Island comments show dangers of US irresponsibility

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Island comments show dangers of US irresponsibility

By Clifford A. Kiracofe (Global Times) 09:16, September 04, 2013

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US Senator John McCain's recent inflammatory remarks in Tokyo calling the Diaoyu Islands Japanese "territory" reflect Washington's irresponsible and provocative Asia-Pacific policy. Despite pro forma statements from Washington about promoting peace and stability in the Asia-Pacific region, critics say Washington's policy may well have the opposite effects. McCain's remarks are a clear indicator of the lack of balance, restraint, and vision in the US Asia-Pacific policy.

In November last year, the US Senate passed unanimously the Webb Amendment to reaffirm US "commitment" to Japan on what was described as the "Senkaku Islands." This biased amendment said the islands are included in the defense perimeter under Article V of the Treaty of Mutual Cooperation and Security between Japan and the US.

By taking this position, the US is not neutral in the Diaoyu issue and risks being drawn unnecessarily into a potential conflict over the islands.

After the WWII, in the prevailing Cold War atmosphere, the US strategic policy was designed to control the "first island chain," which included the Ryukyu Islands, so as to block Soviet Union expansion in East Asia.

In the 1950s, then US secretary of state John Foster Dulles invented the phrase "residual sovereignty" to convey the idea that while the US had conquered various islands and therefore administered them, Washington recognized a supposed underlying Japanese sovereignty. This implied that at some distant future date the US would "return" all the various islands to Japan.

In 1971, the Diaoyu Islands and the Ryukyu Islands were handed to Japan under the Okinawa Reversion Treaty (ORT). In the process of debating the provisions of the ORT in the US Senate, it was clearly seen that the Diaoyu Islands were not Japanese territory but rather a matter of an international legal dispute in which the US was neutral.

But the key point about the inclusion of the islands in US defense commitments with Japan became interpreted in several ways. From the beginning, there was strong opposition to placing them within the defense perimeter of the US-Japan defense treaty. During the Jimmy Carter administration, for example, such opposition included US vice president Walter Mondale.

However, officials at the Department of State and at the Pentagon who were influenced by the pro-Japan Lobby argued for the interpretation that the islands should be included in the defense perimeter. This interpretation vitiates a neutral US stance and the revival of Japanese militarism.

（Editor：YaoChun、Zhang Qian）