When Commodore Matthew Perry sailed into Tokyo harbor in July 1853, opening Japan to the West, a century and a half of economic, cultural, and occasionally violent clashes between Americans and Japanese began. Walter LaFeber has written the first book to tell the entire story behind the disagreements, tensions, and skirmishes between Japan-a compact, homogenous, closely knit society terrified of disorder-and America-a sprawling, open-ended society that fears economic depression and continually seeks an international marketplace. Using both American and Japanese sources, LaFeber provides the history behind the vicissitudes of rearming Japan, the present-day tensions in U.S.-Japan trade talks, Japan's continuing importance in financing America's huge deficit, and both nations' drive to develop China-a shadow that has darkened American-Japanese relations from the beginning.
- ISBN10 0393318370
- ISBN13 9780393318371
- Publish Date 27 January 1999 (first published 17 September 1997)
- Publish Status Active
- Out of Print 9 March 2021
- Publish Country US
- Imprint WW Norton & Co
- Format Paperback
- Pages 544
- Language English