Friend Or Foe?

The FSX becomes a symbol of mounting strain between the U.S. and Japan

American television manufacturers were the first to fall. Then Japanese firms rolled through markets ranging from autos to semiconductors. Now many Washington politicians fear that U.S. plans to develop the FSX fighter jet with Japan could give Tokyo a vital jump start in the aerospace industry, one of the few high-technology fields in which American companies still dominate. The growing outcry has transformed the proposed jet, an advanced version of the F-16, into a powerful symbol of the rising tensions between two countries that are close military and diplomatic allies but also archrivals for the economic leadership of the world. "What...

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