Hello and welcome to the intelligence from The Economist.

I'm your host, Jason Palmer.

Every weekday, we provide a fresh perspective on the events shaping your world.

Daniel Smith may be the last living offspring of an American slave.

Our correspondent hears of his father's horrifying stories, the civil rights leaders he met,

and how he felt about a Confederate flag parading through America's capital in January.

And things have very much changed in Thailand when it comes to cannabis policy.

The best way to see the shift, it turns out, is to take a look at restaurant menus across the country.

First up, though. Earlier this year, I was traveling in the southwest of Japan along an island chain called the Nansai.

Noah Snyder is the economist's Tokyo Bureau Chief.

I went in fact all the way out to the edge of this island chain, to an island called

Yonaguni. It's a tiny little rocky speck of an island at the edge of the East China Sea.

So we took a flight initially to Naha, which is the airport on the main island of Okinawa,

spent a night in a cozy little airport hotel

and woke up early the next morning to catch the one flight a day

on a small propeller plane that takes us out to Yonaguni.

And as you fly, you get this really sweeping view of the islands.

I mean, obviously, gorgeous open seas and a gorgeous view onto the edge of the Pacific Ocean.

And really, as we flew, it hit me just how vast a territory this is.

We're talking about dozens of islands, some of them inhabited, others not.

And that has big implications for Japan's defense. We're talking about dozens of islands, some of them inhabited, others not.

And that has big implications for Japan's defense.

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