China Flexing it's new muscles

The fight over the islands off of China between China and Japan and South Korea is an interesting one. However, maybe looking more historically at this might be useful during these times. In the history of China there are dynasties of Emperors and Empresses going back thousands of years up until around the turn of the 20th century when that ended. China had a very difficult time throughout most of the 20th Century and really only came together to begin to become what it is today through Mao Tse Tung starting during World War II. So, most of the 20th century was sort of a disaster for China. So, Mao Tse Tung and then deng xiaoping who advocated capitalism without democracy permanently changed China to what it is now.

However, then you have to look at Japan. Japan jumped into the Vacuum in China after Japan westernized with western weapons during the late 1800s and early 1900s. And the Chinese are still very upset about things like the "Rape of Nanking" that the Japanese likely today don't acknowledge actually happened formally which greatly upsets the Chinese.

So, as Biden goes to China to make full sense of what is actually going on in China, the Chinese feel that since China (through Chiang kai chek) and others helped the U.S. defeat Japan in World War II that the U.S. should be now loyal to China instead of Japan. However, since once Japan was defeated in World War II it became a U.S. protectorate throught the Marshall plan and became a powerful trading partner with the U.S. So, even though it is long past being a protectorate it is still a very strong trading partner and ally of the U.S. now. And this cannot be said for China which has a much more adversarial relationship with the U.S. except in regard to trade.

However, since the nuclear Disaster in Fukushima caused by the earthquake and Tsunami (which is going to take a minimum of 40 years to clean up now), the Japanese government is not as strong as it was before 1990 or so.

So, the U.S. might be forced over time to be nicer to China in order to make things work out better for everyone in the Pacific region.

However, the U.S. in some ways is still thinking the way it did after World War II that we are the protectors of the whole world which isn't quite as realistic as it was then.

However, everyone knows that if you give China and inch they will take a mile just like they did with the latest legal edict that all aircraft and ships must notify China or be blown up or shot down when they enter this new area.

So, where is this going? I don't really know but it definitely isn't World War II anymore either.

In regard to South Korea they already have enough problems ongoing with North Korea and China so they likely will let sleeping dogs lie for the most part. But, I wouldn't be surprised if we saw Japan and South Korea forming stronger alliances out of necessity for their mutual survival ongoing.

However, then again, South Korea and North Korea to for that matter have a lot of historical issues with Japan as well.

But, if we leave historical issues out of all this (and I don't think that is completely possible for anyone involved) possibly some good will come from all this in the Asian Pacific region ongoing.