Russia-Japan Relations: Prisoners of History?

Abstract

Abstract : Alone among the major combatants in World War II, Japan and Russia have yet to sign a peace treaty fully normalizing their relations. The immediate cause of this anomalous situation is the inability of Tokyo and Moscow to agree on the ownership of the Kurile Islands, which the Soviet Union seized and annexed in the closing days of the war. The Soviets adopted the position maintained by their Russian successors that they did this in agreement with their then ally, the United States, at the February 1945 Yalta Conference, the decisions of which Japan later accepted. In the Russian view, Japan consequently has no basis for disputing Russian sovereignty over the islands. The Japanese, however, argue that even though they ceded the Kuriles in the 1951 San Francisco Peace Treaty, these do not include the four southernmost islands Etorofu, Kunashiri, Shikotan, and Habomai which are an extension of nearby Hokkaido and hence part of Japan. Tokyo therefore insists that these Northern Territories are illegally occupied by Russia and must be returned. The United States supports Japan s position, but it did not begin to do so until the1950s when the intensification of the Cold War made it necessary to bolster Japanese support for the U.S.-Japan alliance. The Northern Territories issue, as the Japanese call it, is not the only intractable territorial dispute in East Asia, nor is it a particularly explosive one in terms of its potential to spark conflict. The Japanese government has never been willing or able to contest the Russian occupation of the islands by force or the threat of force. It has instead kept the issue at the forefront of its bilateral dealings with Moscow, steadfastly maintaining its claim to the islands and insisting on their return as the sine qua non of a peace treaty and improved relations.