Reflections on Japan as a Global Player and Relations with Turkey

1 minute reading time

Foreword: Where is Japan? When I was Political Minister at the Japanese embassy in London several years ago, I met a gentleman at a Chatham House event who asked me, in a refined Oxbridge accent, “Could you be kind enough to tell me where Japan is?” Obviously he was not ignorant of the geography of East Asia, to which his countrymen used to apply the rather Euro-centric term of ‘Far East.’ He went on to explain that “Japan is not on the radar screen of the UK any longer.” Whether on the radar screen or not, Japan is accustomed to Western perceptions of Japan as a country fluctuating between over-evaluation and under-evaluation. For example, Japan’s resounding victory in the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-05 was totally unexpected by many in the West.