved
clearly on the occasion of the normalization of Japan-China
diplomatic relations. However, China has been trying to turn the “oneChina” principle into a fait accompli by repeatedly mentioning thatJapan has approved “one China” principle since 1972.
Similarly, in the UN as well, the “one China” principle has neverbeen approved. In the UN, the right of representation of China has
Japan SPOTLIGHT • March / April 2023

13

been transferred from the government of the Republic of China to thePeople’s Republic of China, but the UN has never decided to approvethat Taiwan is a part of China. Keeping this question unresolved but
repeating its claim that Taiwan must be a part of China, China hascreated a situation where other nations would find it difficult to
oppose it explicitly.
On the question of “peaceful resolution” of Taiwan issue, in thecase of the US, a domestic law, the Taiwan Relations Act, mentions
that normalization of US-China diplomatic relations was achieved
under the “expectation that the future of Taiwan will be determinedby peaceful means”. In other words, it indirectly indicates that use offorce for unification would collapse the premises for normalization of
US-China diplomatic relations. Meanwhile, in the case of Japan, thenForeign Minister Masayoshi Ohira told the Diet, “I think a rivalry
between the People’s Republic of China and Taiwan is basically aChinese domestic issue,” adding “I believe there would be no
possibility of this issue ending in a military conflict.”
But according to former Ambassador to the US Takakazu
Kuriyama’s interpretation, “As long as they talk peacefully about thisissue, it is a Chinese domestic issue,” but “if China attempts toachieve unification with Taiwan by use of force, what we call theliberation of Taiwan by use of forces, this will not be considered as adomestic issue anymore. This is what ‘basically’ in the above
meant.” (Takakazu Kuriyama, “Normalization of Japan-China
Diplomatic Relations”, Waseda Law Journal, Vol. 74, 4-1, 1999).
This is how the US and Japan share the basic view that “peacefulunification would not be a problem but unification by force must be
another story.”In the argument on international law, I think this would be
probably an issue of international humanitarian law. In this law, evenin the case of domestic issues, the slaughter of a nation’s own
people is not allowed. Use of force could kill people and any attempt
to change the status quo by military means is in general not to beallowed by international law.
Another issue is that if a Chinese military attack on Taiwan went
beyond the Taiwan Strait, it would not be as a matter of fact
considered a domestic issue. The Taiwan Strait, for the most part, iswhat we call international waters, excluding territorial waters andcontiguous zone. International waters mainly consist of Exclusive
14 Japan SPOTLIGHT • March / April 2023

Economic Zones (EEZ) and the high seas. In an EEZ, coastal
countries’ rights are limited to sovereign rights to biological andnon-biological resources, and the rights to freedom of navigation or
national security are the same as on and under the high seas. In thislight, China is not allowed to make the Taiwan Strait a battlefield on
its own.
It is physically impossible to achieve unification by force without
turning international waters into a battlefield. For example, in thecase of a blockade of the Taiwan Strait by setting up floating mines
there, some mines could flow into the sea close to Japan. In such away, China’s claim that it is a domestic issue would almost certainly
prevent ships from passing in the seas neighboring Japan. It would
be then impossible to tell Japan not to intervene in a Chinese
domestic issue.
In this regard, the fact that the “importance of peace and stabilityof the Taiwan Strait” was mentioned in the joint statement of the “US
and Japan 2+2 meetings” in 2005 as a common strategic goal andwas repeatedly raised in the “US and Japan 2+2” and also in the
US-Japan leaders’ meeting in 2021 has crucial implications.
Here is to be noted is that Taiwan and the Taiwan Strait are
geographically different concepts. The use of the word “Taiwan” inthe context of the US-Japan alliance would offend China seriously,
but the Taiwan Strait is mostly international waters and Chinese
territorial waters and contiguous zone are limited there. Thus, theemergence of threats to its peace and stability would be an extremely
big concern. By saying that must not be allowed, it is logical that
China should not be allowed to achieve unification with Taiwan byforce under international law.
On the other hand, a legal basis would be needed for the US toprevent China from use of force. In the US Taiwan Relations Act, thegeneral gist of it is that the US shall “maintain the capacity of theUnited States to resist any resort to force or other forms of coercion
that would jeopardize the security, or the social or economic system,of the people on Taiwan” and also that the US shall “provide Taiwan
with arms of a defensive character”. It further suggests that “thePresident is directed to inform the Congress promptly of any threat
to the security or the social or economic system of the people on
Taiwan and any danger to the interests of the United States arising
therefrom. The President and the Congress shall determine, inaccordance with constitutional processes, appropriate action by theUnited States in response to any such danger.”
It is interpreted that “appropriate action” would include anything
appropriate, and thus the law permits the use of force to cope withthe war, if necessary. In this light, China’s military actions are
deterred by the risk of US intervention.
In the US the legal basis for defending Taiwan was changed
around the occasion of normalization of US-China diplomatic
relations in 1979, but in Japan the legal basis for support for the US
military around the time of the establishment of a law of situation inareas surrounding Japan was changed. In the case of a Taiwan
contingency, US military activation to deal with it is assumed.
Meanwhile, the US-Japan Alliance predetermines the area where the
US and Japan could cooperate in military action as the area of “theFar East”. This basically means “in general, the area to the north of
the Philippines and also Japan and its surrounding areas including
the areas under the rule of the Republic of Korea and the Republic ofChina.” This definition remains unchanged even now. In other words,
Taiwan belongs to the area of “the Far East” where the US-Japansecurity alliance is supposed to work.
However, it is to be noted that the Japanese interpretation of thissecurity alliance assumes that US military action is to be “always
taken only as the execution of the right of individual or collective
self-defense allowed by the UN Charter to resist an invasion”.
This means that US military forces were to act for the right ofcollective self-defense to defend their allies including Taiwan when
the US and Taiwan had official diplomatic relations. In this case, it
was assumed that Japan would allow the US army to use its militarybases in Japan after advance talks with the US. However, since 1979
there have been no official diplomatic relations between the US andTaiwan and Taiwan has not been considered an independent state.
The US cannot defend Taiwan legally based on the execution of theright of collective self-defense and its actions must be based on only
its domestic Taiwan Relations Act.
On the other hand, China committed to a policy of “peacefulunification” on the occasion of normalization of US-China diplomatic
relations and thus such a defect in the defense of Taiwan did not
matter for the time being. But the question arose when the Taiwan
Strait war occurred in 1995-1996 whether it was necessary to revise

the legal basis for Japanese support for the US military in the
defense of Taiwan. In the “Guidelines for Japan-US Defense
Cooperation” in 1997 and the law of situation in areas surrounding
Japan in 1999, a contingency in areas surrounding Japan is meant to
be one that has a grave impact on the peace and security of Japan. In
legislation on peace and security in 2015, it is clarified that if Japan
perceives a military conflict as a “situation that will have an
important influence on Japan’s peace and security”, it can engage inrear area logistical support for US military forces participating in theconflict, while keeping the concept of the area of “the Far East” in theJapan-US Security Treaty as it is. This is because Japan cannot
support US military action anymore if it is not based on theexecution of the right of collective self-defense but based on the
Taiwan Relations Act, a US domestic law, according to the existing
interpretation of the law.
In addition, in 2015 another concept – “situations of existential
crisis” – was created. This was meant to allow Japan to use limited
execution of the right of collective self-defense to protect the US
military if it was attacked, and if this attack poses threats to thesurvival of Japan and the people’s rights to freedom and happiness(situation of existential crisis). Also, if the US military bases in Japan
were attacked, this would be literally an armed attack on Japan andJapan could counterattack by executing the right of individual selfdefense, interpreting it as “a situation of an armed attack against
Japan”. So, this is how Japan can now provide different ways of
being prepared for a possible Chinese use of force against Taiwan.
Toyoda: How do the differences in the political systems of China andTaiwan affect this war?
Matsuda: Until the 1980s, the difference in the political systems
between the two was simply socialism and capitalism. Taiwan called
its political system the “Three Principles of the People”, but theCommunist Party of China (CPC) in the People’s Republic of China
and the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) in the Republic of China(Taiwan) were both building up dictatorial regions. Both parties were
contradicting each other and competing continuously, but there were
two occasions when they agreed to cooperate before 1945, namely
the First United Front and the Second United Front. And in the 1980s,
Japan SPOTLIGHT • March / April 2023

15

Chinese supreme leader President Deng Xiaoping proposed aunification formula of “one country, two systems” to integrate thetwo different political systems, socialism and capitalism, into one
single country after achieving a Third United Front through dialogue
between the two and peaceful unification. However, with the
democratization of Taiwan, the preconditions for this proposal totallycollapsed. In democratized Taiwan, the administration is establishedon the basis of elections: how voters think about a policy isimportant and dialogue between two dictators cannot decideanything. At this moment, most Taiwanese people would not beinterested in unification. Besides, the KMT is not in power now, so
based on these facts a Third United Front would be impossible. It isalso almost impossible for Taiwan to accept the idea of peacefulunification through dialogue.
It was also Deng’s plan to achieve the success of “one country,
two systems” in Hong Kong first to reassure the Taiwanese. But
since Hong Kong was returned to China in 1997, Beijing has failed toachieve success to reassure the Taiwanese people. Social andpolitical confusion in Hong Kong in 2019 and the legislation of the
Law of the People’s Republic of China on Safeguarding National
Security in the Hong Kong Special Administration Region further
pushed Taiwanese people to refuse China’s proposal of “onecountry, two systems”.
“One country, two systems” was a kind of formula of collusion
between the dictators in the 1980s. But with the democratization of
Taiwan and China’s failure to create a model of “one country, twosystems” in Hong Kong, it has become almost impossible to beachieved. In other words, it has been theoretically proved that apeaceful co-existence between dictatorship and democracy,completely different political systems, would be almost impossible.
However, China has not given up the idea of “peaceful unification”
despite this. This is because if it gave up, it would be in trouble as it
would bring back the Taiwan Strait as a potential battlefield anddiscourage Taiwanese companies from investing in mainland China.
So, China would probably become obsessed with menacing Taiwan
with its huge military forces without actual use of force. I think this“coercive peaceful unification” would be its strategy to adopt. With
its nuclear arms preventing the US from intervening, as well as
military forces enabling it to conquer Taiwan, it could coerce Taiwan
16 Japan SPOTLIGHT • March / April 2023

into surrender. It might be possible, without losing a single soldier
and without a single gunshot, to force Taiwan to submit and achieve
unification. I think this type of “peaceful unification” is what China isaiming at now.

Impact of the Ukraine War on China’s
Unification with Taiwan
Toyoda: Prof. Matsuda, I would like to ask you further about the
implications of the Ukraine war for China? Do you think its attempted
unification with Taiwan could be prompted or delayed by the Ukraine
war? What do you think would be the timing of attempted
unification?
Matsuda: China is now very carefully observing the Ukraine war andlearning many lessons. In February 2022 on the occasion of the
Beijing Winter Olympic Games, a China-Russia leaders meeting wasorganized and both leaders emphasized that there should be notaboos about both nations’ cooperation. It is said that Putin gave
notice to Xi of the impending Russian invasions of Ukraine in a
private conversation.
Xi did not try to dissuade Putin. Rather, in telephone talks on the
day following the commencement of the war, Xi expressed his
understanding of the Russian national security environment andconfirmed his approval of the invasion. He did it after having
recognized that not only the Donbass region but also Ukraine’s
capital Kyiv had been attacked by Russia.
In other words, at the beginning of the war, as all in the world
thought, Xi believed Russia would win completely and had neverthought that Ukraine would demonstrate such strong resistance orthat the war would be prolonged for such a long time. Therefore, it istrue that China miscalculated the direction of the war, just like Russia
did. This is why we guess the lesson that China is learning from thewar is a negative one.
China supports Russia, but at the same time does not reveal that itsupports Russia, or seems to try to give an impression to the worldthat it is keeping its distance from Russia. Actually, on the ChinaRussia meetings, while China used unclear expressions about themeetings in press conferences or avoided reference to the language

used in the meetings in its public announcements, Russia
announced a clear statement on the website of the embassy inBeijing that China supported its actions. Having understood that too
close relations with Russia could invite secondary sanctions from the
US and EU, and possibly worsen relations with them, China has now
been trying to keep a measured distance. In the light of such Chinese
reactions, it may have drawn negative lessons from the Ukraine war– the most important one being that military power alone cannot
determine the direction of a conflict so easily and may not work very
well in remedying a situation.
There are many in China today who claim that unification with
Taiwan would be easy. There are even people saying that with theirmilitary strength unification could be achieved within several days oreven several hours. The Ukraine war has reminded such people that
arms alone could not decide anything very easily. Besides, Russian
weapons in the battlefield in Ukraine are not as effective as the
Chinese expected.
A second lesson is that – given that Ukraine is connected to
Russia by land – it would be rather easy to send a massive army into
an enemy’s territory by land. But it would be extremely difficult tosend hundreds of thousands of soldiers across the Taiwan Strait to
Taiwan, because they would have to practice landing operations infull view of the enemy. Land forces are the most vulnerable when
they are using the sea or sky – a direct hit on a ship could cause
thousands of soldiers and their equipment to sink. So, this presents
a bigger challenge.
A third lesson is that powerful economic sanctions were
implemented at the earliest occasion. Both Russia and China musthave thought that economic sanctions against Russia could not be
implemented, as European nations’ dependence on Russian energy
sources is high. What Russia can sell to the rest of the world is only
energy resources and weapons, but China has much closer ties withthe world economy and economic sanctions against China could
damage not only China but also the rest of the world. If such asituation continued for a long time, Chinese opportunities for
economic development would be finished and other nations, such as
those that could not replace Chinese products with other ones,
would be in enormous trouble. However, in the case of assemblyoriented simple manufacturing, there are alternatives to Chinese

goods, so with prolonged economic sanctions we could say that
China would be at a disadvantage. Beijing must have understoodfrom the Ukraine war that economic sanctions against it should not
be underestimated.
Nonetheless, China may also have learned some positive lessons.
For example, one crucial lesson is that deterrence by the threat ofnuclear weapons can work effectively. Russia’s nuclear threat may
well have deterred direct US intervention in Ukraine, so China may
now believe that there would be a high threshold for the use of
military force against a nuclear superpower.
However, from the West’s viewpoint, nuclear deterrence also
works well for the US, Europe, and Russia in their own
interpretations. For example, in the current situation, the Westcannot directly attack Russia for fear of Russia’s retaliation with
nuclear weapons and Russia cannot invade NATO member states, as
it thinks that its own possible use of nuclear weapons would provoke
the West to respond in the same way, which would be disastrous for
Russia.
In this regard, what China is doing is expanding its own nuclear
arsenal. It thinks that an overwhelming nuclear arms expansion
surpassing US nuclear weapons would prevent US intervention, andseems to have drawn a theoretical endorsement for this strategy
from the Ukraine war.
A second positive lesson is that in the case of military action, aquick “blitzkrieg” attack to try to finish the war in a moment with full
utilization of all its military powers from the beginning must berecommended. In other words, gradual development of force must
be avoided. The Russian military initiative was started in the belief
that Ukraine, a big country, could be overwhelmed by use of a smallscale military force in a short period, but because of Ukrainian strong
resistance, Russia could not help but send gradual and continuous
military forces to the battlefield and this has resulted in the decline of
Russian national power. Perhaps a Russian victory in this war is notpossible.
A third positive lesson is the importance of creating a fait accompli
at an early stage. In sum, to control Taiwan at a very early stage itwould be important for China to create a situation in which Taiwan
has already submitted completely and is under Chinese governance,
and in this sense any military support for Taiwan or economic
Japan SPOTLIGHT • March / April 202317

sanctions against China would be senseless. Russia’s merger of the
Crimean Peninsula in 2014 would be a case in point. If such a fait
accompli by China could be made as quickly as possible, it could
avoid the economic sanctions that Russia now faces, since its
economy is the second largest in the world while Russia’s is merely
11th.
China has been observing the impact of economic sanctions on
Russia. Moscow has continued to export its energy resources, but
imports of various electronic components, machine tools and theintroduction of high-technology have all been stopped, and humanresource exchange also. Sending students to the US to gather new
knowledge or learn about technology and then calling them back to
China was a trigger for China’s emergence in the world economy, butwith the intensified “cold war” between the US and China it has
become almost impossible to do this. In Russia, since the war with
Ukraine started, several million people have left the country. Most ofthem were young and bright. In other words, with such effective
economic sanctions against Russia, China may be wary of similar
outcomes. This is an important goal of the economic sanctions
against Russia for the US and Japan.
As a matter of fact, it would be far more difficult to impose
economic sanctions against China than Russia. First of all, needlessto say, China would veto any resolution of condemnation against it in
the UN Security Council, and Russia would at least abstain. So, theUN Security Council could not issue any condemnation resolution
against China. In addition, on the question whether an Emergency
Special Session of the United Nations General Assembly could issue
such a resolution or not, as in the case of Russia, we must takeaccount of the fact that Taiwan is different from the case of Ukraine,
an independent state and member of the UN. Not a few countries
consider Taiwan as a part of China and China’s influence upon the
Global South is far greater than Russia’s. Based on these facts, itwould also be difficult. So, it would be difficult to carry out sanctions
against China in a format justified by international law. The current
economic sanctions against Russia are led by the G7 and most likely
there would be no other way but economic sanctions against China
being likewise organized mainly by the G7.
In this light, what is important is for us to lower our dependency
on China in some extremely crucial areas at the earliest opportunity,
18 Japan SPOTLIGHT • March / April 2023

namely in peaceful times. More importantly, there will be cases
where China imposes sanctions against us and to be resilient against
such sanctions we need to think about the weaknesses in our
economy, including supply chains, from now on. If a Taiwan
emergency happens, we cannot expect to control China’s actions
with economic sanctions in the short term.
As for the timing of China’s attempt to unite with Taiwan bymilitary force, it is certain that it cannot achieve it immediately. Thisis true regardless of the Ukraine war. The reason is, as I mentioned,
that the cost of such a war for China would be too great and it cannot
ignore the risk of exceeding the Taiwan Strait as well as risk of US
military intervention.
On the other hand, in 2023 Xi will turn 70 years old. At the age of
80 or 90, it would be difficult for him to lead a large-scale war due tohis physical condition. But while he is still in his early 70’s before
2027, he will be physically and mentally tough enough, and at a time
when Taiwan, Japan and the US still need to strengthen their defense
forces, some may see an early occasion as a window of opportunity
to try to unite with Taiwan. According to this view, China’s militaryinvasion of Taiwan should be realized sooner rather than later.
In contrast, the view that an invasion would be postponed is basedon the time that Xi has left. As seen in the announced personnel
assignment of his administration at the 20th National Congress of
the CPC in October 2022, Xi will not quit for another five years, but at
minimum he has another 10 years until leaving the post of supremeleader of China. Would he risk all his political assets in his first or
second year, given that he still has another 10 years ahead? There
must be a high possibility that he would wait and see during the next
five years.
Another basis for this view is the speed of China’s nuclear
weapons expansion. According to the US intelligence, China is now
aiming to have 1,000 nuclear warheads in 2030 and 1,500 in 2035,
meaning it will take more than another 10 years to create a nuclear
force for immediate use nearly equal to that of the US. At that point,
China could find it possible to deter US intervention by its own
nuclear force. Over the next few years, however, there would be stilla large gap between the US and Chinese nuclear arsenals.
There is another view that China may try to achieve its aims bytaking advantage of a moment when the US has ceased its

commitments to somewhere in the rest of the world. For example, apolitical movement in favor of isolationism could be born in the US
with people wondering why the US should have to send militaryforces to protect Taiwan when the US is no longer the “world’s
policeman”. Or there may come a time when the US would not want
to intervene in other nations’ military conflicts anymore because ofproblems caused by previous such interventions. China may just
wait for such an occasion, which could bring it a better outcome.
There are also occasions when military invasions would be difficult
to achieve. For example, it would be critical to create a safe andtranquil situation without any challenges such as on the occasion of
the Party Congress of the CPC. This is a political season when all
party and government officials from the top to the working level
would not want to make any small mistakes. Under such politicallysensitive occasions, high-risk military actions would be mostunlikely. In this sense, in 2027 when the 21st Party Congress isplanned, such an action must be unlikely.
In addition, a full invasion of Taiwan by military forces would be
limited by the seasons. There are high waves in the Taiwan Strait inwinter and it would not be good for conducting a landing by militaryforces. Besides, it would take a few months or few weeks to occupy
a large island in general, according to historical precedent. In thisregard, the best time would be the season when there would be no
typhoons for several weeks, which means there is no other goodoccasion but a couple of months between April and October.
If, in such period, the Chinese military carries out a large-scale
military exercise, our allies could raise their alert and be well
prepared for a possible invasion resulting from that military exercise.
As a matter of fact, several months would be needed for a militaryinvasion and it could not be concealed. Therefore, a surprise attack
would be extremely difficult. Thus, it is not certain whether China
could choose the best time for a full invasion. Therefore, there is no
simple answer. The Ukraine war would not necessarily serve as a
judgement on whether a Chinese military invasion should be carriedout soon or be delayed.
Toyoda: A question for Mr. Ito. The economic interdependency
between China and the rest of the world is much greater than thatbetween Russia and the rest of the world. China’s GDP is nearly 10

times as big as Russia’s. With economic sanctions imposed on
China, the sanctioning countries would be seriously affected as well.
How would those countries deal with it? What impact would Japan
have from sanctions against China?
Ito: Economic sanctions on China would have an enormous
economic impact on the world, far bigger than the ones on Russia.
China is an economic superpower with the second-largest GDP.
Though China’s personal consumption is half that of the US, it stillaccounts for more than 10% of the world’s private consumption.
China’s investment has reached a little less than 30% of all global
investment. With such a large-scale economy, sanctions against
China and its own retaliatory measures would seriously affect theworld economy.
Meanwhile, the presence of Chinese tourists in the world tourism
market is significant and as their zero Covid-19 policy has ended, inmany countries there are high expectations for inbound Chinese
tourists. Even before the pandemic, China was already the source ofthe largest number of tourists in the world. But if economic
sanctions against China are imposed, the Chinese government is
expected to tighten the flow of tourists to those nations with which it
has worsened foreign relations.
China’s presence in global supply chains has also been raised. In
terms of the scale of manufacturing GDP, China is the largest andaround 30% of manufacturing GDP in the world is now accounted
for by China. Though its status seems to have started to decline as abase of assembling and exporting labor-intensive products it still
maintains a base of manufacturing we can call the factory of theworld.
The Chinese manufacturing industry has seen higher value-added
and its role as a supplier of intermediary goods and capital goods
has been significantly raised. With the pandemic having stopped the
supply of parts and components from China, we really sensed its big
impact on production, ranging from home electrical appliances toautomobiles. We will see another big impact on production if mutual
economic sanctions are imposed. We also saw during the pandemic
that there was concern about the shortage of medical products due
to limited production of those goods, such as masks and personal
protective equipment (PPE).
Japan SPOTLIGHT • March / April 2023

19

As is seen in the intensified US-China high-tech war, China has
been highly competitive as a supplier of high-tech products. It has
the largest share of production in the world in domains like solar
panels, wind turbines and storage batteries. China is still the largest
supplier of IT products, though the production bases of IT goods are
becoming diversified. China also keeps its influence in the supply ofrare earths. With restricted supplies, various products would be
negatively affected in some strategic goods like permanent magnets.
There are now far more countries with more imports from China
than from the US, so we can say that the status of China in global
supply chains has been particularly raised. I think disruption of
economic relations with China would have an enormous impact on
the world economy. In finance as well, the Chinese presence in theworld is rising. Above all, newly emerging countries have highexpectations of China as a provider of economic aid. Its FDI stock
amount has exceeded Japan’s.
Politically, China is one of the permanent members of the UN
Security Council and it has top officials in a variety of internationalorganizations. These political factors would prevent many countries
from imposing economic sanctions on it. Each nation would have to
make a more difficult decision on imposing economic sanctions on
China than in the case of Russia.
Of course, as China is also engaged in economic activity in theinternational network of global supply chains, it too will suffer criticaldamage from economic sanctions. It is to be noted that the
proportion of exports of goods and services in China’s GDP was
about 19% in 2020 and the percentage of the imports in GDP was
16%, still higher than for Japan or the US.
On the destination of Chinese exports, the US, Japan and the EU
account for around 40%, and they account for around 25% of total
Chinese imports. More specifically, China would be in difficulty witheconomic sanctions covering semiconductor manufacturing
equipment, related chemical goods, and the Electronic Design
Automation (EDA) used for circuit design. China also considers highquality industrial machinery or ultra-precision polishing technology
as a choke point. In terms of sources of technology imported toChina, relations with developed nations are still crucial for China, andif dollar settlements are stopped it would inevitably have a grave
impact on the Chinese economy.
20 Japan SPOTLIGHT • March / April 2023

The impact of economic sanctions against China could besignificantly changed depending on what kind of sanctions are
imposed in response to what situation and what kind of retaliation
China would make. Anyway, the impact on Japan would not be small.
China is the largest trading partner for Japanese exports and thepercentage of the value-added induced by Chinese final domestic
demand to Japanese GDP has reached 3.1%. The percentage has
been increasing year after year.
Japan’s staple export items to China are computer memories, autoparts, automobiles represented by hybrid cars, and semiconductor
manufacturing equipment. The percentage of Japan’s GDP fromimports from China was 3.7% in 2021, the highest so far. The staple
import items from China include note PCs and mobile phones, withthe share of these imports exceeding 80%. Meanwhile, the share ofexports to Japan from China to total Chinese exports of those
products is now less than 10%. In the case of Japan, the number of
items with the percentage of imports from China to total Japanese
imports exceeding 50% is larger than the ones in the case of Europe
and the US. And China’s export dependency rate on exports to Japan
has fallen to around 1%. Under such circumstances, China could
take export restriction measures against Japan more easily.
This is how Japan-China mutual dependency in trade isasymmetrical and Japan’s vulnerability has been rising. Under suchcircumstances, with retaliatory measures against sanctions taken
into account, there would be a risk of serious stagflation. For
example, one calculation shows that production equivalent to around
10% of Japan’s GDP would be gone, if 80% of Japan’s imports from
China are suspended for two months. We cannot exclude thepossibility of Japan being significantly affected.

How Should Japan Cope?
Toyoda: Mr. Morimoto, do you think the US would seriously protect
Taiwan in the event of China’s attempt at military unification? In
general, it is said that people in the US are reluctant to send soldiers
to Taiwan. What do you think the US can do more specifically?
Morimoto: I believe that Ukraine war will continue longer than we
imagine. I do not agree with a few experts saying that around the end

of 2023 the war will be ended. Both nations’ claims are so different
and they are reluctant to make concessions. Also their support bases
are working well, so I guess they will continue to fight until they are
truly exhausted. Their supporters would be also exhausted. Within
two or three years from now, the US and Europe will be truly
exhausted politically, economically and on national security issues.
They would still probably support another victim of a new war, like
Taiwan, or hope the war will end somehow.
As is known, there will be important elections in 2024, such as apresidential election in Taiwan in January, a Congressional electionin India in February, a Russian presidential election in March, aUkrainian presidential election in May and the US presidential
election in November. In those elections, how to deal with the
Ukraine war will be an important issue. At this moment it is difficult
to foresee the future, but I would like to say a couple of things.
First, it would not be bad for China if the US and Europe become
exhausted as the Ukraine war continues. If the war comes to an end
quickly, the US and other Western countries could have extra energy
to look to China, which would not be good for China.
Second, whatever may happen in the Ukraine war, I think China
will choose its own way. It cannot ignore the Ukraine war and willdraw some lessons from it, but I believe China will work on
unification with Taiwan using its own kind of logic. I do not think it
will be relevant to think about the issues of Ukraine and Taiwan as
being connected.
Based on these two assumptions, I would like first to talk about
how the US would react to a Taiwan war. President Joe Biden has
clearly mentioned four times so far in responding to media questions
that the US would come to the support of Taiwan in the event ofChinese military action to pursue unification. But you would bewrong if you believe that this policy will remain unchanged in future
US administrations. The US overhauls policies by administration
every four years and adopts new strategies. Biden would observe
what he has said in his presidency to a certain extent at least, but weneed to think about the future direction of US policy, bearing in mind
whether future administrations would observe it or not.
It has been the principal thought driving US politics so far that itshould prioritize US national interests most, while maintaining therole of leadership in the international community without being

closely engaged in other countries’ issues. I think this principle will
not change hereafter as well. But I also think the US would notintervene in the Taiwan issue if China attempts to unite with Taiwan
by means other than military force, such as dialogue, negotiations or
persuasion not considered as military intervention underinternational law.
If political confusion arises in Taiwan as a result of the group ofpeople whom they call the “faction of independence” and China tries
to achieve unification by military force by taking advantage of it, it
would be difficult politically as well as in the light of international law
for the US to stop Chinese military intervention, since unification
efforts would be the result of this Taiwanese group’s own initiative.
As is known, there is a procedure to be taken defined by the War
Powers Act that in the case of the US president’s sending the US
military overseas, it is to be reported to Congress within 48 hours
after the issue of the order and their approval is to be confirmed
within 60 days. If it is not approved by Congress, the US president
must legally order the military to retreat.
The US, in trying to prevent China’s unification with Taiwan bymilitary force, may deploy its air force, Marines, and nuclear
submarines in the Taiwan Strait area and restrain the Chinese
military forces and stop them landing on Taiwan. But China,
expecting this, might pull all its forces together to secure commandof the sea and the air in the Taiwan Strait and strong blockagearound the whole area surrounding Taiwan and Japan.
It may be possible for the US to restrict partly China’s actions but
it would be extremely difficult for it to stop a landing campaign by
military efforts. What the US can do is to provide Taiwan withweapon systems to prevent Chinese military forces from landing,such as anti-ship missiles or anti-aircraft missiles.
Unlike the case of Ukraine, there are not so many countries
supporting Taiwan. In the light of the current North Korea situation,
South Korea can move very little. ASEAN countries only havesufficient weaponry for their own defense, and in their thinking about
their future relations with China it would be difficult to imagine thatthey would cooperate with the US to stop a Chinese landing
campaign in the Taiwan Strait.
The US and Europe may come to support Taiwan, but they would
have to go through the seas and China would almost prevent sea
Japan SPOTLIGHT • March / April 2023

21

lanes communication such as in the South China Sea and around thePenghu Islands and make it difficult for them to aid Taiwan. It would
be only Japan and Australia that could support Taiwan. Even if
Canada or Europe try to intervene, they would not come to Taiwan
directly but come via Japan. In this case, Japan would play a role likethat of Poland in the Ukraine War.
Taking these things into consideration, my Taiwan scenario is asfollows. It is expected that China would try to unite with Taiwan
without resorting to weapons, but it is not assured. Taiwanesepeople firmly believe that Taiwan and China are different nations now
and they do not think they are a part of China. In December 2022 on
the occasion of Japan-Taiwan policy consultations, the Taiwaneseside strongly said that Taiwan is different from China and they havenever thought about its being a part of China as was stated by
Chinese. I do not think that such convincing Taiwanese would accept
a scenario of unification with China even if they were threatened by
China.
On the other hand, China, considering unification with Taiwan as
the Chinese Communist Party’s historical mission, will pursue it
without fail. Trying to prevent China’s unification with Taiwan isextremely important in terms of foreign policy, military strategy, andeconomic policy. But there is no guarantee of success. We must
think about how to deal with this war assuming that Taiwan would
not be a region Japan favors in the future. In this case, the region
southwest of Japan would be set as a frontline against China, and apossible military strategy would be for some US military forces toleave there and instead set the US defense line on Hawaii and Guam,
maintaining an Indo-Pacific alliance to secure the national interestsof all Indo-Pacific nations.
As a matter of fact, the US Air Force let all its F-15 fighters returnto the mother country and it keeps F-22s and F-35s on rotation duty
in Okinawa, but it does not think about keeping them there
permanently. On the other hand, the largest military power
threatening China’s command of the seas and the air in the Taiwan
Strait is the US Air Force in Okinawa, and then it would be likely for
China to try to destroy it before a war begins in earnest. I suggestthat the Japanese Defense Ministry creates a facility at Kadena Air
Base to contain all the fighters in it and at the same time build up
alternative facilities and airports to be used by the US Air Force for
22 Japan SPOTLIGHT • March / April 2023

their activities on the west side of Japan.
Meanwhile, as the frontline of the US itself is Guam, it will be able
to set up an integrated air and missile system to try to protect themainland of the US from Guam, and Japan will be clearly seen as
only an advance deployment base in the Indo-Pacific region for the
US. Bearing this in mind, we will have to work on preparations forsuch a war.
The key points for China in determining the timing of an attempted
unification by force are firstly how much the US would be ready toprevent it and how China can assess this readiness. Secondly, what
would be the military balance at that time? Thirdly, how much would
other nations, in particular those in Europe, Canada and Australia beready to support Taiwan along with the US. And finally, what would
happen in Taiwanese domestic politics with such actions is anotherkey question.
Bearing these points in mind, how can China create a power
vacuum that excludes the US as a leader? For example, withcooperation from Russia or North Korea, it could provoke confusion
in northern Japan so that the US and Japanese defense forces would
have to deal with it and at the same time threaten the Senkaku
Islands so that US and Japanese defense forces are obliged toprotect them. In such a situation, if the US aircraft carrier task force
happens to be in the Middle East, this would create a power vacuum
that China could take advantage of to make a surprise attack on
Taiwan having already prepared for the campaign.
Anyway, the challenge for Japan would be in terms of defense of
the southwest region if China achieves unification with Taiwan andhas occupied the island. It would be extremely important for the US
to deter the Chinese military by keeping a forward deployment
strategy.
In this regard, even though it appears that what Japan can do has
been mostly covered by the security bills of 2015, this is not the casein reality. There are still many things Japan can do if its very
existence is under threat. Japan’s limited execution of the right ofcollective self-defense was presented to the Diet, but what can bedone by Japan under the threat to national existence covers a wide
range, and security bills do not touch upon them explicitly.
Security bills would clearly change role sharing between the US
and Japan: namely, Japan would concentrate its efforts on defense

campaigns, unable to use counterattack forces and leaving all theoffensive campaigns to the US. Any time when both the US andJapan feel it necessary, I think they will have to work on revising the
Guidelines for Japan-US Defense Cooperation.
On economic sanctions, having seen the sanctions against Russia
discussed for a long time in the US and Europe, I guess China would
think about creating a situation in which all the issues are settled
before discussions by the Western allies on possible economic
sanctions are concluded – so that with a short-term decisive war it
would seem pointless to impose any sanctions because “everythingis over” already.
I conclude that the Chinese Communist Party will not change its
resolution to achieve unification with Taiwan as an historical mission
whatever the outcome of Ukraine war may be. We must be well
prepared for this crucial moment and think about our national
security.
Toyoda: Prof. Matsuda, could you explain what can be done to avoid
a Taiwan war? And Mr. Ito, could you tell us how we can minimize
the economic damage from the war?
Matsuda: I think there are many things to be done by Japan. First,
the Japanese Self-Defense Forces have been accommodating selfdefense powers without assuming a large-scale attack from the
major powers, and thus Japan is extremely vulnerable to substantial
attacks like ballistic missiles. It is most important to strengthen its
self-defense capacity fundamentally and this can be done on ourown.
If Taiwan is attacked by China, the US military is assumed to be
activated in general and Japan is expected to support the US. It isalso necessary to be ready to make a counterattack if the US or
Japan is being attacked, but if Japan is attacked in earnest, with thecurrent military capacity of Japan, its air and naval forces could becompletely destroyed in the initial stages of the attack. In otherwords, the current situation of the Self-Defense Forces gives China
an incentive to launch a devastating initial attack which would enable
it to cause continuous damage. Japan needs to change this situation.
For example, Japan needs to contain its vulnerability by building
up air force bases underground or increasing bunkers and shelters.

If ammunition runs short in three days or a week of fighting, as in
the current situation, and Japanese forces cannot continue to fight,
however good its defense facilities may be will be almost
meaningless. So, Japan would need to make it possible for its forces
to continue a war for at least several weeks, at maximum several
months, without provision of ammunition from its allies. It will be,
above all, important for Japan to strengthen the Self-Defense Forces
and acquire a counterattack capacity in order to avoid giving China
the belief that it could have enough time to attack Taiwan with an
initial devastating attack on Japan and the US military.
Next, on the issue of strengthening the US-Japan alliance, first, it
is extremely important to ensure the US commitment. If the US
decides not to join in the war against China, this war will end with aChinese victory. Unless Japan continuously reminds the US of theimportance of Taiwan for Japan and the US, the US could be moreseduced by the concept of “America First” and the US-Japan alliancewould be politically destroyed all at once.
In addition, Japan needs to supplement the US military capacity as
its original mission. For example, Japan should have its own
intermediate-range ballistic missiles not owned by the US. But I
guess that cannot be done immediately. In the three government
documents on national security made public at the end of 2022,
high-speed missiles or hypersonic missiles are mentioned. If Japan
can own such weapons, this would mean that Japan cancomplement the US military capacity with weapons that the US does
not own at this moment.
Lastly, it is important how much Japan can attract the US allies tothis region. Australia is in this region, and Japan must have closer
relations with it hereafter. On the United Kingdom and France as well,their aircraft carriers stayed in this region for months in 2021, whichshowed us their big presence. German warships also came to Japanafter 19 years’ absence. It is necessary to get support from Germany
and from NATO. Germany is Japan’s important ally as well.
Japan would need the commitments of the UK, France andGermany to this region and their stance maintained of not approving
any change to the current status in the Taiwan Strait. With theirmilitary presence, China would have to attack all these US allies in theevent of attacking Taiwan. With this, the war could literally become aThird World War and we can expect China to refrain from it.
Japan SPOTLIGHT • March / April 2023

23

Besides these points, space is another key. In a NATO leaders
meeting in 2021, it was concluded that assets in space being
attacked would be covered by the execution of the right of collective
self-defense. Thus, if China attacks US space satellites in order toattack Taiwan, this could provide an authentic reason for NATO to
execute its right of collective self-defense to defend the US. In the
US-Japan leaders meeting in January 2023, they agreed upon assets
of defense in space. A big motivation for this agreement was toprevent China from attacking those assets. Maintaining the US
military’s advantage in the space domain is extremely important andsupporting this is also important. For example, whether European
satellites can be used to replace US satellites being attacked is
crucial. So, it will be vital to supplement the function of the US
alliance network worldwide and strengthen it to deter any Chinese
military attack on Taiwan.
Ito: I think it is important to maintain and strengthen Japan’s
strategic indispensability. We must protect intellectual property
rights, expand R&D investment and allocate more resources forhuman resource development. It is to be assumed that products
considered strategically important are used well in the Chinese
market to take advantage of such indispensability.
On the other hand, as the importance of the Chinese economy to
the Japanese economy increases, we cannot ignore earnings frombusiness with China as sources for increasing the indispensability ofsuch goods.
From these two points, in order to strengthen strategic
indispensability, it is necessary for us to explore stable Japan-China
relations. In this regard, I believe we need to keep collaborating with
China on common issues such as climate change, aging and disasterprevention and mitigation.
We also need to secure our strategic autonomy. Japanese private
businesses have already started a wide range of strategies ranging
from diversification of procurement of components and raisinginventory levels to changing local production for local consumptiontype supply chains. They are now increasingly conscious of market
diversification.
However, private business involvement alone will not promote thenecessary changes very smoothly. Providing hard and soft
24 Japan SPOTLIGHT • March / April 2023

infrastructure for the regions or countries under consideration fordiversification of production bases or markets and supporting theircapacity building are needed. It is also important to reduce tradebarriers through the conclusion of FTAs and I believe we should
redouble our efforts in this regard.
Industrial policy to secure specific important materials andtechnologies is also important, but more than that we need toharmonize our efforts with our allies and partners. We should pay
attention to consistency with international trade rules and prevent
proliferation of “my country first” policies. Through this, we should
ask China to exercise discipline in its industrial policy and trade
policy.
In other words, maintaining and building up a businessenvironment to achieve fair competition will be crucial for raising theresilience of supply chains. In this light, as China’s Central Economic
Work Conference advocates for China’s joining the CPTPP, it will be
important for us to keep asking them for rules-based actions
consistent with the WTO, RCEP and CPTPP.
Finally, continuous strengthening of economic, financial and fiscal
foundations is recommended in Japan’s recently published public
document “National Security Strategy” and I think above all it is vitalto clarify the route to fiscal reform for its reconstruction. Market
pressures on fiscal disciplines are increasing, and we must face thisissue squarely and build a solid national consensus.
Toyoda: Thank you all so much for your invaluable thoughts andcomments.

Written by Naoyuki Haraoka, editor-in-chief of Japan SPOTLIGHT, with theassistance of TapeRewrite Corporation.