Since the 1840s, East Asia has been a region of conflicts. From the Opium Wars to the Korean War, millions of souls have fallen under the muzzle. Victories and defeats of past regimes shaped the present Northwest Pacific. Now, in an era in which China tries to reclaim its past glories as a formidable empire, nearby countries are threatened with an uncertain future. This is why Taiwan, Japan, and the USA need to team up and work together to make peace in this region.

In 1931, Imperial Japan invaded Shenyang City, sparking the second Sino-Japanese War. After 12 years of fighting, China was at its limit, losing almost every battle. The country was about to become history. Then Japan attacked Pearl Harbor.

The attack made the United States throw all its military power at Japan and ended WWII in four years. This war directly affected present global politics.

Back to 2017, the PRC is now building an army that is commensurate with its size. In order to prevent China from becoming a superpower, the US started its” Asia Pivot.” Under the policy, the American government intervened in the west Pacific both with mIlitary and economic power.

Japan is the country that US works with the most, a country that is hated by all nearby neighbors, except for Taiwan. Japan and Taiwan have had a close relationship since WWII, a strange phenomena since Taiwan was once Imperial Japan’s colony. Both states are critical for the others’ continued prosperity. So the relationship between the two needs to become even closer.

Japan is Taiwan’s second largest trading partner and it’s not hard to see why. Japanese restaurants and stores can be seen around major cities like Taipei and Kaohsiung. Taiwan teens like to watch anime and travel to Japan. Last year alone, there were over two million Taiwanese that traveled to Japan. It is almost guaranteed that the two countries will maintain friendly relations in the future.

Japan needs Taiwan for strategic safety. Goods that sail to this island country will travel around the edges of the West Pacific. The most important import – oil – passes through the South China Sea and goes along the Taiwan Strait or the sea east of Taiwan. Taiwan is in fact providing protection to ships that pass nearby its territory, especially to Japan since we hold the key to their survival.

Since both countries have the same interests and threats we should bond closer to Japan and they should do the same as well.

China, a warlike state, is expanding its influence like nothing we have seen in the past 50 years. As a dictatorship, the world fears that the PRC is a threat to the free world. News about companies owned by China buying crucial technologies can be heard daily, and countries worldwide are scared that China might dominate the world. The only country that can really stop China from expanding its influence is the USA – the only superpower on the planet. With US interests not wanting any country surpassing it, we should bond closer in order to maintain strategic safety.

We know that in order to make peace in East Asia we need to make Taiwan, Japan, and the US bond closely. If not, bad relations between the three will allow China to become powerful and that means regional tensions or even an all out war between countries, and that would be a dim future to live in.