U.S. and Japan: Allies in Security, Partners in Economic Prosperity
The Tennessee World Affairs Council, in partnership with the University of Tennessee Knoxville, is hosting a panel discussion about Japan and its close relationship with the US. Panelists from Kobe University in Japan and the Hudson Institute in Washington, DC will discuss the longstanding alliance between the US and Japan, geopolitical and security challenges in the region faced by both countries, and the strong economic relationship between these two great powers due to trade and Japanese investment in the US, especially in Tennessee.
Wednesday, November 12, 2025 I 11:00am-1:00pm
* Luncheon Event *
Venue:
21 Platform Way South – 23rd Floor
Nashville, TN 37203
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Opening Remarks: Mr. WATANABE Shinji (Consul-General of Japan in Nashville)
Watanabe Shinji assumed his post as Consul-General of Japan in Nashville in April 2024. This is his second diplomatic assignment in the United States, following his first assignment at the Consulate-General in Denver, Colorado. Trained in the Swedish language, he has also served at the Embassy of Japan in Sweden on three occasions, with his most recent assignment being the Deputy Chief of Mission.
Prior to his assignment as Consul-General, he worked as the Director of Exchange Programs Division, Minister’s Secretariat, at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan from February 2021. The division is responsible for policies on people-to-people exchanges including the Fulbright Program, JET Programs, and sports exchanges. Since joining the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1987, Consul-General Watanabe has held various positions in fields such as international cooperation, public relations, and international exchange.
Consul-General Watanabe was born in Fukuoka, Japan. He graduated from Doshisha University in 1987 with a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science. He also studied at Uppsala University in Sweden from 1989 to 1990. Consul-General Watanabe is married with two adult children.
Moderator: Andrew McDermott (Founder, Mission Value Partners LLC)
Andrew was born and raised in Memphis, TN. After graduating from Princeton with a degree in history, he joined NEC Logistics in Tokyo in 1992. In 1994 he fell into a finance career courtesy of JPMorgan, where he worked on deals ranging from Chinese infrastructure finance to venture capital to tech IPOs in Hong Kong, New York, Singapore and San Francisco. He joined Southeastern Asset Management in 1998 and helped lead its international business until 2009 from Memphis, Tokyo and London. In 2010, he founded Mission Value Partners, a Japan-focused investment firm, in Sonoma, CA and returned to Tennessee in 2021. His Tokyo-based partner, Yohei Yamada, spent six years in Maryville, TN before returning to Japan to attend college at Keio University and pursue his PhD in Computational Neuroscience at the University of Tokyo. His essay “Let’s talk about Japan Hard Power: Japan’s industrial power-base: under discussed, under appreciated, undervalued,” can be found on the Japan Optimist substack. He has contributed to the Asia-Law Institute’s Nippon Steel symposium and participated in numerous events dedicated to combining the best of the US and Japanese systems, using Tennessee as a model of co-operation. Andrew currently resides in Nashville with his wife Kelly and four children. He enjoys rock climbing and fishing in the Smoky Mountains.
Panelist: Dr. William Chou (Senior Fellow & Deputy Director, Japan Chair, Hudson Institute)
William Chou is a senior fellow and deputy director of Hudson Institute’s Japan Chair. His work at Hudson focuses on US-Japan/Indo-Pacific relations, with an emphasis on economic security, trade and investment, and regional partnerships. Recent projects include the Nippon Steel-US Steel partnership, critical mineral supply chains, trilateral US-Japan-EU economic security cooperation, and US-Japan energy partnerships with Southeast Asia.
Dr. Chou writes and speaks regularly on policy issues, with his writing and analysis appearing in publications such as The Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, Politico, The Washington Post, Nikkei, The New York Times, and the Financial Times.
He holds a BA in history from Yale and a PhD in history from The Ohio State University, with a dissertation on Cold War US-Japan commercial and diplomatic relations. He is a former fellow at the Smithsonian, the Clements Center at UT-Austin, and the University of Tokyo. He got his start as a research analyst at the Institute for Defense Analyses during the Iraq War.
A native New Yorker, Dr. Chou is a former Jeopardy! champion.
Panelist: Dr. Tosh Minohara (Professor of International Relations & Security Studies, Kobe University)
Dr. Tosh Minohara is Professor of Ko, where he holds a joint appointment with the Graduate School of International Cooperation Studies. He received his B.A. in International Relations from the University of California, Davis, and his Ph.D. in Political and Diplomatic History from Kobe University. He is the founder and chairman of the Research Institute of Indo-Pacific Affairs (RIIPA), a nonprofit organization certified by the Cabinet Office. He is also a senior advisor to KREAB Japan and the National Security Group of the Global Tekijuku, as well as a member of the Kansai Association of Corporate Executives (Kansai Keizai Doyukai). In addition, he was formerly an external advisor to the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA), lecturer at both the Japan Maritime and Air Self-Defense Force (JMSDF/JASDF) Command and Staff Colleges, and has served three tours (2011, 2022, 2023) on the JMDF training squadron as an academic observer/lecturer. He is the author of numerous books and articles, including the most recent, The Handbook of Japan’s Foreign and Domestic Policies During the Decade of Abe (Amsterdam University Press, 2025). His academic achievements have been recognized as a recipient of both the Shimizu Hiroshi Prize (2002) and the Japan Academic Research Award (2019).
