The conundrum of how to de-risk and deter conflict with China is puzzling the West. But one country is ahead in figuring out how to deal with a changing China: Japan.

In the first episode of a two-part series, The Economist’s senior China correspondent, Alice Su, and our Tokyo bureau chief, Noah Sneider, discuss how Japan sees China, and ask whether—after a tangled history of trade ties and territorial disputes—the Sino-Japanese relationship is at a turning-point.

They speak to Aoki Shunichiro, a former director of Panasonic in Beijing, about how Japan’s post-war guilt shaped its economic engagement with China. And Sasae Kenichiro, a former ambassador to America, explains why his warnings of a decade ago about Chinese expansionism and aggression were not heeded.

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