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Japanese might start a limited trade with China in strategic materials, perhaps on temporarily favorable terms because of Communist interest in separating Japan from the United States; the United States in response might then withhold certain economic aid from Japan; and this in turn might inspire the Japanese to widen their trade relations with the Chinese. Through such successive steps American and Japanese economic and military cooperation might in time be completely disrupted, with the resultant collapse of the whole economic and security structure in east Asia on which are based Japan's best hopes for the future and America's best prospects for stemming the further rise of Communism in that part of the world.
This is, of course, an extreme picture of the gloomiest possibilities rather than a prediction of what is to come. It does, however, help to indicate the dangers in differences in emphasis even between countries with fundamentally compatible objectives. It also suggests the need for corrective measures to prevent the problems inherent in Japanese-American relations from developing into crises.
One corrective measure might be for the United States to make conscious efforts to extricate itself so far as possible from Japanese politics. In part this might be accomplished by a more effective program of information and intellectual exchange. In part it might be achieved by a de-emphasis on bilateral relations and a further strengthening of multilateral organs of cooperation with Japan. There is great enthusiasm in Japan at present for the United Nations and the whole concept of international government. As a result international arrangements for defense or economic aid would not only lessen the irritating and sometimes humiliating contrasts of bilateral relations between the United States and Japan but would also arouse far more enthusiastic support than any purely Japanese-American arrangement.
More fundamental than this is the need for a tolerant realization of our divergent points of view and a practical willingness to attempt to compromise our differences. It is only natural that to Americans the problems of defense seem all-important, and economic problems are felt to be of concern largely because of their bearing on security. But it is equally natural for the Japanese to regard their economic problems as the more important because they are in the long run the more difficult to solve. To them there seems every bit as much reason to view relations with Communist countries in the light of Japan's economic plight as to reverse the process, as we do. Because of this Japanese emphasis on economic over defense problems, the United States should attempt to be as conciliatory as possible on economic issues and particularly on those economic matters, such as trade relations with the Communist world, in which the two sets of problems tend to merge. Rigid insistence by the United States on the priority of defense over economic problems could contribute to essential failure in both fields. Only through flexible negotiations unhampered by strong domestic political pressures are the United States and Japan likely to maintain a tenable balance between their divergent interpretations of common interests.
Such a condition is easier to describe than to produce. American-Japanese relations are no longer a game of diplomacy played between experts, but the
