ABSTRACT
The rise of Asia, particularly East Asia, is due largely to its sustained high economic growth. According to the World Bank, East Asia recorded gross domestic product (GDP) growth rates of 8.3 per cent in 2011, 7.5 per cent in 2012 and an estimated 7.9 per cent in 2013. Since the end of the Cold War in 1989, tensions between the USA and China have been steadily on the rise. Tensions came to a head in January 2013, when Chinese warships locked their fire-control radars onto a Japanese destroyer, a provocative act that could have led to open war had the Japanese destroyer responded by firing first. As an analyst noted regarding Shinzo Abe's performance as Prime Minister, Abe has in fact undermined Japan's interest by 'preserving redundant renderings of Japan in the 21st century, negating the positive and responsible record of Japan as a post-war nation-state'.
