The U.S.-Japan Alliance and Rapid Change on the Korean Peninsula: Proceedings from a Pair of Conferences
Abstract
Few areas of the world are more geostrategically important to the United States and Japan than the Korean Peninsula. Whether it is the U.S. alliance with the Republic of Korea (ROK; South Korea); Japan's sometimes cooperative, sometimes tense relationship with the ROK; or the difficult, fraught, and sometimes frightening relations both the United States and Japan have with the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK; North Korea), the issues at stake involve questions of trade and economic exchange, culture, history, territory, war, and peace. Since 2017, a series of unprecedented shifts in the relationships between Tokyo and Seoul have shaken up the traditional trilateral security cooperation between the United States, Japan, and South Korea that is focused on deterrence of North Korea. At the same time, novel approaches to U.S. contact with North Korea have explored whether there is any possibility of denuclearization through summit-level diplomacy, even as Pyongyang's conventional military threat has continued to evolve in new and dangerous ways. To better understand how these rapid changes on the Korean Peninsula are affecting the United States, Japan, and the U.S.-Japan alliance, the RAND Corporation organized a pair of conferences on the U.S.-Japan alliance and the two Koreas at its Santa Monica, Calif., headquarters on March 2-3, 2020. On the afternoon of March 2, former U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of Korea (2009-2011) and President and Chief Executive Officer of the Korean Economic Institute of America Kathleen Stephens gave a keynote address on the topic of "The Importance of the U.S.-Japan Alliance for the U.S.-Korea Alliance," after which Yasuyo Sakata of Kanda University and Jeffrey W. Hornung of RAND offered remarks on issues related to the U.S.-Japan alliance and South Korea.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Jan 01, 2021
- Accession Number
- AD1149065
Entities
People
- Akutsu Hiroyasu
- Jeffrey W. Hornung
- Scott W. Harold
- Soo Kim
- Yasuyo Sakata
Organizations
- RAND Corporation