Japan: Ask Not What America Will Do for You…

Japan: Ask Not What America Will Do for You…

By Robert Dujarric

May 19, 2014

Discussions with Japanese officials and analysts indicate that U.S. President Barack Obama’s public assertion that the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands are covered by U.S. obligations to Japan has failed to dent Tokyo’s doubts about America’s credibility as its protector against China.

Some angst is unavoidable. A variety of factors guarantee with near certainty that the U.S. will fight China if it attacks Japan, but question marks will always remain. And even if the U.S. commitment is watertight today, no one can predict what the future holds.

Washington’s about-face over Syria led many to downgrade the value of American lines in the sand. Syria, unlike Japan and Korea, is not and has never been a U.S. core interest. It’s unclear how American goals would be served by the replacement of the Assad tyranny with an Al-Qaeda theocracy. To his credit, Obama realized his mistake before it was too late. This spared the U.S. and Japan an Iraq-type crusade that would have drained American resources away from East Asia. Nevertheless, Obama’s inability to grasp these facts from the start damaged American standing. Ukraine is also mentioned as an example of American weakness. But in this case, the U.S. never put the military option on the table. Additionally, most European NATO nations have so far made it clear that they will abstain from serious sanctions, limiting U.S. options.

There are steps that Washington could take to reassure Tokyo. The most sensational would be to station U.S. Marines on the disputed islands. Like the Berlin Brigade (U.S. Army units stationed in West Berlin), this would create a tripwire against Chinese invasion. But at this point, even hawkish Japanese leaders would oppose such a deployment.

The United States could also increase dramatically the size and capabilities of its forward-deployed assets in Japan, but this would entail significant financial costs.

Another option, which is in the hands of Japanese rather than American citizens, would be to boost the power of the Japanese Self-Defense Forces (SDF). Though on paper China has a bigger GDP, Japan’s military potential compares well. It is technologically more advanced, has a more stable political system, and doesn’t need to devote massive armed manpower to internal security. Thanks to the U.S. alliance and close relations with U.S. partners, it has access to the world’s best arsenals when purchasing weaponry. Japan would still require extended deterrence from Washington, but its level of dependence on the U.S. would decline.

Under this scenario, Japan would provide a greater share of its own security. Concerns about the willingness of Americans to fight for Japan would diminish as the percentage of “made-in-U.S.A components” of Japan’s defense would get smaller.

There are, however, a host of reasons why this is unlikely to happen. First and foremost, Japan is a democracy whose voters dislike military spending. Moreover, the Abe Cabinet refuses to make a massive and electorally very risky investment of political capital to try to change this. Instead, it has focused on non-security issues and on financially costless new interpretations of constitutional texts whose impact on national defense may turn out to be negligible.

In his inaugural address in 1961, President John F. Kennedy (father of the current American ambassador to Japan, Caroline Kennedy), offered this advice: “My fellow citizens of the world: ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man.”

If the situation were reversed – if the U.S. depended on Japanese deterrence – American leaders would probably also focus mostly on minimizing America’s own efforts and rely as much as possible on their stronger ally. But this doesn’t alter the current situation: the Japanese cabinet’s barely hidden contempt for the American chief executive coexists with a “what will Obama do for us?” mentality. If the premier and his associates emphasized “what can we do for our country?”, misgivings about the president would not diminish but they would cause them far less heartburn.

NYT

Chinese Flybys Alarm Japan as Tensions Escalate

By MARTIN FACKLERMAY 25, 2014

TOKYO — In an ominous display of growing territorial tensions between China and Japan, the Japanese Defense Ministry said Sunday that Chinese jet fighters had flown dangerously close to two of its reconnaissance planes in overlapping air defense zones claimed by both nations.

The ministry described two episodes that took place on Saturday in airspace over the East China Sea that both countries claim as “air defense identification zones,” areas bordering their sovereign airspace in which they require foreign aircraft to identify themselves and provide flight plans.

Japan has routinely ignored the Chinese air defense zone since Beijing declared it late last year. China had also not pushed its new air zone, apparently backing off after the United States immediately challenged the Chinese claim by sending a pair of unarmed B-52 heavy bombers to fly through the airspace without incident.

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China’s Leader, Seeking to Build Its Muscle, Pushes Overhaul of the MilitaryMAY 24, 2014

The Chinese stance toward at least Japanese military flights appeared to change on Saturday, when a pair of Chinese Su-27 fighters flew within 100 feet of a Japanese YS-11 propeller-driven reconnaissance plane. Earlier in the day, another pair of Chinese fighters flew within 150 feet of a Japanese P-3C, another type of propeller-driven reconnaissance plane, the ministry said.

It said the Chinese fighters took no other measures against the Japanese planes, which returned to base safely.

The flybys appeared to signal a dangerous escalation in a game of nerves between the two Asian powers for effective control of the East China Sea, including a group of uninhabited islands administered by Japan but also claimed by China. The nations’ Coast Guards regularly play high-seas games of cat and mouse around the disputed islands, with Chinese ships entering or approaching Japanese-claimed waters about once or twice a week. There have also been a growing number of episodes involving aircraft, whose greater speeds mean a higher chance of an accident or of miscalculation quickly spiraling out of control into a full-blown military confrontation. Speaking to reporters, the Japanese defense minister, Itsunori Onodera, called the close approaches by Chinese fighters a dangerous act that heightened tensions.

“We received a report from the crews that the fighter planes were armed with missiles,” Mr. Onodera said, referring to the Japanese aircrews. “The crews were on edge as they responded.”

The Chinese Ministry of National Defense confirmed on Sunday that the Chinese military jets had approached the Japanese planes, but, in a statement on its website, it defended the action as a legitimate enforcement of Beijing’s air defense zone. The ministry accused the Japanese aircraft of interfering in Chinese-Russian military exercises in the area. “Chinese military aircraft have the right to maintain air safety, and to take the necessary identification and prevention measures against foreign aircraft that enter the airspace of China’s air defense identification zone over the East China Sea,” the ministry said.

It warned Japan to “halt all surveillance and interference” over the area declared for the Chinese-Russian military exercises. “Otherwise, all the possible repercussions will be borne by Japan,” the ministry said.

Japan’s Defense Ministry said that the surge in the number of intercepts of Chinese aircraft began in 2010, after the Japanese Coast Guard arrested a Chinese trawler captain near the disputed islands, known as the Senkaku in Japan and the Diaoyu in China. That, and Japan’s purchase of three of the five islands two years ago, brought angry reactions from China. Beijing has responded by making increasingly assertive claims over the islands and other parts of the East China Sea, sending its ships and planes in or near Japanese-claimed areas in what some analysts have described as a long-term effort to wear down Japan’s resolve.

Because Japan is the only Asian nation that is widely seen as able to match China’s military abilities, American officials and defense analysts have increasingly warned of the dangers of an unintended clash in the East China Sea expanding into a wider confrontation that could drag in the United States, which has a defense treaty with Japan.

On Sunday, Mr. Onodera, the Japanese defense minister, said that Japan had lodged a protest with China over the close approaches by the fighters. “These approaches were meant to intimidate, and were not actions that would normally be taken,” he said.

NYT

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