“ARTICLE 9. Aspiring sincerely to an international peace based on justice and order, the Japanese people forever renounce war as a sovereign right of the nation and the threat or use of force as means of settling international disputes. (2) To accomplish the aim of the preceding paragraph, land, sea, and air forces, as well as other war potential, will never be maintained. The right of belligerency of the state will not be recognized.”
So it says officially. But don’t hold on to it.
Because this is happening: http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/T130315004548.htm
Japan’s ruling party, the Liberal Democratic Party and two other parties in the House of Representatives (together controlling a vast majority) have put the unspeakable and impossible on the table: a revision of Article 9, the so called war-renouncing article of the Japanese constitution.
Of course the left wing, which has been slaughtered in the December 16 elections, is screaming, but I doubt anyone will listen. The LDP and Nippon Ishin no Kai won these elections because the people were worried about China becoming more and more aggressive (government agitators there even claimed that Okinawa was Chinese, based on the fact that at one time Okinawa paid tribute to China, but based on that argument all of East Asia, namely Korea and Japan, would be Chinese; China’s “historical rights” sound a lot like Hitler’s “right of self determination”) and North Korea playing around with nuclear bombs.
But that’s not all. Right now Japan is operating some very large helo carriers in the navy (yes, I call the MSDF navy), but they’re building a larger one. One that, if the talk behind the scenes is true, is F35 capable, which would give the MSDF a significant edge over both the Northies and China (they already have one, China’s naval force is utterly ridiculous.)
Another thing is also on the table: the ability for preemptive strikes against threats to Japan and her people, namely North Korean missile bases. http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/02/15/us-japan-defence-idUSBRE91E0DK20130215
And all of this comes in the wake of Obama’s re-election. The same re-election during which, in the final days, China’s aggression against Japan had skyrocketed to unprecedented levels.
It seems that certain people in the government and military in Japan have realized that the US is a paper tiger under Obama and that they can no longer be relied on in case the SHTF.
But fear not!
John Kerry is going to fix it all: http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/T130315004648.htm
Yeah right
World's Only Rational Man 
Over/under on when Japan announces they have the capability to filed a nuclear deterrent in 180 days?
Mine is two more rounds of appeasement by the Obamination towards the ChiComs.
I’m not sure they have to announce anything, they’re in a great spot overall, with far more leverage on other countries than people realize.
It is time for them to have the capacity of action; I think there was a time for that article, but it’s past now, and being interpreted by hostile interests as a vulnerability.
The “Helicopter Destroyers” of Japans are fascinating, as a practical matter Japan fields the second largest flattop force on the planet now. Which could probably be pushed in operational capacity with VTOL airframes.
Combined with their extensive submarine force and decisively equipped surface action combatants, people fail to see their naval assets as what they are: Second only to the US.
Their ability to act is realistically global and they have a station-keeping capable force that China simply doesn’t right now, any act of naval war close to Japan would be deadly unless Japan itself messes up the fight.
Further I doubt the Chinese see naval warfare in the modern sense; the fundamentals of how its fought changed in WW2, and when I look at the designs and commitments of most nations I do not see an understanding of its modern form.
But that modern form is what both the Japanese and US Navies are built around fighting. And I think, once engaged, the Chinese would break off pretty quickly, finding the costs distasteful.
Combined, the US and Japanese forces couldn’t be stopped by any agglomeration of other nations.
Absolutely. It’s why China has tried to provoke the MSDF into firing the first shot for months, even targeting helos and ships with radar. But too bad for China the MSDF crews are highly professional seamen, they won’t just start popping off rounds.
One on one, in a classic knife fight, I’m convinced that the Chinese navy has only one chance: run or face destruction.
And let’s not forget: China has lost every important war in its history. Every single one. They only “won” WW2 because of Japan expanding into the Pacific and pissing off the Americans. All the wars after WW2 China has also lost. India and Vietnam smacked them back. Except Tibet. But well, that was hardly a challenge to “win”.
Using AEGIS they don’t need the first shot. That system gives its crews far more thinking time in a combat environment.
I don’t think China is positioned for a fight at all, their only chance is a surprise attack which they aren’t realistically able to sustain the price of. Blowing a few things up is easy; keeping ships, thousands of sailors and tens of thousands of tons of supplies in action to maintain an advantage and utilize it is very different.
But for the U.S., there was no stopping Imperial Japan, the other allies really weren’t going to be able to.
Agreed on the read on the Japanese political situ. The “neighbors”–if they’re not going perpetual Nork crazy, are ALL making aggressive moves on Japan’s islands, at the same time–Russia and S. Korea, too. Bunch of t**ds. They’re acting like Japan is reliably both a sucker and a pushover. Actually, to me, the US/Japan strategical alliance is looking pretty tight right now. For all Obama’s manifest shortcomings, I’m not sure the Pacific/Asia policy is one of them (or at least, not much worse than Bush was or Romney would have been). I just wish Japan would stop talking about Ospreys in Okinawa. The Expat better half calls the Japanese “Heiwa baka” (“Peace idiots”), made idiotic by the prolonged comfort of peacetime. In this sense, the situation now is an interesting and probably appropriate wake-up call.
Question: I think Japan’s friendly “neighbors” don’t absolutely need superior naval power to threaten and bully Japan. They can just threaten to rain missiles (of whatever type) on Japan if they ever act up (that is, not roll over whenever pushed, and ever push back).
And I still think China’s using the Island issue to keep itself from imploding with it’s own enraged population, who are getting more and more p****d with their government. Though you are also right in pointing out before that this has not been working as planned. Still, China–one massive powder keg.
Correct. But the thing is, China has a HUGE army. The problem with that, however, is: they can’t really move it anywhere. The western Pacific has many islands, that requires lots of transports. And for now China has been sleeping on the navy part. Same with North Korea.
They can rattle all the sabers they want, but wars are still won on the ground with infantry and tanks and in order to do that, you need to bring those infantrymen and tanks to said ground. You can’t do by airplane.
Agreed on China being a powder keg requiring distraction. I think the problem they will have is that, well, in Germany in the 1920s and into the early 30s, when Adolf started to rise, nationalism wasn’t really that present. It took someone like Hitler and his minions to instill and awaken it from below. The Politüro in Beijing is trying to do it from above, and that’s not going to work on the long run.
Also, forget the economic issues China will face eventually. Their biggest problem is their massive lack of women. They’re lacking women in the millions, thanks to the one child policy. It’s estimated that more than 15 million girls were killed since the introduction of that. In some areas it’s completely unsafe for women these days, due to sex crime being through the roof. That is going to hurt them A LOT.
Even Hitler knew that a people doesn’t become extinct due to a lack of men, but due to a lack of women. Right now they have a lot of soldiers, but time’s against them.
The problem with the Japanese-American alliance has always been how DC handled it. I mean, right now, they go to great lengths to make sure that American servicemen don’t piss off some mohammedans in Whateverstan by drinking beer or having Bibles, but they’ve never, not once, shown the same care for the population of such a tong term ally. Regular scandals or even crimes aren’t going to help, especially not in the areas where lots of US troops lurk around, like on Okinawa. DC has completely failed to prepare US servicemen for duty in Japan for quite some time.
Yeah, why that level of laxity is permitted in the US military that that stuff is still going on in Okinawa. Point taken.
One of my points about China would be that this is not a conventional war. It’s a kind of “meme” war of moral attrition, based on modern victimology. In a sense they don’t have to move troops around. Their “troops” are crazed Chinese nationalists on fishing boats that they can send periodically into Japanese territorial waters to be willing martyrs or national heroes or both. (It’s not even a specifically commie thing, because the S. Koreans use the same tactic.) One stupid fishing boat and they can paralyze the Japanese. When that’s not enough they’d start sending more at a time. When it’s an actual war, they would presumably just fight it with missiles raining on Japanese cities (while they kept their ships and troops safe in various harbors and bunkers). All China’s military hardware and personnel could be the equivalent of a May Day parade, for saber rattling, mainly. You must be right that it could not be fielded successfully (I didn’t realize that), but I think they don’t have to be fielded successfully as that is not how they’d actually fight a “war”–if you can call it that. They’ll try to arrange it so that Japan is the “aggressor” and they can stoke up the Japan as genocidal aggressor meme.
Didn’t finish putting the first sentence together–> I can’t understand how that level of laxity is permitted among US servicemen, that it is even possible for them to still be roaming around the locales around the bases pulling that crap.
Notice how that “Japan is the aggressor” meme is usually only spun by the Big Four: the Koreas, China and Taiwan. You don’t really hear other countries scream it.
Indonesia and Singapore have both come out in the recent past and pretty much screamed at Japan for being to lenient with the Chinese intrusions. Of course they realize that China is the big bully in Asia, and they’re worried. Then you have India and Vietnam, who have both been attacked by China post-WW2 and even post-Vientnam War. They too don’t trust China. Then there’s Malaysia, they suffered under the Japanese, yes, but what’s going on today? Japanese companies are building power stations there. Economically Japan has growing ties with all those smaller ones.
So the Big Four are screaming pretty much by themselves. And these Big Four are what? Proper, free democracies? Hardly. North Korea, we don’t need to explain that one. China? Pretty obvious, too. South Korea? Well, no. Sure they have elections and all that, but their own history against their own people is just disgusting. We don’t know how many people were actually murdered in the anti-Communist massacres post-WW2. Estimates range up and above 1 million people and the government has covered this up into the 2000s, and is still distracting from it by screaming at Japan. Taiwan, sure, they too have their elections, but the treatment of the indigenous population by the nationalist Chinese invaders was hardly better than what they endured under the Japanese. In fact, when one can get closer to actual “Formosians”, it can happen that, especially old people, tend to say that it was better under the Japanese than under the Chinese.
Oh, did you see the speech from the new SK president? Her statement, how, even after 1,000 years the aggressors guilt still holds? She’s a complete retard.
PM Abe should take her up on this and demand compensation for the Mongol invasions.
I had forgotten Taiwan is being a t**d too. And I had been so favorably disposed toward the place.
Tending troops after they’ve landed is even worse than getting them there. It’s a huge commitment which China has not made the ships for. Planes without enough planes and ships to guard them will die to planes and ships, and the men will starve anyways when they’re cut off. Warships used as troop transports is just beyond a terrible idea (Guadalcanal for the IJA is a great representation).
But really they are running out of time, their population crunch is going to be brutal without a massive change internally, and it will cripple them as far as foreign power.
As far as Okinawa, I take accusations from the locals down there with a bucket of salt. The only thing that province ever gave me reason to do as regards them is doubt and expect corruption.
Well, there’s the old saying “amateurs discuss strategy, professionals discuss logistics”.
Okinawa has the problem of carrying a lot of US forces, but not well prepared US forces, mind you, and they have a long history of issues with US troops. The problems in general started shortly after the battle. The problems were never caused by combat forces, but always by garrison units. It has calmed down since the actual occupation ended, but the issue remains and pops up at times. Then add a certain naivety among the population. One of the most popular Okinawan songs talks about how “the war came” to the islands, which is complete rubbish. It’s actually kind of funny. Okinawa screams a lot, at everybody, the US, Tokyo, etc, but their distortion of history makes the crappy information in Yasukuni look like smart stuff.
The result of this combination is hardly good. And the issue remains: US troops are not properly prepared to deal with an ally, but to appease pretend-allies, who follow an ideology of pure hatred, DC goes to great lengths.
Heck. Egypt, which is about 10mm away from becoming another islamic theocracy, is getting $250 million in “aid”, and Japan has to pay $600,000 for the US taking care of some debris from the 2011 quake. The islamic countries get decent military hardware (not top of the line, no, but still pretty decent), but Japan can’t buy the F22.
DC caters to tyrants and pisses on the allies. But that’s DC for you. And I’m digressing.
“This is the imposthume of much wealth and peace,
That inward breaks, and shows no cause without
Why the man dies. I humbly thank you, sir.” ~Hamlet
Most of International Politics have the same disease right now, Xpat. An excess of wealth and ego, combined with a lack of the taste of “total war” to make fools of both sides. Until one day they both pick a pointless quarrel that neither can back away from. The risk I see is the clear technological edge in Japan, their Naval assets have incredible reach if provoked, but don’t have the cowed leadership the U.S. fleet does. I believe they’re more likely to use their ships decisively than we are ours.
With their recent upgrades (and scheduled upgrades) to both Sea and Ground defense assets they are well placed to control all but the most vicious of missile attacks; which, if China or Russia pushed to that extreme the U.S. nuclear deterrent would be expected to auto-respond.
The real key to Naval power is the ability to move the fight away from your borders, Japan can do that while China would be limited in trying to. If the ABM ships can be strung out closer to China than Japan their performance and ability will increase, and mitigate progressively more of the Chinese missile capacity. Further, there’s Malacca, which is China’s great Achilles heel and the original purpose of their Naval force modernization. Looking at the map, Japan’s strongest ally has friends in Taiwan, the Philippines, Australia and increasingly Vietnam along with India; Japan itself is growing closer to the Philippines and others, and as a result is building a road towards that strait. They probably could hold China’s Navy and move on the strait on their own, if they got US support the strait would be lost to China handily, which would compel an end to fighting far quicker than people would think. On the other side, all Japan HAS to defend in sea lanes is on the other side of their country from their foe, as long as the Pacific is open to the US and Panama, Japan can out reach Chinese attrition warfare.
As far as internals, it’s very common with the type of government in China to distract their people with outside enemies. Are we still at war with “Eastasia”?
Getting quite an education here from Edo and MG!