U.S.-JAPAN RELATIONS: TOWARDS A MILITARY ALLIANCE

Abstract

This thesis will explore and assess the evolution of U.S.-Japan relations from their beginning in 1853 to the present bilateral military alliance in the 21st century. The main argument of this thesis is that the relationship between the United States and Japan has been characterized by transformations throughout its one hundred and sixty year history. The first chapter will examine how the U.S.-Japan relationship was established and then transitioned from unequal trading partners to competitors in Asia to bitter enemies. The second chapter will explore how decades of trade and regional competition, in combination with racial policies and thought, ultimately led to and fueled the Pacific War. The third and final chapter will assess how the two nations quickly and improbably became cooperative counterparts following the end of the war, and then developed their relationship over six decades into one of the most important bilateral military alliances in the international community today.