A security “crisis” mainly posed by threats from China is behind Japan’s largest military buildup since World War II, including new strike weapons and asymmetric warfare arms, according to a defense strategy report made public Friday.
As part of the strategy, Japan announced plans to increase defense spending from $12 billion over the past five years to $31 billion in the coming five years, a break from its past, pacifist defense posture.
Article 9 of the 1947 constitution states that Japan renounces war and vows not to maintain military forces with a war potential.
The constitution, drafted during post-war U.S. military occupation, was designed to prevent Japan from again becoming a militaristic power following its role in World War II.
The new strategy represents “a major turning point” for bolstering Japanese defenses, the report said.
The objective of the buildup of military and other national power is to give Japan “primary responsibility” for countering an invasion – a reference to the current reliance on U.S. forces for much of its defenses.
Threats mainly from China, however, prompted the Japanese government in recent years to modify its defense posture. Japan is now fielding or building advanced strike weapons designed to deter adversaries and reduce reliance on the large number of American military forces based in Japan.
The Navy operates an aircraft carrier strike group based in Yokosuka, Japan, south of Tokyo, and a major air base at Yakota, Japan, west of the capital.
The new strategy reveals the Japan Self-Defense Forces will be armed with long-range Tomahawk cruise missiles capable of hitting targets up to 1,000 miles away, along with new long-range anti-ship missiles, and advanced missile defenses.
“The world is at a turning point in history,” said Japanese Defense Minister Yasukazu Hamad in an introduction to the strategy. “The international community is facing its greatest trial since World War II and we have entered a new era of crisis.”
The crisis was outlined in the report as stemming from threats by China to change the geopolitical status quo near Japan through force. Other major threats include North Korea’s nuclear and missile threats, and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and buildup of missile forces near Japan.
China’s buildup of conventional and nuclear forces — as well as aggressive encroachment in the East China Sea and South China Sea — pose the main threat, the report says.
“China’s current external stance, military activities, and other activities have become a matter of serious concern for Japan and the international community, and present an unprecedented and the greatest strategic challenge,” the report said.
Five Chinese ballistic missiles were fired into Japan’s exclusive economic zone during saber-rattling against Taiwan in August 2022, the report said. The missiles threatened Japanese citizens in the area, the report noted.
China also has been conducting provocative military operations near Japan’s Senkaku Islands, territory Beijing has claimed as its own.
“China has relentlessly continued attempts to unilaterally change the status quo by force around the Senkaku Islands for many years,” the report said.
North Korea is rapidly building up missiles and can strike Japan with nuclear warheads, the report said.
Russia for the past 10 years has deployed missiles in the Far East including “Japan’s Northern Territories” – islands held by Russia that are claimed by Japan.
The missiles include two types of advanced anti-ship missiles and Su-35 fighters, a fifth-generation warplane.
On Russia, the Japan strategy regards Ukraine’s lack of military and other power as insufficient to deter the invasion in February 2022.
Without mentioning China, the strategy suggests that excessive secrecy by Beijing produces conditions for threats to materialize.
“To protect one’s country from such states, it is necessary to possess deterrence capability that makes others realize the difficulty of making unilateral changes to the status quo by force, as well as to develop defense capability that [is] focused on opponent capabilities,” the report said.
In addition to new missiles, Japan will develop “hybrid warfare” capabilities including cyber and information warfare tools. Advanced technology also will be used in new weapons.
The report lists seven areas for the defense buildup, including “stand-off” weapons that allow striking opposing forces from a safe distance without being attacked.
Key systems in this area will be an upgraded version of the Type-12 anti-ship missile and the acquisition of U.S. Tomahawks.
In February, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida announced that Japan would buy 400 of the most advanced variants of the Tomahawk, a missile capable of taking evasive action from missile defenses.
The missiles are viewed as key weapons needed to deter an invasion or missile attacks on Japan by threatening counterstrikes as a deterrent.
Missile defenses against Chinese hypersonic missiles also will be deployed, and F-35 jets will be purchased.
The report also states that relations between the U.S. and China are “growing particularly tense.”
“In particular, the number of arms including nuclear weapons and missiles is rapidly building up around Japan, and the tendency towards unilateral changes to the status quo by force is further increasing,” the report said.
On China, the report warns that China’s rapid buildup of military forces includes advances in naval and air forces, along with nuclear and missile forces.
Beijing is expected to possess 1,500 nuclear warheads by 2035 and is rapidly constructing a second indigenous aircraft carrier. The Chinese also have an array of unmanned aerial vehicles.
“Backed by these tremendous military capabilities, China has been intensifying its activities across the entire region surrounding Japan, including in the East China Sea, particularly the area around the Senkaku Islands, the Sea of Japan, and the western Pacific Ocean including areas around the Izu and Ogasawara Islands, extending beyond the so-called first island chain to the second island chain,” the report said.
The strategy states that Japan’s defenses will also be complemented with diplomatic and economic measures and closer alliances, including its stepped-up relations with the U.S.
Other warfighting capabilities to be developed include improved command and control and intelligence assets, mobile weapons deployments and civil defenses, and an improved defense industrial base.
Improved military training also will be part of the buildup.
The new military and defense posture outlined in the strategy is to be constructed in the next 10 years, the report said.
“In response to an invasion against Japan, including our remote islands, Japan would disrupt and defeat the invading forces from a long distance,” the report states.
“We will also acquire superiority across domains and conduct cross-domain operations that organically integrate capabilities in the ground, maritime, and air domains, as well as in the domains of space, cyber, and electromagnetic spectrum to secure asymmetrical superiority, and disrupt and defeat the invading forces.”
• Bill Gertz can be reached at bgertz@washingtontimes.com.
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