Japan’s Prime Minister, Sanae Takaichi, who is visiting Australia from 3 to 5 May 2026, shares the anti-China feelings of most Japanese hard-liners. This colours her foreign policy. (more…)
Gregory Clark
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Australia’s ‘middle power’ myth
Talk of Australia as a ‘middle power’ sounds comforting, but our record in Asia and in global diplomacy often tells a different story.
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Japan’s dramatic election result carries dangers
Japan’s ruling party has secured another overwhelming victory. But beneath the spectacle lies a troubling mix of demographic denial, fiscal illusion and rising geopolitical risk.
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A snap election and shifting alliances reshape Japanese politics
Japan’s Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi has called a snap election as the LDP seeks to rebuild support and secure numbers through new alliances. But economic strain and rising tensions with China could still shape the outcome.
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Bewildered in Trumpland
What happens when militaristic shouts of “USA USA”, are combined with a blatant display of Trumpian boasting in an ersatz Japanese imitation of a 19th century German neo-baroque castle plonked down in a quiet Tokyo suburb? (more…)
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Japan’s LDP coalition splits – what does this mean?
So, finally there is some room for principles in Japanese politics after all! Not much, but when it comes to the point of white having to embrace black something has to give. (more…)
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Japan’s likely new leader is a surprise, and not just because she is a woman
In the recent election held by Japan’s Liberal Democratic Party to find a new leader following the assassination of former prime minister, Shinzo Abe, an unlikely name to emerge was that of Sanae Takaichi. (more…)
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Canberra and Gaza
It’s time to stop just talking about the Gaza atrocities. It is time to do something about them. (more…)
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What goes around, comes around
With Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi attending the SCO (Shanghai Co-operation Organisation) meeting in China this week, we may be witnessing a tectonic shift in international relations, one which could undermine the basis of Australia’s relations with Asia. (more…)
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A strange thing happened last week on the way to the office of Japan’s prime minister, Shigeru Ishiba
People from the parties that had just tried to vote him out of that office were demanding he stay in that office. (more…)
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National security ‘experts’ go ga-ga over China
There was a time when Australian writings on China were first-class. (more…)
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Who’s afraid of Donald Trump?
With his use of extreme tariffs to punish countries with trade surpluses, US President Donald Trump seems to be making an economic fool of himself. (more…)
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Missed opportunities in Japan
John Menadue points to the lack of Australian interest and involvement in Asia. (more…)
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Bumpy relations between Japan and China
After a long hiatus, relations between China and Japan are finally stirring into action. (more…)
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Peace, both for Ukraine and North Korea too?
As President Trump seeks to bring an end to the Ukrainian conflict, at the Asian end of the Eurasian continent some similar but much less known peace-restoring movements are underway. (more…)
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How to protest against the atrocities in Gaza
Remember the Vietnam War? The barbarism there cannot be compared with what we see almost daily in Gaza. But just looking on impotently will not solve the problem.
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Time to take China and Latin America more seriously
The invitation said: ‘Global Multinational Corporations Summit.’ Main Topic: ‘An opening China and the World.’ (more…)
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Russia’s reasons for attacking Ukraine
Vladimir Putin rarely uses English in his speeches. So if in his speech to the recent BRICS meeting in Kazan he insisted the reason for Russia’s 2022 attack on Ukraine was that he was duped (he pronounced it ‘dooped’) by Germany and France in the 2014-5 Minsk Accords then he probably meant it. (more…)
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Breaking the deadlock in Japan-North Korean relations
To break the deadlock in Japan-North Korea relations, Japan’s new Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, has proposed liaison offices in the capitals of both countries to resolve the poisonous abductees issue – the fate of Japanese citizens abducted by North Korea in the seventies and eighties. (more…)
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Who really owns the South China Sea?
We are told the AUKUS ‘security partnership’ with the US and UK requires Australia to acquire a fleet of nuclear-powered submarines (SSNs) to accompany AUKUS. They will operate mainly in the South China Sea, allegedly to deter China’s ‘expansionist’ goals. (more…)
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Japan’s surprising new prime minister
Japan’s new prime minister, Ishiba Shigeru, has called for an Asian NATO. But salivating hawks should restrain the glee. (more…)
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A solution in Ukraine?
There must be a negotiated end to the Ukraine War. The alternative is nuclear armageddon. (more…)
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Japan – Hiroshima and Project Hula
What a difference a day (or a week) makes. What a difference the mere translation of a word makes. (more…)
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Panic as Japan stocks take biggest dive since Black Monday, 1987
If it was panic last Friday, the Asahi Shimbun declared when the stock market fell more than 2,200 points, or 5.8 percent. It was double panic by this afternoon (Monday) when the market fell even more, by 3,800 points to the 31,000 mark. (more…)
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Putin’s mistake in Ukraine: Moscow forced to move to Novosibirsk?
In 2004, Russia’s President Putin said the collapse of the Soviet Union “was the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century.” This was picked up by our hawks as a Moscow wish for more Cold War. (more…)
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NYT confirms war-ending Russian-Ukraine peace agreement sabotaged by West
With much less drama than its famous 1971 Pentagon Papers, the New York Times has disclosed three documents confirming that Russia and Ukraine were close to war-ending agreements in the first half of 2022, shortly after Moscow began its so-called ‘special operation’ attack on Ukraine, February 24, 2022. (more…)
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BBC reporting on Ukraine
The BBC has a loose bolt somewhere. It has now begun a strange campaign saying it is dedicated to non-spin reporting. (more…)
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The Kremlin needs a new PR agent
Moscow would have us believe it is fighting a life and death struggle in the muddy trenches of Donbas. But what do we get to see on the inauguration of its president? Glittering gold chambers and goose-stepping soldiers. (more…)
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Marking 10 years of the Russo-Ukraine War
On February 28, 2022, four days after Russia had attacked into Ukraine, Moscow and Kiev began peace talks. (more…)
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“Seamless integration”: Japan to become sub-contractor for US aggression towards China
‘New era for alliance’ headlined the right wing Japan Times after the Japan-US summit talks in Washington this week between President Biden and Japan’s prime minister, Fumio Kishida.. But not everyone was so enthused. (more…)