Japan bolsters military as spat with China looks set to drag on

TOKYO — Taking his nation another step further from its post-war pacifism, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe approved a new defence plan yesterday that calls for acquiring airborne drones and amphibious assault vehicles to strengthen Japan’s military, as it faces the prospect of a prolonged rivalry with China over islands in the East China Sea.

While Mr Abe described the plan as “proactive pacifism”, it reverses a decade of military spending cuts to offset a rapid build-up of China’s army as well as the relative decline of American influence.

The spending plan was approved by the Cabinet in tandem with a new national security strategy that calls for creating a more dynamic military, loosening self-imposed restrictions on the export of weapons and nurturing a stronger sense of patriotism among Japan’s public.

Under the new strategy, Tokyo will build closer military ties with the United States, whose 50,000 army personnel stationed in Japan still form the basis of the country’s national security.

However, Japan will also strengthen its purely defensive forces by acquiring new weapons and capabilities that would have once been unthinkable for a nation that has long viewed its military, called the Self-Defence Forces, with suspicion after its disastrous defeat in World War II.

Japan’s long-range plans also mark a shift from its Cold War posture of defending itself against a Russian attack, towards a potential conflict with China.

According to the new national security strategy, Tokyo will “build a comprehensive defensive posture that can completely defend our nation”.

“China is attempting to alter the status quo by force in the skies, the East China Sea, South China Sea and other areas, based on assertions that are incompatible with the established international order.”

The new security strategy also calls for raising Japan’s regional profile by building security ties with other Asian nations — such as South Korea, South-east Asian countries and India — as well as Australia.

However, it is unclear to what extent a stronger Japanese military will be welcomed by neighbours like Seoul, where memories of Tokyo’s early-20th-century militarism are still raw.

The plan announced yesterday will raise total military spending over the next five years by US$12 billion (S$15 billion) to US$246 billion, reversing a long decline in spending. While that represents an increase of almost 5 per cent, it is still far below the annual double-digit rises in Chinese military spending.

Much of Tokyo’s new spending will go towards beefing up its ability to monitor and defend its south-western islands, including those at the centre of the stand-off with Beijing, known as the Senkaku in Japan and Diaoyu in China.

To achieve this, Japan will station more early-warning aircraft in Okinawa and buy three unarmed Global Hawk drones.

The five-year spending plan also calls for the acquisition of beach-assault vehicles and American Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft to equip a new amphibious infantry unit, which can defend and recapture remote islands.

Yesterday, the Cabinet approved a revised 10-year military strategy that calls on Japan to create a more mobile military, which can deal with contingencies on far-flung islands, as well as so-called grey-zone conflicts that might involve small numbers of terrorists or paramilitary attackers.

The plan calls for the army to maintain its current level of about 160,000, reversing earlier plans to shrink that figure. It also said Japan would study whether it should purchase or develop long-range strike capabilities, such as a cruise missile, that would allow it to destroy a threat such as a North Korean ballistic missile before it can be launched.

Japan has so far eschewed such clearly offensive weapons to maintain the purely defensive nature of its military, whose existence already pushes the limits of a post-war Constitution that bars the nation from possessing “land, sea and air forces, as well as other war potential”.

Mr Abe wants to go even further by stretching the definition of self-defence to include action taken on behalf of allies under attack, allowing Japan to, for example, shoot down a North Korean ballistic missile heading towards the US.

However, that doctrine, known as collective self-defence, has run into stiff public opposition. Yesterday, top government spokesman, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga, said consideration of collective self-defence would be put off until next year at the earliest. AGENCIES