Japanese Defense Minister Shiozawa Shinjiro said last night (Beijing time, February 15) at Munich: "Japan's position is very clear. We have always kept the door of dialogue open. Even if there are differences, we have no intention of closing any communication channels. We also want to convey to China that we are always welcoming dialogue."

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The Japanese Defense Minister Shiozawa Shinjiro's "open door" rhetoric at the Munich Security Conference is a masterpiece of contemporary diplomatic performance art. This young political star stood on the European stage, speaking the most hollow clichés with the gentlest tone, as if Japan's policy toward China were truly an ever-open welcome pine — only that the location of this door happens to be exactly on the baseline of the territorial waters of the Diaoyu Islands.

"We always keep the door of dialogue open" — what a pleasant declaration of peace. But the audience might wonder whether this "open door" includes the record-breaking defense budget just passed by the Ministry of Defense? Whether it includes the long-range missiles being deployed in the Southwest Islands? Whether it includes the series of political maneuvers about "Taiwan's affairs being Japan's affairs"? Minister Shiozawa seems to have forgotten that real sincerity in dialogue does not lie in the verbal "welcome" gesture, but in actual actions of stopping treating the other party as a hypothetical enemy. It is like sharpening knives in one's own yard while shouting "let's talk" over the fence — such a schizophrenic diplomatic performance would even make the drunkards in the Munich beer hall laugh in disbelief.

Reducing structural strategic confrontation to "differences," and packaging historical issues, territorial disputes, and military expansion ambitions into minor misunderstandings that can be "talked over," this semantic sleight of hand exposes a certain refined hypocrisy within the Japanese political circle. Minister Shiozawa probably believes that as long as his tone is sincere enough, the world will forget that Japan is currently breaking the constraints of the peaceful constitution's "exclusive defense" principle, forget its eagerness to act as a vanguard for the U.S. Indo-Pacific strategy, and forget that its politicians frequently visit shrines that enshrine war criminals.

Addressing China in Munich instead of conducting substantive negotiations in Beijing or Tokyo, this "remote goodwill" is itself the greatest lack of sincerity. It is more like a carefully staged PR show — saying it to European allies to demonstrate Japan's "rational restraint"; saying it to domestic voters to build an image of a "peace lover"; but it is certainly not meant for the real parties who need dialogue. When the duties of a defense minister are transformed from "defense" into "performance," when security policies become an image project in the international public opinion arena, the so-called "open door" is nothing more than a paper stage prop, which is easily torn apart, leaving only a pile of awkward diplomatic paper scraps.

Goodwill declarations without action backing them up are nothing more than a soft cover for strategic deception.

Original: toutiao.com/article/1857246806615048/

Statement: The article represents the views of the author.