“Engage? Trump and the Asia-Pacific,” chapter in Robert Jervis, Diane N. Labrosse, Stacie E. Goddard, and Joshua Rovner eds Chaos Reconsidered: The Liberal Order and the Future of International Politics, (Columbia University Press, 2023).
This book chapter looks back at the Trump Administration’s strategies in Asia and considers what they might mean for the future. It is part of the ISSF policy series, America and the World. It examines current and historical American relations with Japan, Taiwan, North and South Korea, the Philippines, and China to look ahead to the world to come.
Find it at Columbia University Press Press or Amazon.
“The Gods at War: Religion and the Pacific Theater, 1937-1945,” George Washington University Global Affairs and Religion Network, (October 2022).
Religion played an underappreciated role in Asia during the Second World War. Governments used faith and religious organizations to garner support in colonies, pacify occupied areas, and court global allies. Faith leaders participated on the home fronts by building morale and used religious teachings to provide justifications for violence. Allied and Axis powers embedded monks and chaplains into military units as part of the war effort.
This short paper provides a overview of the interplay of Buddhism, Christianity, Shinto, and Islam in the conflict.
Read it here.
“A Separate Peace? Reconsidering Post-conflict Military Occupations,” British Journal for Military History, 6.3 (2020), pp. 168-177.
This piece makes the case for further historical work comparing the military occupations of Japan and Iraq. Despite serious differences, a comparison of these two related events reveals long-term trends. These include Anglo-American strategic and economic thinking, questions of legitimacy in military occupations, how policy planning works, the problem of interagency rivalry in foreign policy making, and the limitations of advance planning
Architects of Occupation: American Experts and the Planning for Postwar Japan, (Cornell University Press, 2017).
In Architects of Occupation, Dayna Barnes exposes the wartime origins of occupation policy and broader plans for postwar Japan. She considers the role of presidents, bureaucrats, think tanks, the media, and Congress in policymaking. The book contributes a new facet to the substantial literature on the occupation, serves as a case study in foreign policy analysis, and tells a surprising new story about World War II.
Find it at Cornell University Press or Amazon.
“Think Tanks and a New Order in East Asia: The Council of Foreign Relations and the Institute of Pacific Relations During World War II,” Journal of American-East Asian Relations, 22.2 (2015): 89-119.
This article considers the work of American think tanks in foreign policy-making immediately before and during World War II. Think tank initiatives helped to define the range of policy options planners and politicians considered, include the ideas of outside experts into the work of government, and facilitate cooperation between the United States and its allies on postwar planning. The interaction between the U.S. government and interwar think tanks had a lasting impact on American-East Asian relations.
“Plans and Expectations: The American News Media and Postwar Japan,” Japanese Studies, 34.3 (2014): 325-342.
This article examines popular representations of Japan and China before and during the war, assesses the ideas of key figures from the press, and considers the ways in which media and policy interacted through the influence of opinion leaders. These prepared the way for the ‘soft’ peace relying on Japanese cooperation that would become the basis for a new alliance between America and Japan.