The most important bilateral relationship in Asia since the end of World War II is assuredly between the United States and Japan. In fact, many foreign relations experts claim that the most important bilateral relationship the United States has with any country in the world is with Japan. Despite the rising geopolitical and economic importance of China, U.S.–Japan relations have remained paramount for well over 50 years and are likely to remain that way well into the 21st century.
This important bilateral relationship might seem odd because the U.S. and Japan are different in several ways. The U.S. is a continent-size superpower while Japan is an island country with a relatively small military force. The U.S. has a “melting pot” population descended mostly from Europe, Latin America, and Africa, whereas Japan's population is more than 98 percent ethnic Japanese. Traditional culture and ideals of the U.S. are mostly derived from the European Renaissance and Enlightenment, while Japan's traditional culture was adopted from China and Korea, and then adapted to indigenous Japanese influences. Not surprisingly, the above differences have contributed to political, economic, racial, and even military clashes between the two countries since formal relations began in the 1850s.
Yet, these and other differences are often more complementary than divisive, and contribute to overall stability in East Asia. Despite the terribly destructive Korean (1950–1953), Vietnam (1965–1975), and Cambodian (1975–1979) wars, there have been no wars between the major powers in East Asia (U.S., Russia, China, and Japan) since 1945 due in large part to the stabilizing political, military, and economic influences of the U.S. and Japan. In addition, interregional and international trade between all countries in the region has dramatically expanded due to a large extent to the same stabilizing influences of the U.S. and Japan.
Geographically, the United States is 25 times the size of Japan. Japan is about the same size as the state of Montana. This does not mean Japan is a “small” nation in size; it means the United States is unusually large. Only the nations of Russia, Canada, and China are geographically larger than the United States. By way of international comparison, Japan is geographically larger than the countries of England, Germany, Italy, or both Koreas. As of 2004, the population of the United States was more than 280 million, and for the last hundred years has been approximately twice the size of Japan's population. Nevertheless, Japan's current population of nearly 130 million is greater than the populations of France, England, Germany, or Mexico. Japan's geography and population are “small” in comparison to the United States, but compared to most of the world's nations, Japan's geographic territory and its population are relatively large.
There are five themes to consider while examining the historical relationship between Japan and the United States. First, since the 1850s, Japan has tried to maintain a stabilizing balance between the dichotomy of “Japanese spirit, Western learning.” This is both a philosophical and practical approach to adapting, adopting, and sometimes rejecting Western standards and institutions while simultaneously maintaining Japan's historic and cultural East Asian heritage. Second, since the 1850s the United States has maintained a vision of “Manifest Destiny.” After expanding its territory on the North American continent, the United States has sought to expand its political, economic, and cultural influence throughout the globe. Third, there is a continuing struggle to reconcile the political and economic relationship between Japan and the United States. This struggle sometimes erupts into serious clashes, including racially motivated discrimination and especially the bitter Pacific War between 1941 and 1945. Fourth, the political and economic struggle between the United States and Japan often involves the relationship each country has with China. Finally, despite the differences between Japan and the United States indicated above, Japanese and American people as individuals have often maintained an amicable relationship for most of the past 150 years. Politicians, “patriotic” organizations, novelists, and media commentators sometimes hurl jingoist “Japan bashing” or “America bashing” denunciations, particularly during periods of economic and political tensions. Yet, many Japanese and Americans display mutual understanding, friendship, and significant interest in the history, culture, language, and society of one another's country.
During the 19th century, individual Japanese and Americans encountered one another for the first time, and the mid-1850s, the two governments began formal diplomatic relations. The first individual contacts and start of diplomatic relations between Japan and the United States were conditioned by their respective societies and worldviews of the era. What kind of countries were the United States and Japan during the 1850s?
The United States was not really “united” by 1850. The northern states of the mid-Atlantic and New England regions were industrializing. They were building factories powered by steam and coal, and improving the roads, bridges, and canals to create the infrastructure of a modernizing, industrializing society. Meanwhile, most of the southern states remained in a semi-feudal social and economic system largely dependent on the forced labor of African American slaves who produced agricultural commodities of cotton, sugar, tobacco, and rice. The northern states had a mixed, industrializing economy while the southern states were not industrializing and remained almost exclusively dependent on agriculture, which in turn depended on slave labor.
At the conclusion of the Mexican–American War in 1848, the United States militarily and diplomatically conquered the vast southwestern and western territories of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California at the expense of Mexico and Native American tribes. Slavery became an even more divisive political issue with regards to whether these new territories#x2014;soon to become states—would allow slaves and slave owners.
From the late 18th century, many northerners despised the existence of slavery for both political and moral reasons. They did not necessarily believe in the equality of all races; but they did believe that human slavery was both immoral and unlawful. By the early 19th century, all New England states and most mid-Atlantic states outlawed slavery within their borders. The Compromise of 1850 called for an equal number of slave states and non-slave states among the newly conquered territories, but ultimately failed to resolve the issue. In 1852, Harriet Beecher Stowe's novel, Uncle Tom's Cabin, shocked northerners and infuriated southerners with its depiction of the cruelty of slavery in the southern United States. The Supreme Court's Dred Scott decision in 1857, John Brown's raid on Harper's Ferry in 1859, and the election of Abraham Lincoln as President in 1860 also significantly contributed to the “impending crisis” that erupted into the American Civil War.
This was also the era of “Manifest Destiny,” the widespread belief among Caucasian Americans that they had a God-given right to continental expansion from the Atlantic coast to the Pacific coast. In January 1848, James Marshall was building a sawmill in Coloma in the then-Mexican territory of California when he discovered gold. By the end of the year, Marshall's discovery launched the “Gold Rush,” arguably the most significant historical event of the American West. The Gold Rush transformed the West, especially California, into a mining, agricultural, and industrial power attracting people and capital from all over the world, including Asia.
By the time United States Navy Commodore Matthew Perry sailed for Japan, the growing economic and social disparity between northern and southern states, the increasingly divisive issue of slavery, territorial expansion on the North American continent, and the transformation of the American West by the Gold Rush were the primary features of national life for most Americans. Although not a major world power by 1850, the expanding United States increasingly attracted the attention of Europeans, including Alexis de Tocqueville and Karl Marx. The country was growing in population (primarily through immigration from Europe), expanding its already vast territory, and developing its natural resources, industries, and technologies.
In 1850, Japan was not an industrializing country. There were handcraft, agricultural, and fishing industries in many parts of the country, but not large-scale heavy industries requiring inanimate sources of energy, such as steam power. Japan had an advanced artistic, architectural, and philosophical culture for well over a thousand years, and an advanced administrative system run by the Tokugawa shogun's bakufu government that kept relative peace for over 200 years. Japan was relatively urbanized, with more than 20 percent of Japanese living in cities. The major cities of Osaka, Kyoto, and especially Edo compared favorably with Paris, Berlin, and New York of the same era.
Japan up to the 1850s is often described as “feudal” because of its hereditary, Confucian-based hierarchical class system of samurai, farmers, artisans, and merchants. The samurai—including domain leaders (the daimyō), their retainers, and all officials of the Tokugawa shogunate government—were Japan's warrior class. Numbering less than 10 percent of the population, the samurai were an unproductive class that lived off stipends. They were the privileged and the powerful of Japan. They were also increasingly disunited by the 1850s. The majority of the Japanese population were peasants; farmers and fishermen who produced agricultural goods that sustained the entire population. Artisans, those who made items by hand, and the merchants were the other two levels of this Confucian hierarchy and who, like most samurai, lived in the larger cities. Not part of this four-level hierarchy were those in “special” categories, such as imperial family members; priests (Buddhist and Shinto); Ainu native people; the burakumin who handled animal products, disposed of human corpses, and did other “outcaste” work; and foreigners.
Japan of the mid-19th century is often described as “isolated” because it did not engage in substantial foreign relations. This view is somewhat misleading. Such relations had existed extensively before the 1600s, and then in a limited manner from the 1630s to the 1850s. A policy known as sakoku (“national seclusion”) significantly restricted the country from foreign relations in the early 17th century. However, the sakoku policy was primarily directed at Portugal and Spain. The Dutch, Koreans, Okinawans, and especially the Chinese maintained trade and contact with Japan throughout much of the Tokugawa Era (1600–1868).
Nevertheless, Japan's contact with the West during most of the Tokugawa Era was limited to Dutch traders in Nagasaki, and to Dutch books on science and medicine. During the Euro–American era of scientific, political, and industrial revolutions Japan had very little contact with the West. By 1850, Japan was both an ancient and advanced culture, especially in the arts, architecture, philosophy, and administrative systems. But its economic and military power, and its knowledge of science and technology needed for large-scale industrialization was far behind even a middle power, such as the United States.
Tokugawa Japan was a highly structured society, divided by class and hierarchy. The Tokugawa shogun, at the apex of all samurai, controlled the country and domain lords, the daimyō, through the shogunate government (also known as the bakufu). Yet, during the first half of the 19th century, internal political and social strains were weakening Tokugawa bakufu power. Lower and middle rank samurai felt their talents were being squandered while their stipends were reduced. Daimyō from powerful domains were increasingly frustrated at being controlled, spied upon, and taxed by shogunate authorities in Edo. Prolonged famines in the 1830s led to an upsurge in rebellions against Tokugawa authorities, especially Oshio Heiachiro's rebellion in Osaka in 1837.
At this vulnerable historical moment, the West knocked on Japan's door. Russian, British, and American ships began appearing off Japan's coasts. The China trade and North Pacific whaling drew most of these ships close to Japan's shores. Japan turned down their occasional requests for trade and diplomatic contact because it violated the centuries-old sakoku policy. After the Opium War of 1839–1841 between the British and the nearby Middle Kingdom of China, it became obvious to foresighted Japanese scholars and officials that someday the increasingly powerful Westerners would not take “no” for an answer to their demands.
The first direct contacts between the United States and Japan were Japanese castaway sailors, most notably Manjiro Nakahama, Hikozo Hamada (later known as Joseph Heco), and the adventurer Ranald MacDonald from the Pacific Northwest Territory. Their sojourns and experiences provided the first direct knowledge between the United States and Japan. The United States government initially sent Edmund Roberts in 1832, and then Commodore James Biddle in 1846 on missions to Japan to investigate the possibility of beginning diplomatic and trade relations. Roberts died of cholera in Macao and never arrived in Japan while Biddle sailed away after the shogunate politely, yet firmly refused his requests. Following the Mexican–American War of 1846–1848 and the discovery of gold in California in 1848, the United States acquired vast areas of the American southwest and California from Mexico. Across the Pacific Ocean from China, where the United States had already established trade and diplomatic relations, and near North Pacific whaling areas frequented by New England whaling ships, Japan became increasingly significant to American political and economic interests.
U.S. Navy Commodore Matthew C. Perry was sent to Japan to make a concerted effort to establish relations with Japan. In July 1853, he sailed into Uraga Bay near Edo with four large warships and hundreds of armed sailors. Two of the ships were steam frigates fitted with coal-fired engines and belched black smoke while chugging up the bay. The wooden hulls of all four American ships were painted with dark sealant to prevent the wood from rotting. The Japanese called them “the black ships,” a symbolic harbinger of death. Perry delivered a letter from President Millard Fillmore to the Japanese government. In addition to establishing a formal diplomatic relationship between the two countries, President Fillmore's letter outlined three specific objectives the United States government desired from Japan. First, the Americans wanted Japan's assurance that shipwrecked sailors found on Japan's shores would be aided and cared for until an American vessel arrived to retrieve them. Second, with the advent of steamships, Americans wanted to use one or more ports in Japan for coal, along with water and other provisions for use by their ships in the Asia Pacific region. Finally, they sought to establish trade relations with Japan in the belief that commerce between the two countries would be of mutual benefit. Aware that shogunate officials would need time to consider the proposals, Perry and the American fleet left for the Ryukyu Islands and China after informing the Japanese officials that they would return within one year for an answer.
Perry returned to Japan in February 1854 with eight warships. There is no firm evidence he directly threatened to use force to secure a treaty, but the presence of such firepower was an obvious “gunboat diplomacy” factor during negotiations. Tokugawa shogunate officials were confronted with a serious dilemma: they had to make an agreement with Perry despite the opposition of most daimyō. After negotiations started, a measure of friendliness and goodwill developed between Americans and Japanese. American sailors wandered around the area, and local Japanese villagers soon lost their fear and crowded to see the big, funny-looking barbarians from the West. American sailors and lower-level Japanese officials spent much time eating and drinking together, while Perry and top Japanese officials argued and negotiated.
In the end, Japanese officials agreed to protect shipwrecked sailors and provide the ports of Shimoda and Hakodate for depots of coal and other provisions for American vessels. However, they steadfastly refused to establish commercial trade relations with the United States. Perry sailed away with the Kanagawa Treaty, the first formal government agreement between Japan and a Western country. Perry's 1853–1854 mission and the Kanagawa Treaty between Japan and the United States unleashed a deluge of longstanding, internal discontent within Japan. From 1853 to 1868, political intrigue, assassinations, an increasingly strained relationship between the Tokugawa shogun in Edo and the imperial court in Kyoto, and finally civil war between pro-Tokugawa and pro-Restoration forces ended with the downfall of the Tokugawa shogunate and the emergence of the Meiji imperial government.
The first resident American diplomat sent to Japan was Townsend Harris. He negotiated the United States–Japan Treaty of Amity and Commerce of 1858, which included commercial trading rights and extraterritorial rights for Americans living in designated areas in Japan. This was the first of the Ansei Treaties, also known as the “unequal treaties,” between Japan and Western countries. Henry Heusken, a Dutch-born American citizen, was Harris's indispensable assistant and translator at the American consulate in Kanagawa. Heusken also assisted other countries negotiate treaties and agreements with Japan. Tragically, Heusken was murdered by anti-foreign ronin in 1861.
Soon after completion of the U.S.–Japan Treaty of Amity and Commerce, the Tokugawa shogun decided to send an embassy of government representatives to the United States to officially ratify the treaty in Washington, D.C. The leader of the 1860 Embassy was Norimasa Muragaki, a conservative samurai official who often complained during the trip about the barbarian ways of Americans. Shaking hands, dancing, casual dress (i.e., business suits) by President James Buchanan and other American officials, and being introduced to wives and daughters of American officials at receptions upset Muragaki and other conservative members of the Japanese delegation. Other members of the delegation, such as Yukichi Fukuzawa and Manjiro Nakahama, liked the relatively egalitarian, informal ways of the Americans.
The Shogun's Embassy attracted a great deal of attention in 1860. It was the first time practically anyone in the United States could see and meet Japanese. At hotels in San Francisco, Washington, New York, Baltimore, and Philadelphia, the lobbies were mobbed with Americans wanting to see the diplomats from the “mysterious” country of Japan wearing their elegant kimonos with top-knot hair styles. Walt Whitman wrote a poem titled, “A Broadway Pageant,” in honor of Japan and Asia after watching a welcoming parade for the Japanese diplomats in New York. There were troubling incidents: some American newspapers made fun of short Japanese with “funny clothes and funny rituals,” and two samurai swords were stolen from one Japanese diplomat's hotel room. But overall the trip was a success and the Japanese diplomats were well-treated—and nearly all their expenses paid for by the American government. Even the dour, conservative Muragaki later told his wife that Japanese should stop referring to Americans as barbarians.
When the Japanese diplomats returned to Japan in 1861, the United States erupted into the American Civil War (1861–1865), the bloodiest war in American history with more than 600,000 deaths. Japan, too, was nearing a state of civil war over the crisis between domains supporting a “restoration” of imperial rule and others trying to reform and revitalize the Tokugawa shogunate. Naosuke Ii, who approved the U.S.–Japan Treaty of Amity and Commerce and second only to the shogun in the Tokugawa hierarchy, was assassinated in early 1861. Japan's relationship with the West, particularly what many considered to be the “unequal treaties” between Japan and Western countries, was a major factor in the burgeoning political crisis—a crisis that included assassinations of Westerners and Japanese deemed to be “pro-West.” Muragaki, Fukuzawa, Joseph Heco, and other Japanese with significant experience with the West lived in fear of attack during the early 1860s. By the mid-1860s, the crisis became more anti-Tokugawa than anti-foreign and erupted into domestic civil war. After losing significant battles against the anti-Tokugawa forces in late 1867 and early 1868, the last shogun, Tokugawa Yoshinobu, bowed to the inevitable and turned over governing authority to the emperor, ending two and a half centuries of rule by the Tokugawa shogunate. Thus began the Meiji Era, Japan's entrance into the industrial and modern age.
Knowledge Shall Be Sought Throughout the World
So As to Strengthen the Foundations of Imperial Rule
Charter Oath, Issued by Emperor Meiji, 1868
In 1871, Japan sent many of the Meiji government's highest officials on an extended mission led by Prince Tomomi Iwakura to the United States and Europe. Earlier, the government sent Arinori Mori to Washington as Japan's first resident diplomat to the United States, and to make advance preparations for the Iwakura Embassy. Its primary objective was to re-negotiate the “unequal treaties” of the 1850s the previous Tokugawa government signed with the United States and several European countries (Britain, France, Holland, Germany, and Russia). The United States and the European countries politely refused to re-negotiate the treaties because they believed Japan did not have a system of laws up to Euro–American standards. The Euro-American refusal to re-negotiate the treaties upset many of Japan's leaders.
The second objective of the Iwakura Embassy was to study the political, economic, educational, military, and scientific institutions of the West for the purpose of adapting useful elements of these institutions in Japan. This objective was more successful. The Japanese diplomats were impressed with America's education system, with Britain's parliamentary government and navy, and with Germany's army and constitutional monarchy. They were impressed with France's architectural and artistic heritage. Likewise, the presence of diplomats from Japan began a “Japonisme” movement among many American and European artists.
During the 1870s, the Japanese government employed hundreds of Americans and Europeans as instructors for their technical expertise in establishing Western-oriented institutions in Japan. William E. Griffis and David Murray, from Rutgers College in New Jersey, William Smith Clark, and Mary Eddy Kidder were among the Americans who came to Japan as instructors. Starting in the early 1860s, hundreds of students from Japan traveled to the United States and Europe for university studies. These students brought knowledge of the West back to Japan. Arinori Mori and Hirobumi Ito were among the earliest students, as was Jo Niijima, a Christian missionary and founder of Doshisha University in Kyoto. As a result of their transnational and cross-cultural educations and experiences, these early Japanese students became a crucial element in expanding Japan's knowledge of the West and in expanding American knowledge of Japan.
In 1879, former President Ulysses S. Grant and his wife Julia visited Japan during a long, round-the-world tour. His two terms as president from 1868 to 1876 were plagued by scandals, a bad economy, and problems in the wake of the American Civil War. Nevertheless, Grant was hailed everywhere in the world as the hero of the Civil War, including in Japan. Grant spent several weeks in Japan sightseeing and had general discussions on political matters with Japanese officials, including Emperor Meiji.
In 1894, war erupted between Japan and China over issues relating to control of Korea. The Korean peninsula is strategically centered among Japan, China, and the Russian Far East, and these countries regularly competed for control over Korea. Too weak to defend itself by the late 19th century, Korea was at the mercy of its bigger and more powerful neighbors. Japan defeated the decaying Qing Dynasty of China in this “First Sino–Japan War” and gained control over the Korean Peninsula as a condition of the Shimonoseki Treaty of 1895. Japan then participated with the United States and European powers in putting down the Boxer Rebellion in China in 1900, and earned international praise for its military discipline.
Less than four years later, Japan went to war against Russian military forces stationed in China and Manchuria in the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–1905. On land, the Russian and Japanese armies were nearly evenly matched. At sea, however, the Japanese Imperial Navy completely destroyed the Russian Fleet. Japan's victory over Russia demonstrated the success of the policies of industrialization and modernization adopted during the early Meiji Era. Japan, a relatively small nation, had defeated the huge Russian Empire! The early 20th-century was also an era of so-called scientific racism, a widespread but absurd idea that races had a scientific hierarchy with Caucasians at the top and Asians close to the bottom. According to “scientific racism,” the Asian nation of Japan should never have defeated a white nation, such as Russia. Japan's victory stunned much of the world, and Tokyo soon became a hub for Asian students and activists who wanted to learn how to build an economy and military that could stand up to the Western powers colonizing their countries.
The United States became a major power at nearly the same time. It formally gained control of Hawaii and defeated the decaying Spanish imperial forces in Cuba and in the Philippines between 1898 and 1903. The situation in Hawaii involved political negotiations with Japan because of the large number of Japanese immigrants on the islands. The military and diplomatic victories by Japan and the United States in the 1890s and early 1900s demonstrated to the world that both countries were rising powers, while some European countries, particularly Russia and Spain, were declining.
By the closing years of the 19th century, both Japan and the United States had emerged as imperialist powers in Asia and the Pacific. They were not alone. Great Britain, Russia, Germany, and France were all playing their part in an imperial scramble whose focus unmistakably rested with China. United States Secretary of State John Hay in 1899 and again in 1900 issued his famed Open Door notes, which warned against both encroachments on Chinese sovereignty and restrictions on American trade in that country. The Japanese government, which was eyeing Russian encroachments in the Chinese territory of Manchuria and the Korean peninsula, responded favorably to the Open Door notes. Far more significant from Tokyo's point of view, however, was the conclusion in January 1902 of the Anglo–Japanese Alliance. This strengthened Japan's hand vis-á-vis Russia to a far greater extent than did agreements concerning the Open Door. Even so, Foreign Minister Jutaro Komura throughout 1903 assiduously kept American officials informed of the state of his negotiations with Russia. Thus, when the Russo-Japanese War broke out in February 1904, Tokyo knew that it was not only allied to the world's foremost power, but that it also had the sympathy of the United States.
Acting on this perception, the Japanese government in February 1904 dispatched Kentarō Kaneko to Washington. A graduate of Harvard University who had long known President Theodore Roosevelt, Kaneko quietly sounded Roosevelt out on the prospect of the latter offering his good offices to bring an end to the Russo–Japanese War. It was a sagacious move. The vehemently anti-Russian Roosevelt believed Japan was fighting America's war, and Kaneko saw no need to disabuse him of this notion. Against this promising backdrop, Kaneko broached with Roosevelt Japan's terms of peace with Russia, among which were included a free hand not only in Korea but also in southern Manchuria. Roosevelt proved amenable. In August 1905, he approved the so-called Taft–Katsura Agreement, according to whose terms the United States and Japan agreed to respect each other's possessions in Asia and the Pacific. At the same time, Roosevelt mediated an end to the Russo–Japanese War, and in so doing oversaw the transfer to Japan of Korea, southern Manchuria, and southern Sakhalin.
Roosevelt's sponsorship of the Portsmouth Peace Conference marked the zenith of the spirit of U.S.–Japanese cooperation in the period 1900–1909. If both the Japanese and American governments sought to define their interests on a complementary basis, however, there was also an abiding awareness of the potential for friction. One need look no further than the fact that both the United States Navy and the Imperial Japanese Navy (in 1906 and 1907, respectively) designated each other their hypothetical enemies. Roosevelt, too, was concerned that victory in the Russo–Japanese War might propel Japan onto a course frankly adverse to American interests in the Philippines and Hawaii. In the immediate aftermath of the war, Japanese policymakers revealed themselves no less distrustful of American designs on their newly gained sphere of influence. When the great railway builder Edward H. Harriman in October 1905 offered to purchase what was to become the South Manchurian Railway, Foreign Minister Jutaro Komura argued successfully that Japan raise its own money so as to strengthen its hard-earned foothold in southern Manchuria.
Harriman—and his financial partners on Wall Street—may have been impressed, but Roosevelt was not unduly perturbed. In his estimation, Manchuria was of peripheral interest to the United States. Although not blind to the potential presented by Chinese markets, Roosevelt rather welcomed Japan's preoccupation with the continent because, in his calculations, it served to lessen the possibility of a U.S.–Japanese clash in the Pacific. In other words, he hoped that by engaging their respective interests in areas separate from each other, U.S.–Japanese relations might remain on a harmonious footing.
This was the basic framework in which Japanese and American policymakers worked throughout the remainder of this period. Roosevelt was no less infuriated than was the Japanese government when in 1906 the San Francisco School Board segregated Japanese school children. His response was twofold. On the one hand, he managed to convince Californian authorities to rescind the offensive segregation order. On the other, he finalized with Ambassador Keikichi Aoki a deal known as the Gentlemen's Agreement, according to whose terms the Japanese government agreed to curb immigration to the United States.
In the meantime, Roosevelt resigned himself to the fact that the United States did not possess the wherewithal to defend the Philippines. In 1908, he moved the Pacific base from Manila to Hawaii. Having conceded by this act that the Philippines were militarily indefensible, Roosevelt sought to protect them by other means. It was fitting that the end of this period should be marked by the so-called Root–Takahira Agreement of November 1908. By this agreement, both nations agreed to respect China's independence and integrity—the Open Door—while at the same time respecting each other's possessions in the region. This meant that the United States recognized Japan's possessions in Korea and Manchuria, while Japan recognized American possessions in Hawaii and the Philippines.
Roosevelt left the presidency in 1909, and with him went any goodwill generated by the Root–Takahira Agreement. Roosevelt's hand-picked successor, William Howard Taft, dispensed with Roosevelt's policies and instead chose to challenge Japan's predominant position in southern Manchuria. Underlying this policy was the Taft administration's faith in the power of the American dollar, as well as a belief in the compatibility of American and Chinese interests. Generally referred to as “dollar diplomacy,” this policy's defining moment came in late 1909, when an American banking group gained Chinese approval to build a railway that would run part of the way parallel to Japan's South Manchurian line. As if this were not enough to challenge Japan's position on the continent, Secretary of State Philander Knox immediately raised the stakes by proposing that China—replete with funds provided by a consortium of major powers—buy the Russian-owned railway in northern Manchuria and Japan's South Manchurian line. The Japanese government responded by reaching an agreement with Russia that provided for cooperation over railways and railway finance in Manchuria. The British, for their part, refused to climb aboard Knox's neutralization scheme. Roosevelt was aghast. Taft had needlessly antagonized the Japanese, and in the process had driven them into the arms of the Russians. This phase of dollar diplomacy was as spectacular for its audacity as for its failure.
U.S.–Japanese relations worsened considerably after the outbreak of World War I. China was again at issue. Having entered the war ostensibly as Britain's ally, Japan fought not for its allies’ survival but for such objectives as the seizure of German possessions in China and the Pacific, and ultimately, economic and political hegemony over all of China. In pursuit of this second objective, Foreign Minister Takaaki Katō in January 1915 handed to Chinese President Yuan Shih-kai the so-called Twenty-One Demands. The administration of U.S. President Woodrow Wilson, which clung to an ill-defined policy of goodwill and friendship toward China, protested vigorously. The British, recognizing that their imperial interests in China were being threatened by their ally, repeatedly urged Japan to drop the more onerous of its demands. Japan did so, and eventually gained China's begrudging acceptance. The damage to U.S.–Japanese relations, however, was palpable. Japan's renewed commitment to the Open Door principle in 1917 by means of the Lansing-Ishii Agreement did little to assuage American distrust of Japanese motives. Nor did joint U.S.–Japanese participation in the Siberian Intervention bring a halt to the two nations’ increasingly acrimonious relations.
The antagonism was brought into full relief at the Paris Peace Conference of 1919. Here, Wilson launched a concerted assault on the imperialist practices that had led inexorably to a world war, and championed instead a new diplomacy whose defining characteristics were the spread of democracy and the encouragement of free trade throughout the world; the destruction of German militarism; and great power cooperation within a League of Nations. The Japanese delegation remained entirely out of step with Wilson's “new diplomacy.” It saw its most important task at the peace conference as the retention of all German rights and concessions on China's Shantung peninsula, and threatened to walk out if these demands were not met. Wilson capitulated. He did refuse, however, to insert a racial equality clause in the League of Nations charter. Furthermore, despite the hopes for disarmament that statesmen—including Wilson—expressed both during the war and in its aftermath, Japan, the United States, and Great Britain found themselves embroiled in the immediate postwar era in a costly and dangerous naval arms race.
The Washington Conference of November 1921–February 1922 marked a significant turning point in U.S.–Japanese relations. Delegates to the conference were inspired by a spirit of compromise and goodwill. Various treaties and agreements were concluded, the most important of which were the Five Power Treaty and the Nine Power Treaty. The former halted the naval arms race in the Pacific by setting a ratio of 5:5:3 in capital ship strength for the United States, Great Britain, and Japan (and a lesser ratio for France and Italy), while the latter gave solemn treaty form to the traditional American policy of the Open Door.
Naval disarmament, non-interference in the internal affairs of China, and peaceful competition for that nation's markets and resources were the hallmarks of what became known as the Washington System. All this was underlined by growing U.S.–Japanese economic interdependence, which dictated the necessity of friendship as the basic framework of the two nations’ relations. Nevertheless, there were problems. The United States Congress in 1924 prohibited Japanese immigration in its entirety in what is known as the Oriental Exclusion Act. Although politicians and statesmen on both sides of the Pacific continued to speak of the spirit of the Washington Conference, there can be little doubt the Oriental Exclusion Act undermined U.S.–Japanese relations for years to come.
There was also widespread dissatisfaction within Japanese naval circles with the disarmament system. Led by the impetuous Kanji Katō, these officers opposed Navy Minister (and chief delegate to the Washington Conference) Tomosaburō Katō's contention that war with the United States must be avoided. In 1923, they included in the Imperial National Defense Policy a statement that war with the United States was “inevitable.” The revolt against the Washington System simmered throughout the 1920s, and exploded at the time of the London Naval Conference of 1930. At that time, the Japanese government—including the policymaking nucleus within the Navy Ministry—indicated its acceptance of a formula that sought to extend the naval disarmament system to incorporate auxiliary vessels. However, Kanji Katō (who by this time had been appointed chief of the Navy General Staff) remained irreconcilable, and sparked a months-long struggle that split the Navy.
The rise of nationalism in China presented yet another challenge to the Washington System. By means of the treaties and agreements concluded at the Washington Conference, Japan, the United States, and the other powers regulated their competition in China and the Pacific, but these agreements did nothing to account for the phenomenon of an emerging national consciousness in China. Largely interchangeable with anti-imperialism, this national consciousness was directed against the Washington system powers. The Chinese were virtually unanimous in their condemnation of the unequal treaties (fixed tariff and extraterritoriality) that the powers had forced upon China in the 19th century and which the Washington Conference perpetuated. Popular boycotts repeatedly broke out against Western and Japanese business interests in China. Most disturbingly from Tokyo's perspective, Chiang Kai-shek, who by 1929 had succeeded somewhat in unifying China, refused to recognize the validity of past treaties and agreements relating to Manchuria. Several Sino-Japanese military clashes ensued, although Kijuro Shidehara returned to the foreign minister's post in 1929 no less convinced than he had been previously of the continued efficacy of the Washington Conference system. In 1930, Japan extended formal recognition to the new Chinese government of Chiang Kai-shek, and decided to cooperate with the United States and Britain on the question of abrogating extraterritoriality in China.
Perhaps the greatest challenge to the Washington system came from the American stock market crash on 29 October 1929 and the subsequent Great Depression. Its reverberations were felt around the world, although the situation in Japan was particularly acute. Lacking in raw materials, Japan relied on foreign trade to pay for them. With the onset of the Great Depression, however, its Washington system partners—most notably the United States and Great Britain—lost their enthusiasm for free trade. The United States Congress in June 1930 passed the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act, imposing the highest rates on imports in the 20th century. The system of free trade that held the Washington system together suddenly unraveled.
Japan's invasion of Manchuria in September 1931 marked the beginning of the end of the Washington Conference system. By this action, the Japanese military signaled its disregard for both the principle of non-interference in China's internal affairs and the notion of cooperation among the great powers. Worse still, the civilian government in Tokyo proved utterly powerless to restrain the military. By January 1932, the United States government concluded that Japan was no longer a partner for stability in Asia and the Pacific, and Secretary of State Henry Stimson informed both Japan and China that the American government refused to recognize any changes in China brought about by force and in violation of the Open Door policy. When the League of Nations formally refuted Japan's contention that Manchuria—which Japan called “Manchukuo”—was an independent nation, Japan quit the League of Nations. The final nail in the coffin of the Washington Conference system came in 1934 when the Japanese navy determined to end the era of naval limitation.
U.S.–Japanese relations considerably worsened after Japanese and Chinese forces clashed at the Marco Polo Bridge near Beijing in July 1937. The so-called China Incident, which Prime Minister Fumimaro Konoe hoped to bring to an early conclusion with a preponderance of force, quickly developed into a deadly quagmire, including Japanese attacks on Shanghai and Nanjing, causing widespread death to Chinese civilians. In early 1938, Konoe announced that henceforth his government would deal with Chiang only on the battlefield and at the surrender table. Later that year, Konoe proclaimed to the world that Japan sought the construction of a “new order” in East Asia. Konoe's “new order” envisioned Japan, the puppet state of Manchukuo, and China (under a collaborationist government in Nanjing) bound together. Washington responded by announcing in July 1939 its intention to abrogate the U.S.–Japan Treaty of Commerce and Navigation. Because Japan's economic well-being continued to depend on close commercial relations with the United States, such a measure clarified American opposition to Japan's policy of aggression in China. In taking this step, however, Washington had committed itself to nothing final. The application—or non-application—of economic sanctions would depend on subsequent Japanese actions.
The Japanese government for a time sought to conciliate the United States. The most notable attempt toward this end occurred from September 1939 to January 1940 when Admiral Kichisaburō Nomura served as foreign minister. However, in the summer of 1940, German armies overran Western Europe, leaving the resource-rich regions of Southeast Asia defenseless. With the advent of Konoe's second cabinet in July 1940, attentions in Tokyo duly turned to the conclusion of an alliance relationship with Nazi Germany. As if to underscore its intentions in negotiating an alliance with the Germans, Japanese forces in late September advanced into northern French Indochina. Washington regarded the defense of Britain as vital to its own survival, viewed Nazi Germany as a quasi-enemy, and responded to Japan's actions by slapping a virtual embargo on aviation gasoline, high-grade iron, and steel scrap for Japan. In September 1940, the Japan-Germany-Italy Tripartite Pact was formally concluded after negotiations led by Yosuke Matsuoka, the American-educated foreign minister of Japan.
The tone for the U.S.–Japanese negotiations of 1941 had thus been set. Japan was allied explicitly with Nazi Germany, and the United States was allied—in fact, if not yet in name—with Great Britain. Japan had decided on an opportunistic policy of advancing into Southeast Asia, and the United States determined to respond to any advances by increasing economic pressures on Japan. At the same time, the administration of President Franklin D. Roosevelt regarded Germany as the greatest threat to American security. It thus trod a delicate diplomatic line toward the Japanese. On the one hand, there was an unmistakable display of firmness toward Japan's hegemonic aspirations. On the other, there was a determined effort not to shut the door on the possibility of rapprochement should the Japanese dissociate themselves from Adolf Hitler and his brand of militaristic aggression.
The outbreak of the Soviet–German war in June 1941 provided the Japanese government with a golden opportunity to follow the latter course. After all, Hitler had launched his assault on the Soviet Union without first informing his alliance partner. Japan, however, had never seriously contemplated this possibility. The Soviet threat to the north having been removed, policymakers in Tokyo determined to undertake further advances into French Indochina. There was widespread recognition that such a step carried with it the possibility of war with the United States. The Imperial Japanese Navy, which would bear the brunt of the fighting if war did break out, was particularly belligerent. For its part, the Roosevelt administration cracked Japanese diplomatic codes and was privy to Japan's determination to occupy Indochina. In late July, it froze Japanese assets in the United States. The economic pressure quickly escalated on 1 August when Washington embargoed high-octane gasoline as well as crude oil. In the meantime, Japanese troops occupied the Indochinese peninsula in its entirety.
The U.S.–Japanese negotiations continued in Washington, although any chance of diplomatic success was scuttled by the Japanese occupation of Indochina, especially Vietnam. Neither the Japanese Army nor the Navy held out any hope for rapprochement with the United States. Attitudes in Washington, too, had hardened. Konoe sought to break the deadlock by floating the idea of a summit meeting with Roosevelt, although his unwillingness—or inability—to define the terms to which he might agree at any such meeting merely served to further arouse the Roosevelt administration's suspicions. Konoe's idea of a summit meeting collapsed, and so did his cabinet. General Hideki Tojo did not assume the prime minister's post with the immediate intention of taking his country to war against the United States. Yet, his cabinet never seriously contemplated the painful diplomatic concessions required to avoid that outcome.
Japanese military forces struck Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, with dramatic suddenness on 7 December 1941. The early months of the war were wildly successful for Japan, capturing Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaya, the Dutch East Indies, Burma, Ceylon, and the Philippines from the Americans, British, and Dutch. Then in June 1942, American forces sank four Japanese naval carriers and destroyed some 300 planes in the Battle of Midway. In January 1943, American forces recaptured Guadalcanal. Thereafter, American forces gradually rolled back Japan's territorial gains in Southeast Asia and the Pacific—though not in China—and in the spring of 1945 captured Okinawa. Most major Japanese cities, including Tokyo, were razed by conventional and fire-bombings. After the Japanese cabinet refused the surrender terms offered in the Potsdam Declaration, the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were destroyed by the world's first atomic attacks on 6 August and 9 August. Soon after the atomic bombing of Nagasaki and the Soviet Union's invasion of Manchuria, Emperor Hirohito carefully and publicly announced Japan's surrender on 15 August 1945. On 30 August, the first occupation troops arrived on Japan's shores, opening a new chapter in U.S.–Japanese relations.
After Japan's defeat at the end of World War II, the United States played a leading role in implementing the Allied Occupation policies in Japan led by General Douglas MacArthur. The United States, its wartime allies, and Japanese supporters also put in place constitutional, political, and educational reforms in the first two and a half years of the Occupation. Washington then changed course and worked to establish a self-sufficient Japanese economy. In February 1949, Joseph Dodge, an American economic adviser, imposed a politically unpopular austerity program called the Dodge Line in order to balance the Japanese budget.
The Dodge Line was a major turning point in the Occupation. It transformed the state-managed economy into a market-oriented, export-led economy. The fate of the Dodge Line depended on the revival of Japanese foreign trade; unfortunately, this was not achieved for some time because of a worldwide depression in 1949. Southeast Asian countries were Japan's natural market because of their great demand for industrial goods and their proximity. Establishing a regional economic linkage, however, required political stability in Asia. Accordingly, by 1949, the United States had focused its attention on bringing political stability to Southeast Asia, as a prerequisite for Japanese economic recovery.
The United States also emphasized demilitarization in the early stages of the Occupation. Because this left Japan defenseless, Washington realized that to guarantee Japan's security the U.S. would have to maintain military bases and armed forces on the Japanese islands and, in 1951, the U.S.–Japanese Security Treaty was signed. The United States compelled Japan to accept American bases on the former's territory, and to agree, reluctantly, to rearm.
The Korean War, which broke out in June 1950, had a positive effect on the Japanese economy. The Chinese Communists’ intervention in the war and their military successes enhanced China's prestige in Asia, even though hundreds of thousands of Chinese “volunteer” soldiers were killed in Korea. As China's status increased, the United States believed that it would be difficult to retain Japan's pro-American orientation unless it made strenuous efforts to preserve its own prestige. In Asia, China and America were close allies during World War II, but when the Communists came to power in 1949 the two countries became bitter enemies. As this situation left Japan as the United States’ principal Asian ally, Washington did its utmost to reinforce the U.S.–Japan alliance, primarily by means of economic and military measures.
During the 1950s, the United States tried to reduce Japan's trade deficit and integrate the Japanese economy with those of the Western bloc. Washington expected that the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) would provide Japan with economic benefits; however, Japan could not enjoy the full benefits of the GATT because of restrictions imposed by other member states. Moreover, the United States itself restricted the possible expansion of Japanese trade by severely constricting relations with China.
In spite of these difficulties, four factors helped Japanese economic development in the early post-Occupation period. First, the United States tolerated Japan's restrictions on imports and foreign investment, because few American businesses regarded the Japanese market as important. Second, Washington facilitated Japanese access to the American market by opposing demands for protectionist measures that were coming from less competitive, labor-intensive industries in various U.S. states. Third, American military spending in Japan and in other parts of Asia helped revitalize the Japanese economy. Fourth, Japan was able to concentrate on economic growth because it was not hampered by excessive defense spending. During the 1950s, the United States and Japan suffered from trade friction only in certain sectors, including textiles and general merchandise. The American textile industry was especially hard hit by heavy importation of cheap Japanese products. In January 1956, Japan began to adopt voluntary export restraints. These restraints achieved the protectionists’ goal of limiting the number of commodities coming from Japan, while they preserved the spirit of free trade.
As American hegemonic status gradually declined in the late 1960s, Washington could no longer keep its domestic markets open to Japanese goods. The U.S.–Japanese textile negotiations between 1969 and 1971, which were designed to restrain imports of Japanese textiles into the United States, were symbolic incidents of this era. Americans were alarmed to realize that Japan had recovered from World War II so quickly and that, by the early 1970s, Japanese industries had become competitive with U.S. industries.
In the mid-1980s, the United States started to focus serious attention on Japan as an economic competitor because of its increasing trade deficits and increasing trade surpluses in Japan. Washington emphasized not only reducing Japanese imports to the United States, but also expanding U.S. exports to Japan. In addition, it focused on unfair Japanese trade practices, considering it imperative to change the domestic Japanese system. By the late 1980s, Japan had an enormous trade surplus with the United States, while the United States was running a huge deficit. Between September 1989 and June 1990, Washington and Tokyo devised the Structural Impediments Initiative as a way to mitigate such trade problems. Unlike earlier trade agreements, this one dealt with structural issues instead of focusing on particular items.
The United States–Japan Security Treaty of 1951 had two major problems. First, it gave the United States the right to station its military forces in Japan, but it did not specifically oblige the U.S. to defend Japan or to consult with it over military operations. Second, the treaty allowed the American military forces to repress domestic rioting, a potential violation of Japan's sovereignty. In 1960, a new U.S.–Japan Security Treaty was concluded that abrogated the United States’ right to intervene in domestic rioting and specified that the United States assumed official responsibility for Japan's defense. In turn, Japan was obligated to protect U.S. installations in Japan if they were attacked.
Japan did not become directly involved in the Vietnam War, but as a dependable ally of the United States, it made significant contributions and reaped enormous economic benefits. Okinawa became a base for B-52s and a training base for U.S. Marines. The United States used its bases on mainland Japan for logistics, supplies, training, and rest and recreation. Withdrawal from Vietnam encouraged the United States to promote closer military cooperation with Japan. In November 1978, the United States and Japan began to review various aspects of military cooperation, such as emergency defense legislation and logistic support.
The Cold War structure and America's preeminence in the world brought stability to post–World War II U.S.–Japanese relations. The Cold War caused Japan to depend on the United States strategically, and U.S. hegemony brought both military protection and economic well-being to Japan. However, the decline of U.S. economic and military hegemony after the late 1960s and the end of the Cold War in the early 1990s undermined the basis of stability in the countries’ relations.
During the 1990s, the U.S. economy revived, primarily because of the information technology (IT) revolution and to the rapid development of IT-related industries, while Japan began a decade-long era of deep political and economic turmoil. In July 1993, the Japanese Liberal Democratic Party, the long-term ruling party, lost its majority in the Diet, ending its 38-year control of Japanese politics. A series of weak coalition governments followed, none bringing political stability, which exacerbated Japan's economic recession. Economic crises in Southeast Asian countries in 1997 further aggravated Japanese economic conditions.
In the 1990s, in order to redress trade imbalances, Japan and the United States stressed macroeconomic concerns, area-specific issues, structural problems, and a results-oriented approach. Washington demanded that Japan set minimum numerical targets for increases of imports, arguing that because the Japanese market was closed, the United States had severe difficulty in expanding its exports to Japan. Japan strongly opposed this request on the grounds that it could lead to managed trade, and insisted that U.S. firms conduct more effective market research and produce goods suitable for Japanese consumers.
The gross domestic products (GDPs) of the United States and Japan combined constituted approximately 40 percent of the world's total GDP, and their economic assistance made up about 50 percent of the total amount of aid. Since U.S.–Japanese economic relations will continue to have a decisive impact on the health of the global economy, the U.S.–Japan Twenty-first Century Committee was established in July 1996 as a bilateral, private-sector forum for dialogue and the consideration of policy proposals. Moreover, the two nations have worked together on such global threats as the deterioration of the earth's environment, communicable diseases, natural calamities, and terrorism.
In April 1990, in response to a request from the U.S. Congress, the George H. W. Bush administration issued its strategy for East Asia, “A Strategic Framework for the Asian Pacific Rim: Looking Toward the 21st Century.” This document laid out the main points of the Bush administration's view of the post–Cold War situation. The report stated that the 1990s would probably mark a turning point for political conditions in the Asia–Pacific region. Meanwhile, members of the U.S. Congress, who saw the end of the Cold War as a reason to cut unnecessary defense spending, began demanding a reduction of U.S. military forces in East Asia, primarily those in South Korea and Japan. In 1992, the White House announced a second strategy document for East Asia that reaffirmed the plan for gradual troop reductions decided in 1990.
Nevertheless, the 1990s were an unstable decade for U.S.–Japanese relations, a time during which the two countries searched for a new principle to determine the orientation of their relationship. The Persian Gulf War of 1991 confirmed the importance of the U.S. bases in Japan. There was a great deal of American public and unofficial government criticism of Japan for not sending any military forces—even for possible non-combat operations—during the war itself. The $13 billion paid by the Japanese government afterward did little to assuage American criticism. The war led the United States to restructure its strategic policy toward Asia as a whole. Between August 1994 and February 1995, the United States and Japan began to jointly seek a way to redefine the U.S.–Japan alliance. Both countries assumed that conditions of instability would persist in the Asia–Pacific region, despite the end of the Cold War. Alongside their concerns about stability and various other problems was the recognition that the Asia–Pacific region had the greatest economic growth potential of any region in the world. Both countries were convinced that a U.S. military presence would be indispensable to assure regional security. Their joint analysis went so far as to conclude that the basing of U.S. military forces in Japan was a crucial factor in maintaining the U.S. posture of global military preparedness and quick response, based on the use of a flexible array of options to react to developments in international hot spots. The two countries concluded that the U.S.–Japan alliance would continue to make a crucial contribution to the maintenance of stability in the Asia–Pacific region. For its part, the United States emphasized the view that this alliance was important for maintaining forward-deployed forces and a regional balance of power in East Asia, and for defusing new local threats that had emerged. Consequently, Japan was expected to play an active role with respect to regional security matters within the context of its alliance with the United States.
The way in which the U.S.–Japan alliance was to be redefined was spelled out in February 1995, when the U.S. Defense Department released its third East Asia strategy review, known as the Nye Report. This report underscored the importance of security in the Asia–Pacific region and proclaimed that the United States intended to keep a military force of 100,000 in the region, of whom 60,000 would be stationed in Japan. It reconfirmed the U.S.–Japan relationship as the necessary foundation for both U.S. security policy in the Asia-Pacific region and overall U.S. global strategy. The Nye Initiative defined U.S.–Japanese relations as the most important bilateral relationship in Asia, and Japanese security as the linchpin of U.S. security policy there.
In April 1996, President Bill Clinton held a summit with Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto and they signed the “Japan–U.S. Joint Declaration on Security: Alliance for the 21st Century.” In May 1999, the Japanese Diet passed legislation supporting the guidelines. Japan formally approved conducting military-related action outside of Japan, including rear-area logistic support, but not active combat operations, to enhance its own security interests.
Japan's neighbors, especially China, are closely watching the expanding role of the U.S.–Japanese alliance in the Asia–Pacific area, and they worry that Japan might again become a great military power even while China is dramatically increasing its military spending as a result of its rapidly growing economy. Yet, in the post–Cold War era, Washington redefined the security treaty with Japan to maintain a military presence in Japan partly because it intends to avoid a revival of Japanese militarism.
Cultural and educational exchanges are a significant part of the relationship between Japan and the United States. Despite political and economic clashes of the past few decades, grassroots relationships are as strong as ever between the two countries. There are over 100 Japan–America Societies (JAS) in the United States and Japan. Each JAS society includes business people, corporations, academics, politicians, community leaders, and students as members who promote strong relations and mutual understanding between the two countries. Sister Cities International, headquartered in Washington, D.C., includes more than 100 sister-cities between Japan and the United States, from large cities to small, rural towns. Most individual members travel every other year to meet and visit with members from their sister city. Some U.S.–Japan sister cities have scholarships and other programs and opportunities of mutual benefit. A similar organization with dozens of U.S.–Japan chapters is People to People International (PPI).
Begun in 1987, the Japan Exchange and Teaching (JET) Program has had thousands of young American college graduates participate as assistant teachers and instructors in elementary, middle, and high schools in Japan. Each teacher serves for one year, and may choose to serve for up to three years. Education and cultural experiences vary, but the vast majority of young Americans on the JET Program stay for more than one year. Funded primarily by the Japanese government through the Foreign Ministry, it was originally established in the midst of the Kokusaika (“internationalization”) movement in the 1980s, and has since become a prestigious and competitive program for young Americans and other Westerners. Since the late 1940s, the renowned Fulbright Program has provided fellowships to nearly 6,000 Japanese and more than 2,000 Americans to pursue academic and cultural studies. Most Fulbright fellows have been lecturers, researchers, graduate students, or language instructors in either Japan or the United States.
Numerous Japanese students have gone to universities and colleges in America since the late 1860s. Currently, almost 50,000 Japanese students are at American colleges. Although Japanese students can be found at almost any college in America, nearly 25 percent attend colleges in California. Two-thirds of Japanese college students are undergraduates, 20 percent are graduate students, and 13 percent are enrolled in ESL (English as a Second Language) programs. Relatively fewer Americans have attended Japanese colleges and universities, but thousands of American college students have studied Japanese culture and language, participated in study abroad programs, or have done graduate research in Japan.
Hollywood films are popular in Japan, and Japanese watch American TV soap operas and dramas while many young Americans are hooked on Japanese-produced anime films and manga comic books. Since the 1950s, American baseball players have played on Japanese teams, and some Japanese professional teams have been led by American managers. Recently, Japanese players have joined Major League Baseball teams and become stars in both Japan and the United States. Japanese restaurants are located in practically every city in America, though they are not quite as ubiquitous as McDonald's, Kentucky Fried Chicken, and Starbucks in Japan.
At the end of June 2001, Prime Minister Koizumi Junichiro visited Washington for a meeting with President George W. Bush, taking with him the sad statistics of the country's economy. Japan faced its highest level of deflation since the Great Depression of the 1930s, and accumulated government debt had risen to more than 130 percent of gross national product. Banks were the most important problem for Koizumi and the Japanese economy. Nonperforming loans amounted to hundreds of billions of dollars. Koizumi openly expressed his deep pro-U.S. position in public, looking for solid outside support to implement his potentially unpopular reform agenda. President Bush, for his part, demonstrated his clear support for Koizumi's economic structural reform policy. North Korea's ballistic missile and nuclear research programs, and especially the al-Qaeda attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon in September 2001 further promoted military cooperation between Japan and the United States. The U.S.–Japanese relationship continues to be one of the most important bilateral relationships in the 21st century, especially in the Asia–Pacific area. The peace and stability of the Asia–Pacific area in the 21st century depend on U.S.–Japanese cooperation and their efforts to contain destabilizing factors in this area.
On 29 October 2001, the Anti-Terrorism Special Measures Law was enacted. The Japanese Maritime Self-Defense Force began to supply fuel to U.S. ships in the northern part of the Indian Ocean in December 2001. This law was extended for two years in November 2003, and extended again for one year in November 2005. Over this period, the Japanese Self-Defence Forces have been acting in a supportive role in the Indian Ocean.
In August 2002, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State James Kerry informed former Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto that North Korea was suspected of secretly developing nuclear weapons. However, On 17 September 2002, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi went ahead and visited North Korea and signed the Pyongyang Declaration.
Japan also supports U.S. policies toward Iraq. On 26 July 2003, Special legislation calling for assistance in the rebuilding of Iraq was enacted. In December 2003, the Japanese government formulated a basic plan. On 16 January 2004, based on this law and plan, the Japanese government dispatched an advance party of the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force to Iraq. Japan dispatched approximately 600 members of the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force to As-Samawah, Iraq, to set up water supply, recovery and development of public facilties, and medical support. In December 2004, the law stationing the Japan Self-Defense Forces in Iraq was extended for one year. In December 2005, the basic plan was extended for one year. Japan decided to spend up to $5 billion for reconstruction assistance of Iraq. In short, Japan has been helping the United States in Iraq, both in terms of economic cooperation and of reconstruction of Iraq by the Self-Defence Force.