For all its problems, Japan requires no one's sympathy. It remains a proud and successful nation, a unique and rewarding culture and an economy not by any remote stretch of exaggeration or bizarre imagination an Asian Greece (suddenly the most turbulent modern economy).

On the contrary, its per capita income still dwarfs that of China's, and for a population of 127 million — only a touch more than Mexico's and well short of Russia's — the fact is that its economy usually gets ranked as No. 3 worldwide, even above powerhouse Germany. But Japan, the second-largest financial contributor to the United Nations and a major global player in many other respects, does not always get respect. In part that's because, these days, the land of the rising sun is dwarfed by the shadow of China.

And now the Japanese people, among the most pacifist and anti-nuclear on Earth, have become unsettled, somewhat on edge and perhaps feeling (wrongly or rightly) a little double-crossed. According to many opinion polls, they have begun to distrust China's intentions and doubt the validity and wisdom of their nation's pragmatic attitude and policy toward their gigantic neighbor on the other side of the Korean Peninsula.