U.S.-Japan alliance is facing the challenge of China's rise

The row over relocating the Futenma air base on Japan's southern island of Okinawa is straining ties between the United States and Tokyo's new government, which has vowed to steer a more independent diplomatic course from its security ally..

Entangled with the feud, however, are deeper questions about whether Obama and Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama, whose Democratic Party ousted its long-dominant conservative rival in an August poll, can start to reframe a nearly five decade-old alliance that has been at the core of security arrangements in Asia.

Obama will visit Japan on Nov. 12-13 as part of his first tour of Asia since taking office.

“We have a multi-polar system emerging. You cannot deny the fact that the rise of China is now seen as an essential element (of that system),” said Hitoshi Tanaka, a former senior Japanese diplomat who advises some Democratic Party lawmakers.

“In 1996, I felt that when you dealt with a specific but important question like Futenma, we had to put it in the larger context,” Tanaka said, recalling the last alliance review when the two nations tightened security ties after years of bitter trade disputes.

“I have a feeling we need to engage in the same thing,” he said, proposing the two countries reassess the alliance, its goals and the countries' respective roles over the coming year.

Hatoyama told parliament on Thursday he wanted to conduct a comprehensive review to create a multilayered alliance long term.

While the process would likely be bumpy, many agree the alliance, while vital to both partners, needs a rethink.

“There is more raison d'etre to the alliance than ever before, but they have to reframe it and take it out of the Cold War context,” said Daniel Sneider at Stanford University's Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center.

With China forecast to overtake Japan as the world's second-biggest economy as early as next year, concerns in Japan that Washington will cozy up to Beijing in a “Group of Two” (G-2) that leaves Tokyo out in the cold are never far from the surface.

“That idea sends shivers down Japanese spines,” said Richard Samuels, a Japan security expert at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

The feud over Futenma has fanned such fears among Japanese conservatives, who say Hatoyama risks mismanaging the matter.

Tensions rose after U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates bluntly told Tokyo this month that he wanted a 2006 pact to replace Futenma with a facility in a less crowded part of Okinawa and shift 8,000 U.S. Marines to Guam to go ahead as planned.

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