Monday, September 13, 2010

The Senkakus and Sovereignty

DSCF4020
One of my daughter's paintings. She practices by copying.

Nicholas Kristoff, the well known Asian affairs commentator, holds forth on the Senkaku Island dispute today in the NY Times. His piece is long and there are several parts I'd like to highlight.

First, the "weak government means war" thesis:
The reason to worry is that nationalists in both China and Taiwan see the islands as unquestionably theirs and think that their government has been weak in asserting this authority. So far, wiser heads have generally prevailed on each side, but at some point a weakened Chinese leader might try to gain legitimacy with the public by pushing the issue and recovering the islands.
Time for analysts to get on board with reality: right now the Chinese government enjoys good legitimacy and is strong and yet China is growing ever more belligerent. Make the connection guys -- in this case growing strength drives growing expansion.

Second, on the US role:
The other problem is that, technically, the U.S. would be obliged to bail Japan out if there were a fight over the Senkakus. The U.S. doesn’t take a position on who owns the islands, but the Japan-U.S. security treaty specifies that the U.S. will help defend areas that Japan administers. And in 1972, when the U.S. handed Okinawa back to Japan, it agreed that Japan should administer the Senkakus. So we’re in the absurd position of being committed to help Japan fight a war over islands, even though we don’t agree that they are necessarily Japanese.
In reality, of course, there is zero chance that the U.S. will honor its treaty obligation over a few barren rocks. We’re not going to risk a nuclear confrontation with China over some islands that may well be China’s. But if we don’t help, our security relationship with Japan will be stretched to the breaking point.
Kristof writes that there's zero chance we'd honor our treaty. Zero chance? We'd just ignore Japan instead? The problem is that a few years ago the US and Japan held joint military exercises in those selfsame Senkaku Islands, which implies that the US would in fact honor the security treaty. Especially since armed clashes between Japan and China are likely spread to take in other Japanese held areas, such as Yoniguni Islands or Okinawa. Can you imagine how Japan and the rest of the world would take it if the US did not come to the aid of its ally? I think "zero chance" is simply wrong.

Kristof writes on the sovereignty issue:
So which country has a better claim to the islands? My feeling is that it’s China, although the answer isn’t clearcut. Chinese navigational records show the islands as Chinese for many centuries, and a 1783 Japanese map shows them as Chinese as well. Japan purported to “discover” the islands only in 1884 and annexed them only in 1895 when it also grabbed Taiwan. (You can also make a case that they are terra nullis, belonging to no nation.)
In fact as the pro-PRC Wiki page notes, the governor of Okinawa had requested their inclusion into the Japanese empire in 1885. Japan finally incorporated the islands in Jan of 1895, prior to the annexation of Formosa. As I have noted many times, prior to the announcement of the possibility of oil there in 1968, both PRC and ROC maps showed the islands as either Japanese or lying outside the territory of China. This whole dispute is a post-1969 fantasy retrojected into the past. Sorry, Nick, but this dispute is very clear. UPDATE: The Washington Times has published an excerpt from the 1969 map.

But more importantly, the whole way sovereignty is thought about here is ridiculous. The Chinese claim is like one of those medieval European claims that were revived to use as a pretext to annex a neighboring kingdom: "My fourth cousin's second wife was your great-great-great uncle's daughter therefore I own your kingdom!" The current Chinese method is like the "Courts of Reunion" that the Sun King used to claim adjacent states, manufacturing current sovereignty by retrojecting modern claims on sovereignty into selectively reconstructed history.

Essentially, using a Qing claim to support the current PRC claim is like arguing that Turkey owns Egypt because the Ottoman empire once did. The Ottomans are gone and so is their sovereignty. The Qing are gone and their empire has dissolved into independent states. The difference is that after 1911 Chinese nationalists decided to inflate China out to the old borders -- much as if Turkish nationalists had decided to reconstruct a Greater Turkey along the old Ottoman lines, and were currently trying to annex Serbia, Greece, Egypt, and Jordan. We are still living with the consequences of post-Qing Chinese re-expansionism and will be for another 50 years, through the next several rounds of hegemonic warfare.

Another sovereignty issue is one for that stream of Taiwan nationalists who argue based on the Qing claim that Taiwan owns the Senkakus. My response would be that if you recognize Qing sovereignty as extending into the modern era and shaping claims to the Senkakus, then you recognize PRC sovereignty over Taiwan based on the Qing claim. You can't pick and choose among Qing claims just because they suit your appetite for expansion. Taiwan doesn't own the Senkakus.

The last paragraph is a bit of mainstream media hubris:
As Chinese nationalism grows, as China’s navy and ability to project power in the ocean gains, we could see some military jostling over the islands. You read it here first.
No, we didn't read it here first, Nicholas. This blog has been pointing this out for several years, and many others were there before I was, including the US and Japanese Navy officers who put together joint exercises in the Senkakus. As is always with the mainstream media, you guys are way behind academia, the government, and the blogs.

Also, I find the habit of mainstream media columnists calling their columns "blogs" to be entirely reprehensible. It should stop.

Have a great week! I'm off to drown my sorrows over the Browns loss in a passion fruit smoothie.

UPDATE: Ampotan with an extensive, excellent post.

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41 comments:

Marc said...

Impressive work of art!

Anonymous said...

The Tiao Yu Tai islands belongs to Ilan county, Taiwan.

Now it's a disputed area because America delegated to Japan the US Occupation Forces administrative powers after giving Okinawa back to Japan. But even now your country the most powerful U.S.A. doesn’t take a position on who owns the islands.

That's very fair.

How would you explain that ?

Islander said...

Great post as always. I especially liked your analogy of Qing claims on territory to Turkish claims based on the Ottoman Empire.

Furthermore, I don't even consider the Qing Dynasty Chinese. They are Manchurian (aka Tartars) invaders from the North that sacked and took down the last Chinese dynasty, the Ming. The Qing Dynasty is non-Chinese just as the Yuan Dynasty is Mongolian. In fact, what's neat is if you go to Fort Provintia (赤崁樓) in Tainan, there are several Qing Dynasty edicts, basically huge stone monoliths with words carved on one face. The text are bilingual, in both Chinese and Manchurian. The Manchurian text is totally different from Chinese. They look more like Tibetan.

mike said...

"We are still living with the consequences of post-Qing Chinese re-expansionism and will be for another 50 years, through the next several rounds of hegemonic warfare."

If you're going to castigate others for their hubris Turton - which is all very well and fine - at least put away your own crystal ball. Fifty more years of Chinese expansion! You don't know that.

But what do we know?

Fertility rates; woman-smuggling; big crime. Massive distortion of capital structure; housing and construction bubbles; possible financial meltdown. Chronic energy, water and environmental crises; disease; chronic and worsening social unrest. And of course, no tradition of individual liberty worth a damn to allow creative people the freedom to craft solutions to these problems.

I might bet on them having the next decade at most.

Anonymous said...

You have nothing positive to say about China as well as Chinese/Taiwanese thinking. Diaoyutai definitely belongs to the ROC. If you are not happy over it, please pack your bags and go away, laowai.

Native

Anonymous said...

Hi Michael,

Do you ever come to the states? I think you'd make a wonderful featured speaker for some of the Taiwanese conferences here, such as FAPA, TAC or TANG.

jerome in vals said...

Like father, like daughter.
The girl has wit.

Michael Turton said...

But even now your country the most powerful U.S.A. doesn’t take a position on who owns the islands.

That's very fair.

How would you explain that ?


Because they don't need to.

So you would argue that Taiwan belongs to Fujian, China?

Michael Turton said...

Do you ever come to the states? I think you'd make a wonderful featured speaker for some of the Taiwanese conferences here, such as FAPA, TAC or TANG.

I'd love to. But I seldom get to the States.

jerome in vals said...

Diaoyu what? Poor choice of a headline. It is called the Senkakus. Period.

First, the US-educated scions of the Chinese refugees President Truman allowed on Japanese Formosa staked a preposterous claim.

For too long the sullen Formosans had been presenting them with a perennial indictment of what their Nazi-inspired, China-centered education had taught them.

Did they not own Formosa? So be it, they would stake a claim on the Ryu-Kyus.

Meanwhile, in the Beijing red-lights district of Zhongnanhai, the Madams at the Pavilion of Red Cupids co-opted that unreasonable claim.

The last word about that piece of Japanese real-estate was when former CEO of the governing authority on Formosa, Lee Deng-hui pooh-poohed those Chinese pranksters.

The whole issue should be dismissed for what it originally was, a BOG-US notion born out of testosterone-encumbered Chinese grads’ group-think.

To the NYT editors: there is one redeeming aspect to that shallow piece, and it is to be found in Michael Turton's well documented rebuttal.

Anonymous said...

"So you would argue that Taiwan belongs to Fujian, China?"

No, unlike the Afhgan , Iraq and Pakistan colonizer America, the most powerful U.S.A. which doesn’t take a position on who owns the islands.

The fishermen of Ilan have tombs of their ancestors there that dated way back Turton Island.


That's the reason why Japan built a light house on some burial sites.

Michael Turton said...

Anon, you're just spewing. The Senkakus don't belong to Taiwan. They belong to Japan. That is what law and custom say.

Anonymous said...

You're a Browns fan? I salute you, especially since I have a visceral hatred of the Stealers.

Anonymous said...

Kristof's logic is so terrible... what a chump.

What is your daughter copying? Looks pretty interesting.

Michael Turton said...

My daughter put together that one based on six or seven other paintings she had arrayed around her.

Lifelong Browns fan, to my everlasting sorrow. Why couldn't the 'rents have been Packer fans?

Anonymous said...

"As I have noted many times, prior to the announcement of the possibility of oil there in 1968, both PRC and ROC maps showed the islands as either Japanese or lying outside the territory of China"

Do you have any of those maps? Would be interesting to see them.

Michael Turton said...

Sadly no. Next trip to Washington I will scoop them up.

Michael

Anonymous said...

"Sadly no. Next trip to Washington I will scoop them up. "

Why wait that long? Why Washington?

You can let your artist daughter draw one for you and it will be just fine!

Are you connected with the State Department?

Michael Turton said...

No connection to the State Department.

Kaminoge said...

"Why couldn't the 'rents have been Packer fans?"

Ah, but these aren't the same Cleveland Browns your parents rooted for in days of yore.

I grew up a Los Angeles Rams fan, and was devasted in Super Bowl XIV when the Rams blew their 19-17 lead going into the 4th quarter, eventually losing to the Steelers. By the time the St. Louis Rams won the Super Bowl in 2000, I couldn't have cared less.

Of course, once upon a time, the LA/STL Rams were the Cleveland Rams.

Anonymous said...

Sadly no. Next trip to Washington I will scoop them up.

Err, are you being sarcastic or serious? :)

I take it you don't know of any online I could look at?

Anonymous said...

Islander,

"Furthermore, I don't even consider the Qing Dynasty Chinese. They are Manchurian (aka Tartars) invaders from the North that sacked and took down the last Chinese dynasty, the Ming."

By the same notion, I consider Queen Victoria, Elizabeth... and every British Royal after 1066 to actually be French. They are, after all, descendants of Norman conquerors of what had been an Anglo-Saxon kingdom.

D said...

I have an easy solution. Rename the Senkaku/Diaoyutai the "Irrationality Islands". Then the stakes will be a little more clear to outside observers.

Michael Turton said...

Maps? Was being serious, I know where a bunch are, but none online. Sorry man.

Michael Turton said...

By the same notion, I consider Queen Victoria, Elizabeth... and every British Royal after 1066 to actually be French.

You'd be daft, then. For the Manchus struggled their entire reign to preserve their Manchu-ness, issuing edicts in Manchurian right down to the 1911 revolution. China was part of an empire during the Manchu era.

Kaminoge said...

If Anon at 6:10am had bothered to do any research before posting, he/she/it would have learned that the current British royal house, the Windsors, was originally called the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, and is of German (not French) descent.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_windsor

Anonymous said...

Anon 6:10 is selective in blood stock...

I would like to push things back to australopithecine dynasty.

Anonymous said...

I like the 'native' douchebag who first conflates taiwanese/chinese, and then can add nothing better to the discussion than to call the author a foreigner.

Under an anonymous name of course.

Boy, those patriotic Taiwanese sure talk tough on the internet don't they? I'd put my money down that the same guy would be real friendly and tell Turton how great his Chinese was and smile if he met him in person.

God help this place and their spineless internet trolls.

ANONYMOUS

Anonymous said...

Oh wait, I should have said "Taiwanese/Chinese". Because a guy that was born here said it was so. So that must make it true.



ANONYMOUS

Anonymous said...

Peace to all.

As a Japanese Monk said... "

Divide the Islands and make it a Peace Memorial."

Shoji

Raj said...

Why is the wikipedia article pro-China? Doesn't it use the name "Senkaku Islands" as its title?

Michael Turton said...

Raj, the "debate" began in 1969. There used to be mention of that, as well as of the fact that PRC/ROC maps show it as Japanese until 1969. I know, because I put in that language, along with a pic of the Renminerbao article, etc. PRC/ROC nationalists deleted all that and made it seem like the "controversy" stretches back into the centuries, when it is forty years old.

Michael

Anonymous said...

"Boy, those patriotic Taiwanese sure talk tough on the internet don't they? I'd put my money down that the same guy would be real friendly and tell Turton how great his Chinese was and smile if he met him in person."

Hope and pray that you will always be right in your judgement.

mx said...

No worries, when the Japanese gov't bonds go bust they can sell the islands for $$ like Greece.

clb said...

Here is a link to the maps, and other evidence, sporting Turton's statements: .

clb said...

Sorry, that link didn't show. Here's Take II: http://tw.myblog.yahoo.com/jw!ARR7CzOBSEbGZjQIIAbtkQ--/article?mid=1582

Michael Turton said...

Damn! That is an awesome collection of stuff. Thanks man.

Michael

Ampontan said...

Just ran across your post. Here's one of mine on the same issue; we're working the same patch from different perspectives:

http://ampontan.wordpress.com/2010/09/24/coming-attractions/

jerome in vals said...

@ Ampontan, jerome in vals said
Saturday, September 25, 2010 at 8:14 am

Awesome. Right down to the sudbued reaction from Zhongnanhai at the Russian coastguard sinking of an undocumented Chinese ship off Nakhodka in Feb 2009.

“China Desk” Bevin Chu is the “scion of the humble ROC foreign affairs officer” who peacefully spent WWII in Canada while his boss CKS, the warlord America had fallen in love with, used his compatriots as scorched earth fodder against Japan.

Thanks due to Nick Kristoff, I assume.

Arthur said...

I looked at your image of "ren min ri bao" excerpt that you claim to be proof that PRC government considers Diaoyu Islands to be Japanese territory, but I have some reservations. The main article, which supports your claim, and the clipped excerpt on the lower left, which shows name of paper and date, does not match. I cannot find the article in the bottom image showing the newspaper. Then how can you say for sure that those are from the same source? Can you find a complete image, showing your article, the name of paper, and date in one frame, not cut out and excerpted as it is now? It would make your claim more unrefutable.
Thank you.

Michael Turton said...

Arthur, as it says in the post, I assembled them from an image of the original. So I am sure because I myself created that image, so that the date and the article could be together on an image small enough to fit on the blog. In any case there is a whole image in the post with the large collection of images here.

Michael