It is, rather, a central component of Prime Minister Abe’s nationalist agenda on security affairs.
Supporters of the alliance in the US over the years have encouraged Japan to lift the prohibition on collective self-defence. But in recent years the US has achieved its goal of raising alliance efficiency through enhanced operational integration between the two forces irrespective of Japan’s internal discussion on collective self-defence.
Under former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, Japan used ad hoc legislation, rather than changing the interpretation of its constitution, to justify the deployment of its Self-Defense Forces to perform rear-area logistical support and non-combat activities in the American-led wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. The prohibition on collective self-defence, therefore, has not been a real impediment to the actual operations of the alliance. This issue has become even less important for the US because of the withdrawal of American forces from Iraq and the pending withdrawal from Afghanistan.
What Abe really intends to do is to give Japan a more muscular military posture and allow greater scope of action for its defence forces. It is part of his long-held ambition to break away from the postwar system that restricts Japan’s military role. This naturally causes wariness among Japan’s neighbours, and should also be alarming to Washington, the architect and maintainer of that system.
Abe is likely to push his agenda by exploiting tensions between Japan and its neighbours. At present the Japanese public remains divided on whether to change the constitutional interpretation of collective self-defence. Within the Japanese government there are also cautious voices holding back Abe’s agenda. Facing these obstacles, Abe may be tempted to exaggerate external threats so as to justify his policy and prevail in domestic debates. The last time Abe attempted to reinterpret the constitution he played up the North Korean threat, this time it’s the China threat.
One may argue that Japan is merely ‘normalising’ its foreign and security policies. But China and South Korea are unlikely to accept a Japan that expands its military role without coming to terms with its history of aggression and colonialism. In other words, a Japan with a ‘normal’ military posture but ‘abnormal’ views of history and international morality would only deepen mistrust among the countries of Northeast Asia.
Washington is not unaware of the problems arising from Abe’s political ambitions. American officials have in various ways warned about Abe’s nationalist statements on history, which would jeopardise security co-operation between Japan and South Korea, two US allies in the region, and inflame relations with China.
The US also takes a divergent view from Japan on collective self-defence, per se. While Abe’s advisory panel tasked with reconsidering the legal basis for collective self-defence and other security matters clearly stated that the purpose of their study was to address the challenges posed by growing tension in Japan’s surrounding areas, the US sees the issue from a different perspective. When asked about her attitude on this question, the new US Ambassador to Japan, Caroline Kennedy, replied that she hoped Japan would play a more active role in the international community, but the only example she gave for this was Japan’s participation in international peacekeeping operations.
The gap between Japanese and American views seems more pronounced when it comes to their threat perceptions in the region. Japan names China as a top threat to its national security, while the US sees North Korea as its immediate security concern. Talking about America’s future in Asia, US National Security Advisor Susan Rice said that American and Chinese interests can and should be more closely aligned on many major challenges, which is most evident in confronting the North Korean threat.
As such, Japan’s security policy agenda under the Abe administration is not only alarming to its neighbours, it also contradicts US security interests in the region. Abe is misreading regional trends and creating new obstacles to building trust.
Gui Yongtao is Associate Professor at the School of International Studies and Assistant President of the Institute of International and Strategic Studies, Peking University.
A longer version of this article was published on Global Asia.
Associate Professor Gui appears to be suggesting that Abe’s desire for collective self-defence equates with a desire to act belligerently.
Any military repositioning that Japan has undertaken since 2012 has been done with the aim of protecting what Japan considers to be its sovereign territory. One country that has threatened that sovereignty is China. Hence successive governments of Japan (not just that of Abe, but that of Kan and Noda) have responded to that threat.
Giving Japan a more muscular military posture does not mean that Abe seeks military adventures abroad. In an era of collective management of international crises (civil war, disaster management), for Japan, an economic superpower, to stand aside and decline to contribute to the international response to such events (much of which involves the use of military assets) because of constitutional limitations would be counter-productive and contrary to Japan’s national interest.
If Professor Gui believes there is a gap in US and Japanese perceptions of threats in the Asia region, this is contrary to the vast amount of literature produced over the past three years that suggests the exact opposite. Both countries regard China and North Korea as threats, although Japan gives greater emphasis to North Korea for the simple reason that North Korea has a tendency to shoot missiles over Japanese territory and has previously kidnapped Japanese citizens.
Ultimately Associate Professor Gui is merely repeating the mantra of the Chinese Communist Party regarding Abe’s intentions. If it really wanted to know what Abe thinks, perhaps it might be better to speak to him rather than attempting to condemn him using academic and public forums abroad.
Is PM Abe a nationalist? Most certainly. Is he a historical revisionist? The evidence is clear that he is. Yet is his desire for Japan to exercise collective self-defence proof that he is seeking to antagonise both China and South Korea, and that he wishes to jeopardise relations with both of those countries and the US in order to achieve “a more muscular military posture”? That depends on how you interpret PM Abe’s comments on collective self-defence.
In public interviews, press recordings, and Diet speeches, PM Abe has repeatedly said that collective self-defence means cooperation with other nations in responding to threats that transcend borders. The most fervent advocate of collective self-defence within the LDP, Secretary General Ishiba Shigeru (himself a former defence minister), has written that collective self-defence does not mean that Japan will seek out foreign wars to engage in, but that it will fulfill its obligations to the international community (particularly when the UN is unable to act as a result of veto powers of permanent members of the UNSC) and to its principal ally, the United States (as outlined here in Japanese http://ishiba-shigeru.cocolog-nifty.com/blog/2013/09/post-9fdf.html, and in Chapter Two of Ishiba’s book “Kokunan: Seiji ni gensou wa iranai”, Shinchousha Press, Tokyo, 2012, pp.49-142).
As the Advisory Panel on Reconstruction of the Legal Basis for Security established by the Abe government has yet to reach a verdict on whether collective self-defence can be exercised via constitutional re-interpretation or whether it requires a revision of the constitution, all of which will impact upon the course Abe takes for collective self-defence, it seems premature to conclude that Abe is motivated by nationalist sentiment that ignores Japan’s obligations to its alliance with the US or that Abe is insincere in his desire for Japan to contribute to global peace.
As for the US position on Abe’s desire for collective self-defence, Ambassador Kennedy, before she was appointed to that position, told a US Senate hearing that she considered this issue one for the Japanese people themselves to discuss, but that the US would support such discussions (http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2013/09/24/national/transcript-of-caroline-kennedys-senate-hearing/. Rather than alarming the US, such debate appears to have been condoned by the US, as demonstrated by the joint statement released after the U.S.-Japan Security Consultative Committee (SCC) meeting that convened in Tokyo in October last year, whereby the US said that it welcomed Japanese efforts to examine the right to collective self-defence (http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2013/10/215070.htm).
If my original post insinuated that Associate Professor Gui was not entitled to express his opinion, then for that I do apologise as that was not my intention. Rather, it was an observation that portraying PM Abe as a ‘destabilising’ factor in East Asia has been an editorial line from China that does not seek to find a compromise between both countries but places undue emphasis on Abe and his beliefs as the root cause of tensions in the East Asian region.
Professor Gui’s argument steps on wrong premises, but makes somewhat right conclusions. Claiming that “in recent years the US has achieved its goal of raising alliance efficiency” by Koizumi’s use of ad-hoc legislation is close to laughable. One has to remember the caricature that were the Japanese “non-combat troops” in Iraq were effectively body guarded by Australian and British troops of the same if not greater number. US “efficiency” has never been the goal in this “coalition of the willings” anyway.
Similarly, the claim that “lifting the ban on the exercise of the right to collective self-defence is not driven by the imperatives of the US-Japan alliance” is plain wrong. One has to examine the US-Japan history of relationships to discover even at first glance that US regretted ever promulgating the peace clause in the constitution as soon as the constitution was passed.
That is a pity, because professor Gui’s conclusions are largely correct. But the one-sidedness of his premises takes away from his persuasive power. It is hard to disagree that a nationalist emancipation agenda lurks in the back of Abe’s actions. But in this he is supported by the US, which in my humble lame opinion is pursuing a policy of offshore balancing and setting up the region for permanent volatility.