00:00After Japanese Prime Minister Takechi Sane's comments on possibly intervening in a Taiwan
00:05contingency, Chinese officials have only grown more strident. First was a now-deleted tweet
00:11from China's Consul General in Osaka saying next should be cut, spiraling up to China's
00:16Defense Ministry directly saying Japan would suffer a quote-unquote crushing defeat,
00:20and the government warning its citizens against traveling to the country.
00:30This is a major test of Sane's leadership, only two weeks after she met with Chinese President Xi Jinping
00:47in South Korea at this year's APEC Summit to stabilize relations. Even before becoming Prime Minister,
00:53Sane's stance on Taiwan and controversial issues like Japan's actions in World War II
00:57had China wary of her. The Japanese government insists that its position on Taiwan has not changed.
01:04Issues over Taiwan need to be resolved via dialogue in a peaceful manner,
01:09and that's what we expect, and that's the government's consistent stance. Also,
01:14the government's stance on the 1972 Japan-China declaration is the policy, and that remains unchanged.
01:21An op-ed in the Chinese state-owned People's Daily
01:24said Sane is the first Japanese leader since 1945 to threaten China. Prior Japanese leaders usually
01:31followed the US policy of maintaining strategic ambiguity on Taiwan's defense, and what steps
01:36they would take if a conflict were to break out. Yet despite the pressure from Beijing,
01:40which included summoning Japan's ambassador to lodge a complaint, Takeichi has not retracted her comments.
01:45Beijing trying to impose more pressure, both verbally and diplomatically, to try to force Takeichi back
01:53to retracting her comment and then returning to the more longstanding policy that Japan has
02:01always implemented in place with regard to the issue of Taiwan. I think for her to backtrack her
02:08comment is probably quite unlikely in the near term, unless there is an obvious domestic pushback against
02:16what she had said. Taiwan is just over 100 kilometers away from Japan's easternmost island,
02:22making an invasion an acute concern for Japan's security. Japan constitutionally does not have
02:27an army and cannot deploy its forces except in cases of self-defense. And it's an open question
02:32whether a Taiwan-straight conflict would qualify. Joseph Wu and Larry Siano for Taiwan Plus.
Comments