In Search of a Panacea: Japan-Korea Rapprochement and America's "Far Eastern Problems"

TLDR: The United States had three challenges in Asia in the mid-1960s: a hostile China, an assertive Japan, and a faltering South Vietnam, and Johnson administration's solution to these problems was to promote the normalizing of relations between its two vital Asian allies, Japan and South Korea as mentioned in this paper.

Abstract: The United States had three challenges in Asia in the mid-1960s: a hostile China, an assertive Japan, and a faltering South Vietnam. The Johnson administration9s solution to these problems was to promote the normalizing of relations between its two vital Asian allies, Japan and South Korea. The two countries had refused to recognize each other diplomatically since the end of Japan9s colonial rule over Korea after World War II. The acrimonious relations between Seoul and Tokyo weakened the containment wall in Northeast Asia while depriving Korea of Japanese investments, loans, and markets. These problems forced the United States to commit extensive military and economic assistance to Korea. As expected, a Tokyo-Seoul rapprochment buttressed the West9s bulwark against communist powers in the region and hindered a potential Beijing-Tokyo reconciliation. It opened the road for Japan9s economic penetration into Korea and enabled Seoul to receive Tokyo9s help in economic development. Reassured by the friendship between Korea and Japan, Washington forged an alliance with Seoul in the Vietnam War. Between 1965 and 1973 Korea dispatched 300,000 soldiers in Vietnam, making it the second largest foreign power in support of Saigon. The Korea-Japan rapprochment proved to be a powerful remedy for America9s problems in Asia.