Tokyo governor Shintaro Ishihara has announced on a visit to the USA that he is negotiating for Tokyo to buy the Senkaku Islands, currently the subject of Chinese claims.
In a recent press conference given in Washington, he announced that he is negotiating with the private owner of the islands with a view to acquiring the isles for Tokyo.
The likely effect of an ultra-rightist Japanese politician buying the islands on China is evidently not lost on him:
“Whichever country we may annoy, this is so the Japanese can protect Japan’s territory.”
He says he will “likely purchase the entire archipelago” and reports that the existing landowner “is basically in agreement – our agents are negotiating.”
Although the Senkaku Islands lie within Okinawa prefecture far away from Tokyo, the idea of Tokyo possessing islands thousands of kilometres away is not without precedent – the Izu and Ogasawara Islands extend almost 2,000km into the Pacific and are governed from Shinjuku as part of the Tokyo metropolitan government despite having a population in the low tens of thousands.
The press conference itself was hosted by the Heritage Foundation, a prominent US conservative think tank, and saw Ishihara as guest of honour to discuss “The U.S.-Japan Alliance and the Debate Over Japan’s Role in Asia,” as part of their “American Leadership Initiative” – unsubtle code for better using Japan to help contain Chinese expansionism.
What the citizens of Tokyo think of their mayor using civic funds in order to provoke the Chinese and engage in nationalist grandstanding is not clear, but given that they have repeatedly re-elected him for doing just this, it seems likely they approve.
Predictably, the almost exclusively “net-uyo” patter which dominates the likes of 2ch and Twitter was well in evidence:
“Nice one, keep at it!”
“Next buy up Takeshima!”
“As expected of Ishihara, he’s a master at pissing everybody off.”
“I support you!”
“So who the hell owns them at the moment anyway?”
“They are apparently owned by a Fukuoka businessman.”
“Ishihara is a true patriot! Hashimoto cannot compare!”
“Why does this idiot have to drag Tokyo into his crusade against China…”
“Hurry up and die you old fool. If you want to buy them, use your own damn money and not so much as a yen of our taxes!”
“Even if Tokyo buys them, they don’t become part of Tokyo? It would just be land in Okinawa prefecture which is owned by Tokyo’s government.”
“Seeing him speak in public I get a bit worried as he looks as if he is suffering from dementia…”
“Is there some significance to the fact he said this in Washington? Like, he has their support?”
“Beautiful!”
“He’s so clever to announce it in the US too!”
“Superb! Please Ishihara, spend my tax money any way you see fit!”
“Anyone criticising this is a Chinese stooge.”
“Please Ishihara, become prime minister!”
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read sankaku islands at first glance _-
Where only men lives
With thousand of photos of lenfriend.
What a huge waste of money. Sounds par for the course for a political leader.
THe people at 2ch are a bunch of moron. If Ishihara becomes prime minister you can can kiss freedom artistic expression good bye. Anime will become very very dull. Sure this was a brilliant strategy in one sense, but in another sense this is also capable of starting a war. Does that old fool know what he's playing at? The chinese have nukes and I don't care to be living in a real life version of Fallout 3.
So is anything on these islands but feral goats and palm trees?
No, but people need topics of controversy so that those who care have something to kill time with and those who don't care can show off how refined and educated they are by calling other people dumbasses for caring.
National pride, apparently.
I checked on Wikipedia. Nothing but goats and a few trees and an abandoned bonito processing plant. Also some birds and an endangered special of mole.
Ishihara go to China, so they can shoot you!
He's more likely to explode for stepping foot within Chinese territory than to be shot.
The sankaku island are covered end to end with semen.
XD
I read it as "I'm buying the Sankaku Islands"
Fear not fear not: that Alzheimer's addled dinosaur dosen't even know what a interweb is, much less where Sankaku is.
How the heck does this have anything to do with the US? Why involve a bystander?
Also, now he's admitting the islands belong to China?
He didn't admit that it belonged to China but he did admit that Japan does not own them if he's buying them from the owners.
The islands are, and have always been part of Japan. The islands are currently privately owned by a Japanese man living in Saitama Prefecuture. He own the land-title to Senkaku and some of the surrounding island.
US formerly had control of the islands, and returned them to Japan after post WWII occupation ended. Then when China was like uh what those are ours, the US was like well whatever you guys can argue about it and stopped paying attention to the issue.
Brilliant! I'm sure Ishihara will grow to become even more of a loved character throughout the world only but to be shot in a visit to China.
Profound sadness
Ishihara + the Heritage Foundation + President Mitt = bad news for American anime fans. Make room for censored American porn!
Sheesh with Mitt as president, America's bound to be even more fucked up as it is.
That's why he's not going to win, simple as that.
EXACTLY!!!
Mitt is losing on almost EVERY poll against President Obama.
Well, he does do well with the wealthy and with uneducated white people, so we have to give him credit there. He deserves a participation trophy, like crushing defeat.
As far as republicans go he's the best we could possibly hope for this election cycle. Thank all the Gods of humanity that Santorum didn't get the nomination! We'd all better beg and plea that Obama wins though, or shit's gonna hit the fan no matter how moderate Romney tries to go.
You do know that Ron Paul is going head-to-head if not winning against Obama on almost every poll right? GOP can do better
If people actually looked at Ron Paul's platform outside of "legalize pot", they'd see he's exactly the kind of insane old coot out of touch with reality that Ishihara is. Only instead of "trying to provoke a war with China" it's "trying to reverse 100+ years of progress and return the US to the Gilded Age." He's a terrible candidate with ridiculous ideas, and the sooner otherwise intelligent people realize it the better.
Either of these guys being in charge just gives China more and more of a foothold in taking over, the only fortunate thing for Japan is that (hopefully) Ishihara dies before being elected PM and starting World War III, while Ron Paul will NEVER win the Presidency. Not that the Tea Party is any better...the GOP desperately needs the adults to take control of their party again, we've got a bunch of spoiled brats with entitlement issues in the guise of middle aged men running it right now.
Keep making your assumptions that all anime fans are teenage hipsters. It'll get you real far. 40 years later you'll probably still be posting ignorant BS on Sankaku while fapping to Obama. Do the world a favor and kill yourself now.
romney is an unlikable piece of shit. Unless the GOP obstructionism sinks the economy for the second time, obama will win
Obama is better.
Why would you care if he is unlikable? You are not electing a rock star.
Fuck Romney
Fuck Ishihara
Ron Paul is the only honest man that is consistent, knows the issue, and wants PEACE in the world as well as Liberty for the American Citizens.
Ron Paul 2012
I can't stand this bastard, but he's really amusing, and also one hell of a Troll.
This guy is going to be assassinated by some Chinese agent one day a.k.a. "die by an unfortunate accident" >.>
you wish...you wish.
If only Tokyo had the balls to not re-elect this farce of a government official...
The islands themselves are not of much economic value.
What I believe the dispute is actually over is the fishing grounds around said islands.
If you buy the islands you get control of any waters 12 nautical miles out and exclusive economic rights 200 nautical miles out.
Why would this involve the US I don't know except for maybe trying to get them to send an aircraft carrier there as a scare tactic to the Chinese.
Weren't there considerable gas reserves found around them? That's why China even started to care in the first place, isn't it?
And one the Chinese wouldn't have to be overly scared of. After all, they have an endless supply of cheap fish trawlers and human material manning them to ram into any US or other fleet occupying the area...
Something tells me that wouldn't work
It works and they're actually doing it.
Good luck ramming into the thick armored destroyer hull. Tell me how it went after you are done sinking to the bottom of the sea.
I see you have not yet grasped the concept of quantity over quality. They might not destroy the armor, but one hundred fish trawlers massing in on a destroyer from one side is sure to capsize it anyway.
@01:46
I see you have not grasped the concept of multiplying by 0. It's ok, not everybody needs to understand 3rd grade math.
@01:49
Don't lecture me on mathematics if you're obviously too dump to realize that your analogy doesn't even make sense in this context. Apply sufficient force to the sides of a ship and it will capsize. Even more so if none of the energy is spent on deforming its armor.
And what's to stop the crew on the destroyer from blowing them to hell before they can move that many fishing boats?
How many 200~300ft-ish incoming targets can they destroy before they're too close for any countermeasure? 10? 20? 50? It doesn't matter in the face of China's vast fishing fleets.
As you might have guessed by now, my initial comment was meant as a joke. I can't believe it devolved into this conversation.
@08:04
(am a different anon from the one you were arguing with, but have to put my 2 cents in.)
Putting aside that you were joking for a moment, it's not a tactic that could work in RL.
Having two ships floating close to each other at the same pace, is already extremely difficult. But it's doable, as can be seen when ships are resupplied at open sea.
But multiple ships beyond that?
It vastly increases the chances of collision between the ships, you also have to take into account the ocean/sea currents.
Plus there's the issue of the shells being fired by the destroyer causing a temporary disturbance in the current, thus further increasing the chances of collision (not fully sure that I'm explaining this part right, but don't know how to rephrase it.)
Then there's the damage caused by the shells to the ships themselves can lead to a) explosions which would effect all the ships in the immediate area, b) can cause a ship to start sinking, which would cause the ships behind it to run into it, or to slam into it from the side, due to the above factors.
Doing this sort of stuff with dinghies or zodiac boats is one this, due to their lack of mass. But fishing trawlers have a great deal of mass, and that effects how the water and the current effects will behave.
After the USS Cole incident, the Americans might disable or sink any dubiously approaching boat, rather than wait for a collision. Unlike the Japanese, the US navy has a backbone.
actually, isn't it said that there are large deposites of gas and oil there?
Very large deposits nearby, and by owning the islands you have proxy ownership by a set distance of the sea-shelf to use any resources within range. The Chinese didn't want the islands until they found gas for this very reason.
Well we are winding down Iraq and maybe Afghanistan and our poor boys and girls are itching for something to shoot at. All right I am sure we can swing by and help poor little japan out with those pesky microscopic islands.
Here's a link with some info:
http://factsanddetails.com/japan.php?itemid=1789&catid=22&subcatid=149 [http://factsanddetails.com/japan.php?itemid=1789&catid=22&subcatid=149]
Personally, I'd be cautious about "scaring" someone with their finger on the Nuke Button(TM).
Think about it - what's scarier?
(a) Meeting a thug in an alley who pulls a pistol on you and calmly says, "Wallet, watch, keys, turn out your pockets. Use your left hand, slowly. Now." or...
(b) Meeting a drug-addict in an alley, who, with wide-open, crying eyes, a runny nose, a shaky voice and shaky hands, pulls a pistol on you, and says, "Gi-gi-gi-gimme the c-ca-ca-ca-cassshhhhh."
Run away from the second. If the guy somehow absurdly manages to aim and hit you, your chances of dying from a shot are around 5% or lower. So I pick the first.