Sino-Japan strategic rivalry and the security of the Korean Peninsula

Abstract

The Northeast Asian regional security complex has both consistent and inconsistent factors within the global security structure. While non-traditional security issues dominate academic discussions in the European region, traditional security concerns are still preponderant, both among policymakers and the general public in the Northeast Asian region. Sino-japan rivalry centers on the discussions on Northeast Asian regional security. The expectation on the rivalry between China and Japan is one of the representative security concerns in the region, and to a certain degree it also stabilizes the Northeast Asian security order, even though this was not intended. It is highly likely that an escalation will be avoided of military confrontation leading to a war-scale conflict between the two countries. Instead Japan will pass the buck for its military responsibility against the China threat to the hegemonic state, the United States, and China's military capability cannot catch up with that of the United States, at least until 2030. Also it is inappropriate to evaluate the two countries' military strategies as revisionist ones preparing for hegemonic status. Regarding its implications for the Korean peninsula, if Japan buck-passes its role of counter-balancing China to the United States, the latter will demand an alliance commitment from the ROK to a similar level of that of the U.S.-Japan alliance.