A century-and-a-half ago, Japan was jolted out of strategic complacency following the unwelcome visit of American Commodore Matthew Perry. Soon after, the Asian nation abandoned its 220 years of self-imposed isolation and embraced a traumatic but ultimately successful process of rapid modernization.
Nowadays, it’s instead China’s monstrous warships sailing through the East China Sea with growing impunity that have jolted Japan out of its decades-old strategic passivity. Notwithstanding, Japan’s postwar peace Constitution and the “lost decade” of economic stagnation, the nation is still blessed with the world’s third largest economy and Asia’s most advanced navy.
And here lies the immense significance of Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga’s upcoming visit to the White House, the first visit by a foreign leader under the presidency of Joe Biden. The United States and Japan now have a unique opportunity to establish a formidable “G2” (Group of Two) to check China’s worst instincts and uphold a "free and open" order in the Indo-Pacific.