After returning as Japanese prime minister, Shinzo Abe has been acting "tough", claiming that Japan enjoys an advantage in the Diaoyu Islands dispute and launching "attacks" on China on the diplomatic front.

Tensions have escalated in the East China Sea because of the Diaoyu Islands dispute and pose an unprecedented challenge to peace and stability in Northeast Asia, and Japan is squarely responsible for that.

The previous Japanese government, under the Democratic Party of Japan, played out the farce of "nationalizing" the Diaoyu Islands. And now Abe's Liberal Democratic Party government refuses to recognize the dispute over the Diaoyu Islands. It is not only refusing to negotiate to resolve the dispute, but also challenging China's territorial sovereignty and trying its patience.

On political and historical issues, Abe favors the right-wing forces, and has tried to deny Japan's history of aggression and revise the country's pacifist constitution in the hope of building a full-fledged military and reviving the national economy.

On the diplomatic front, Abe uses a tactic of maintaining friendly relations with distant countries and challenging Japan's neighbors. It peddles "democratic values" and "dollar diplomacy" to build a wider Asian "arc of freedom and prosperity" encircling China.

Abe is eager to strengthen Japan-US ties, which he believes were weakened under his three predecessors when the DPJ was in power. He even offered to visit Washington in January but was stopped by the US administration from doing so because of US President Barack Obama's tight schedule. Abe also plans to have friendly relations with Russia and the Republic of Korea to end Japan's total "isolation" in the region. And he intends to maintain good ties with the Philippines, Vietnam and other Southeast Asian countries that have territorial disputes with China in order to put more pressure on Beijing.

Japan has increased its defense expenditure, boosted the forward deployment of forces, held drills aimed at strengthening "island defense", intercepted Chinese ships and threatened to fire flares to warn Chinese aircraft "violating Japanese airspace". In doing so, Japan is not only betraying its guilty consciousness, it is also risking a conflict.

The United States has played a role in creating the Diaoyu Islands dispute and is still employing double standard over the issue. On one hand, it says the US-Japan Security Treaty covers the Diaoyu Islands in an attempt to use the Sino-Japanese dispute to strengthen the US-Japan military alliance and promote its strategic rebalancing in the Asia. On the other hand, it does not want to be dragged into a conflict started by Japan because of growing Sino-US common interests and its domestic economic problems.

Japan, by not accepting the rise of China, is ignoring the irreversible change in the balance of power in Northeast Asia and the general trend of East Asian cooperation.

This is all the more reason for China to have confidence in its justified stance and comprehensive national strength. But it should refrain from committing mistakes while responding to Japan's provocations, for the competition between China and Japan is a "protracted war" and the situation is moving in favor of China.

Beijing should devise strategies calmly and control the initiative firmly in the strategic game. It should choose the least risky way to attain its end after taking the overall situation into consideration.

Beijing should try to maintain overall peaceful relations with Tokyo and take all necessary steps to help far-sighted Japanese personalities striving to pull Sino-Japanese relations back on the "mutually beneficial" track.

At the same time, China should use the situation to safeguard and expand its maritime rights and interests. It has achieved a breakthrough in the Diaoyu Islands dispute by breaking Japan's "actual control" and letting the international community know the reasons for the dispute.

China also has to ensure that its ties with Japan do not deteriorate further to keep its neighboring environment stable and favorable. Therefore, it has to focus on the development of its domestic market and internal stability, and follow a defensive defense strategy.

Besides, it should take a combination of measures to make Japan face reality and correct its mistakes. For that, it has to first make Abe acknowledge that there exists a dispute over the Diaoyu Islands.

China should continue to take powerful countermeasures against Japan's provocative actions, maintain its pressure on Japan by intensifying the regular patrols in the waters and airspace of the Diaoyu Islands, and be ready to launch a counterattack in self-defense. It can also use the economy and market card and East Asian cooperation to drive sense into Japan.

On the diplomatic front, China should avoid making enemies in East Asia, or anywhere else in the world, and try to isolate right-leaning Japan by building an "international united front".

More importantly, China must strengthen communication and coordination with the new US government to reach a strategic understanding and warn Washington against the risk of intervening in a Sino-Japanese dispute.

It should cooperate with Russia and the Republic of Korea to jointly safeguard the post-war international order by thwarting Japan's attempt to deny its history of aggression before and during World War II. And it should work with member states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, and India and let them the weigh pros and cons of defeating Japan's designs.

The author is deputy director of World Politics Research Institute, affiliated to the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations.

(China Daily 01/25/2013 page9)