Field Article: Japanese Rearmament and Modern Geopolitics

On April 29, 2015, former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe spoke before a joint session of the United States Congress to confirm his commitment to the strategic U.S.-Japan alliance that had been in place since the end of World War II. In his address, Abe detailed the history of the two nations’ cooperation since 1945 before stating his intentions: “That’s why we now hold up high a new banner that is ‘proactive contribution to peace based on the principle of international cooperation’... The time has come for the U.S.-Japan Alliance to face up to and jointly tackle those challenges that are new” [1].

Then, in September, amidst protests from both opposition party members and citizens outside the parliamentary building, Abe and his colleagues in the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) passed 11 security bills into law that permitted the Japan Self-Defense Forces (JSDF) to aid the U.S. military logistically and provide armed backup if a conflict threatening the Japanese people ever arose [2]. After the legislation passed in the upper parliamentary house, Abe called the bills “legislation that is necessary to protect the people's lives and peaceful living and to prevent wars… Japan now has a legislative framework necessary to maintain peace” [3].

Abe’s moves to tie the JSDF more closely to the U.S. military and expand their operating parameters are in direct opposition to the controversial Article 9 of Japan’s post-WWII constitution. The provision, drafted by Americans and reviewed by Japanese scholars, essentially prohibits Japan from waging war and forbids the state from maintaining an army, navy, or air force for such purposes. However, Japan became the U.S.’s logistical base of operations during the Korean War in the immediate aftermath of the constitution’s ratification, and the Japanese government created a police security force for self defense that would become the JSDF in 1954.

Since then, the JSDF has become Japan’s de facto military, with land, sea, and air branches, in spite of Article 9. The force maintains more than 247,000 active personnel, and members have participated in U.N. security actions and minesweeping operations in the 21st century. While the JSDF has slowly grown in size and scope since its inception, Abe’s security reforms greatly expanded their reach under newly-strengthened support for Japanese rearmament in Abe’s right-wing network. Additionally, Abe announced in May, 2017, that he intended by 2020 to hold a public referendum on whether to repeal Article 9 from the constitution, officially enshrining the military as part of Japanese life [4].

One influential group pushing for rearmament is Nippon Kaigi, the “Japan Conference”. Their members made up an overwhelming majority of Abe’s cabinet between 2014 and 2017, and they have close ties to the imperial family, including helping to organize a public event after Emperor Naruhito ascended the throne in 2019 [5]. Since their founding in 1997, Nippon Kaigi has advocated for rearming the Japanese state to protect itself from aggression from China and North Korea, centering society around tradition and the imperial family, and debating Japan’s past culpability regarding WWII [6].

Nippon Kaigi is associated with multiple conservative think tanks, including the Japan Institute for National Fundamentals and the Society for the Dissemination of Historical Fact. The latter of these two groups publishes historical revisionist material online specifically for English-speaking audiences, with a focus on the Japanese Empire’s guilt for the Nanking Massacre and the forced sexual labor of so-called “comfort women'' during WWII. While the group’s mission statement claims, “The historical facts of modern Japan, especially where they concern relations with neighbor nations, remain largely unknown to the English-speaking world,” that same statement also admits, “We cannot guarantee that all the information provided on this website is accurate beyond question. Ultimately, readers must form their own opinions about it, based on the validity of the evidence it presents” [7].

Pro-rearmament sentiment also comes from the U.S., Japan’s longtime postwar ally and security guarantor. The reasonings largely focus on Japan’s reliance on the U.S. as a deterrent to regional enemies like China and North Korea; outgoing President Trump criticized the alliance as one-sided, noting that Japan is not legally bound to help the U.S. if it is attacked [8]. China’s increasing military spending and capabilities, not to mention manpower, have become a credible threat to Japanese national security [9], and North Korean missile tests, while good for boosting Abe’s popularity in the short-term, still create a climate of fear at home [10]. Americans advocating for rearmament cite these growing concerns as reasons for Japan to amend its constitution and allow for the creation of an official military, abandoning the pretense of pacifism enshrined in Article 9.

However, popular sentiment is not on the side of rearmament. As mentioned above, the security bill debates drew large protests, and survey polls indicated that two-thirds of those asked opposed the bills [11]. In the midst of the parliamentary debates over the security laws, a student activist group called Students Emergency Action for Liberal Democracy (SEALDs) led anti-government protests to express disapproval for the possible expansion of the JSDF’s engagement parameters. SEALDs were the driving force behind multiple protests in front of the Diet building throughout 2015 and 2016 before disbanding to focus on their studies. However, SEALDs successfully influenced multiple other student protest groups around the country to advocate against the revisionist government’s policies and may have led to an increase in voter turnout in the 2016 elections [12].

In his article “Explaining Japanese Antimilitarism,” Professor Yasuhiro Izumikawa lays out a “hybrid model” to explain popular Japanese sentiment regarding rearmament and possible military conflict, naming fear of entrapment as one of the factors prohibiting support for an increase in military power. He writes, “The fear of entrapment has helped to constrain Japan from developing a more active security policy; that is, when the Japanese public experiences such fear, it seeks to pressure the Japanese government not to adopt an active security policy. For its part, the Japanese government may try to limit its alliance commitments to the United States” [13]. Izumikawa’s assessment puts into words the paradox of a Japanese military: If Japan continues to stay under the U.S.’s security umbrella, then they may need a military to engage with U.S. conflicts; if they form a legitimate military body, then they will no longer necessarily require U.S. protection, but it would violate their constitution and popular opinion.

There is some debate over the continuity of Abe’s rearmament push as it relates to Japanese postwar history. Dr. Sabine Fruhstuck of UC Santa Barbara links it to 21st-century geopolitical concerns: “Then September 11 happened... That triggered both in the United States, of course, but around the world including Japan, a whole lot of discussions and debate about security, particularly related to terrorism, but also a rethinking of the military and policy around the military. What has happened in Japan [is part of] a number of things that have to do with the changing security environment in East Asia, including the so-called ‘rise of China,’ [and] there’s a more serious and deep engagement about what the Japanese military [can] do in certain scenarios”. In this model, Japanese rearmament is largely in response to the changing geopolitical landscape of East Asia. Dr. Fruhstuck also notes that there was little academic interest in the Japanese military before 9/11 due to its limited deployment, which points to the JSDF’s presence in Japanese society being largely unnoticed before the 21st century. 

However, a professor from Kwansei Gakuin University sees the contemporary rearmament movement in the government as contiguous with the rest of postwar Japanese history: “Japan has been rearming itself since before the American occupation [1945-52] ended, and that’s something they’ve been doing continuously since those days. While this rapid expansion of the military is new, the problem isn’t whether Japan is or isn’t rearming, from what I’ve seen. Japan has always been rearming, even now. This militarist doctrine, for which they’ve chosen rearmament, is an ideological problem”. For this professor, rearmament has been an ongoing process in Japan, increasing continuously from the end of WWII onward. In this framework, there is a necessary interrogation of the dual ideologies guiding Japan’s supposed pacifism.The professor claims pacifism and militarism have existed side by side for the duration of Japan’s postwar existence, a condition Dr. Jeff Kingston calls “double-think” [14]. Pacifism is law according to the national constitution, yet Japan maintains a sizable military ostensibly for purely defensive purposes, which it is attempting to send out more and more to assist in foreign conflicts. 

Despite his efforts, Shinzo Abe was forced by health issues to resign from his position in September, 2020, and the proposed referendum to amend the Japanese constitution and repeal Article 9 has yet to happen at time of writing. His successor, Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga, intends to finish Abe’s constitutional revision project and has already begun talks to sell weapons and equipment to other Asian countries, a move permitted by Abe’s lifting of Japan’s ban on exporting weapons in 2014 [15]. For the time being, it seems Japan’s ongoing rearmament will continue, though it remains to be seen how the new American administration will affect East Asian geopolitics.

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References

1. Abe, Shinzo. "Full Text of Abe's Speech before U.S. Congress." The Japan Times. 30 Apr. 2015. Web. 6 Nov. 2020.

2. Soble, Jonathan. "Japan Moves to Allow Military Combat for First Time in 70 Years." The New York Times. 16 July 2015. Web. 6 Nov. 2020.

3. "The Showdown That Obscured Japan's National Security Debate." Nikkei Asia. 19 Sept. 2015. Web. 6 Nov. 2020.

4.  “Japan's Abe Hopes for Reform of Pacifist Charter by 2020.” Edited by Simon Cameron-Moore and Robert Birsel, Reuters, Thomson Reuters, 3 May 2017, www.reuters.com/article/us-japan-government-constitution-idUSKBN17Z0BH.

5. Yamaguchi, Mari. "Japan Emperor Greets at Celebration Hosted by Conservatives." ABC News. 9 Nov. 2019. Web. 9 Nov. 2020.

6.  "日本会議がめざすもの (Nippon Kaigi's Goals)." 日本会議 (Nippon Kaigi). Web. 11 Nov. 2020. <http://www.nipponkaigi.org/about/mokuteki>.

7. Mission Statement. www.sdh-fact.com/mission-statement/.

8.  Cohen, Zachary. “Trump Claims Japan 'Doesn't Have to Help' If US Is Attacked.” CNN, Cable News Network, 27 June 2019, www.cnn.com/2019/06/26/politics/trump-japan-defense-commitments/index.html.

9.  Bandow, Doug. “Time to Let Japan Be a Regular Military Power.” The National Interest, The Center for the National Interest, 29 Oct. 2017, nationalinterest.org/feature/time-let-japan-be-regular-military-power-22954.

10.  Bradley, Matt. “Kim Jong Un's Missiles May Be Final Nail for Japan's Pacifism.” NBCNews.com, NBCUniversal News Group, 18 Sept. 2017, www.nbcnews.com/news/world/kim-jong-un-s-missiles-may-be-final-nail-pacifist-n802271.

11. Soble, Jonathan. "Japan Moves to Allow Military Combat for First Time in 70 Years." The New York Times. 16 July 2015. Web. 6 Nov. 2020.

12.  Kikuchi, Daisuke. “SEALDs to Disband but Founder Says Political Activism Just Beginning.” The Japan Times, 14 Aug. 2016, www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2016/08/14/national/politics-diplomacy/sealds-disband-founder-says-just-beginning/.

13.  Izumikawa, Yasuhiro. “Explaining Japanese Antimilitarism: Normative and Realist Constraints on Japan's Security Policy.” International Security, 2010, pp. 123–160. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/40981245?seq=10#metadata_info_tab_contents.

14.  Kingston, Jeff. “Japan's Quiet Rearmament.” Prospect Magazine, 11 Nov. 2020, www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/magazine/japans-quiet-rearmament-shinzo-abe.

15.  Strangio, Sebastian. “Japan's Suga Set to Authorize Arms Sales to Vietnam.” The Diplomat, 15 Oct. 2020, thediplomat.com/2020/10/japans-suga-set-to-authorize-arms-sales-to-vietnam/.