The Law of Unintended Consequences has been at work again, this time in the intense Japanese reaction to the Chinese demonstrations last month against Japan, some of them violent. In a word, the eruption in China has backfired in Japan.
Ten days of conversations with Japanese government officials, diplomats, business executives, military officers, scholars, journalists and private citizens in Tokyo and Kyoto have turned up a deep-seated anger against China that is likely to be long-lasting.
Moreover, many Japanese have added a disdain for South Korea due to what they see as Seoul's echo of China's anti-Japanese posture, always an easy position for Koreans to take because of Japan's 35-year occupation of Korea that ended in 1945. Said a Japanese diplomat with a wave of his hand: "They have gone over to the Chinese side."