What choices are available to a nation that, in its quest for modernization, foolishly built a nuclear reactor in a seismically active tsunami zone? The Royal Society reported in 2015 that the disastrous fate of Fukushima in 2011 resulted from a “cascade of engineering and regulatory...
North Korea’s acquisition of nuclear weapons has changed the nuclear balance in Northeast Asia. But it hasn’t altered the way politicians and diplomats approach the question of arms control and disarmament in the region. The debate among influencers continues to revolve around two versions of...
Japan is set up for a stint in the international spotlight, hosting the G20 summit at the end of June and the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. It will be a busy few years for Japan, which hosts the G20 summit on June 28-29 followed by the Tokyo Olympics in 2020. The international attention sparks questions...
Media in Japan focuses heavily on domestic affairs, affecting the country's global outlook. Our world is becoming increasingly interconnected in a multitude of ways, and advances in information and communication technologies have made the gathering and dissemination of information at a global...
It’s not just the chilling rhetoric. In the past five months, warships from both sides have done everything but ram one another. A combination of recent events, underpinned by long-running historical strains reaching back more than 60 years, has turned the western Pacific into one of the most...
Two devastating earthquakes cause much suffering and highlight the need to prepare better for future natural disasters. Few could have imagined in the 16th century that we would have satellites in space, open-heart surgeries and infinite information in the palms of our hands. Yet every now and...
With nearly 1.1 million unemployed youth, is the burying of “historical hatchets” a way of distracting locals from domestic economic woes? A fervent disciple of the capitalist system, where social admiration revolves around material gain, modern South Korea has become a victim of its own...
With its fourth test of weapons of mass destruction, is North Korea running out of friends? The news cycle around North Korea’s actions has become all too predictable. Its rocket launches and bomb tests tend to lead to a round of condemnation but little action from the usual voices. As of last...
China, South Korea and Japan need to be more honest about their own history if they want peace and stability. The Nanjing Massacre. “Comfort women.” Did the Chinese communist forces beat imperial Japan or the nationalists? And who really owns the islands known in Japan as Senkaku and in...
Imagine the US actually curbed its military adventurism, reeled in the Pentagon budget and closed its global network of bases. Then what? Let’s say the car stops and we get our teeth around the tire. Let’s say we bite down hard enough to let out all the air from the US empire. Now...
