Weekend Roundup: The New China Faces the 'New Japanese'
Category: WORLDPOST
A furious war of words was unleashed at the Shangri-La Dialogue security conference in Singapore last weekend. The U.S. and Japan accused China of trying to change the status quo by coercion and intimidation; the Chinese accused Japan and the U.S. of inciting instability with its "20th century mentality" of war and conflict. Following up on his comments in Singapore, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe  writes in The WorldPost that China ought to abide by the rule of law in the seas of Asia and calls for negotiations.  Recalling the experience of World War II, Shanghai scholar/entrepreneur Eric X. Li  mocks Abe's pledge in Singapore that the "new Japanese" will help their neighbors resist Beijing. The great danger now, writes the Australian scholar Hugh White , is that the ground is being laid for a catastrophic clash since both sides in this conflict assume incorrectly that the other will back down. South Korea's Foreign Minister Yun Byung-se  fears a "Pandora's box" is being opened in Asia. Marking the 25 years since the Tiananmen massacre, China scholar Perry Link worries that Xi Jinping is becoming "a Mao-like strongman."(continued)
By Nathan Gardels, ContributorEditor-in-chief, The WorldPost, 2014-06-06