Published on November 30, 2019.
Based on Hiroshi Yuasa’s essay “Only Firm Pressure Freed the Hokkaido University Professor,” published in the monthly magazine WiLL, this article discusses China’s detention of Hokkaido University Professor Masaru Iwatani, the issue of Xi Jinping’s planned state visit to Japan, the Chinese fishing boat collision near the Senkaku Islands, and China’s creation of faits accomplis in the South China Sea.
It argues that China advances by testing the strength of an opponent’s resistance, moving “moderately,” “without restraint,” or “brazenly” depending on the response, while making “tactical retreats” when met with firm opposition.
It also introduces Professor Paul Krugman’s criticism of China as a “rogue great power” that uses influence in violation of trade law to get its way in political disputes, and argues that Japan must seek a path of self-reliance and multilateral cooperation.

November 30, 2019
He condemned China for “exercising influence in violation of trade law in order to get its way in a political dispute,” and labeled it a rule-defying “rogue great power.”
The following is from an essay by Hiroshi Yuasa, published in the monthly magazine WiLL released on the 26th, under the title “Only Firm Pressure Freed the Hokkaido University Professor.”
It is an essay that not only the Japanese people but people throughout the world must read.
I have heard that China has a certain pattern when it advances into the sea.
Because the sea involves the large exclusive economic zones of coastal states, China proceeds while gauging the mood of the other country.
If it receives firm resistance in a sensitive sea area, it intrudes “moderately”; if the resistance is not so strong, it proceeds “without restraint”; and if there is no resistance, it “brazenly” piles up faits accomplis.
It reclaimed the reefs it had seized in the South China Sea and quickly built artificial islands.
Some Indian commentators called this salami tactics, while some American scholars defined it as the conduct of a “rogue state.”
However, changing its attitude in an instant as soon as it sees that the other side is strongly resisting is also China’s way.
Such a temporary evasive retreat is called a “tactical retreat.”
The release, after two months, of Professor Masaru Iwatani of Hokkaido University, who had been detained by the Chinese authorities, was nothing other than a “tactical retreat” caused by the backlash that arose from Japan.
It was probably because President Xi Jinping is scheduled to be invited to Japan next spring as a state guest, and China did not want that to be damaged.
Professor Iwatani visited China in September and appears to have been detained on suspicion of crimes such as endangering national security.
He is a researcher whose theme is the history of the Sino-Japanese War based on primary sources, and it is hard to understand why he was made into a spy.
A spokesperson for China’s Foreign Ministry merely stated that “the male professor, who had been detained on suspicion of violating the criminal law and the anti-espionage law, has been released on bail.”
Putting together the accounts of fellow researchers who know Mr. Iwatani, he sheds light on matters such as the Nanjing Incident through original materials, and as a result exposes the falsehood of the “Japan-as-villain theory,” which is truly inconvenient for China’s historical narrative.
The Japan Institute for National Fundamentals touched on this issue in its “Statement of the Week” on its website dated October 28, and proposed that “President Xi’s state visit to Japan requires reconsideration.”
It pointed out that Mr. Iwatani has papers on intelligence organizations and media warfare, such as “The Developmental History of the Chinese Communist Party’s Intelligence Organizations,” and that his research into such organizations “must have been inconvenient for China.”
Furthermore, it urged reconsideration, saying, “If Japan welcomes President Xi Jinping as a state guest next spring, it will no longer be regarded as a normal country.
The government should reconsider.”
The Sankei Shimbun also raised doubts about inviting President Xi as a state guest, and criticism of China was spreading one after another, including a joint criticism by forty-seven Japanese China researchers.
The adoption, on November 13, by the “Group for Protecting Japan’s Dignity and National Interest,” composed of conservative LDP lawmakers, of a resolution opposing President Xi’s state visit to Japan will surely be a strong boost.
The resolution criticized the situation by saying that, given Chinese government vessels’ intrusions into territorial waters around the Senkaku Islands and China’s suppression of the Hong Kong demonstrations, “Japan–China relations cannot be said to be on a ‘normal track.’”
I think the ruling and opposition parties should unite and pass this as a Diet resolution, but the opposition parties are not as interested in human-rights issues as they claim.
As if the “Cherry Blossom Viewing Party” at the Prime Minister’s Office were the great matter, they are nitpicking over trifles.
By the way, the Chinese fishing boat ramming incident against Japanese patrol vessels around the Senkaku Islands in 2010 was marked by the disgraceful response of the Democratic Party’s Naoto Kan administration.
The captain was released by Prime Minister Kan’s decision, and the pressure from China, which saw Japan as weak, was tremendous.
As soon as China saw that the other country had fallen into a state of panic, it forcibly increased the pressure.
The person who called China at that time a “rogue state” was Professor Krugman, the Nobel Prize-winning economist, not the Kan administration or the Japanese Diet.
According to the professor, the detention of a fishing-boat captain in the waters around the Senkaku Islands was, as a cause of dispute, “a trivial cause.”
He concluded that China had intentionally “gladly accepted” it.
As retaliation, China went as far as banning exports of rare earths and detaining four Japanese nationals.
Professor Krugman, though it concerned Japan, lost his patience.
He condemned China for “exercising influence in violation of trade law in order to get its way in a political dispute,” and labeled it a rule-defying “rogue great power.”
In the South China Sea as well, after China demarcated most of it under its Territorial Sea Law in 1992, it sent out armed vessels and went around threatening neighboring countries.
In the end, a senior Chinese military officer boasted, “It is only natural for a great power to possess aircraft carriers, and we are not the same as small countries.”
In this way, China built runways on artificial islands in the South China Sea where military aircraft can take off and land, deployed missiles, and began glaring at others, saying, “This is China’s sea.”
When a “rogue state” gains power, it becomes an arrogant autocrat and grows angry unless neighboring lords kneel before it.
However, today’s United States is frightened by the decline of its national power, keeps its distance from its allies, and allows hostile countries to become arrogant.
Perhaps the time has come to seek a path of self-reliance and multilateral cooperation, prepared for the possibility that the strategic basis of the Japan–U.S. relationship may someday collapse.