Japan Strips Itself Of Pacifist Nation Status As It Looks To The Skies

The Space Wars Begin

Many nations are planning for war in space. Long term military strategies for all the world's powers naturally include launching satellites and other platforms into space to increase spying capabilities, and to eventually lock weapons into orbit that can take out people, vehicles, towns and cities on earth, along with enemy satellites and weapons platforms.

China, Russia, the United States, all have their eyes on dominating near space in the decades to come, at least directly over their own territories, and allies, and while China has been vocal in its opposition to the weaponisation of space, it too, like the United States, is planning for the day when armies are obsolete, and destruction can be wrought on the enemy from 20 miles above the planet. They're all planning, and testing, but none want to be the first to officially announce that space is the new frontier for war-fighting.

But now Japan has decided it's time to get serious about increasing its military capability into space, and has given an official start to what presumably will become known as the 'Space Wars', should the world's nations history of violence and confrontation continue in this new domain, as it has on the lands below.

Japan passed a law on Wednesday allowing military use of space, ending a decades-old pacifist policy as it casts a wary eye on North Korea's nuclear ambitions and China's rising spending on its armed forces.

The law, which allows the military to launch its own satellites for spying and warn of missile launches but rules out offensive weapons in space, was approved by parliament's opposition-controlled upper house, a sign of rare consensus in Japan's divided political arena.

Japan's space scientists and industry have long complained that the separation of space development from the military since 1969 hampers technological process in the sector.

Japan's powerful Keidanren business lobby had pushed for the law along with a relaxation of the country's ban on arms exports in order to help the nation's defence industry compete globally.

"The key point is that rather than just focusing on research and development like before, this new law will balance R&D, the industry, and security," Satoshi Tsuzukibashi, a director at one of Keidanren's industrial affairs bureau, said.

"In the future, there will be more satellites and rockets used for space security, so that is a positive factor for the space industry," he added.

The legislation mandates the creation of a new cabinet level post to oversee Japan's space security, a move that could help pry more funding out of tight-fisted finance bureaucrats worried about the nation's bulging public debt.

Space security. The US will soon follow in announcing its own new 'Space Security' military plans, which will be in sync with Japan. Presumably, Russia and China will then make clear that they, too, are working on joint space defense systems to ensure their own 'Space Security.'

Japan Re-Arms, Prepares For Future Wars

Pacifist Constitution Likely To Be Rewritten As Japan Spends Billions On American Weapons

Japan is rearming on a scale not seen since the late 1930s. At the same time, Japan is expected to soon change its Constitution, one that renounces war and only allows for troops to be used in defence of Japanese sovereignty, after deploying non-combat forces into Iraq. Rumours are beginning to sound in diplomatic circles that Japan may soon begin a propaganda campaign on its people to attempt to chase away the widespread abhorrence generations of Japanese still hold towards nuclear weapons.

At the same time, Japan is rapidly rewriting its list of what it can do, and what it cant do, as far as its military forces go. Its Defence Agency has been quietly transformed into a full ministry. Its defence budget now tops $40 billion a year, making it one of the top buyers of international arms and weapons systems.

This famously pacifist nation is becoming something else entirely.

Japan is now a key ally of the United States, and is receiving billions in declared, and undeclared, military funding. Japan plays a key role, along with Australia, in the American encirclement of China, and has all but declared it will eventually host American missiles, radar stations and more US bases as part of the Missile Defence Shield project that has seen Russia verbally threaten European states.

In June, Japan joined the United States Air Force for war games in the western Pacific. Japanese pilots dropped 500 pound live bombs on a tiny island, a first for its current generation of pilots. It's hard for Westerners to imagine how dramatic so simple a military rehearsal as this is for the Japanese.

From the International Herald Tribune :

Flying directly from Japan and practicing live-bombing runs on distant foreign targets would have been regarded as unacceptably provocative because the implicit message was clear: These fighter jets could perhaps fly to North Korea and take out some targets before returning home safely.

The incremental changes - especially since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States - amount to the most significant transformation in the Japanese military since World War II, one that has brought it ever closer operationally to America's military while rattling nerves throughout northeast Asia.

In a little over half a decade, the Japanese military has carried out changes considered unthinkable a few years back. In the Indian Ocean, Japanese destroyers and refueling ships are helping the U.S. military fight in Afghanistan. In Iraq, Japanese planes are transporting cargo and U.S. soldiers to Baghdad from Kuwait.

Japan is acquiring weapons that blur the line between defensive and offensive. For the Guam bombing run, Tokyo deployed its newest fighter jets, the F-2, the first developed jointly by Japan and the United States.

Unlike its older jets, the F-2s were able to fly the 2,700 kilometers, or 1,700 miles, from northern Japan to Guam without refueling - a "straight shot," as the Japanese military said with pride.

Now Japan is indicating that it is intensely interested in buying the F-22 Raptor, a U.S. stealth fighter known mainly for its offensive capabilities, like penetrating contested airspace and destroying enemy targets, and whose export is prohibited by U.S. law.

Critics at home say the military changes under way, details of which the government has tried to hide from public view, especially for missions in Iraq, have already violated the (pacifist) Constitution and other restrictions.

"The reality has already moved ahead, so they will now talk about the need to catch up and revise the Constitution," said Yukio Hatoyama, secretary general of the main opposition Democratic Party.

Richard Samuels, a Japan expert at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said that revisionist politicians like Abe and Koizumi, once on the fringes of Japan's political world, have succeeded in grabbing the mainstream in a time of uncertainty. They shared the view, Samuels said, "that the statute of limitations on Japan's misbehavior during the Pacific War had expired" and that Japan should have a military like any normal country.

Their predecessors feared getting entangled in a U.S.-led war. But the new leaders feared that Japan would be abandoned by the United States unless it contributed to its wars, Samuels said.

Japan's military has become less shy in projecting its power away from home. Japan lacks the nuclear submarines, long-range missiles or large aircraft carriers that amount to real power projection.

But it is acquiring four Boeing 767 air tankers that will allow its planes to refuel in midair, as well as two aircraft carriers that will transport helicopters and, with some adjustments, planes capable of taking off vertically.

The United States has welcomed the changes while pressing for more.

"The restrictions that Japan has lived under, which I would say Japan has maintained on its own or imposed on itself, are quite unique," said a Pentagon official who requested anonymity so that he could speak candidly.

"The changes that you're seeing in Japan are very unique changes in the context of those restrictions. In the context of everything else that is going on around the world, or in the context of Japan's potential to contribute to the region and the world in security areas, the changes are fairly small."

They may be small, but the money being spent is enormous. In amongst the back-and-forths on whether or not Japan should be getting involved in foreign wars and allying so closely with the United States, the simple fact is that Japan is a rich nation, and the United States is a leading manufacturer of the weapons of war.

Behind all the heartache over changing Japan's pacifist Constitution, and debates about its involvement in the US Missile Shield, there are multi-billion dollar deals being cut in the boardrooms between the Japanese government and the US military industrial complex, which remains one of the biggest employers and money-generating industries in the United States.

Right now, Japan is buying up its products to the tune of billions of dollars, generating wealth, jobs and taxes for the US government. Naturally, this makes the Bush administration, and the military industry elite of America very, very happy indeed.

Japan Now Plans To Build Its Own Stealth Fighter

China To Gradually Draw Taiwan Back Into Its Fold

US-Japan Contingency Plans For Taiwan Loudly Opposed By China

Arms Race? Asks China. What Arms Race?

In February, defense department officials from Japan and the United States will meet to discuss what is known as 'The Taiwan Strait Contingency'. China, naturally, has expressed strong interest in exactly what this 'contingency' constitutes, because one of the key parameters will be how Japan and the US will react if Taiwan decides to declare independence from China this year, or if China decides to invade and occupy.

The United States and Japan decided in 2005 that protecting Taiwan from China amounted to a "common strategic objective."

Wrong, says China, Taiwan is ours, and we will have it back in the fold sooner rather than later.


From Bloomberg :

China opposes a U.S.-Japan military contingency plan over the Taiwan Strait, saying that such a plan must take into consideration the fact that the island is a part of China.

"We have taken notice of this,'' China Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao said in a statement posted on the ministry's Web site."`Both the U.S. and Japan must honor the `one China' principle.''

China and Taiwan have been ruled separately since 1949, when China's Communist Party overthrew the ruling Nationalist Party, forcing it to flee to Taiwan. China's criticism of the U.S.-Japan contingency plan on Taiwan also comes after the admiral in charge of the U.S. Pacific Fleet expressed concern over China's recent acquisition of warships with a ``blue water'' capacity.

"Clearly the growth and capacity of China's navy, its ability to go into the blue water is very, very clear,'' Admiral Gary Roughead, commander of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, said in a November briefing at the U.S. Embassy in Beijing. He was in China to help oversee a joint U.S.-China naval sea rescue exercise off the south China coast.

Since 2004, China has spent more than $2 billion building or acquiring from Russia more than a dozen 6,000 or 7,000 ton battle ships, mostly destroyers, and a dozen kilo-class submarines, enabling it to ``project power far into the western Pacific,'' said Andrew Yang, an analyst at the Taipei-based Chinese Council of Advanced Policy Studies.

Naturally, the talk of Japan and the United States making plans to officially team up to protect the sovereignty of Taiwan received favourable coverage in that country.

From Radio Taiwan :

China's foreign ministry Thursday expressed "serious concern" over this plan, which could worsen thawing Sino-Japan ties. It said, "Taiwan is an inseparable part of China. Any arrangement or consideration should respect and abide by the principle of one China."

Kyodo (Japanese news agency) says that Japan's decision to go ahead with the Taiwan study is believed to reflect the pro-Taiwan stance of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.

The United States and Japan angered China in February 2005 with a joint statement that easing tensions in the Taiwan Strait was part of their "common strategic objectives."

Under the Taiwan Relations Act, the United States is required to provide Taiwan with defensive arms if China attacks Taiwan

China continues to push the line that they will never accept Taiwan's breaking away from China, and that aggression by Japan and the United States over the breakaway territory will not be tolerated.

From DailyIndia :

China has said that it hopes the US would strictly abide by its promise and not would send any wrong signals to secessionists trying for Taiwan's independence.

The Chinese side stressed that to curb "Taiwan independence" and maintain peace and stability across the Straits were of mutual benefit both to China and the US, the news release said.

...the US would stick to its "one-China policy and did not want to see any unrest or crisis across the Taiwan Straits" and its surrounding regions, said the release.

China sent out a call on New Year's Eve to Chinese people, across the globe, to oppose any moves by Taiwan towards independence. Presumably, this call translates as a request by China to its national in foreign countries to keep up the talk of Taiwan staying part of China, and opposing discussions and debate about Taiwan declaring independence.

From the Union Tribune :

Chinese President Hu Jintao called on the 'sons and daughters of China' at home and abroad to resist moves towards Taiwan independence, state media reported on Tuesday.

'In the new year, we will uphold the basic principle of 'peaceful reunification' and 'one country, two systems' when dealing with relations across the Taiwan Strait,' Hu added.

"China will never give up our efforts to reunify the country peacefully, but we will not compromise on Taiwan independence and splitist activities," he was quoting as saying.

"So here, I am calling again for the sons and daughters of China from overseas and home to join hands, and to crack down together on Taiwan independence and splittist activities..."

Taipei and Beijing have been arch rivals since the end of the Chinese civil war in 1949, when the defeated Nationalists took refuge on Taiwan. China says the self-ruled, democratic island is a breakaway province, and has threatened to attack if it declares independence.

In his New Year address, Chen said 'the sovereignty of Taiwan belongs to its 23 million people, and it absolutely does not belong to the 'People's Republic of China',' according to a press release put out after his remarks.

'Taiwan's future is determined only by its 23 million citizens, and Taiwan is part of the world, absolutely not part of China,' Chen said.

China is also denying repeated, hypocritical claims by the United States that it is re-arming out of proportion to existent threats in ts region. United States officials, usually talking in an anonymous capacity to BushCo. mouthpiece agencies like the Washington Times, claim that China is engaging in a new arms race.

Arms race? says China. What arms race?

From Speros :

China claims that it is neither capable nor wants to rival the United States on issues such as military spending....

However, it does expect the United States to progressively disengage itself from Taiwan.

China’s defence policy is designed to preserve its sovereignty and territorial integrity and favour world peace, this according to state news agency Xinhua quoting a government official.

...China has no intention, nor ability to conduct an arms race with other countries, but wants to enhance regional security through cooperation with others.

In the last few days, there has been a lot of talk about China’s defence spending which has doubled in ten years.

Officially, China’s defence spending in 2005 represented 1.35 per cent of its GDP compared to 6.2 per cent for the United States.

However, many Western experts such as those from London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies claim that Beijing’s actual defence expenditures are much higher than officially reported.

In meeting a delegation from the Armed Services Committee of the US House of Representatives, Chinese Defence Minister Cao Gangchuan said that China shares extensive strategic interests with the United States and does not want to get into an arms race.

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