This piece, based on a text dated April 19, 2019, examines the results of Japan’s disaster relief and infrastructure support in Indonesia, contrasted with the stalling reality of China-led projects such as the high-speed rail plan and power plant construction.
While highlighting Japan’s growing presence through the opening of Jakarta’s subway and cooperation in disaster prevention, it also criticizes the emptiness of the repeated “two great powers, America and China” narrative promoted by NHK and others, and reconsiders Japan’s true strength and the actual substance of China.

2019-04-19
The high-speed rail project adopted the Chinese proposal, but there is still no prospect of completion.
The power plants built by China have suffered one breakdown after another, causing power shortages.
The following is from a newspaper article the other day.
Infrastructure support.
Japan’s presence.
Japan’s presence is growing in Indonesia.
One aspect is disaster relief.
In response to the damage caused by the earthquake and tsunami that struck Sulawesi last September, the Japanese government is advancing reconstruction assistance making use of know-how such as the tsunami countermeasures developed after the Great East Japan Earthquake.
Seawalls are to be placed not on the seashore but inland, and parks are to be developed along the coast.
As both countries suffer many natural disasters, it is thought that they will deepen cooperation even further in disaster prevention and town planning from now on.
Another aspect is support for infrastructure development.
This month, Indonesia’s first subway, completed with Japanese assistance, began full-scale operation in the capital Jakarta.
Japanese-style services, such as punctual and orderly operation, are said to be receiving favorable reviews.
In the suburbs of Jakarta, construction is progressing on a large port to improve the efficiency of logistics.
Indonesia’s feelings toward Japan are favorable, and many students there study Japanese.
Japan’s expectations are high, having now turned toward expanding the acceptance of foreign workers.
Meanwhile, China, which had won many projects by using low prices as its weapon, is losing momentum.
The high-speed rail project adopted the Chinese proposal, but there is still no prospect of completion.
The power plants built by China have suffered one breakdown after another, causing power shortages.
Yet Arima, the NHK employee who calls himself an anchor on Watch 9, repeatedly, again and again, belittles Japan…our wonderful country…by saying things like, “between the two great powers of the United States and China.”
I deeply love the United States, especially for its sports culture and for the excellence of the films produced by the best part of Hollywood, but that has never once led me to think that I am inferior to Americans…if anything, the reverse.
And as for China, it is completely out of the question…In what sense can one call a one-party dictatorship of the Communist Party, a country with neither freedom nor true intelligence, a great power.
A great power only in population…but what is its real substance…A country in which the Chinese themselves constantly denounce their own country whenever the occasion arises, whose officials spirit away astronomical amounts of embezzled money abroad, mainly to the United States, and send all their children to study overseas, mainly to the United States…A country where, if anything should happen, those at the top are the first to think of escape and are already laying the groundwork for it…To call such a country, like a fool who knows only one phrase, a great power, a great power, is something found nowhere except among idiots such as NHK’s Arima, the Asahi Shimbun, Kenzaburō Ōe, and Haruki Murakami.