Conférence de Kuan-Jen Chen (Institute for Modern History de l’Academia Sinica – Taiwan)

The recent deterioration of US-China relations has turned maritime East Asia into one of the most contested regions on the globe, with no country in the region able to remain neutral. In his new book drawing on archives in Chinese, English, and Japanese, KJ Chen explores the genealogy of this contested present, tracing its origins to the early Cold War period and the invention of an American strategy in the western Pacific.

Shifting the focus from land to sea when considering the Cold War in East Asia, Kuan-Jen Chen sheds light on the importance of the ‘oceanic’ lens as a structural imperative in grand strategic thinking. Despite extensive scholarship on postwar US-East Asia relations, questions about the relationship between maritime space, national sovereignty, and geopolitics have not been fully explored. Drawing on archives in Chinese, English, and Japanese, Chen uses the western Pacific as a historical platform, illustrating the relationship between the geopolitical value of the sea and the strategic deliberations of American and East-Asian decision making. The recent deterioration of US-China relations has turned maritime East Asia into a powder keg, with no country in the region able to remain neutral. By anchoring today’s maritime East Asia in the past, this book traces the evolution of historical factors that led to the current status quo in the western Pacific, and shows the origins of controversial issues in the region.