US-Japan tensions: Gerald Curtis (19)

In the 1980s, Japan-U.S. relations were beset by tensions unprecedented since the end of World War II. Republicans and Democrats, business leaders, labor unions and the mass media all sang from the same hymn book about how Japan had become a mortal threat to the U.S. -- its export offensive undermining American industries from textiles to automobiles, its successes anchored by industrial policies that kept its own markets closed at the same time that they helped Japanese companies capture markets abroad.