"Japan’s Quiet Preparation for War: How to Defend its People" - by CWP's Ayumi Teraoka
“Implementation” has been the guiding principle for Japanese defense planners since the release of the most recent National Security Strategy (NSS), National Defense Strategy (NDS), and Defense Buildup Plan (DBP) in December 2022.1 These three documents collectively marked drastic changes to Japan’s longstanding defense policies by committing the country to increase its defense budget toward 2 percent of its GDP and substantially improve both the hardware and software of the Self-Defense Forces (SDF).2 Since taking office in October, Prime Minister Ishiba Shigeru has promised to continue his predecessors’ efforts to reinforce Japan’s defense capabilities.3
Among the seven key fields the NDS identified for Japan’s defense reinforcement efforts, the procurement of new weaponry and assets, such as stand-off strike capabilities, as well as the modernization of the SDF’s command and control (C2), have rightly drawn considerable scholarly and media attention.4 These efforts have profound implications not just for Japan’s defense posture but also for the organization of the US-Japan alliance. Following Tokyo’s decision to reform the SDF’s C2 structure by establishing the new Japan Joint Operations Command (JJOC), US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin announced in July 2024 that the Pentagon would upgrade the U.S. Forces Japan (USFJ) into a joint force headquarters, serving as JJOC’s counterpart.5 That Japan’s move prompted the United States to better prepare its military structure for a regional contingency in the Indo-Pacific was an unprecedented dynamic in the decades-long history of the alliance. Historically, it was almost always the United States that raised the alarm on military readiness with Japanese counterparts.
Tokyo’s rare initiative in this realm was also indicative of the mounting sense of urgency within Japan. After decades of trying to shape the trajectory of China’s rise, the Japanese government has finally acknowledged in the 2022 NSS that its neighbor has now grown into “an unprecedented and the greatest strategic challenge in ensuring the peace and security of Japan.”6 The Chinese military has been ever more active around Japan’s borders in recent months, and the possibility of a contingency in the Taiwan Strait looms large in the minds of Japanese security planners.7
Ayumi Teraoka is Postdoctoral Research Scholar in the Weatherhead East Asian Institute at Columbia University. Previously, she was an America in the World Consortium Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Texas at Austin. Her research focuses on coercive diplomacy, alliance politics in the Indo-Pacific, and Japanese foreign policy and national security. Her current book project, Strategy of Alliance Management: Procedural Autonomy in U.S.-China Competition, examines the interactive effects of U.S. alliance management efforts and China’s attempts to weaken U.S. alliances from both historical and contemporary perspectives. Her writing has appeared in PS: Political Science & Politics, Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs, The Japan Times, and Foreign Policy, among others. She is a past recipient of numerous fellowships and grants, including Princeton University’s A.B. Krongard fellowship, the Lynde and Harry Bradley fellowship, and the Smith Richardson Foundation’s World Politics and Statecraft Fellowship.
Photo Credit: By Chitrapa at English Wikipedia - Transferred from en.wikipedia to Commons., Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2106983
