Posted on 02/25/2003 10:26:51 AM PST by Enemy Of The State
Japan: Hawks coming out of the woodwork By Axel Berkofsky
Can a self-declared pacifist country attack another country preemptively and go nuclear?
Japan may have to do both as far as parts of Japan's defense establishment and right-wingers in the country's ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) are concerned. While LDP defense hawks and the country's Defense Agency chief Shigeru Ishiba himself were allegedly flirting with the idea of attacking North Korea before it pulls the trigger first, it was recently revealed that Japan was looking into the feasibility of joining the nuclear-weapons club even back in the 1990s.
In 1995, after the first nuclear crisis on the Korean Peninsula in 1994, Japan's Defense Agency reportedly compiled a 31-page "internal" (read secret) report looking into the pros and cons of having nukes in Japan. The report, drawn up during the administration of socialist prime minister Tomiichi Murayama, whose party was strongly opposed to even maintaining armed forces before coming to power in 1994, concluded that Japan's neighbors don't have to worry about a nuclear Japan. "The discussion in favor of owning nuclear weapons lacks sufficient study into the negative impact, while the idea that not possessing nuclear weapons is detrimental is not sufficiently backed by military theory," the report said.
Japan's own experience with nuclear weapons, however, might have suggested a somewhat different explanation why going nuclear should not be an option and the country's allegedly sacred three non-nuclear principles - not introducing, not possessing and not producing nuclear weapons - did not seem to be a problem back then. Instead, the report concluded that nuclear weapons are not in the "nation's best economic and political interest" - producing and storing nukes were not only considered too expensive, but would also upset the United States and the regional balance of power.
Japan's Defense Agency insists that there have been no other studies on Japanese nuclear weapons after 1995 and claims that that study was only undertaken to "reassure" neighbors in East Asia that Japan would not go nuclear even if North Korea threatened to do so.
If that sounds pretty implausible, that's because it is. It seems that the Japanese press found nothing unusual about the fact that the report was leaked just as Pyongyang was flexing its military muscles threatening to inflict "total war" over East Asia.
On the other hand, who can really blame Japanese hawks for discussing nuclear options when even South Korea's outgoing president Kim Dae-jung, usually soft-spoken and dovish when dealing with his cousins in the north, got carried away in the heat of the moment. "If North Korea gets nuclear weapons, the stance of Japan and our country toward nuclear weapons could change," he said on February 18, advising Pyongyang not to "even dream of getting nuclear weapons".
CNN changed the "could" into a "would" in Kim's statement, while US commentators believed that Japan and South Korea could indeed be obliged to get nukes rather sooner than later. "If Pyongyang is allowed to go nuclear, there will be strong pressure on South Korea and Japan to go nuclear as well," James E Goodby, former US diplomat in residence at Stanford University, wrote in the International Herald Tribune two days after Kim's remarks.
Kim himself had second thoughts about his belligerent rhetoric and toned down his own remarks on the very same day, saying, "I believe the danger of war is slight - in fact non-existent."
Not as far as Shigeru Ishiba, Japan's defense hawk-in-chief, is concerned.
During a parliamentary debate last week, he announced that Japan might consider attacking North Korea in "self-defense" if there were "sufficient evidence" that Pyongyang was preparing to launch a missile attack on his country.
Attacking North Korea preemptively?
That's what parts of the non-Japanese media heard, thereby "relying on mistranslations between the original Japanese and the English idea of 'preemptive strike'", said Chris Hughes, senior research fellow at the Center for the Study of Globalization and Regionalization at the University of Warwick in England. "Neither Kawaguchi [Japan's foreign minister] nor Ishiba have used the word 'preemptive strike' [sensei kogeki] when speaking in the parliament," he added, indicating that the foreign press made Japan more bellicose than it really is.
Ishiba, known for hawkish rhetoric and, as a Japanese political commentator put it, his belief that "a-shut-mouth-catches-no-flies attitude" is for weaklings, reconsidered his line and published a statement on his agency's website denying that his remarks meant that Japan was preparing to launch a preemptive strike against North Korea.
"If North Korea said it was going to turn us into a sea of fire and were about to load their missiles with fuel, Japan would start to consider whether North Korea had started an attack," said Ishiba, trying to defuse his explosive rhetoric.
Even Robyn Lim, professor of International Relations at Nagoya University, usually in favor of a tough line toward North Korea, fears that Ishiba might have leaned too far out of the window. "His statement doesn't help matters because it is not a credible threat. Japan doesn't have aircraft capable of attacking North Korea and returning home," Lim wrote.
Japan's defense establishment hopes that won't be true for much longer. By 2005, a couple of US-made in-flight-refueling aircraft will become part of the Japanese air force, allowing it to operate farther from home.
For now, however, Japanese Aegis high-tech destroyers, currently cruising in the Sea of Japan conducting "anti-North Korea drills", as Japan's Yomiuri Shimbun reports, would not even be able to shoot down incoming rogue missiles. "The ability of Aegis cruisers to actually shoot down missiles at this time is zero, since Japan's missiles on the Aegis vessels are not yet configured and developed for missile defense. It will need US assistance to shoot down anything at all," Hughes said.
A North Korean missile is only a 10-minute ride away from downtown Tokyo and, fearing that its military would indeed merely be reduced to cleaning up the mess, the Japanese government recently filed an emergency report instructing the armed forces on what to do in an after-impact scenario.
While six younger LDP hotheads filed a bill suggesting to impose economic sanctions on North Korea on the spot, Yasuo Fukuda, chief cabinet secretary, urged his colleagues to remain "calm" and hold off on economic sanctions for now. A good idea, indeed, as cautious political commentators in Japan fear that imposing economic sanctions might encourage Pyongyang to make up for the loss of legal revenues by exporting missiles to other "rogue states" and smuggling drugs in the Sea of Japan.
Japan wants first-hand information on these activities as well and on March 28 will launch its first spy satellite to check on "suspicious" ships (usually North Korean spy and smuggler ships, says the government) in Japanese territorial waters. (See Look up, Mr Kim: Japan's spy in the sky, January 15.)
When the United States and Japan held another round of bilateral "strategic dialogues" last week, Washington informed Tokyo that the US is considering increasing its military presence on Japanese soil. Japan's government, unlike the majority of the country's public, "welcomed" the US advice to better have one finger on the trigger when dealing with North Korea.
Japan's public, however, seems less paranoid about North Korea attacking Japan. Most of them think Tokyo is not in charge anyway and is reportedly confident that the United States will solve the crisis with North Korea bilaterally.
"Not in my name" read the banners of anti-war demonstrators all over the world a week ago, and the Japanese public might consider getting a couple of those flags the next time its government elaborates on its North Korea policy.
Japanese pilot no wurry bout return home hahahahahahahahahaha
It is one of the main themes in Japanese popular culture. It is the central idea driving the plot of the anime series Gundam Wing and one of the core ideas in two of the most popular anime series of the 1990's: Escaflowne and Neon Genesis Evangelion (although the later is more about alienation and the human condition generally).
Sorry pal, but the dreaming part is over. NK has nukes and you'd better wake up to the fact.
Honorabrrlllllle Kamikaze pirots of Rllising Sun Empire of Japan!
You guys know the rest...
Nuclear Japan.........Chairman Mao, how does that sound? (laughing)
Of course Japan has been saying that they will strike out at Korea if the threat of an attack seems imminent.
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