A combination of domestic political preoccupations in Southeast Asian countries, the presidential election campaign in the United States, and continuing sensitivities over the U.S.-led intervention in Iraq meant that U.S. relations with Southeast Asia were essentially on hold during the second quarter of 2004.  Nevertheless, ongoing concerns, including terrorism and piracy as well as the increasingly crowded calendar of regular regional meetings, ensured that activity and dialogue continued at a relatively intense pace throughout the quarter.

If 2003 was the year during which Beijing laid the foundation for a new relationship with the nations of Southeast Asia, 2004 may emerge as a period of fine tuning and adjustment. During the second quarter, as during the first, Beijing focused on the details of agreements already in place rather than offering bold new initiatives. China’s quest to achieve increased respectability and influence in Southeast Asia by following a two-pronged strategy that focuses on ASEAN for dealing with the region as a whole while dealing with nation-specific issues on a bilateral basis was readily apparent throughout the quarter. In some ways, the balance may have shifted slightly toward the bilateral arena.

The South China Sea and various areas along the Mekong River drew Chinese and regional attention, as did ever-present issues of trade and finance. However, these do not appear to have slowed the pace of Beijing’s political progress through the region, much less obstructed it. China’s relations with ASEAN remain positive, although Beijing must be disappointed with the lack of progress in such areas as the ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA), security discussions, and the effort to establish multilateral mechanisms for securing unhindered passage through the Strait of Malacca.

In his second inaugural address, President Chen Shui-bian explained revised plans for constitutional reform and his desire for cross-Strait dialogue without preconditions.   Beijing, which had predictably reiterated its “one China” precondition for talks, criticized Chen’s speech as disguised separatism and threatened to crush Taiwan independence whatever the price.  Cross-Strait political relations thus will remain deadlocked, but stable, for the rest of the year as Chen’s Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) focuses on winning a majority in the December Legislative Yuan (LY) election and Beijing delays difficult decisions on how to deal with Chen until it can assess that election outcome.

After the relative lull of the previous two quarters, spring brought new growth to inter-Korean relations, with a spate of meetings in many fields. In particular, South Korea finally obtained its long-sought goal of direct North-South military talks at general level, who in turn swiftly agreed to communications steps to prevent naval clashes like those of 1999 and 2002. In a highly symbolic move, on June 15 – the fourth anniversary of the June 2000 Pyongyang summit – each side turned off its propaganda loudspeakers, terminating decades of noise pollution across the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ).

Multilaterally too, Seoul played a key role in the latest, and most hopeful so far, six-party nuclear talks in Beijing. For the first time, the U.S. presented a detailed and phased plan, including incentives for Pyongyang – based on a South Korean draft. Yet many obstacles remain on this front. Bilaterally too, while North-South progress looks encouraging, the exact mix of symbolism and substance in this process remains arguable. Nonetheless Seoul seems set on sticking with Sunshine, whatever might transpire on other fronts.

The wheels of dialogue continue to spin between China and the Korean Peninsula, thanks to Beijing’s generous quarterly hospitality to participants in the six-party talks.  China’s efforts kindly assure that we at Comparative Connections always have something to write. The talks occurred on schedule following assurances of North Korea’s top leader himself during his visit to Beijing that the talks could be a desirable vehicle for addressing the dispute over North Korea’s nuclear weapons program.  Kim Jong-il’s third visit in four years to Beijing breathed new life into the dialogue (combined with his consultations with Prime Minister Koizumi Junichiro in Pyongyang) and provided at least some impetus for another round of talks – and an actual U.S. proposal to settle the crisis – during the last week in June. Beijing’s shuttle diplomacy with Pyongyang and Washington has yielded enough progress to say that diplomacy has not failed yet.  Meanwhile, the protracted nuclear crisis remains the primary focal point of China’s diplomacy toward the Korean Peninsula.

Aside from six-party talks, the stellar growth of the China-South Korean economic relationship has slowed as Beijing tries to rein in its own economy, inducing the first “China shock” in the Korean equity market and underscoring Korea’s dependence on exports to China as the primary driver for the country’s current economic growth.  The usual negative aspects of the relationship – refugees, spoiled food imports, cross-Strait tensions – were also on display this quarter.  There are an increasing number of regional economic and other consultations between China, Japan, and South Korea in various forums – from the Asian Development Bank, to energy security cooperation, to a gathering of foreign ministers.  These contacts – quite aside from South Korea’s own vision of itself as a regional hub in Northeast Asia – suggest potentially significant changes are in the works that may open up new forms of regional cooperation in Northeast Asia.

Issues related to sovereignty dominated the Japan-China political and diplomatic agenda. As the quarter began, politicians and diplomats were involved in the controversy generated by the landings of Chinese activists on Uotsuri Island in the Senkaku/Diaoyu Island chain. The quarter ended with politicians and diplomats dealing with Chinese efforts to test drill for natural gas in the East China Sea bordering the Japan-China demarcation. Tokyo was concerned that extraction could tap resources on the Japanese side of the demarcation line. In the interim, the issue of Chinese maritime research ships operating, without prior notification, in Japan’s Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) kept the political-diplomatic spotlight focused on sovereignty claims.

At the same time, issues of history repeatedly surfaced.  In April, the Fukuoka District Court ruled that Prime Minister Koizumi Junichiro’s visits to the Yasukuni Shrine were tantamount to religious activity and violated the constitution. However, in May, the Osaka District Court, while not addressing the constitutional issue, found the visits to be private in nature, not the official action of a government officer.  In either case, the prime minister made clear that he would continue to visit the shrine, and his foreign minister returned from China again without the prime minister’s long-sought invitation for an official visit to China. In northeast China, chemical weapons abandoned by the Imperial Army again affected Chinese construction workers in Qiqihar.

The big news for the quarter was the May summit between Japanese Prime Minister Koizumi Junichiro and North Korean leader Kim Jong-il. Contrary to the pundits’ assessment, the results of this summit were not half-bad (and not fully appreciated until after the six-party talks in June).  They represented moderate successes for a U.S.-Japan strategy of engaging North Korea from a position of strength, not weakness.

The second quarter of 2004 marked the beginning of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s second term and the second year in office for China’s Hu-Wen team. Normal consultations and exchanges remained dynamic at all levels, particularly over the issues of Iraq, Korea, and Central Asia. The meetings included the Putin-Hu mini-summit during the Shanghai Cooperative Organization (SCO) annual meeting in the Uzbek capital of Tashkent in June, the official visit of China’s Parliament leader, Wu Bangguo, to Russia in May, and Russian Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov’s visit to China in April.

Beyond these high-level exchanges, Moscow and Beijing pursued their respective policies and interests in different ways. While Putin maintained his high profile (attending the G8 Summit and the 60^th anniversary of the Normandy landing), Beijing leaders seemed to soft-pedal the Russian factor: more attention to problem solving, particularly in economics, less rhetoric about the China-Russia strategic partnership; more attention to nations around Russia, less “major-power” politics of the Jiang-Yeltsin style; and more attention to areas outside Moscow, though not necessarily neglecting Moscow’s central role in Russian politics.

The six-party coalition of the not-so-willing held its long-awaited second meeting in Beijing in Feb with CVID – the complete, verifiable, irreversible dismantlement of all of North Korea’s nuclear programs – becoming the new mantra.  CVID fit snugly into the Bush administration’s broader focus on halting the global spread of weapons of mass destruction (WMD), underscored in a major address by the president in early February laying out his determination to “close the loopholes” of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and rally worldwide (including United Nations) support behind the expanding Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI).

Meanwhile, in the “be careful what you wish for because you might get it” category, two of Asia’s most vibrant democracies – Taiwan and South Korea – became a bit too vibrant this quarter as the region prepared for a series of presidential and parliamentary elections that could change the political face of East Asia for years to come.  Anxiety levels were also beginning to rise as Asians watched the political process unfold in advance of this November’s U.S. presidential elections.  A question (or accusation) on many minds: “Were Pyongyang and Washington already playing a ‘wait until November’ game?”

It’s only fitting that the United States and Japan marked the 150^th anniversary of the Treaty of Kanagawa this quarter as they celebrated “the best relations ever” between the two nations. Cynics will note that it’s only downhill from here, so there is every reason to enjoy the blissful state of relations while we can. To the delight of alliance managers on both sides of the Pacific, both governments managed to stay the course. There were no surprises or shocks, despite concerns about the risks in Japan’s deployment of Self-Defense Forces (SDF) to Iraq.

That historic event was part of a larger effort to strengthen the framework for intensified collaboration between Washington and Tokyo. That agenda continues to move forward. There were some bumps along the way, but they were minor. All in all, it was a very good quarter.