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China–Japan Tensions (Episode 2): “Emotional Psychological Warfare” vs. “Institutional Psychological Warfare”
This is Jersey’s Decode China—a news channel dedicated to telling the truth through in-depth analysis.
Have you noticed something strange?
Between China and Japan, no one has said they want a war.
No one has crossed a red line.
Yet tensions are rising day by day.
So the question is: if everyone claims to be “exercising restraint,” where is this tension coming from?
There is only one answer:
it is not military escalation that is spinning out of control—it is psychological warfare.
More importantly, China and Japan are not even fighting the same kind of psychological war.
China is waging emotional psychological warfare.
Japan is waging institutional psychological warfare.
These two logics are almost destined to misread each other, amplify each other, and ultimately reinforce each other.
Many people, when they hear the term “psychological warfare,” immediately think of deception, intimidation, or the manufacture of chaos.
But in real-world politics, psychological warfare is often aimed first not at the opponent, but at one’s own society.
Its goal is not
“to make the other side afraid,”
but to make the domestic public accept a certain position, to give the government greater room to act,
and to make restraint, retreat, and compromise increasingly untenable in public opinion.
China’s psychological warfare relies on a single core resource: historical emotion.
Through commemorative dates, official narratives, and the rhythm of public discourse,
it continuously reawakens, reaffirms, and intensifies anti-Japanese sentiment.
And this emotion is—
deployable, releasable, and capable of being heated up.
What is the result?
Hard-line stances are moralized; caution is marginalized; escalation through friction is diluted into something “only natural.”
Once emotions are ignited, policy is no longer steering emotion—emotion begins to drive policy.
Now look at Japan.
What is the one sentence in Chinese public opinion that triggers the strongest backlash?
—“If Taiwan is in trouble, Japan is in trouble.”
In China, this is read as provocation.
But within Japan, it serves an entirely different function.
It is not about stirring emotions.
It is about explaining risks, laying institutional groundwork, and securing procedural legitimacy.
What Japan is actually doing is this—using law, budgets, and alliance frameworks
to convert fear into manageable security policy.
This is a
calm, technical, and institutionalized form of psychological warfare.
Here is where the problem arises.
Within an emotion-driven logic, every defensive move by Japan is easily interpreted as conspiracy, disguise, or preparation for attack:
defense budgets equal military expansion; alliance coordination equals encirclement; statements of restraint equal covert advancement.
Within an institutional logic, Japan often underestimates the irreversibility of China’s emotional mobilization.
Once emotions are continuously activated, the space for rational judgment collapses rapidly, and policy becomes hostage to public sentiment.
That is why we are entering an extremely dangerous state:
no one truly wants escalation, yet no one can easily stop.
Because these two forms of psychological warfare are often not driven by deliberate “plans,”
but pushed forward by psychological inertia.
Under such a structure and condition, the truly scarce capacity is not toughness, but this:
to remain rational amid tension,
to exercise restraint without being accused,
and to avoid miscalculation amid mutual misreading.
This is what deserves the most serious attention in the dangers unfolding in the East China Sea.
I will continue to analyze China–Japan tensions.
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