The Ukraine War: Perspectives from Northeast Asia

Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine has important connections to and implications for Northeast Asia. Russia has relied upon China as a supplier and a market, and on North Korea as a source of weapons and increasingly of soldiers. Conversely, the United States has turned to its allies in Northeast Asia, like its allies in Europe, for support. Meanwhile, the war and Western economic sanctions have not merely disrupted, but reshaped global energy markets as well as other international trade. Finally, many have argued that Chinese officials are drawing consequential lessons from U.S. and allied responses to Russia.

On November 20, the Center for the National Interest convened an expert panel to assess perspectives on the war from Northeast Asia—especially Japan and South Korea—as well as how these perspectives are shaping policy in these two key U.S. allies.

—Dr. Akihiro Iwashita is a professor at Japan’s Hokkaido University, where he has long worked as a scholar in the university’s Slavic-Eurasian Research Center. An expert on Russia’s relations with Japan and with China, as well as Russia’s border disputes with both countries, he has also served as a visiting fellow at the Brookings Institution.

—Dr. Jae Ku is Senior Fellow, U.S.-Korea Relations at the Center for the National Interest. He was previously co-founder and Director of the U.S.-Korea Institute at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies for over ten years and, before that, was director of the Human Rights in North Korea Project at Freedom House.

Dr. Andrew C. Kuchins, Senior Fellow at the Center for the National Interest, moderated the discussion.