In 2013 attitudes toward other countries did not substantially change in contrast to the tectonic changes of 2012, when Japanese awakened to a dangerous region. In the annual survey, Yoron chosa, issued in November, one reads of further improvement in relations with and friendly feelings toward the United States, already at record high levels, and slight improvement in these measures with Russia, starting from a low level and still leaving a ratio of 2:1 thinking relations are not good. Yet, one gets a sense that Japan is almost friendless: while 37 percent unambiguously feel friendly (shitashimi o kanjiru) to the United States, the figure is 16 percent for ASEAN, 8 percent for India and South Korea, 4 percent for China, and 3 percent for Russia. Clearly, the bloom is still off in relations with South Korea, amid comments about the end of the “Korea wave” and a drop-off in tourists after forty years when Japan had been No. 1 only to lose that ranking to China in 2012 and then to see Park Geun-hye’s popularity lead to a 48 percent jump in Chinese tourism to South Korea in the first nine months of 2013. The Tokyo-Seoul-Beijing triangle looms large this fall.

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