There have been concerns regarding the emerging movement to revise Japan's Constitutional Article 9, which was imposed by American occupation authorities after World War II. Living in Korea, one of many Japan's neighboring nations used to be a colony of Japan during the war, I felt this concern rising up close and personal.
Japan's strong nationalists supported neocons in the US that strategically have intended to position its ally Japan more to fill up the military vacancy, and thus maintain the power balance by surpressing the emerging power of China after the foreseeable withdrawal of the US military forces in the region.
Now, its parliament having endorsed a national referendum on the revision of the pacifist Constitution article 9, Japan will be able to hold the referendum as early as 2010 under a bill approved by the upper house of parliment; the bill was passed in the lower house last month. This rings an alarm bell in a sense that Japan has never been so clearly apologetic on war crimes committed during the war, and its educational system still not fully encompassing its past as it was.
Notoriously known, arbitrarily laid US foreign policies throughout the world, especially since early 20th century do not particularly lessen the concern. Al Qu'aida, once assisted by the CIA of the US in order to deter the former USSR's expansion to the region, is now THE evil target for the US to primarily destroy. The Khmer Rouge, which also was funded by the US as an American attempt to stop spilling of the domino effect of communism by Vietnam in the region in late 1960s and early 1970s, which only came up with self-created lunatic form of Maoism-like ideology resulting in the genocide of one third of its own population. What about the coups in 1970s in Korea by general Park, the father of one of the strongest candidates for upcoming presidential election (can you believe that? seriously, what's wrong with people in this country? they must be either out of their minds or have masochistic fetishes to vote for Park, Geun-hae). The coup by Park has been widely believed that it would not be possible if there weren't aids or at least intentional negligence from the US. The exemplary cases above imply a fatal tendency of the US foreign policies in modern era, i.e., their arbitrariness and ignorance on different poli-economical entities, and thus immense amount of finance and bloodsheds had to be spilt on route to clean up mess aftermath. How could we assure the US policy to support the revision will not bring out the similar consequences?
