Reshuffling Priorities for Northeast Asian Security: Revisionism, Regionalism, Reunification, and Realism

Northeast Asia reached a crossroads in 2005. Revisionism intensified with Japan’s assertive and insensitive handling of its historical legacy, as South Korea and China contem-plated revisionist moves of their own. Their conflicting strategies for regionalism were tested in preparations for the first East Asian Summit, as China took the lead in pressing for faster integration while Japan grew more wary of its apparent interest in gaining dominance and South Korea narrowed its focus. As the Six-Party Talks faced a turning point, Seoul’s rush to accelerate inter-Korean inte-gration clashed with other notions of reunification, espe-cially with Tokyo’s priority on abductions and the efforts by Washington and Beijing to narrow their distance on dealing with the nuclear weapons and materials in the North. On all sides, there was a shortage of realist measures to prioritize stability. Each side’s ideological inclinations compounded the emotional responses of public opinion, and the situation in 2006 was slow to improve until Chinese overtures to Ja-pan and the North Korean nuclear test laid the foundation for new responses. In 2007 the balance of priorities across the region remains in doubt.