History serves as a contentious arena for explaining the world as it is and as it is desired. In October 2009, Chinese, Japanese, and South Koreans made plans to write a joint textbook recognizing the shared history of their countries and helping to realize an East Asian community. In the tradition of new regimes steeped in the Confucian heritage, a didactic history would serve a legitimating purpose. Yet, it could also pose a challenge to U.S.-centered histories of the twentieth-century struggle for freedom and to efforts to look ahead toward globalization based on universal values. China's thinking about the past is at the center of this struggle between rival histories, and its recent disputes with South Korea over an ancient kingdom are instructive for understanding what is at stake.

The Hu Jintao era reveals an increasingly assertive China in international affairs, striving to counter U.S. power around the globe while drawing neighboring states closer in a regional community. Much has been written about China's use of economic power and its buildup of military power, as its search for soft power also has not been ignored. Yet, discussions of soft power have little to say about the way China handles historical memories, even with the two countries most often associated with its Confucian tradition and its twentieth-century wars. To the extent history is covered, it is centered on Japan's need to apologize and reassure the Chinese people. Missing is how China deals with issues from its own imperial assertiveness.

I face two difficulties in writing a chapter on Japan's historical memory toward the United States. First, for a Japanese to write a chapter as an analyst summarizing the debate in Japan on the subject objectively is not easy. I have lived my life with the controversy on historical memory, and I cannot dissociate myself entirely from the judgments which I have made in these years. Also, because of my past involvement with this issue, my chapter will be interpreted with a certain value judgment by any reader, Japanese or foreigner, whether I like it or not. Second, to give an adequate analysis covering the political left, right, and center as distinct threads of Japanese thinking on historical memory is a voluminous task that goes beyond the scope of this chapter. Nevertheless, there are two reasons that propelled me to write this paper. First, although the United States has never been a major factor in Japan's historical memory controversy, and there is no reason to make it a major factor at this point, Japan's historical memory toward the United States has always been in the consciousness of the Japanese as an underlying theme of Japanese identity and values since the end of World War II. Proper analysis of Japan's historical memory toward the United States, distinguishing democratic values and national identity, could clarify the state of political thought in Japan in a new way.

In 1950, history seemed all but forgotten as the specter of communism hung ominously over Northeast Asia. The Chinese Communist Party had just fought its way to power in a revolution aimed at sweeping aside history, especially Confucianism, which was seen as leaving China backward and ill prepared to rise up and modernize. The Korean War had turned Koreans away from memories of the past that united them to a fateful choice about their future as part either of the wave of communism or of the U.S.-led “free world” bloc. In Japan, preparations were under way for the San Francisco Peace Treaty, which focused on putting aside the legacy of Japan's colonialism and wars in order to rebuild as part of the U.S.-led bloc. Large numbers of Chinese, Japanese, and South Koreans were inclined to condemn their past for the sorrows and weakness it had brought; few defended it. With their eyes on modernity, which leaves the past behind, Americans were eager to embrace a democratic Japan and South Korea while condemning communist states that were seen as rejecting both their own traditions and the promise of the free market and free world.

In 2010, the specter of history is hanging over Northeast Asia, but a struggle lies ahead. Confusion reigns as to what is the true threat from historical legacies and memory. Over the previous decade, concern centered on Japanese revisionism, defending the conduct of Japan in 1895–1945 in a manner that offends its neighbors.

“I consider that there were clearly things which Japan overdid during the colonial period. I think that the Japanese people should know about them, remember them, and then maintain a feeling of remorse.” This was the author's position, which he actively communicated to interlocutors with whom he had the opportunity to talk during his four-month stay in South Korea from September to December 2007. But based on his research and conversations, the historical memory issue is far more complicated than this simple position suggests. Fundamentally, from the point of view of geopolitics and liberal values, Japan and South Korea have so many factors in common, and hence have structural reasons for cooperation, but historical memory drives them far apart. This reality is even negatively influencing cooperation on security (based on common geopolitical interests), values (democracy), and economic integration. This chapter first analyzes the intricate relations among geopolitics, values, and historical identity in Japan–South Korea relations; then it assesses how the rift on historical memory is perceived from the U.S. point of view. Finally, in search of a new strategy, the chapter highlights three distinct approaches open to a U.S. administration: the traditional approach of keeping its distance; the oft-considered but rarely tried approach of taking a judge-mediator position; and an unprecedented integrated approach treating the United States as an integral part of Northeast Asia's history. It concludes by evaluating how Barack Obama is positioning his administration in the face of changes under way in Japan and the Korean peninsula.

U.S. leadership of alliances with Japan and South Korea long avoided history and, by its very nature, stifled candid discussion of differences in historical memories. As part of the Yoshida Doctrine, Japan's leaders deferred to U.S. international leadership while postponing raising sensitive historical issues. Even more reliant on U.S. support, South Korean leaders used their dictatorial power to suppress discussion of the most sensitive historical issues linked to the United States. Given that conservatives in each state feared that progressives would seize any sign of anti-Americanism to attack the legitimacy of the government, censorship served domestic political objectives. Yet, it also allowed accusations and rumors to spread without being adequately answered. During the 1990s and 2000s, conservatives in these states have shown that they have historical grievances too, while progressives have found new opportunities to have their voices heard. Seeking answers to far-reaching national identity questions, both Japanese and South Koreans were prior to the military crisis of 2010 newly poised to raise history issues with the United States in a more insistent manner.

While Japan and South Korea are close allies clearly committed to democratic values, unlike most U.S. allies in other parts of the world they are troubled by memories centered on past American foreign policy that have been artificially and only temporarily suppressed over many decades. This little-recognized reality could become a stumbling block in attempts to sustain U.S. leadership in Asia, especially since these countries are tempted by notions of Asianism or reunification.