Recurring Japan-U.S. trade disputes have hogged the limelight for way too long, forcing assiduous readers to master arcane terms and acronyms while feuding wonks on each side of the Pacific whack at each other with renewed vigor over the dispute of the month. In this dysfunctional relationship, as in most stormy marriages, each partner blames the other and neither is inclined to go into therapy. Outsiders can't imagine what keeps the couple together, much less speculate on what such a rancorous pair saw in each other in the first place.
Aaron Forsberg takes us back to the 1950s, a nostalgic time when Uncle Sam was wooing Japan, ready to forget the stormy past and eager to jettison the initial punitive and reforming zeal of the U.S. Occupation (1945-52). The Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union started heating up from 1947 and, as a consequence, U.S. policies toward Japan shifted dramatically.
With the "reverse course," the U.S. abandoned plans to remake Japan and squeeze it dry with onerous reparations. Instead, the Occupation authorities introduced a series of policies aimed at reviving the war-devastated economy and transforming the recent enemy into America's most important and reliable ally in the Pacific.