The invasion of Ukraine has sounded the death knell for many long-held foreign policy goals. None has been more thoroughly upended than Japan’s aspiration to partner with Russia against China.

Moscow’s attack on Ukraine and Beijing’s refusal to drop its close partner is forcing Tokyo to admit the futility of its decade-long effort to befriend its northern neighbour.

“That China is the number one problem for us is a clear consensus. But how to relate to Russia is a deep-rooted problem,” said Yoko Iwama, Director of the Strategic Studies programme at the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies in Tokyo. “For us, it’s hard to think that we need to face Russia and China at once. So the idea was that somehow we need to pry Russia away from China.”