452 { China’s Quest
Chinese foreign minister and long-time Japan hand Tang Jiaxuan explained
in his memoir the logic of Beijing’s Japan policy.^42 China desires friendship
with various countries, including Japan, Tang explained, but the existence
of “incorrect views” within those countries makes this difficult, creating
obstacles. China must struggle against these incorrect ideas, correcting them
and thus making friendship possible. There are two major forms of struggle,
Tang explains. First, educational efforts by China’s diplomats, leaders, media,
scholars, and so on, explain how and why the pernicious foreign views are
incorrect. Second, levying sanctions—canceling dialogues, exchanges, visits,
and so on—to make clear China’s unhappiness and the possible costs of that
unhappiness. Tang’s account of Sino-Japanese relations under his tutelage
revolves around China’s struggle over “history.”
Beijing’s understanding of this dual-track process was that through
struggle against Japan’s failure to recognize its past mistakes, a firmer foun-
dation could be laid for economic and political cooperation: in Chinese,
qian shi bu wang, hou shi zhi shi (past experiences if not forgotten may be a
guide for the future). In fact, by the beginning of the post–Cold War period,
Beijing’s emphasis on past events would make Japan much more skeptical and
guarded about cooperation with China.
In practice, Beijing’s application of this unity-struggle-unity approach led
not to Sino-Japanese unity but to gradually deepening estrangement of the
two countries. Chinese efforts to re-educate Japan led not to amity but to
growing Japanese resentment. This then combined with spontaneous erup-
tions of popular Chinese hatred of Japan to generate increased Japanese fear
of China’s growing power. Unfortunately for Beijing, its wielding of the his-
tory issue against Japan has not had the desired effect. Rather than making
Japan more amenable to following Beijing’s wishes, Beijing’s repeated tirades
about the history issue have made Japan resentful.
The history issue, as noted earlier, refers to the appraisal by Japan, China,
and other Asian countries of the episode of Japanese aggression in the first
half of the twentieth century. Broadly speaking, China’s position has been
and remains that Japan’s leaders, or some of them, do not recognize the grave
crimes and immense suffering their nation inflicted on the peoples of Asia in
those years. Rather, they deny or beautify Japan’s criminal aggression. This
failure to frankly confront Japan’s past—in contrast, say, to how leaders of
the Federal Republic of Germany confronted Germany’s responsibility for
Hitler and all that he wrought—holds dangers for the future. Failure to rec-
ognize past mistakes means that those mistakes may be repeated. There is a
real danger that Japan may once again pursue a course of military aggression
in an effort to bring Asian countries under its sway. This, in any case, is what
China’s media often maintains.
The PRC’s stance on the history issue must be understood at several levels.
There is little doubt that individual Chinese embrace the views outlined in