Japan and the United States need to engage China while maintaining a solid partnership, and the new Japan-U.S. defense guidelines can help to strengthen this relationship, retired U.S. Gen. Colin Powell said in Tokyo Sept. 26 at a symposium addressing future Japanese-U.S. relations.
"As long as we keep our strength up, as long as we keep our partnership intact, we can deal with China through a process of engagement and not containment," the former chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff told an audience of 600 during a keynote address at the symposium, titled "U.S.-Japan Relations in the 21st Century, A Bond of Friendship."
Powell said the two countries share fundamental values that will facilitate cooperation, and called the new guidelines a "sensible updating which threatens nobody."