They’re at it again.
China and Japan — frenemies, trading partners and uneasy neighbors with a tortured, bloody history they still struggle to navigate — are freshly at each other’s rhetorical throats as 2026 begins. And it’s over the same sticking points that have kept them resentful and suspicious for many decades: Japan’s occupation of parts of China in the 20th century, the use of military power in East Asia, economics and politics — and, of course, pride.
