English: Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe at the G8 summit in Heiligendamm. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
This is an important story from Bloomberg Business. It’s a must-read. Check it out!
via Japan Holds Out on Joining China-Led AIIB as Deadline Arrives – Bloomberg Business.
As China’s media highlights bias in the Western media on China’s AIIB, Bloomburg highlights the excuses coming from Japan. Japan is dreaming up governance issues – but the proposals seem OK for the UK, France, Germany and Italy. Really Japan is concerned about loosing face because the Japan/US dominated Asian Development Bank has not been entirely successful – it may now get eclipsed by China’s AIIB.
Reuters too focuses on Japanese defensiveness about the AIIB.
Surely, it’s a major mistake for Japan not to join AIIB?
Thoughts?
Dr Alf's Blog 
Japan is being “leant on “hard by the USA and has been losing face for years to the Chinese who have pointedly told them that “there cannot be 2 suns in the sky”.
Japan and the rest of us will have to achieve our own rapprochement with China with sensible dialogue about those areas where we can co-operate rather than compete.
There are many areas where Japan has an industrial leading edge such as miniaturisation of components,robotics and smart manufacturing.
Abe needs to focus his efforts in these key areas rather than visiting shrines where war criminals are buried which is an action likely to open old wounds with all those people who ended up on the wrong end of Japanese atrocities in the 1930’s and 1940’s.
As Dr Alf knows,the IMF and the ADB are creatures of American policy which really is about “full spectrum dominance” based on powerful military forces,containment and financial domination through the Petrodollar.
It is also part of UK policy at arms length although we will not own up to it.
Such dominance is not possible if such a large proportion of US debt is held by China and with New York and the City of London about to be eclipsed as global financial centres by Hong Kong and Singapore in 2016 economic power is being transferred eastwards even faster.