Chapter 403: A New Door
That silent standoff, for Japan, was not a military failure, yet it was worse than one.
It was like a mirror, reflecting the entire nation’s powerlessness in front of a powerful neighbor.
This sense of humiliation from defeat without battle fermented into a powerful storm sweeping the political arena in the next 48 hours.
The anger and self-mockery on social platforms were just the prelude.
When Japan’s mainstream media, from the right-leaning Sankei Shimbun to the centrist Yomiuri Shimbun, all began using front-page editorials to question the silence of the Prime Minister’s Official Residence, the real political crisis erupted.
On television debate programs, left and right commentators who used to be sharply opposed actually reached a surprising consensus this time.
They no longer argued about whether laws should be revised, but jointly questioned the same issue: “When danger comes, where are the defense forces we spent huge sums to build, and our most trusted ally?”
Where did the Zeus ships, which we had been talking about, emphasizing, with continuously rising budgets, and invincible in promotion, go?
The Cabinet’s support rate plummeted from 45% to 19% overnight.
He himself was crowned by the media with the humiliating title of “Bystander Prime Minister.”
His rational restraint based on military reality was completely redefined as cowardice and dereliction of duty in the face of surging national self-esteem and insecurity.
Ono Yukio, the leader of the party’s largest faction, gathered all the elders of the factions.
“He can’t stay in that position any longer.” A former Prime Minister slammed the table, his voice hoarse, “Public opinion has collapsed. If we dissolve Congress now, we’ll lose a hundred seats! This is a scandal that shakes the nation itself!”
This was a political assassination without any blade flashes or sword shadows.
Early the next morning, Japan’s Cabinet resigned en masse, and the news spread around the world via flash reports.
Tokyo’s financial market, already fragile from the previous events, welcomed the final straw.
Inside the Tokyo Stock Exchange, the Nikkei 225 index plunged instantly after opening, dropping over 1500 points in one hour.
What investors were selling was no longer stocks of a certain company, but the uncertainty of Japan the country itself.
A Japan without a leader and with huge question marks over its foreign and security policies is a nightmare for global capital.
The Japanese Yen exchange rate against the US Dollar, after the previous plunge, staged another high-dive, quickly breaking below the psychological barrier of 145.
The Japanese Yen, once seen as a safe-haven currency, has now become the epicenter of risk.
Even the most stable bond market saw rare selling.
Overseas investors began to worry whether an unstable government still has the ability to repay its astronomical national debt.
Although Japan’s Central Bank announced large-scale market intervention measures again, this time, the trillions of funds they invested were like poured into a black hole, only barely slowing the decline, but unable to reverse the market’s despair.
To prevent the market from completely collapsing, ZMD completed the selection of the new Prime Minister at an unprecedented speed.
Sugawara Naoki, former Minister of Foreign Affairs and leader of the party’s centrist faction, was elected as the new party president amid the support of faction elders, and will officially become the 102nd Cabinet Prime Minister after Congress approval in the evening.
Choosing Sugawara was the most prudent choice the factions could make amid the stormy waves.
He has a steady style, good relations with all factions in the party, and more importantly, he is a staunch pro-America faction and the choice most familiar and reassuring to Washington.
5 p.m., Prime Minister’s Official Residence
Sugawara Naoki, who had just received authorization, immediately held his first press conference. His expression was serious, and his speech was short and forceful.
He emphasized only three things:
The new Cabinet’s primary task is to stabilize the financial market and restore national confidence.
He will form a strong Cabinet to unite all forces to overcome the national calamity.
He announced that next week, he will immediately visit Washington, hold talks at the White House, and reaffirm to the world the rock-solid, unshakable alliance relationship.
This political tsunami triggered by the humiliation of the bystander ultimately came to a temporary end in the fastest and most conservative way.
But the ghost still lingers over Tokyo, and the doubt “Can America really protect us?” still cannot be dispelled.
In China, the atmosphere was completely different.
All major social media were filled with a jubilant atmosphere.
Although it was just an ordinary recovery, in their view, it had major strategic significance.
Official media reports remained restrained and rigorous, repeatedly emphasizing that this was a scientific exploration activity for peaceful use of space.
But in the public opinion arena, all sorts of demons and ghouls took the stage one after another, with various interpretations emerging endlessly.
Weibo’s hot search list was filled with entries that Chinese people find amusing and Japanese people find chilling:
#Bystander Prime Minister#, this term created by Japanese media was quickly ported to Weibo by Chinese netizens and given a whole new, sarcasm-filled meaning.
Countless netizens flooded into the Weibo of Japan, with remarkably consistent comment formats: “Warm reminder: Strong winds and waves today, please keep your country’s ships away from dangerous waters~”
#Suggest Renaming Pilipinas Sea#, a high-praise comment read: “Since our express delivery can be precisely delivered there from the Moon, it shows that place has good feng shui and signal, I suggest renaming Pilipinas Sea to the First Postal Station on the East Side of the South China Sea, for convenient future express delivery.”
#485m Top-Level Versailles#, countless tech bloggers and military influencers used various ways to explain to ordinary netizens how godlike the technological strength is to smash an object from 380,000 km away at hypersonic speed toward Earth with a final error of less than 500 meters.
#Is Tokyo Bay Water a Bit Cold#, when the news of Japan’s stock market plunge came, this entry quickly rushed to the hot search.
The comments below were all “Weather turning cool, remind little Japan to wear more clothes” and “Heart as clear as ice, sky falls without alarm, doge.jpg”.
On Zhihu, under related questions, the top-voted answer was not analysis of faction politics, but a simple picture comparison:
Top image: In 1894, after the Battle of the Yellow Sea at Dadonggou, the Japanese fleet strutted arrogantly, the Beiyang Navy’s “Dingyuan” ship struggling in the smoke.
Now big brother is just us and America, the others are all little brothers waiting to be fed, all waiting for big brother to cut flesh to feed the tiger, waiting for big brother to feed them.
Little did they know, this is not the Cold War at all, this is a confrontation with completely different rules. Big brothers don’t want to share meat with little brothers at all. We want fair trade and win-win cooperation, to make the cake bigger together, then talk about distribution.
America is much more excessive; they want to cut meat from allies to feed themselves, to suck the marrow from allies’ bones.
Leaving the little brothers confused: Isn’t this the Cold War? Why aren’t you flattering me, but instead forcing me to hand over chips?
What makes them even more helpless is that they discovered, America treats them this way, and if they go to China, China is equally unwilling to give any benefits.
Switch to the Cold War sixty years ago, if Europe went to the Soviet Union to talk cooperation, the Soviet Union would have given substantial benefits, okay?
So I want to say, Japan’s politicians are among the few in the world who have understood the new era’s game rules, far superior to those European politicians.
To understand this matter, you must abandon all emotional language based on courage, spirit, and morality, and look at it from only three cold perspectives: Japan’s stop-loss, America’s injury check, and the new Asia-Pacific tacit understanding born from it.
I. Japan’s Retreat: Stop-Loss Named Observation.
Many people, especially Japan’s right-wingers, are cursing Chiyoda for cowardice and loss of samurai spirit. This view is very superficial.
On the contrary, Japan’s decision that day was an extremely professional and rational judgment made by its bureaucratic system in an extremely short time.
The core of this judgment is not whether to dare to fight, but what is the cost of fighting?
Before the conflict, Japan, like America, remained at the stage of theoretical deterrence and model simulations regarding our anti-intervention/area denial capabilities.
But that day, they saw two live trading data that cannot be simulated by models:
The fire control radar’s decisive lock-on: This is not a warning, this is a death sentence.
Our warships, from hundreds of kilometers away, used their most powerful fire control radar to illuminate the P-3C, using an internationally conventional military language to clearly tell them: “I can see you, I can hit you, and I dare to hit.”
485 meters terminal precision: This is the straw that broke the camel’s back.
This number announced to Japan’s military experts that the Aegis missile defense system they spent huge sums to introduce has an interception probability approaching zero when facing this kind of package with terminal hypersonic gliding and autonomous navigation capabilities.
In this situation, what is the result of sending the Haguro? Not heroic standoff, but turning their most expensive warship into a live target for the opponent’s navigation system, for a public execution witnessed by the world.
Therefore, non-intervention is a military stop-loss, avoiding a battle that is bound to fail and would completely destroy their confidence.
Secondly, the precise calculation of economic cost: If real firefighting occurred, even just friction, what would happen to Tokyo’s stock market the next day? Not a drop of 1500 points, but direct suspension.
The Japanese Yen would collapse instantly.
Japan’s national credit would be completely buried overnight by this military adventure.
Non-intervention is an economic stop-loss.
Therefore, Japan’s observation was not an emotional retreat, but a painful rational decision that had to be accepted after pressing the results on a calculator.
They sacrificed dignity to preserve the fleet and economy.
II. America’s Observation
More people, especially many in 4v, think this is America’s betrayal. I see fewer of those crazies on Zhihu shouting for me to fight these days.
This view also fails to understand the essence of America’s behavior.
America did not betray Japan; America was loyal to itself, just like they have chosen countless times in the past.
That P-8A and the higher-altitude RC-135S reconnaissance aircraft were not bodyguards, but injury inspectors.
Their only task there was to answer the question the Pentagon cares most about: How powerful is the A2/AD system in the real world?
Japan’s coast guard ships and reconnaissance aircraft, in a sense, became bait for America to test this net.
Every radar illumination, every electronic signal’s frequency and intensity, every reaction speed of the Chinese fleet was greedily and completely recorded by US military aircraft.
Through this observation, America obtained the data they most wanted to know and least wanted to see:
China’s anti-ship ballistic missile system and naval fleet’s data link have been fully connected.
China’s navigation technology has escaped dependence on external satellites, possessing beheading capability under strong electromagnetic interference.
The Chinese military has the determination and will to pull the trigger without hesitation in this area.
Therefore, America’s observation was a cold, strategic injury check that did not hesitate to take ally’s humiliation as the price.
They were testing how severely injured their West Pacific strategy, centered on carrier battle groups, which they have relied on for the past thirty years, really is.
The injury check result: Severely injured and near death.
III. New Era’s Asia-Pacific Tacit Understanding
So, when Japan stopped the loss and America checked the injury, a brand new, wordless Asia-Pacific tacit understanding was born:
The red line has been drawn; this sea area has been proven by facts to be within the scope where we can effectively exercise jurisdiction.
Here, our interests are core interests, not to be challenged.
The traditional deterrence of America’s carrier battle groups has been greatly discounted in this sea area.
America’s future interventions will have to rely on higher cost, higher risk submarines and long-range bombers from Guam and Kangaroo Country.
Pawns must protect themselves: Japan and 4v both saw their true status from this event. They are no longer protected allies, but assets on the edge of danger.
In summary, this recovery operation was not a gunshot, yet it was better than one.
It completed the reconstruction of the Pacific coastal order in a nearly peaceful way.
That precisely fallen command module was like a key, opening the door to the new era’s power map for us.
The words on the door are written very clearly: “Welcome to the world where strength decides everything.”
And on Bilibili, a famous military UP main hastily produced a video overnight, titled “Subduing the Enemy Without Fighting: A Textbook-Level Great Power Game.”
In the video, he strung together a complete story from China issuing the navigation notice, fleet advancing, recovering the command module, Japan’s restraint, America’s observation, Tokyo Incident, and other series of events.
At the end of the video, with passionate background music, he displayed this subtitle:
“We didn’t fire a single shot or shell, yet made a world power admit the incapacity of its military power at its own doorstep.
We didn’t say a harsh word, yet made a country that has wavered left and right for over seventy years complete the change of highest power overnight.
This is not the highest level of subduing the enemy without fighting.
When your technology, military, and national will are already so strong that the opponent feels confrontation itself is meaningless, you have won the final victory.
Welcome to the new era.”
“Mr. Kimura,” Wang Hao spoke first, his Japanese very fluent, “Today’s data is very perfect. Your accumulation in high-k metal gate process is truly admirable.
Just, I have a question about FinFET gate profile control. Why did you choose the more complex multiple sidewall deposition instead of optimizing the etching scheme?”
Even before this recovery, the transfer of semiconductor technology at 28nm and below between China and Japan had already begun.
Wang Hao is one of the many Chinese engineers sent to Japan to receive technology, and he once worked at NEC.
The question he asked was a very detailed one.
Kimura Toshiro, this old man who has worked here for nearly forty years, showed his first genuine smile of the day.
It was the relieved smile a master craftsman gives when seeing a clever apprentice.
“Young Wang, you have a sharp eye.” He took a sip of iced barley tea, “Because ten years ago, the best plasma etcher we could get couldn’t meet our leakage current requirements in uniformity control.
We were forced into it.
Use more complex processes to compensate for equipment shortcomings. This is the destiny of our generation of Japanese semiconductor engineers: Achieve ultimate perfection within restricted frameworks.”
Wang Hao nodded; he understood the history behind these words.
After a moment of silence, he asked a more personal question: “Mr. Kimura, you have dedicated your life to this production line. Now, handing it over… handing everything of it to us with your own hands. What kind of feeling is that?”
“Feeling?” He murmured to himself, “No anger, no unwillingness. Just a destiny-like calm.”
He turned his head, looking at Wang Hao, his eyes like looking at his younger self.
“Young Wang, do you know? Thirty years ago, when I first joined the company, this place was the center of the world. America’s Fairchild and Intel sent people to learn our storage chip manufacturing technology. We defeated the American masters; at that time, we believed the world was ours.”
“Later, we lost to the Koreans.
Not lost in technology, but in their gambling spirit.
In market downturn cycles, they dared to use government money to aggressively expand production against the cycle, dragging us down with price wars.
We lost to their gamble.”
“Then later, we lost to 4v.” Kimura’s tone had bitterness for the first time, “Still lost on money. TSMC’s Mr. Morris Chang invented a whole new way of playing.
He doesn’t produce his own chips; he only does foundry for the world.
He turned the world’s capital into his own ammunition.
And we, these large comprehensive electrical manufacturers, were still quarreling over our internal product lines. We lost to his model.”
He picked up the teacup and drank the barley tea without ice cubes in one gulp.
“Now, we sell it to you.” He looked at Wang Hao, his eyes unusually frank, “Because we know, in this game, we are completely out.
Chip wars, in the end, are not about technology, not models, but total war of capital, market, and national will.
We no longer have advantages in these three.”
“So, for me personally,” Kimura said finally, with relief in his tone, “Rather than watching this production line slowly and painfully eliminated by the market in the next few years, eventually turning into a pile of useless scrap metal.
I prefer to hand over all its processes, all its data, completely and intact to you.
At least, I know that the efforts of my life can continue to shine and heat in a new place. This may be the best outcome an engineer can get.”
Kimura then voiced his inner doubt: “Just, Young Wang, I don’t quite understand. You have achieved such efficient integration, with the final landing point deviation only 485 meters.
Electromagnetic launch, lunar surface nuclear energy, new Hall thruster, autonomous navigation, hypersonic reentry.
Any one of these technologies is a difficulty that a country needs to pour ten or even twenty years of effort to overcome.
And you not only overcame them all, but assembled them perfectly, like gears in a Swiss watch, seamlessly, and succeeded on the first try.
You have achieved such great success, why still obsess over 28nm technology from over ten years ago.
Forgive my bluntness, I’m old, I don’t quite understand. Do Chinese people want to do everything themselves?”
