https://www.ft.com/content/aeb283f2-71b5-11e6-bf48-b372cdb1043a
Walk me into the virgin island of the taiga if old..
Walk me into the virgin island of the taiga if old..
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Japans PM makes plea for friendship with Russia
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TheOnlyOneHeEverFeared
Member
The only things I know about Japanese - Russian relations is the 1905 war, the 1939 conflict, then the Russian Invasion of Manchuria and all that territory in 1945, then nowt. So thats kinda interesting.
Hexa
Member
They need allies to counter China and the US has been dropping the ball (also everything embodied by Trump). Hence Russia.
Ether_Snake
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NCR Redslayer
NeoGAF's Vegeta
Russia response
JonnyDBrit
Member
Moreover while Japan does have a territorial dispute with Russia over the Kuril Islands, this conflict is less fundamental (or beneficial) to either nation than say, the Senkaku Islands dispute between Japan and China (both of them). Meanwhile Russia and China maintain a strong relationship, so if Japan can strengthen its ties with the former its harder for the latter to move against it with impunity.
Imperial Bishop
Banned
As a sign of friendship, another season of Hetalia focusing on Russia.
exmachina64
Banned
As a sign of friendship, another season of Hetalia focusing on Russia.
The cat is Abe!
VendettaRed07
Member
Keeping Japan our waifu is one reason why the TPP needs to pass
If we don't spread our influence in the region to help undercut China, Japan may try to go to Russia to do it if we hesitate
If we don't spread our influence in the region to help undercut China, Japan may try to go to Russia to do it if we hesitate
Vigilant Walrus
Member
No it really isn't. The TPP can fuck the right off cliff.
Abe is an asshole. Fuck him.
Vigilant Walrus
Member
Japan embarrassed and heavily crippled the Russian navy. The Russian navy came home defeated, and it was one of the paramount reasons for the uprisings that led to the revolution. The people were fed up of paying for a failed war.
You have to understand, the Japanese didn't have a real effective fleet, and Russias fleet at the time was the largest in the world. It's one of the biggest upsets in the history of naval warfare.
And what is more, this upset is what gave Japan the confidence it needed to take a few more stabs at its neighbours in Korea and China.
Technically Russia and Japan are still at war. They have a cease fire but they never signed an official peace treaty.
Frozenprince
Banned
Shinzo Abe continues to be asshole.
Japan continues to respond with overwhelming apathy at their political system.
Pretty much it.
Japan continues to respond with overwhelming apathy at their political system.
Pretty much it.
That was more than 100 years ago. I really don't buy that as a reason why relations between the two countries are frosty
JonnyDBrit
Member
History, though nowhere near as extensive as Japan and China's beef with each other.
Basically when Japan emerged from its long isolation in the Meiji period, there were two major powers in East Asia with which it had to compete: China, and Russia. Russia in particular had ambitions of expansion in Asia due to a lack of overseas colonies (bar Alaska, and they sold that off because they felt they couldn't secure it against a possible British invasion). Japan meanwhile had ambitions of expansion as part of maintaining their own autonomy - they would resist being subjugated by a great empire by being a great empire. This led to more than a few disputes in the latter half of the 19th century, particularly regarding Korea and the region then known as Manchuria, culminating in war in 1904.
Russia lost.
This was unprecedented for the time - an Asian power had thumped a European one, when Europeans being the de facto rulers of the world was kind of an accepted norm. It emboldened Japan's imperial ambitions and was one of the many humiliations that gradually led to the Russian Empire's collapse. Then WW2 came about, when Japan was already in control of Manchuria - as a subject nation called Manchukuo - and was furthering its expansion into China. When Germany declared war on the USSR that meant Japan did so as well. As you can imagine the war did not go in Japan's favour in the end, losing all their territories in China and Korea, and several islands - namely the Kurils - in what is Russian territory today. With Japan being a major ally of the USA during the height of the cold war this left things tense for quite a while, and the effect still somewhat lingers to this day.
Edit: Forgot they lost half of Sakhalin as well.
This is going to be really tough for Abe. Right now, Russia values their relationship with China above all other countries, so any negotiations are only going to go as well as China wants them to go. Moreover, Japan can't completely back Russia given Russia's relations with the US and NATO, and then there's the ongoing dispute over the Kurils. Basically, Japan wants stuff from Russia, but can't offer much in substance for it, and at the same time, China can act as a wedge in these negotiations whenever they feel like it.
Japan has been staunchly anti-Communist since the Russian Civil War, contributing the largest force to fight against the Bolsheviks. After World War II, the Soviet Union held on to the Kurils and wouldn't give them back. This is probably the largest obstacle to Russian-Japanese diplomacy, and it's one that will probably never go away.
TheOnlyOneHeEverFeared
Member
Doesn't Russia retain Pacific territories and stuff it got in 1945 and refuses to give them back to Japan?
Spooky Scary Skeleton
Member
Russo-Japanese War happened a century ago. This is more about Russia occupying Kurile islands, which they took at the end of WW2. This is the primary reason why Japan's relation with Russia was never repaired ever since.
JonnyDBrit
Member
Those would be the Kuril Islands. Its something of a letter of law vs the spirit kinda deal, since by treaty Japan gave up all claims to the islands... but it didn't necessarily grant Soviet sovereignty of them - and moreover, the Soviet Union doesn't exist anymore so any claim they had could be seen as invalid. Then of course there's the question of what exactly are the Kuril Islands and what aren't, and if some of them aren't then Russia would have had no right to them to begin with and Japan never gave up their claims.
Gangster Bastard
Member
It all centers around the islands. I believe the background is that Japan and the Soviets had signed a non aggression pact during WWII, which the Soviets took the opportunity to break just as Japan was about to surrender so they could make a few easy land grabs, among those were the Kurils, which continues to be disputed territory to this day.
Vigilant Walrus
Member
Spooky Scary Skeleton
Member
Ummm, no. That neutrality pact was voided later in 1941 when Japan signed Tripartite Pact and denouncing the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact.
radios shipping overview
Member
The Non-agression pact was in play until the Soviet Union repudiated it in April 1945. The Yalta Conference stipulated that the Soviet Union was to declare war on Japan within three months of Germany's surrender, and that one of the concessions for doing so was that they would then be allowed to take all of Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands.
Spooky Scary Skeleton
Member
You're right. I stand corrected.
SenorArdilla
Member
You mean Trump?
Vigilant Walrus
Member
I assume Hitler also potential in Japan then due to the fact they had a common enemy in Russia. It's said that Hitler feared Russia more than anyone else!!
So much ignorance in here. The Soviet Union broke the Soviet-Japanese Neutrality Pact in August 1945 (within three months after Germany's defeat, as agreed at the Yalta Conference in February 1945), even though the pact was in effect until April 1946. Japan signing the Tripartite pact did NOT void the prior Neutrality Pact, which is why Japan never attacked Russia's east, in turn allowing Stalin to move his eastern troops to Moscow in December 1941, thus preventing Soviet defeat.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet–Japanese_Neutrality_Pact
The Japanese regarded this breach of contract as shameful and dishonorable, and the Russian occupation of the Kuril Islands keeps the memory alive.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet–Japanese_Neutrality_Pact
The Japanese regarded this breach of contract as shameful and dishonorable, and the Russian occupation of the Kuril Islands keeps the memory alive.
ThoseDeafMutes
Member
Japan was team America in the cold war, so they have not enjoyed any close relationship in recent history.
Soyongdori
Member
Japan DID attack east which ended up in total failure. Look up Battles of Khalkhin-Gol (the same battles where Zhukov earned his infamy to Japan). After the battles, the military officials in Japan pushed for the non-aggression pact. The entire Kwantung division and the sixth army getting curb-stomped in Soviet-Mongolia was not in Japan's favor, when they were still mired in China. Plus, Japan favored for the expansion into South East Asia for abundant raw materials, Japan was never interested in Hitler's request to join attack the Soviets because there was absolutely no reason for them when they were still stuck in China and gunning for the European colonies in South Asia, plus Japan attacking the Soviets did not even guarantee the fall of the Soviet Union. That's just a pure wishy fan-fiction.
Which pretty ironic, considering what they were literally doing in China and the rest of South East Asia, but that's Japan for you I guess.
There are a number of points that aren't quite right here. While the Soveit-Japanese Non-Aggression Pact was supposed to last until 1946, there's nothing that bound the parties to it. And indeed, Japan considered dropping it during Operation Barbarossa, but decided against it because it would have been a bad idea for them. As such, there wasn't any shame or dishonor attached to the Soviets dropping it - heck, they even gave ample warning to Japan. On Japan's side, it really is all about the Kurils.
Not really. China is Russia's only major ally, and Russia has been asking for more and more things from China lately. Besides, there's zero chance that Japan's going to drop their claims on the Kurils, and there's really not all that much that Japan can offer to Russia. This is effectively a situation where China holds all the cards.
Technosteve
Banned
WW2
Of course the treaty was binding until the end of its 5-year term. That's the whole point. What you are saying is simply factually wrong.
"On April 5, 1945 the Soviet Union denounced the pact, informing the Japanese government that "in accordance with Article Three of the above mentioned pact, which envisaged the right of denunciation one year before the lapse of the five-year period of operation of the pact, the Soviet Government hereby makes known to the Government of Japan its wish to denounce the pact of April 13, 1941." The wording of the denunciation suggested that the Soviet Union wished to see the treaty go out of effect immediately, and Time magazine reported that the Soviet Foreign Commissar's tone indicated that the Soviet Union might go to war with Japan soon. However, the text of the treaty clearly stated that the pact remained in force until April 1946. When pressed by the Japanese Ambassador Naotake Sato, Molotov confirmed that the treaty did remain in force until April 1946."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet–Japanese_Neutrality_Pact
The Soviet denunciation of the treaty in 1945 is quite hilarious in claiming that circumstances changed after Nazi Germany's attack on the Soviet Union in 1941 and after the Soviet Union and the United States became allies in autumn 1941, (starting with the Lend-Lease aid at the end of October, before Pearl Harbor and before the German declaration of war against the US). Yet they didn't denounce it then but waited four years to do so (which was a breach of contract in 1945, and they only did so when it became opportune, mere weeks before Japan's defeat when no more military action could be expected) - because back in 1941 the treaty saved Stalin's ass.
Had the Soviet Union not broken the treaty after the drop of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, when the war was virtually over, post WW2 relations between the two nations would have been much better.
Well we'll see about that..
that china part sticks out like a sore thumb
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanghai_Cooperation_Organisation
also i just want an excuse to post this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vYrjHoI2iUs
lazybones18
Banned
only way this will be settled: Abe cosplaying as Mario and playing Tetris against Putin
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