Thanks for the article Jonathan.
via SCMP.
Pacifist Japan will adopt new defence guidelines next week paving the way for its military to respond more quickly and forcefully to perceived threats from China and North Korea, officials said Thursday.Read it all here.
The government of conservative Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will approve rules intended to help air, land and sea forces work together more effectively in the face of danger, an official from Abe’s Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) said.
The move comes amid the continuing row between China and Japan over the sovereignty of a small island chain in the East China Sea, a dispute that has escalated over the last year to include military hardware from both sides.
Lawmakers from the ruling bloc on Wednesday endorsed the plan, which would create what it called a “Dynamic Joint Defence Force”, the official said.
“For the first time, we will be able to obtain mobility, or the capability to deploy swiftly in an integrated manner,” Defence Minister Itsunori Onodera said on Thursday.
“When we deploy troops to remote islands... we need to respond with ground, marine and air defence forces,” Onodera said in a speech at a private think tank in Tokyo.
“Or if we faced a North Korean missile, Japan would first attempt to shoot it down from the sea, then from the ground.
“While the Air Defence Force has huge radar sites, it is the Ground Self Defence Force who protect these important facilities,” he said, adding the country’s military had to be alert to a possible “intrusion from the sea”.
The Japanese are moving full steam ahead into a full fledged arms race that appears to have the support of the people. We've never seen a nationalistic Japanese nation. Not in modern times anyway. If history repeats then we're about to see a sight to behold.
Ancient tensions. Ancient animosities. Ancient grudges.
All settled with modern weaponry.
Add to it an America ready to step back from the international stage and take care of issues at home and you have a massive power vacuum.
The burning question.
China has nukes. N. Korea has nukes. Will Japan acquire them along with a more powerful military?
Plus you have the South Koreans, North Koreans and, oh yes, the Russians in the mix. We live in interesting times.
ReplyDeleteJapan has a massive demographic hole. There are no young people in that country. Last year they sold more adult diapers than baby diapers. Plus their national debt is enourmous and at the same time is the savings of all the old people.
ReplyDeleteDemographics and economics say that a nationalistic Japan is going nowhere. They could still prove to be a pain to Chinese but they cannot win.
As for how China is acting just think of it as the Chinese version of the Monroe doctrine.
the Chinese version of the Monroe doctrine. never thought of it that way. in that case their behavior makes sense....kinda twisted sense in this modern world but understandable .....
DeleteChina does not want to fight us. They want to be us. In 2025 when Sudan/Argentina/Iraq/ whoever, nationalizes the Chinese built and invested in oil infrastructure/telecom/whatever, China wants to be able to sail across the world slap them really hard and demand that be paid back for being ripped off. When Chinese citizens are killed in backlash some crap hole of Africa, China again wants to do the same thing.
DeleteThey want to tell everyone in the neighborhood, "Here is your foreign policy." Just like what we do to Canada and Mexico. So Vietnam can stay independent and trade nicely with China but will not be allowed to host a large American military presence.
Militarily, China is major league and Japan is way down in the minors.
ReplyDeleteGlobal Firepower Ranking -- China #3, Japan #17.
http://www.globalfirepower.com/countries-listing.asp
China has an excellent legal case in the dispute in the Senkakus dispute, which was exacerbated by Japan's recent grab of the islands. China is pissed and I don't blame them.
There is no similarity with the Monroe Doctrine which was designed to keep European countries out of the Western Hemisphere.
Don Bacon
DeleteThe People's Republic Of China actually doesn't have a legal claim on the Diaoyu Islands; The Republic of China(Taiwan) does because it was the KMT's Chiang Kai Shek that signed the Cairo Declaration document. This is why China refuses the Japanese invitation to settle the dispute at the ICJ. On the other hand, Japan refuses to answer Taiwan's demand to settle the dispute at the ICJ for the same reason, because Japan fears that Taiwan could win at the ICJ.
you're being too literal in the comparison. think about it from a old chinese kingdom point of view. in that light the japanese islands themselves are part of china. so in that light the similarities are strong. additionally if you think about the adiz, its not just aimed at their neighbors but also the US so that makes the case even more.
ReplyDeletethe chinese monroe doctrine fits in my mind.
Some feed back.
ReplyDelete1. Ancient grudges. <= There are no ancient grudges. Japan simply doesn't figure into China's history at all until the late 19th century, when modernized Japan armed with latest western weapons began to colonize China from the Manchurian rulers who themselves were non-Chinese and didn't care for Chinese subjects they ruled. So most of China's ill blood with Japan was formed in the past 150 years.
2. a full fledged arms race that appears to have the support of the people. <= Actually Abe doesn't, based on his latest poll number that is nose diving. Abe won power based on the mandate of the people to recover Japan's economy, not to turn back the clock all-the-way back to the Imperial era which Abe and his followers are trying to do. As Abe shifts this attentions away from economy to political and constitutional restructuring, Japanese citizens are finally revolting against Abe in polls.
Even for the US backing the Japanese re-militarization to share the burden, a big concern is if Abe's rearmament program can be sustained, based deteriorating financial situations of Japan. The Japanese economy is in a total disarray with a slowing economy, a record trade and current-account deficit, and the national debt about to burst compared to China and Korea with strong economic indicators and a rearmament program that is within their means without having to burrow.
Bubba, 150 years IS ancient history, 150 years ago the US had just ended the War between the states and those animosities are still there, smoldering with a hate for the Washington DC government and those damned Yankees.
DeleteThe Japanese will follow their leaders no matter what they think or feel otherwise.
Re militarization will build the economy of Japan.
Oh 150 years is not even close to "ancient"... you will not call the US an ancient culture or civilization don't you ? Now a 1k of year is more an ancient, when was the first time Chinese clash with Japan ?... some say that it was at first Mongol Invasion some, what ? 800 years ago ? Now that's some ancient stuff.
DeleteShas
DeleteMongol Invasion was exactly that; a Mongol invasion. The primary combat troops who saw action were Mongol and Korean troops, while the conscripted Chinese troops met their ends at the sea by the famous Kamikaze and never even set a foot on Japan.
Then the second confrontation was in the war of 1592, but the event took place outside of China and the Chinese were merely providing a human road block to apply pressure on Japanese positions while Koreans were the primary combatants, so the only direct consequence of that war was that power vacuum in Korea/Manchuria following the war gave the rise to the Manchus, who you may know would conquer and rule over China until 1912 and the Manchu rule were responsible for China's Century of Humiliations.
So until the late 19th century when the modernized Japan showed up in China, Japan actually had a less influence on China's course of history than France or Britain did and this is well reflected in Chinese historical dramas and TVs where Japanese simply do not show up in pre-modern era, unlike the Mongols(The famous Yuan Dynasty), the Turks(Remember Mulan), Khitans, Manchus(Changed the dress and heirdo of Chinese and left the legacy of Mandarin(Means Manchurian Lord) behind), Koreans, Tibetans(Yup, Tibet used to rule a part of China believe of not), etc.
When you turn to modern era then it's all Japanese "devils" raping Chinese citizens that flood the Chinese airwaves, so much so that the communist party ordered the TV networks to cut down. So why do Chinese hold such a grudge against Japanese but not against Manchurians, 20 million of who are still living among them? That's because Manchurians are now weak and no longer present a threat to Chinese in 2013, while an average Japanese is still 10 times wealthier than an average Chinese citizen, and Chinese corporations cannot compete with Japanese corporations in world stage. So call it a case of over jealousy of Japan's success and wealth. If Japan went down the gutter after the surrender and is like Vietnam today, then Chinese wouldn't hate Japan at all.
Ah you posses greater knowledge then my in this topic. And I capitulate, relations between country's in Asia region is indeed not my specialty.
DeleteIf the Japanese do not have the un-assembled parts for nuclear weapons already lying about they will soon be building them.
ReplyDeleteHow long would it take for Japan to build a nuke?
Smart folks the Japanese, I'd say they have them already.
An elderly population and the youth who don't have sex because it interferes with their IPODS and such.
tell me the Japanese don't want an excuse to reverse this and a healthy fear of an aggressive and vengeful China, Nanking after all was the Japanese version of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Our current administration may just cede the western half of the Pacific from Midway Island to the Chinese just to be fair in some liberal guilt trip over those two nuked Japanese cities.
At this point anything is possible out of these clowns.
Dang if that AFV ain't purty as hell!
ReplyDelete"If the Japanese do not have the un-assembled parts for nuclear weapons already lying about they will soon be building them."
ReplyDeleteYep. Nukes arent complicated. They are hard, but they arent complicated.
I would happily bet my left nut that the Japanese have a formidable nuclear tipped IRBM force in kit form.
Demographics
The thing about demographics is, they take a pretty short amount of time to change.
Japanese adults dont have kids not because they are overgrown manchilds, but because they cant afford houses / flats.
Thats easy to solve.
Increase the normal tax free allowance by an additional $5,000 per child a couple has, make it transferable to parents and grandparents and great grandparents.
Hell make it transferable to the ****ing company the mother / father works for!
$10,000 per child tax free.
That doesnt work? Sod changing the tax boundaries and just send the parents a cheque!
$10,000 per year per child under 16
With the PRC's defense budget only being 2% of their GDP we don't want this to turn into an aggressive arms race. It would be good for us though if our allies chose to increase the strength of their military's.
ReplyDeleteJapan South Korea and Taiwan need to continue to upgrade their militarys and increase their naval capabilities to counter the growth of the PRC's military but all this rubbish over little islands and nasty name calling isn't good for America.
Why we let them send all those industries to asia instead of our low militarized freinds in latin america is beyond my understanding. What a blunder.