George Ehrhardt wrote:

“1) Ronald Dore asserts the deterministic rise of China.
I'd just note that his language is almost identical to the 1950s-era descriptions of the Soviet Union. Or depictions of the way North Korea was going to
outcompete the South. He also talks about the
Chinese ability to "devote the best brains" to new weapons research--did that remind anyone else of the 1950s-era rhetoric about a "Missile
Gap?" The lesson: long-term power predictions based
on
straight-line assumptions of current alarmism aren't worth the pixels they're written with.”

Actually, those predictions were right in many ways:
the Soviet Union did catch up and demonstrated the ability to match, and in some ways exceed, the US missile for missile over several decades. That said, it also depends how we define a “straight-line”
assumption. George seems to be saying that current Chinese economic growth is a straight line assumption, although for the record nobody is predicting continued Chinese growth in excess of 10%. Most estimates see growth slowing to the 8% range over the next few years and then closer to 6-7% or lower as China’s labor market tightens further, which is certainly not straight line growth. By the same token, is continued US military hegemony also a straight line assumption?
Just as the Soviet Union was not able to continue as it was forever, US dominance will diminish at some point, if it isn’t diminishing already. This is the lesson that the IR power transition literature points to: the periodic rise and fall of great powers (e.g. Gilpin and Kennedy; for the record Keohane isn’t usually thought of in the context of power transition) as the locus of economic competitiveness shifts from one power to another.

“3) I'd also look at the security community literature to better understand the US-Japan alliance--a literature that suggests the US- Japan alliance is resilient in ways that Dore apparently doesn't expect.
That also raises the issue of multilateral security
institutions: no discussion of Japanese security policy is credible without considering the role of the UN at a deeper level than "just pull out of the NPT."

I agree that it would not be easy for Japan to withdraw from the NPT, and I do not necessarily agree with Ronald Dore that it would be a good idea for Japan to obtain nuclear weapons, in part because nuclear weapons may be beginning to become obsolete. That said, increasingly the most important multilateral organizations, including security organizations, for Japan are regional ones in East Asia: ASEAN Plus Three, the Trilateral Summit, The East Asian Summit (now a misnomer), the ASEAN Regional Forum and ASEAN Defense Ministers Meeting Plus (not an exhaustive list either). These, plus Japan’s growing ties with Australia, South Korea, and India, offer Tokyo potential options beyond the US alliance in terms of other potential partners or other means for dealing with potential threats.

“4) Dore's argument about how Japan will Finlandize to a rising China resembles one that David Kang has been making for years about Asia's historically "China-centered" international system. “

It’s a misreading of Kang to claim that he sees Japan or East Asia Finlandizing, which is pejorative, and connotes an unenviable position (not to mention that Finlandization as the term is used in the US bears little connection to Finland’s actual situation during the CW). It would be more accurate to speak of “Canadization.” Like Canada, East Asian countries have, and in Kang’s view probably will, get used to living next to a giant with whom they can enjoy generally peaceful and profitable ties.

More generally, this discussion begs the question of why Japan does ally with the US? If Japan has a balance of power strategy, it should ally with China against the US hegemon (assuming the US still holds this position). If Japan is responding to threats, then, more plausibly, Japan is allying with the US because it views US intentions as benign (the opinion poll George mentioned being one piece of evidence in support of this) relative to China’s But here’s the rub of Kang’s argument and a recent Op Ed in the International Herald Tribune by a Chinese scholar:
China is trying to “out benevolent” (sorry, I have to work on this verb) the US, with China convincing its neighbors that a hegemonic China is in their interests.

In terms of alliance choices, Japan should at least have the courage to ask itself whether the US alliance best serves its interests or whether there might be other options. In other words, Japan has to start with a blank slate when thinking about its security and consider the alliance as a possible, and quite possibly the best, option for its security. I am struck by the extent to which some in the LDP and elsewhere (especially Yomiuri Shimbun) can act rather cowardly in this respect.

If Japan asks itself what the tradeoffs would be in a level-headed way (i.e. avoid the hysterics of people like Hiramatsu Shigeo who claim Japan would be reduced to the status of Tibet), there are options worth pondering. China can easily offer Japan one thing the US really cannot: a promise that a Sino-Japanese alignment/alliance will never result in the undermining of Japanese territorial integrity through the stationing of Chinese troops on Japanese soil. The only place where Japan might be forced to compromise its territorial integrity would be the Senkakus (worthless rocks), and perhaps some areas of its East China Sea EEZ. On the other hand, it might be easier for China to make concessions in these areas to a Japan in alliance with it. A Japan in alignment with China might want to have its own nuclear arsenal as an extra guarantee, but it would also have plenty of other options at its disposal vis-à-vis China: realignment with the US, India, Russia, etc.

Finally, Rajan Menon, in his highly regarded book, End of Alliances, makes a related argument: for the sake of the US, Japan, and the NATO allies, the US centric system of alliances should be ended. He sees Japan successfully pursuing autonomous defense, albeit with flexible alignment options vis-à-vis the US, India, Russia, etc, as needed.

Paul Midford