frontational approach, and neither the diplomatic or academic communities should spare effort in trying to devise common direction for Sino- American security cooperation in the late 1990s.
In the final analysis, the most promising future for the coming period in East Asia is that of a combination of a loose balance of power embodying areas of political and economic cooperation among the states concerned, with the U.S.-Japan alliance as the stabilizing core of the region. It could sustain the movement toward ever more open markets in a way that will forestall the formation of an exclusivist East Asian yen- dominated trading bloc and will advance a Pacific Basin-wide economic and political community. The question which will then remain is whether the U.S.-led coalition of East Asian states and Japan--if realized--with its policy of appeasement which is reflected in Clinton's policy shift vis- a-vis China will find itself on the road toward a new "Munich"--a peace settlement which then would lead, not toward a lasting "peace in our time," but toward a hegemonic war. I assume that the Clinton initiative constitutes a real policy alternative to start building a "regional concert" among China, the United States, Japan and other states in East Asia. 27
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