Japan says it will create an amphibious warfare unit modelled on the US marines to protect its outlying territory in new defence guidelines that cite concern about China's growing military muscle.
The midterm defence programme sets aside almost 24.7 trillion yen (about €175 billion) in military spending from 2014 to 2018, an increase of roughly 5 per cent from the last five-year plan.
Japan's cabinet has already approved the defence package, which comes amid growing tensions with China and a bitter standoff over disputed islands that lie between the two countries.
Political ties have turned toxic since Japan in effect nationalised three of the five Senkaku Islands last year. Beijing, which calls the territory Diaoyu, has launched dozens of incursions into Japan’s declared territorial waters. In September, Tokyo warned it would shoot down unmanned Chinese drones near the islands, a threat Beijing said would constitute an “act of war”.
Beijing has infuriated Tokyo by recently declaring an air defence identification zone covering a huge tract of the East China Sea, including the disputed islands.
A summary of the new national security strategy warns that China has been “rapidly advancing its military capabilities” and has tried to “change the status quo by coercion” in the sea and air – a reference to the island row. The document criticises what it calls a lack of transparency in China’s military spending.
Chinese military budget
"China's military budget has increased 30 times over the last 10 years," said an official with Japan's defence ministry, who requested anonymity. "In contrast, Japan's budget has been levelling off or shrinking for the last 20 years. China's publicly announced annual spending is twice Japan's."
Beijing says Tokyo is protected by its military alliance with the US and does not need to build up its armed forces. The China Daily said yesterday that under Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe, Japan had "increased regional tensions and revived concerns about [its] militaristic past".
Mr Abe has built a reputation for hawkish views and has repeatedly warned about China’s growing military might.
He has pledged to build new army bases on Japan’s southwest flank and broaden the military’s role, which conservatives say is too constrained by the nation’s pacifist constitution. One of Mr Abe’s earliest acts in office this year was to authorise Japan’s first rise in military spending in a decade.
Last month he established a Japanese version of the US National Security Council.
Government officials denied yesterday that the new strategy would end Japan’s pacifist stance but said the nation had to confront “complex and grave national security challenges”. They said this situation meant Japan had to develop a policy of what they called “proactive pacifism” and work more closely with the US military.
The new guidelines leave the number of Self-Defence Force (SDF) personnel the same but budget for a large increase in the hardware of marine warfare, including seven more destroyers and six more submarines, along with drones and amphibious aircraft.
“The SDF will develop full amphibious capability in order to land, recapture and secure without delay in case of any invasion to any remote islands,” it says.
Analysts warn Japan’s strategy could bring confrontation with China closer but the mood for compromise has faded since the territorial row began, said Tetsuo Kotani, a research fellow at the government-linked Japan Institute of International Affairs. “To have dialogue with China we need to strengthen our defence posture,” he said.
