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Japan is aggressively pushing for militarization in the squo

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Japan is aggressively pushing for militarization in the squo Yoshihara 14 (Toshi, senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, American Enterprise Institute, “Japanese hard power: Rising to the challenge,” published August 25th, 2014, http://www.aei.org/publication/japanese-hard-power-rising-to-the-challenge/, accessed 7/13/19, JME.) A “Normal” Japan at Last? Prime Minister Shinzō Abe, who returned to power in late 2012 following the Liberal Democratic Party’s landslide victory in the Diet’s lower-house elections, has pushed aggressively to realize his ambitious agenda. Within a year of being elected, Abe instituted sweeping reforms to the national security apparatus. In December 2013, Japan announced the formation of a National Security Council (NSC) modeled after that of the United States. The council streamlines the prime minister’s decision-making process while breaking down the various bureaucratic barriers that have impeded effective crisis management. Tokyo also enacted a controversial state-secrets law that tightened the government’s control over sensitive and classified information, enabling the NSC to centralize the handling of intelligence. Concurrent with the NSC’s creation, Tokyo issued three defense policy documents that furnish the roadmap for developing and sustaining Japanese hard power. The National Security Strategy (NSS), the first of its kind, sets forth “Japan’s fundamental policies pertaining to national security.”1 The document is a welcome expression of Japan’s long-term vision for securing the nation’s regional and global security objectives. The fifth National Defense Program Guidelines (NDPG) establishes Japan’s longer-term defense policy and force structure.2 The Medium Term Defense Program (MTDP) is a programmatic statement of defense requirements and acquisition plans over a five-year period.3 For the first time in Japan’s post-World War II history, Tokyo has produced policy documents that systematically align Japanese policy, strategy, and capabilities. Notably, the NSS promotes the concept of “proactive contribution to peace” that commits Japan to an even more forward-leaning posture in world affairs. Describing the concept as a “fundamental principle of [Japan’s] national security,” the NSS argues that the security of Japan and of the wider international community have become indivisible: “Japan cannot secure its own peace and security by itself, and the international community expects Japan to play a more proactive role for peace and stability in the world, in a way commensurate with its national capabilities.”4 In other words, Japan advances global security by safeguarding its own neighborhood, while Japanese defense of the international order benefits Asian regional stability. As such, the NDPG contends that Japan must “contribute even more proactively in securing peace, stability and prosperity of the international community while achieving its own security as well as peace and stability in the Asia-Pacific region.”5 Indeed, Prime Minister Abe can look to Japanese contributions to international peace and security since the end of the Cold War as the basis for his foreign policy vision. In a concrete manifestation of this proactive stance, the Abe administration relaxed Japan’s arms-exports ban, which had been in place for nearly five decades. Issued in April 2014, the new guidelines for transferring defense equipment intend to enhance technological cooperation with partners and friends, raising Japan’s profile in regional and global arms markets. The move quickly bore fruit. A week after the new policy was announced, Australia and Japan agreed to a joint research project on marine hydrodynamics for constructing new submarines. In July 2014, the newly established NSC approved Japan’s research with Britain on the Meteor air-to-air ­missile and approved exporting a sensor component for the Patriot Advanced Capability-2 air defense system to the United States. A network of defense collaboration centered on developing hard power among like-minded nations could well emerge from these joint ventures. A proactive contribution to peace is thus as much about empowering other defenders of the status quo as it is about strengthening one’s own capabilities. In an even more consequential move, Abe partially lifted Japan’s self-imposed ban on the right of collective self-defense, the hallmark of the nation’s post-World War II foreign policy. For decades, successive Japanese governments strictly followed the constitutional interpretation that permitted Japan to exercise the right of individual self-defense, which forbids Japan’s Self-Defense Forces (SDF) from aiding friendly or allied military units that have come under enemy assault. This self-denial of a universal right, a right recognized under the UN charter, has long imposed a highly asymmetric and awkward arrangement on the US-Japanese alliance. Washington would be obliged by treaty to defend Japan should it be attacked, while Tokyo could not reciprocate without violating its constitution. To Abe and his followers, such a legal constraint has become untenable in an increasingly dangerous security environment. Among the scenarios used to advance Abe’s initiative, two relating to the US-Japan alliance stand out. Imagine that a Japanese warship were in the vicinity of an American naval unit under attack and the warship took no action because of constitutional constraints. Imagine, too, that a Japanese destroyer equipped with the Aegis ballistic missile defense system were in a position to intercept a long-range missile headed for the United States, but the destroyer failed to do so owing to Japan’s ban on collective self-defense. To Abe and his lieutenants, if either of these crises occurred and Japan did nothing, then the alliance might not survive the subsequent political blowback in Washington. Thus, adopting the right to collective self-defense would signal Japan’s determination to act alongside the US military, sustaining the alliance’s integrity while enhancing allied deterrence. In July 2014, after intense negotiations with the New Komeito-the Japanese government’s ambivalent junior coalition partner-Abe’s cabinet approved the reinterpretation of the constitution, allowing Japan to nominally exercise its right of collective self-defense. Under the new understanding, use of force would be permitted “not only when an armed attack against Japan occurs but also when an armed attack against a foreign country that is in a close relationship with Japan occurs.”6 However, in a compromise acknowledging the New Komeito’s concerns, the Japanese government attached three key conditions necessary to invoke the right: Only an attack or an impending attack that “threatens Japan’s survival and poses a clear danger to fundamentally overthrow people’s right to life, liberty and pursuit of happiness” would meet the constitutional standards for engaging in collective self-defense. Moreover, policymakers must determine that “no other appropriate means” were available to counter the threat to Japan. Even then, the SDF must limit its use of force to “the minimum extent necessary” to repel or defeat the threat.7 Abe’s cabinet further acknowledged that “prior approval of the Diet is in principle required upon issuing orders” to the SDF for collective self-defense missions.8 By no means has Japan been unshackled from its constitutional restraints or from its exclusively defensive orientation. The cabinet decision represents just the first step in what will likely be a deliberate political process to ­operationalize this broader constitutional interpretation. The Abe administration will need to submit a legislative package to the Diet that would provide the proper legal framework for the SDF to help assist or defend allies and friends should they come under attack. At least 10 existing laws would be reviewed, updated, and revised in this process. Opposition parties will have another chance to litigate the issue. In the meantime, changes in popular opinion or other domestic political developments, such as local election outcomes, could influence the momentum behind Abe’s initiative. Public debate and legislative scrutiny-integral to Japan’s open democratic system-will inevitably accompany this important shift in defense policy. Change will come incrementally through careful and transparent negotiations. It is still unclear how the concept of limited collective self-defense will translate into operational practice for the US-Japan alliance. Planned revisions to the US-Japan defense guidelines, which spell out the allied division of labor, will reportedly incorporate an expanded defensive and logistical role for the SDF. Due for completion at the end of 2014, the guidelines could call on the SDF to provide maintenance, supplies, and fuel to American military units heading into a combat zone-all rear-area activities that were previously prohibited. In addition to improving allied cooperation, the cabinet decision could broaden the scope of the SDF’s out-of-area operations. For example, the Abe administration has identified minesweeping as a potentially permissible action under UN Security Council authorization. Given Japan’s dependence on energy from the Persian Gulf region, the mining of the Strait of Hormuz could constitute a clear threat to the nation’s survival and well-being. This and other scenarios will likely be the subject of further debate when the government submits its legislative package to the Diet. Japanese officials must strike a balance between adhering to the constraints of the cabinet decision and ensuring sufficient flexibility to account for the uncertainties of real-world military contingencies. Limited collective self-defense will open the door for Japanese hard power to play a more effective and meaningful role in maintaining regional and global security. Download 0.83 Mb. Share with your friends: