ISPI – Working Paper
3
No. 45 - FEBRUARY 2012
Abstract
Japanese Defense and
Security Policy and the
“National Defense
Program Guidelines”
(NDPG): Radical Changes
or Business as Usual?
Axel Berkofsky
On December 17, 2010, Tokyo adopted new
defense guidelines, the “National Defense
Program Guidelines” (NDPG). The
December 2010 defense guidelines outline
the country’s ten-year defense strategy
and call for the establishment of a flexible
armed forces structure with mobile units
capable of rapid deployment in the case of
a regional military crisis. Japan’s new
NDPG, however, did not alter the
fundamentals of Japan’s defense and
security policies: They will remain
“exclusively defensive defense policies”,
the country’s so-called “Three Non-Nuclear
Principles” remain unrevised and Tokyo
did not lift the self-imposed ban to export
weapons and weapons technology (which
it then did in December 2011, see below).
While the December 2010 defense
guidelines do not introduce a radical
qualitative departure of from decade-long
defense and security policies, they are
nonetheless defense guidelines which
unambiguously respond to China’s rapid
military modernization and the Beijing’s
equally growing assertiveness (and indeed
aggressiveness) as regards its territorial
claims in the East China Sea
In sum, Japan’s new defense guidelines
are those of a country that is willing and
prepared to defend its territorial and
security interests with military force. Japan
is-at least more or less- becoming
“normal” in terms of security and defense
and this paper will seek to explain why and
how.
Axel Berkofsky (PhD, Hamburg University) is
Senior Associate Research Fellow, Istituto per
gli Studi di Politica Internazionale (ISPI) Milan,
Italy and Gianni Mazzocchi Fellow at the
University of Pavia, Italy.
Project on China and East Asia
(*) The opinions expressed herein are
strictly personal and do not necessarily
reflect the position of ISPI.
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ISPI – Working Paper
Introduction
In December 2010, Tokyo adopted new defense guidelines, the so-called “National
Defense Program Guidelines” (NDPG) outlining the country’s security and defense
strategies for the next ten years 1.
Japan’s December 2010 defense guidelines are aimed at equipping Japan’s “Self-Defense
Forces” (SDF - “jietai” in Japanese) with the capabilities and equipment to react to crisis
scenarios going beyond the defense of Japanese territory on the Japanese mainland (e.g.
in Japanese-controlled territories in the East China Sea, i.e. the Senkaku Islands, subject to
a territorial dispute with China). The 2010 NDPG stipulate the re-location of defense
capabilities and troops from the northern toward the southern part of the country, including
to the southern island chains in relative vicinity to Mainland China and Taiwan. The relocation of Japan’s armed forces from the northern to the southern parts of the country is
motivated by Beijing’s fast military modernization, its increasingly regular intrusion into
Japanese-controlled territories in the East China Sea, and Beijing’s overall assertive and
indeed aggressive and policies related to territorial claims in the East China and South
China Seas.
Japan’s defense and military policies, however, will continue to remain strictly defensive in
nature, i.e. the guidelines do not foresee (as it was requested several times by parts of the
country’s hawkish defense establishment in the recent past) the acquisition of offensive
military equipment: “Japan will continue to uphold the fundamental principles of defense
policy including the exclusively defensive defense policy and the three non-nuclear
principles”, the guidelines read. Tokyo’s “defense-oriented defense policies” demand that
the country’s armed forces capabilities and equipment are strictly limited to the minimum
necessary for self-defense and the defense of Japanese territory 2. Japan has in 1967 autoimposed the rule onto itself not to spend more than one per cent of its GDP for defense 3.
Spending one per cent, it was maintained by Japanese policymakers over decades, is
acceptable for an officially pacifist country. To be sure, such reasoning always sounded
awkward in view of the fact that the constitution’s war-renouncing Article 9 does strictly
speaking not even allow Japan to maintain armed forces. Japan’s new defense guidelines
announced that the self-imposed restriction not to spend more than one per cent of the
country’s GDP could in the case of a military crisis be eased, i.e. Tokyo could spend more
than one per cent of its GDP on defense should the security situation in the region call for
such an increase (in e.g. a military crisis on the Korean Peninsula involving Japan). To be
sure, Japan’s annual $47 billion defense budget is the world’s fourth largest. Only the US,
China and Russia spend more on its armed forces than the on paper “pacifist” Japan.
Re-Arming and Re-location the Military
The defense guidelines will be accompanied by a comprehensive restructuring of Japan’s
armed forces, formulated in the “Mid-Term Defense Program (MTDP) for FY2011-FY2015”,
1
Japan’s military is called “Self-Defense Forces” as Article 9 of Japan’s constitution does not allow Tokyo
to maintain “normal armed forces”.
2
See MINISTRY OF DEFENSE, Basis of Defense Policy, accessible at: http://www.mod.go.jp/e/d_act/d_policy
/dp02.html.
3
Since 1967, Tokyo has (with the exception of 1995-1997) consistently spent less than one cent of its
GDP on its armed forces.
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published together with the defense guidelines on December 17, 2010 4. The armed forces’
re-structuring will affect all three branches of Japan’s armed forces: the Ground SelfDefense Forces (GSDF), Air Self-Defense Forces (ASDF) and Maritime Self-Defense
Forces (MSDF). Ground forces troops, units and equipment will be re-located from northern
Japan to the south and southwestern parts of the country. Ground forces troops will also be
stationed on Miyakojima, Okinawa prefecture. A GSDF coastal monitoring force will be
deployed in Japan’s southwestern islands while the overall number of Japan’s ground
forces will be reduced from 155.000 to 154.000, the number of Japanese tanks will be
reduced from 600 to 400. Most Japanese tanks stationed in Hokkaido and will in the years
ahead be re-located to the southern parts of the country. Tanks, it was argued by Japan’s
defense planners, are for modern warfare no longer as relevant as they used to be. In the
past, Japanese tanks stationed in the northern part of the country in general and the island
of Hokkaido in particular served to deter and counter an invasion from Soviet Union Red
Army Forces.
Furthermore, the defense guidelines and the MTDP confirm Japan’s commitment to
continue the US-Japanese joint development of a second-generation missile defense
interceptor (the S-3AII system) 5. Two additional AEGIS-class destroyers equipped with
state-of-the art SM-3 missile interceptor systems will be deployed. 6 The ASDF’s air defense
capabilities will be upgraded by the stationing of an additional fighter squadron at Naha Air
Base in Okinawa. The ASDF’s F-4 fighter aircraft will be replaced with a fifth generation
fighter. The number of Japanese F-15 fighter jets deployed on Okinawa will be increased
from 24 to 36. Japan’s Coast Guard (JCG)’s overall budget will after several budget
increases in the past again 7 be increased to acquire additional patrol ships, and jets, all of
which is equipment to address potential Chinese aggressions in the East China Sea. Due
to its state-of-the art equipment and capabilities, Japan’s coast guard is amongst the
world’s best-equipped. In fact, scholar and policymakers alike refer to Japan’s coast guard
already as Japan’s ‘second navy.’
Indeed, Japan’s coast guard able to reach and operate quickly and efficiently in the East
China is a force to reckon with and will continue to motivate China to upgrade its navy and
coast guard capabilities.
From “Static” to “Dynamic” Armed Forces
Japan’s new defense guidelines replace the country’s “Basic Defense Forces Concept”
– first published in Japan’s 1976 “National Defense Policy Outline” (NDPO) – with what
is now called “Dynamic Defense Force” concept. The “Basic Defense Forces Concept”
(BDF) specified that Japan’s defense capabilities must in terms of quality and quantity
be designed to enable the country’s armed forces to deter and counter a small-scale
invasion of Japanese territory. While under the static BDF concept, weaponry and
4
Online at http://www.mod.go.jp/e/d_act/d_policy/pdf/mid_termFY2011-15.pdf.
US defense contractors depend on Tokyo to develop the missile system’s nose cone, the second and
third stage rocket boosters, and the upper and lower separating segments of the second-stage rocket
engine. For further details on the US-Japan defense missile system also see C.W. HUGHES R.K.
BEARDSLEY, Japan's Security Policy and Ballistic Missile Defense, London-New York 2008.
6
See e.g. A.P. LIFF, Japan’s 2010 National Defense Program Guidelines-Reading the Tea Leafs, in
«Asia-Pacific Bulletin», 89, December 22, 2010.
7
The JCG’s budget was increased several times in recent years to equip the coast guard with the
equipment to deal with North Korean intrusions into Japanese territorial waters.
5
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ground forces troops were mainly stationed across Japan’s four main islands, Tokyo’s
new defense policy doctrine is aimed at allowing the armed forces to use its capabilities
according to actual security needs to deter and counter an attack on Japanese territory.
However, Tokyo’s defense policies will remain exclusively defense-oriented, i.e. will
remain what is referred to as “defensive defense policies”. Japan’s “defensive defense
policies” will continue to exclude the acquisition and deployment of power projection
capabilities, such as offensive US-made Tomahawk missiles able to hit e.g. North
Korean missile and nuclear sites. In sum, Japan’s armed military will not be equipped
with military equipment enabling the country to attack or invade another country.
Continuing to exclude the acquisition of offensive military equipment arguably and
indeed realistically renders (usually Chinese) concerns and fears that the guidelines lay
the basis for Japan to become a potential military threat to others in the region baseless.
Chinese concerns are most probably motivated by the fact that Tokyo’s new defense
guidelines do not limit themselves to equipping Japan’s armed forces with the
capabilities and equipment to defend Japanese territory on the country’s four main
islands, but will also better equip Japan’s military and the country coast guard to defend
Japanese-claimed (and disputed) territories in the East China Sea.
But Enough Money?
The armed forces’ re-structuring plans are ambitious and costly, but the funds necessary
to implement the re-structuring are scarce. In fact, Japan’s defense budget is predicted
to shrink by three to five percent in the years ahead, as the government announced
when the defense guidelines were adopted in December 2010. The reduction of the
country’s defense budget could indeed have an impact on the armed forces’ restructuring plans and the acquisition of defense equipment accompanying the armed
forces’ restructuring. Given Japan’s fiscal and financial dire situation with public debt
amounting to more than 200% of the country’s GDP, there remain doubts whether the
envisioned re-structuring and upgrade of Japan’s armed forces and the country’s coast
guard will take place as formulated in the defense guidelines. In fact, Japan’s overall
defense budget will decrease by 3-5% over the next three years and Japan’s defense
planner have yet to plausibly explain how these reductions will not impact the very
ambitious and comprehensive re-structuring and re-location of Japan’s armed forces.
Indeed, it cannot be excluded that the government will turn to creating so-called
‘supplementary budgets’ for the envisioned re-structuring, i.e. creating funds to finance
the re-structuring without having to rely on the ordinary defense budget. Such practice is
indeed not uncommon in Japan and the enormous funds e.g. invested into missile
defense (more than $2 billion per year) are not part of the official defense budget but are
indeed part of a ‘supplementary budget’ for missile defense.
To be able to nonetheless and despite the budget cuts to finance the acquisition of new
defense equipment without increasing the overall defense budget the Ministry of
Defense felt obliged to cut costs for posts not included in the armed forces’ restructuring leading to a reduction of the MTDP’s overall budget. It will be reduced by
US$8.9 billion to US$283 billion in the years ahead. The country’s ground forces’ troops
will be most affected by budget cuts- the number of its tanks will decline from 600 to 400
over and the number of troops forces will be reduced from 155.000 to 154.000 over the
next five years.
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The Guidelines’ Drivers and ‘Targets’
What hardly comes as a surprise, North Korea and China are the countries which
determined the quality and scope of Japan’s revised defense guidelines. North Korea has
already for years been exploited by Japan’s defense planners to explain and indeed justify
changes of Japanese defense and security policies to the Japanese public, such as
Japan’s official commitment to jointly develop a regional missile defense system with the
US.
For years (since 1998) Tokyo invested significant funds into the joint US-Japanese
research phase of the system arguing (to be sure always unconvincingly) that no decision
has been taken whether Tokyo would also be interested in the development and
deployment phase of the system. Such claims, however, always lacked credibility in view
the enormous funds Tokyo invested into the system’s research phase over the years. Only
in 2005, Tokyo officially acknowledged to be also interested in and committed to investing
funds into the development phase of the missile defense system and North Korea’s
increasing belligerency and nuclear tests in 2006 and 2009 have without a doubt helped
Japan’s defense planners to sell decision to the Japanese public, traditionally skeptical of
investing too many of taxpayers’ funds into the missile defense system. China for its part
always considered the system to be offensive in nature, not least because it potentially
renders the efficiency and function of Chinese ballistic missiles (aimed at Japan) obsolete.
To be sure, Beijing for its part has exploited the US-Japan missile defense system as a
(welcome) justification to upgrade its ballistic missile capabilities over the years.
Independent Japanese and non-Japanese analysts critical of Tokyo’s strategy of using
North Korea as “proxy threat” to upgrade the country’s defense profile have argued that
Tokyo has indeed deliberately exaggerated the threat posed by North Korea’s conventional
armed forces and the country’s missile and nuclear programs to “sell” changes to and
upgrades on Japan’s defense and security policy agenda as supposedly necessary. The
revelation that North Korea’s secret service abducted up to 100 Japanese citizens to North
Korea 8 – which Pyongyang officially admitted to in 2002 – has over the years enormously
helped Japan’s defense establishment and policymakers to portray North Korea as an ‘evil
country’ and a threat to Japan’s national security.
Until today, Japan categorically excludes the establishment of diplomatic relations with
North Korea unless Pyongyang provides Tokyo with verifiable and plausible information on
the fate of the abducted Japanese citizens. To be sure, North Korea will continue to insist
that the so-called ‘abduction issue’ has decisively and for good become a non-issue on
North Korea’s Japan policy agenda since it officially apologized for the kidnapping of
Japanese nationals in the 1970s and 1980s in 2002 (in the context of the Japan-North
Korea summit in Pyongyang of that year).
The threat posed North Korea’s armed forces, its missile and nuclear programs, it is argued
by independent analysts, is not nearly as imminent as Japan’s defense establishment has
tried to make believe over recent years In fact, there is wide agreement amongst
independent analysts that North Korea’s armed forces are no position whatsoever to launch
and execute a successful attack on Japan and South Korea and the US armed forces
stationed there. While North Korea maintains 1.1 million men strong armed forces, their
8
Some of the abducted Japanese citizens were allowed to return to Japan in 2003 and have since then
appeared numerous times on Japanese television.
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military equipment is most probably largely outdated and due to the lack of fuel, training for
e.g. air force pilots is insufficient.
As regards North Korea’s nuclear program and its apparently ongoing ambitions to develop
and deploy nuclear bombs, analysts widely agree that North Korea is despite the 2006 and
2009 nuclear tests still far away from being able to e.g. mount nuclear warheads onto
carrier missiles to actually deploy nuclear bombs. North Korea, it is argued in this context,
lacks the know-how and technology,. Without diminishing the threat posed by a country
with nuclear ambitions as such, it must not go unmentioned that conducting nuclear tests is
not the same as actually being able to deploy nuclear bombs mounting them on carrier
missiles. Alarmist rhetoric in Japan and elsewhere that North Korea is threatening Japan
with nuclear weapons (which allegedly ‘obliges’ Tokyo to equip develop and deploy nuclear
weapons) are misleading at best and indeed wrong, at least for the foreseeable future.
To be sure, Japan’s defense establishment will continue to exploit the perceived threat from
North Korea’s nuclear program for its own purposes and it cannot be excluded that
Pyongyang-currently in the middle of a leadership transition-will choose to send a signal of
military strength to the region by conducting a third nuclear test later this year.
Defending Southern Japan (from China)
Leaving the perceived threat from North Korea aside, Tokyo’s December 2010 defense
guidelines confirm unambiguously that not North Korea but rather China’s rapid military
modernization together with its increasingly assertive regional policies related to territorial
claims in the East and South China Seas is what Japan’s defense planners motivated and
guided when issuing the December 2010 defense guidelines. The guidelines refer to the
country’s southwestern parts and islands in geographic vicinity to the Mainland China,
Taiwan and the Taiwan Straits as a “strategic vacuum” to be addressed (or indeed “filled”)
by the foreseen re-structuring of the country’s armed forces in the years ahead. In the
same context, the defense guidelines also refer to so-called “gray-zone disputes” in
Japan’s southwestern parts and islands. “There are a growing number of so-called “grayzone” disputes-confrontations over territory, sovereignty and economic interests that are
not to escalate into wars”. Obviously, the guidelines refer to unresolved territorial disputes
with China in the East China Sea in this context. Indeed, Chinese naval activities in or close
to Japan-controlled territories in the East China Sea (the Senkaku Islands) have confirmed
Tokyo’s defense planners that Japan’s defense capabilities and equipment must be
concentrated in the southern part of the country. In September 2010, Japanese-Sino
relations were strained for weeks when Tokyo detained a Chinese skipper whose trawler
deliberately rammed into a Japanese coast guard patrol boats near the disputed Senkaku
in the East China Sea.
Of concern to Japan’s defense planners are also Beijing’s plans to build and deploy an
aircraft carrier battle-group which is feared could become part of Beijing’s so-called “antiaccess strategy”, i.e. the strategy of blocking East Asian sea lanes of communication aimed
above all at reducing Washington’s ability to project military naval power in the region in the
case of a military contingency. As counterstrategy, Tokyo plans to deploy five additional
submarines off its coastal waters while at the same time increasing its overall number of
Japanese submarines from 16 to 22. The submarines’ main task will be to strengthen the
defense of Japan’s sea lanes of communication, its coastline amounting to 29.800 km and
the country’s enormous maritime “Exclusive Economic Zone” (EEZ) amounting to roughly
4.5 million square kilometers.
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However, it must not go unmentioned that while China has recently deployed one aircraft
carrier 9, Beijing is realistically still years if not decades away from actually being able to
deploy an entire aircraft carrier battle group in the East China Sea or anywhere else.
Not Lifting Tokyo’s Weapons Export Ban
In 1967, Tokyo adopted the so-called “Three Principles” on arms exports through which
weapons sales to communist countries, countries involved in international conflicts and
countries subject to United Nations sanctions were banned. In 1976 then Tokyo decided to
ban the export of Japanese weapons and weapons technology to all countries and not only
to those falling into the category of countries affected by one or more of Tokyo’s “Three
Principles”.
Until right before the guidelines’ adoption in December 2010, it was considered to be a
matter of course amongst Japanese pro-defense policymakers and scholars that the
government would lift the export ban to allow Japanese defense contractors to export
weapons used in either UN peacekeeping and peace-enforcement missions or missions
combating international terrorism 10. In the framework of such missions, Japanese defense
contractors envisioned joint projects with defense companies in South Korea, the US and
Europe. In November 2010, the government published a set of three rules which are in the
future to guide the easing of Japan’s weapons export ban: 1. Export of weapons is limited
to peace-building and humanitarian missions; 2. Joint development projects are to be
limited to partners in the US and NATO member states and 3. Standards to prevent the
transfer of defense technologies to countries other than US and NATO member states will
be established.
Shortly before the adoption of the defense guidelines, however, the government felt obliged
to give up (or postpone the lifting of the ban by one year as it turned out, for details see
below) its plan to lift the weapons export ban. The ruling Democratic Party (DPJ) coalition
partners’ – the People’s New Party (PNP) and the Social Democratic Party (SDP) – were
categorically opposed to the lifting of the ban and threatened to leave the coalition in case
the Kan government decided to lift the ban. Whereas the DPJ commands a nearly two-third
majority in the parliament’s Lower House (the parliament’s first chamber), it does not have
the necessary majority in the parliament’s Upper House to adopt laws related to the fiscal
2011 without support from its coalition partners in the parliament’s second chamber, the
Upper House (the laws had be enacted by March 2011). Both the PNP and SDP
threatened to refuse to provide the DPJ with the necessary support and votes in the Upper
House if the government decided to lift Japan’s weapons export ban. Prime Minister Kan as
it turned out decided to choose a smooth implementation of the county’s budget over lifting
the weapons export ban.
However, while the weapons export ban was not lifted in December 2010, the defense
guidelines did not exclude the possibility of revisiting the decision to leave the ban in place
in the future: “Measures to follow the international trends of defense equipment will be
studied”, the December 2010 guidelines read. Tokyo in December 2010 continued to
9
See also S. SMITH, Japan’s Dynamic Defense Policy and China, Council on Foreign Relations,
December 17, 2010, accessible at: http://www.cfr.org/japan/japans-dynamic-defense-policy-china/p23663.
10
Then Japanese Defense Minister Kitazawa told then US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates that Japan
is about to ease the weapons export ban; see Kitazawa: Review of Arms Ban May be in the Cards, in «The
Asahi Shimbun», October 13, 2010, accessible at: http://www.asahi.com/english/TKY201010120151.html.
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reserve itself to the right to revisit its decision not to abolish the self-imposed to export
weapons and weapons technology.
In fact, Japan’s government led by Prime Yoshihiko Noda did exactly that on December 27,
2011.
U-Turn Politics-Lifting it…
In October 2011, then Japanese Defense Minister Yasuo Ichikawa told Reuters news
agency that he expected a government decision on a possible easing of the weapons
export ban “before long”11. In mid-October 2011 then it was again Reuters which
reported that Japan-by then governed by new Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda-is
considering to further ease the country’s weapons export ban allowing the defense
industry to contribute to multinational weapons development consortia 12. Reuters
referred in its report to the Yomiuri Shimbun which on October 14 reported that Noda
would tell US President Obama at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum
summit in Honolulu in mid-November 2011 that Japan would lift its ban to export
weapons 13.
At the time, Tokyo denied the accuracy of the Yomiuri newspaper report and instead
insisted that the government is not planning to ease the ban any further allowing
Japanese defense contractors to co-operate with non-US defense companies. Chief
Cabinet Secretary Fujimura Osamu back then maintained that he was not aware of a
planned easing of the ban as reported by the Yomiuri Shimbun. Instead, he maintained
that it is “Our position is to follow the weapons export ban that has been in place until
today” when speaking to journalists. When meeting Obama in Honolulu in November,
Prime Minister Noda did indeed not mention the easing of the country’s weapons export
ban.
On December 27, 2011, however the Japanese government took a U-turn and officially
announced to ease the ban allowing Japanese defense contractors to take part in the
joint development and production of weapons with other countries (as opposed to only
the US) and to supply military equipment for humanitarian missions 14. On the same
day, the Japanese government announced to establish new rules that guide the
relaxation of Japan’s weapons export ban.
The new guidelines are called “criteria regarding overseas transfers of defense
equipment” stipulating that 1. Japanese defense contractors are allowed to participate in
joint projects to develop and produce military equipment and technology with the US and
European countries, 2. Japanese defense contractors are allowed to export defenserelated equipment in support of peace-building or humanitarian missions 15. While the
easing of the weapons export does not automatically mean that Tokyo will immediately
11
Japan eyes easing of joint arms development, in «Reuters», October 5, 2011, accessible
http://uk.reuters.com/article/2011/10/04/uk-japan-defence-idUKTRE79332020111004.
12
See Japan PM to ease weapons export ban - Yomiuri, in «Reuters», October 14, 2011, accessible at:
http://208.175.66.104/article/2011/10/14/idINIndia-59886720111014.
13
See Noda to brief Obama on arms export/relaxing ban to ban enable joint development, in «Yomiuri
Shimbun», October 15, 2011, accessible at http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/T111014004781.htm.
14
See Debt-riddled Japan relaxes decades-old arms exports ban, in «Reuters», December 27, 2011.
15
See Govt decides to ease arms export ban/Way clear for joint into arms development, in «Daily Yomiuri
Shimbun», December 28, 2011.
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sell weapons and weapons technology to other countries than the US, Mitsubishi Heavy
Industries is very likely from now on to contribute to the development of Lockheed
Martin’s F-35 fighter, which the Japanese government earlier in December chose as the
country’s future frontline fighter. In the years ahead, Japan’s Ministry of Defense plans
to acquire 42 F-35 fighters spending roughly $7 billion.
Exporting Already
In December 2004, the Japanese government decided to partially ease the country’s
weapons export ban, officially allowing Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and Kawasaki Heavy
Industries to cooperate with US counterparts on the development of the US-Japan
missile defense system. To be sure, even before 2004, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries
already cooperated on joint military projects with US defense contractors such as
Raytheon, the world’s largest missile maker, and Lockheed Martin, the biggest U.S.
defense contractor. The partial easing of the weapons export ban in 2004 allowed
Mitsubishi Heavy Industries to sell components used for the US-Japan missile defense
system. Mitsubishi supplied US partner companies with nose cones, motors and other
components for sea-based antimissile systems.
Japan’s biggest and most influential business association Nippon Keidanren published a
report on Japanese defense and security policies in 2010 in which it complained that
Japanese defense contractors are unable to develop long-term business strategies in
view of reductions of Japanese defense spending 16. The report urged the government to
allow the country’s defense industry to participate in international research and
developments projects and consortia to secure the industry’s international
competitiveness and increase the very modes share of Japan’s defense industry of the
country’s total industrial production.
Not Revising the “Non-Nuclear Principles”
Japan’s new defense guidelines do not revise Japan’s “Non-Nuclear Principles”. The
principles are a parliamentary resolution that served as the basis for Japan’s nuclear
policies since their inception in the late 1960s. The principles state that “Japan shall neither
possess nor manufacture nuclear weapons nor shall it permit their introduction into
Japanese territory” 17. The Japanese parliament adopted the principles in 1971 but they
were never embedded into a legally binding framework, i.e. the principles never became
laws. Recommendations and requests from parts of Japan’s defense establishment to
review or indeed abolish of the three “Non-Nuclear Principles” received some (albeit
temporary) support from the Japanese public after North Korea’s nuclear tests in 2006 and
2009.
In August 2010, then Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan excluded the revision of any of
the three “Non-Nuclear Principles” and instead announced to embed the principles into a
legal framework, i.e. forbid Japan by law to introduce, stockpile or manufacture nuclear
weapons in Japan. However, embedding of the principles has been announced and indeed
promised by Japanese governments several times over the last decades without however
16
See Proposal for the New National Defense Program Guidelines, in «Nippon Keidanren», July 20, 2010,
accessible on Keidanren’s website at www.keidanren.or.jp.
17
The principles were introduced by Japan’s government then led by Prime Minister Eisaku Sato.
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any follow-up 18. In fact, since Kan announced to embed Japan’s policy of not developing
and stationing nuclear weapons into a legal framework 18 months ago, the government has
not followed-up on Kan’s announcement to transform the country’s non-nuclear principles
into legally binding laws. The principles will very likely continue to remain principles in the
years ahead and every once in a while Japan’s ultra-conservatives and parts of the
country’s hawkish defense establishment will seek to re-activate a discussion to revise and
indeed abolish these principles.
It is without a doubt possible that an inner-Japanese debate on Japan’s “nuclear option” or
on revising one or more of the country’s “Non-Nuclear Principles” could be resumed should
North Korea continue not to honor its 2007 commitment to dismantle its nuclear program,
or worse continue to weaponize plutonium, turning it into weapons-grade plutonium needed
for nuclear bombs. While the vast majority of Japan’s mainstream policymakers and
lawmakers as well the public remain strongly opposed to nuclear armament, advocates of
nuclear armament in Japan go as far as to argue that Japan’s constitution and warrenouncing Article 9 do not prohibit the country from developing and station nuclear
weapons for the purpose to defend Japanese territory (as an act of individual self-defense
in accord with the interpretation that the second paragraph of Article 9 gives Japan the right
to defend Japanese territory with military force).
Claims by parts of the defense establishment that the potential threat posed by North
Korea’s potential nuclear has made the Japanese public less opposed to nuclear armament
since North Korea conducted its first nuclear test in 2006 are simply not accurate and are
not being supported by any opinion polls conducted by Japanese newspapers and
magazines over recent years.
Not Touching War-Renouncing Article 9
The defense guidelines do not call for or recommend the revision or re-interpretation of the
Japanese constitution’s war-renouncing Article 9 19 and do not propose to allow Japan to
execute the right to collective self-defense, arguably the basis for effective and ‘real world’
military co-operation between partners of a bilateral military alliance in general and in the
case of Japan the US-Japan security alliance in particular.
Parts of Japan’s defense establishment was hoping that Tokyo’s new defense guidelines
would revive the currently quasi-dormant inner-Japanese debate on the revision of warrenouncing Article 9-a debate that would have been accompanied by the revival on the
debate on the alleged “necessity” to officially allow Japanese soldiers to execute the right to
collective self-defense (i.e. to execute the right to defend soldiers from other countries in
the framework of international and military and peacekeeping operations). Japan’s prodefense policymakers and scholars have long complained that the government refuses to
seriously consider adjusting the official interpretation of Article as to allow Japanese
soldiers to execute the right to collective self-defense – the adoption of the guidelines and
18
For details see M. TOKI, Japan’s Defense Guidelines: New Conventional Strategy, Same Old Nuclear
Dilemma, Issue Brief National Threat Initiative (NTI), March 1, 2011.
19
Article 9 reads: ‘Aspiring sincerely to an international peace based on justice and order, the Japanese
people forever renounce war as a sovereign right of the nation and the threat or use of force as means of
settling international disputes. (2) To accomplish the aim of the preceding paragraph, land, sea, and air
forces, as well as other war potential, will never be maintained. The right of belligerency of the state will
not be recognized.
ISPI – Working Paper
11
the failure to request to authorize Japan’s armed forces to execute the right to collective
self-defense in the framework of Japanese contributions to international military missions is
another missed opportunity, at least as far as a scholar from a think tank affiliated with
Japan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs is concerned 20: “There are no references whatsoever to
the possible amendment to the constitution in the guidelines. The current DPJ-led
government is not interested in looking into any matter relating to the constitutional
amendment. Nor is it ready to study issues regarding collective self-defense”21, the scholar
complains.
Already in the recent past, however, Japanese policymakers have de-facto allowed
Japanese military to execute the right to collective self-defense, to be sure without referring
to it as such: In order to avoid being accused of violating Article 9 of the Japanese
constitution, Japan’s policymakers referred to the above-mentioned Japan’s missions in the
Indian Ocean, Iraq and the Gulf of Aden as missions of individual as opposed to collective
self-defense. Supporting other countries (above all the US) to fight terrorists and pirates in
Afghanistan, Iraq and the Gulf of Aden, Tokyo argued (first under Prime Minister Junichiro
Koizumi in 2001 in the wake the deployment of Japanese navy vessels to the Indian
Ocean), directly contributes to the defense and protection of Japanese national security
(under threat from global terrorism).
Beijing’s Misplaced Concerns
While Japan’s December 2010 defense guidelines stipulate that Japan’s defense and
security policies will remain ‘defense-oriented’22, Beijing (very predictably) voiced concerns
that it might no longer be possible to refer to Tokyo’s defense policies as “defensive” or
“defense-oriented” but as potentially ‘offensive’ threatening Chinese national security 23. In
reality, however, Chinese concerns that Japan’s new defense guidelines transform
Japanese defensive policies from “defense-oriented” to “offensive” are baseless, not least
because Tokyo will continue to exclude the acquisition of offensive military equipment.
However, the adoption of the defense guidelines accompanied by the above-described
armed forces’ re-location to the southern parts of Japan as well as the strengthening of the
navy’s and coast guard’s capabilities to deter and deal with a military confrontation in the
East China Sea did send a very clear and unambiguous signal towards Beijing that Tokyo
is prepared to address and deal with Beijing’s increasingly assertive and indeed aggressive
policies related to territorial claims in the East China.
Indeed, Japan’s plans to further upgrade it navy and coast guard equipment and
capabilities to deter and counter Chinese intrusions into Japanese-controlled territorial
waters close to the disputed but Japan-controlled Senkaku Islands is what Beijing’s
policymakers and defense planners worry about most.
20
Who requested not to be mentioned by name.
In an interview in 2011.
22
See MINISTRY OF DEFENSE, Summary of the National Defense Program Guidelines, FY 2011,
accessible at: http://www.mod.go.jp/e/d_act/d_policy/pdf/summaryFY2011.pdf.
23
To be sure, well-informed Chinese policymakers and scholars are well aware that in reality Japanese
defense and security policies cannot be referred to as “offensive” after the revision of the defense
guidelines.
21
12
ISPI – Working Paper
Arguably, these worries are justified but not because the Japanese navy and coast guard
were equipped with the mandate to expand Japanese territories in the East China Sea with
military force. Instead, the navy and the coast guard will be equipped with more funds and
equipment to better defend existing Japanese territory. What’s more, neither Japan’s navy
nor the coast guard will in the future be equipped with power projection capabilities, i.e. with
capabilities and equipment to attack another country, including China. Chinese
policymakers are well aware of that even if their political rhetoric (and the CCP’s
propaganda) might suggest otherwise.
What’s more, the (predictably) harsh Chinese reaction to the adoption of Japan’s defense
guidelines was most probably above all directed at a domestic as opposed to international
audience. As ever, the Chinese leadership sticks to the strategy-or indeed is obliged to
stick it- of reacting harshly to anything Japanese that could be interpreted as a threat to
Chinese national integrity and national security in order to avoid accusations of being
‘weak’ and not determined enough to defend Chinese national integrity and territory (in the
East China Sea). Portraying Japan as a potential military threat “occupying” Chinese
territories in the East China Sea usually goes down well with the Chinese public and is an
opportunity for Beijing to score politically displaying Chinese determination to defend China
and Chinese territory against “outside forces” (usually Japan but also the US). That this
does not have anything to do with the realities and tendencies of Japanese security and
defense policies is not necessarily understood by ordinary Chinese and hence of
secondary importance to Beijing’s policymakers.
Conclusions
The adoption of the defense accompanied by the above-described armed forces’ relocation to southern Japan as well as the strengthening of the navy’s and coast guard’s
capabilities to deter and deal with a military confrontation in the East China Sea did send a
very clear and unambiguous signal towards Beijing that Tokyo is prepared to address and
deal with Beijing’s increasingly assertive and indeed aggressive policies related to territorial
claims in the East China Sea.
Japan’s December 2010 defense guidelines confirm that the officially pacifist Japan can
(almost) do anything “normal” and non-pacifist country do to defend Japanese territory,
including Japanese territories off the country’s mainland in the East China Sea. Due to the
reasons explained above, however, Tokyo’s new defense guidelines December do not
make a military threat out of Japan and the armed forces’ above-mentioned re-structuring
exclusively serve to improve and increase the country’s capabilities to deter and counter an
attack from the outside.
The impact of Japan’s December 2010 defense guidelines on the debate of constitutional
revision will continue to remain very limited, not least because Article 9 of the Japanese
constitution has in recent years not hindered Japan and its armed forces from “doing” what
the country’s new defense guidelines authorize them to ‘do’ in terms of actual defense and
military policies, including contributions to international quasi-military operations such as
the country’s anti-piracy mission in the Gulf of Aden (initiated in March 2009). To be sure,
the defense guidelines accelerate the “hollowing out” of Article 9 and Japanese pacifism for
those inside and outside of Japan who are (arguably unnecessarily) concerned about a
“militarization” of Japanese foreign and security policies.
13
ISPI – Working Paper
In sum, Japan’s new defense guidelines confirm that there is fairly little left of Japan’s
constitutionally-prescribed pacifism formulated in Article 9 of the Japanese constitution.
Then again it always very difficult to plausibly explain
that there is no contradiction between being a pacifist
country while spending $47 billion on defense per
year, exposing military equipment to promote peace
and stability and export weapons and weapons
technology.
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dell’ISPI sono realizzate
anche grazie al sostegno
della Fondazione Cariplo.
ISPI
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© ISPI 2012
14
ISPI – Working Paper
Box 1
Japanese-Chinese Territorial Disputes in the East China Sea
Both Tokyo and Beijing claim sovereignty over the same islands chain-the Senkaku (in Japanese)/Diaoyu
(in Chinese) Islands, located in the East China Sea. The Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands comprise five
uninhabited islands and three rocks, aggregating roughly 7 square kilometers.
The islands are situated approximately halfway (roughly 400 km) between the Chinese mainland and
Okinawa, and about 170 km northeast of Taiwan. The islands are controlled by Japan but claimed by
China (as well as by Taiwan) which does not miss an opportunity to refer to Chinese sovereignty over the
islands chain as ‘indisputable’. While it can realistically be excluded that Tokyo will ever renounce the
Senkaku Islands as integral part of Japanese territory, Beijing for its part will not give up its territorial
claims, based on Chinese historical records dating back to the Ming dynasty (1368-1644), either. To be
sure, China only began to officially state its territorial claim over the islands when in the late 1960s it was
reported that the waters around the islands could be rich of petroleum and gas. Japanese-Sino territorial
disputes in the East China Sea, however, are not limited to the Senkaku/Diayou Islands but involve
disputed waters totaling roughly 210.000 square kilometers. What’s more, Tokyo and Beijing also disagree
on the borders of their respective “Exclusive Economic Zones” (EEZ). While Japan claims a division on
the median line between the two countries’ coastlines as the border of its EEZ, China claims that its EEZ
extends to the eastern end of China’s continental shelf, which in turn goes deeply into the EEZ claimed by
Tokyo. The disputed waters are believed to hold significant gas and oil reserves and as the waters are
mostly shallow, resource exploitation is believed to relatively easy. This encouraged China to start test
drilling for oil and gas in disputed waters in the mid-1990s, including in areas beyond the median line
claimed by Tokyo. In 2004 then, Beijing announced the establishment of a special naval fleet to be
deployed to the East China Sea to protect its drilling ships and the country’s territorial sovereignty. Tokyo
responded in kind in April 2005 by allocating rights for gas exploration to Japanese companies in Chinese
claimed areas. While the Japanese-Chinese tit-for-tat game centered around the drilling for gas and oil
continued over the years, Beijing also intensified its naval activities in and close to the disputed waters
from the 2000s onwards.
Indeed, since the mid-late 2000s, the Chinese navy sailed increasingly frequently into Japanese-controlled
territories in the East China Sea, which led to several clashes with Japan Coast Guard (JCG) patrol ships.
In September 2010 then, Sino-Japanese relations were damaged for weeks when Tokyo detained the
captain of Chinese trawler who intentionally rammed his trawler into a Japanese coast guard patrol boat
near the disputed Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands. As for the good news, in June 2008 Tokyo and Beijing
adopted the so-called “Principle Consensus on the East China Sea Issue” which foresees the joint
Japanese-Chinese exploration of natural resources in the East China Sea. However, given that the
agreement deals exclusively with the possible joint exploration of natural resources, possible steps
towards the resolution of maritime border issues in the East China Sea will continue to remain elusive.
Through functional co-operation, Tokyo and Beijing nonetheless demonstrated a joint interest to side-line
controversies and disagreements over sovereignty and reduce them to a level that makes military
confrontation over the disputed territories unlikely. However, given that Beijing has repeatedly stressed
that joint exploration of resources around the disputed islands will only take place on the condition that
Tokyo recognizes Beijing's complete sovereignty over them, joint exploration of gas and oil in the East
China Sea is very likely to place on paper and paper only in the years ahead.
In November 2011, Beijing suggested to resume bilateral negotiations with Tokyo to settle the dispute
related to the boundary lines in the East China Sea. The Japanese government accepted the Chinese
proposal to resume negotiations under the auspices of the U.N. Convention of the Law of the Sea in
principle although a start date for negotiations has yet to be announced. In the meantime, Tokyo is
equipping its navy and coast guard with the budget, capabilities and equipment to better deter and counter
Chinese intrusions into Japanese-claimed waters in the East China Sea.
Washington has also become increasingly concerned about Chinese naval activities in the East China
Sea and has in mid-2011, (through US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton) declared that defending
Japanese territory in the East China Sea, i.e. defending the Senkaku Islands are subject to US-Japan
military-cooperation as formulated in the US-Japan Security treaty. This announcement confirmed that
Washington is prepared and indeed obliged to defend Japanese national territory alongside Japanese
armed forces in the case of a military confrontation with China over the ownership of the Senkaku Islands.
Unless something ‘dramatic’ happens, territorial disputes in the East China Sea will very unlikely lead to
Japanese-Chinese military confrontations in 2012. However, joint exploration of natural resources in
disputed waters, not to mention the resolution of issues related to sovereignty over disputed territories and
waters in the East China Sea will most probably not make it onto the Japanese-Chinese 2012 policy
agenda either.