China’s growing nationalism and assertive foreign policy particularly over territorial disputes have made Tokyo to think over its pacifist constitution particularly article 9.
The constitution, also known as the “postwar constitution or the “peace constitution”, is most characteristic and famous for the renunciation of the right to wage war contained in article 9.
The constitution was drawn up under the Allied occupation that followed World War II and has intended to replace Japan’s previous militaristic and absolute monarchy system with a form of liberal democracy. Currently, it is a rigid document and no subsequent amendment has made to it since its adoption. Due to this pacifist constitution, Japan relies on US for external security matters.
After returning to power in 2012, Abe has set about transforming Japan’s foreign policy. He has emphasized on three pillars of Japan’s foreign policy, which are strengthening the Japan-U.S. Alliance, deepening cooperative relations with neighboring countries, and strengthening economic diplomacy as a means to promoting the revitalization of the Japanese economy.
To counter the rising dominance of China on Asia Pacific, Abe has put stress on transforming Japan’s military strategy and forming close alliances with US, ASEAN, India, Australia and South Korea.
Japan’s growing militarization
Abe has proposed a 5 percent increase in defence spending to $240 billion for the next five years. As Abe is very well aware that Tokyo can never match Beijing’s rapidly growing defense budget or the size of the PLA (People’s liberation Army), he therefore, wants a military doctrine that will leverage the Japanese lead in technology, focus on Chinese vulnerabilities and let Tokyo stare in the Beijing in the Eye.
The second most important development in this regard is release of country’s first-ever national security strategy. This comes just weeks after China declared a new air-defense identification zone in the East China Sea, covering the disputed islands that Japan calls the Senkaku and the China the Diaoyus. Abe has underlined the importance of a “dynamic deterrence” and “active defense” against the growing Chinese military challenge. Japan will now develop a marine corps of its own, integrate unmanned drones into defense plans, strengthen its capacity for real-time military intelligence, and respond effectively and immediately to Chinese intrusion into the disputed air and maritime spaces.
Abe is complementing changes in the military strategy with policy change and institutional innovation. HE wants to lift the ban on Japan’s arms export in order to strengthen the domestic defense industrial base. He is also trying to dismantle the many self-imposed political constraints on Japan’s ability to cooperate with other nations in securing the region from military threats.
Alliances
Abe is very well aware that Japan on its own can’t balance China, whose comprehensive power is growing by day. Therefore he is focusing on making closer alliances with US, India, ASEAN, and Australia. Alliances, therefore, are central to Abe’s strategy, specially the longstanding one with the US.
As the China’s dominance on the region is growing and that of US is declining, some in Japan are indeed questioning the overreliance on US for security. Some in Japan also doubts the US commitments. Will the US defend Japan against China, when Washington’s stakes in a good relationship with Beijing have risen so much in recent years?
Abe is now focusing more on developing strategic partnerships with key ASEAN neighbors. In an intense round of diplomacy over the last year, Abe travelled to all the 10 countries of Southeast Asia and held a summit meeting with the leaders of ASEAN in Tokyo in December. The message from Abe was that Japan was not going to stand by and quietly watch Southeast Asia slide into China’s sphere of influence.
China and Korea have reacted harshly to this development while the ASEAN countries are eager to see Japan contribute actively to the construction of a stable regional balance.
Abe’s “Democratic Security Diamond”
The day after Shinzo Abe was elected for a second time as Prime Minister of Japan, He proposed “Democratic Security Diamond” in Asia Pacific whereby Australia, India, Japan and the US form a diamond to safeguard maritime commons stretching from Indian Ocean to the western Pacific.
Some has marked this attempt as a revival of his controversial and short-lived 2007 initiative, the quadrilateral dialogue or quadrilateral cooperation. The proposal was not materialized at that time because of strong protest from Beijing.
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