Intra-alliance politics in Northeast Asia: The Japanese 'defensive intervention' towards South Korea under American pressure

Analytical interpretations of South Korea and Japan's relationship during the Cold War era and studies on the political interaction between them as an alliance game facing a common communist threat have been nearly non-existent. This paper attempts to remedy this impoverishment of theoretical and analytical explanations by emphasizing the significant role of the Japanese Ohira cabinet on the United States-South Korea relations from January to October 1979, the period when there was political pressure from the United States to the South Korean Park Chung-hee regime.