Japan and global security

Akira Kato, Asahi Shimbun/Tokyo

The United States is pressing ahead with its planned global transformation of U.S. armed forces both in terms of hardware (equipment) and software (strategy).

As far as hardware is concerned, there is a revolution in military affairs. This concerns precision guidance weaponry, such as cruise missiles and weapons systems with high mobility, including C17 transport aircraft.

In terms of software, the United States is shifting its emphasis from an anti-Soviet deterrent-oriented game plan to a risk-management anti-terrorist strategy. It is centered on the notion of pre-emptive strikes.

In keeping with this military transformation, the U.S. government is also moving ahead with new alliances centered on "a coalition of the willing" rather than ones aimed at countering the former Soviet threat. Traditionally, the United States has maintained ``forward deployment'' bases on the front line during peacetime as a deterrent to enemies. But to meet the change in strategy, it is reorganizing its bases on a grand scale, moving them to the rear in times of peace and to improve their mobility and ability to project forces to the front when emergencies arise.

As far as U.S. forces in Japan are concerned, the plans include integrating the Fifth Air Force command in Yokota in western Tokyo with the 13th Air Force command in Guam. In addition, the Pentagon intends to relocate the command of the U.S. Army's I Corps currently based in Washington State to Camp Zama in Kanagawa Prefecture. Other than that, there seems to be no major restructuring at this time.

This is because the U.S. Army, which is the main target of reduction, has only about 2,000 troops in Japan. The U.S. military presence in Japan is mostly made up of some 19,000 Marines and 14,000 Air Force personnel who are already highly mobile.

However, there is a possibility that U.S. forces on Okinawa will be reorganized in the future, given the fact that Japan's southernmost prefecture is geographically close to China, which is rapidly modernizing its military, and North Korea with its suspected development of nuclear weapons. As such, the region is deemed to be more vulnerable than during the Cold War.

One possibility is to transfer some U.S. troops stationed on Okinawa to bases across the Asia-Pacific region in Guam, Australia, Singapore and elsewhere.

In trying to meet future Japanese security concerns, in addition to reorganizing U.S. bases, it is important to focus on the restructuring of alliances and the U.S. military as a whole.

In the U.S.-led war against terrorism, beginning with the military campaign in Afghanistan, Japan has been very supportive. It has made a positive contribution to the war effort as a member of the coalition of the willing.

As a result of the ongoing reorganization of alliances, the Self-Defense Forces have been virtually incorporated into the U.S. forces transformation plan both in terms of hardware and software. One can argue that they are gradually becoming part of the U.S. military.

For example, in the area of hardware, the SDF is pushing ahead with development of new weapons technology, including missile defense systems, in cooperation with the United States.

As a result, Japan now has to re-examine its three basic principles on weapons export.

In terms of software in the form of legislation, Japan has enacted sets of special measures laws to deal with terrorism and the dispatch of SDF to Iraq to keep in step with the U.S. strategy to counter terrorism.

If the SDF develops even closer cooperation with the U.S. military in its fight against terrorism, debate on constitutional revision concerning the right to collective self-defense will likely intensify. In fact, it could become a major political problem.

The U.S. government appears set to turn its mainland into a fortress by using the troops it pulls out from overseas bases to protect it. At the same time, it seems to be counting on the armed forces of its allies in the coalition of the willing to play the role of "sakimori" soldiers garrisoned in remote posts to substitute for U.S. soldiers stationed aboard.

Will Japan be a U.S. sakimori in Asia and the Pacific? Or can it build an alliance with the United States as an equal partner? Japan is standing at the most crucial crossroads since it signed the revised Japan-U.S. Security Treaty in 1960.

The author is an Obirin University professor specializing in conflict research and a former researcher at the National Institute for Defense Studies.