Why did Heisei Japan decline? Complacency after economic success, political instability, and above all Japan’s decision to support China’s communist regime after Tiananmen. This essay examines the historical turning point that enabled China’s rise as a global economic power under one-party rule.

January 2, 2019
The starting point from which China rose to become the world’s second-largest economic power while maintaining one-party dictatorship lies precisely here.
The following is a continuation of the previous chapter.
What was the greatest cause of defeat.
Why did Heisei Japan lose.
There are many reasons.
A business leader quoted earlier declared, “It was the lack of a sense of crisis,” but personally I would point to three causes of defeat:
(1) complacency born from the miraculous economic recovery from the ashes of war,
(2) extreme political confusion, with as many as eighteen politicians assuming the post of prime minister over thirty years,
and (3) support for China’s Communist one-party dictatorship.
The third in particular was an irreparable miscalculation.
In the first year of Heisei, the Tiananmen Incident shocked the world when the People’s Liberation Army massacred citizens and students gathered in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square demanding freedom.
It was Japan that helped the Chinese Communist regime, which had become internationally isolated and fallen into severe difficulty.
The Kaifu administration quickly resumed yen loans, and the succeeding Miyazawa administration realized the Emperor’s visit to China.
The Sankei Shimbun argued for caution from the beginning, but overwhelmed by the tide of opinion, China returned smoothly to the international community.
The starting point from which China rose to become the world’s second-largest economic power while maintaining one-party rule lies precisely here.
There is no “if” in history.
Speculating that things might have been different if only we had acted otherwise carries no meaning.
This essay continues.