The Northern Territories: Case Study in Japanese-Soviet Relations.

Japanese-Soviet relations have historically been, as they are today, characterized by distrust and dislike for each other. One of the manifestations of this antagonistic relationship is the Northern Territories problem - the conflicting claims of Japan and the Soviet Union to a group of four islands in the southern Kuriles. By presenting a case study of the Northern Territories dispute, this thesis will attempt to illuminate some of the salient differences in the national patterns of Japan and the Soviet Union. It is the hypothesis of thesis that the Northern Territories problem exists because Japan and the Soviet Union subsist and function in radically different paradigms - disparities in their historical, economic, political, geo-strategic, and philosophical existence.