Pacifist Japan is stepping out of the diplomatic shadows and enacting tough measures in a show of support for West-led actions against Russian aggression in Ukraine. Experts say the bolder diplomacy is one of the clearest indications that the country is eager to strengthen its solidarity with the world order by openly supporting democratic causes and taking on rights advocacies.
Beneath that eagerness, however, is a wariness of what could also happen in its backyard.
“Japanese leaders view the invasion of Ukraine as a wake-up call for East Asia that is also facing its own Cold-War related conflicts,” comments Kunihiko Miyake, research director at the Canon Institute for Global Studies in Tokyo. “There is now a move to improve national deterrence that can stand up against countries that rock the status quo.”
The actions of Japanese officials somewhat mirror what the public seems to be thinking. In its March 13, 2022 editorial, Japan’s largest daily, the Yomiuri Shimbun, noted, “Germany has decided to increase its defense spending in response to the Ukraine conflict. Japan also urgently needs to drastically strengthen its defense capabilities.”
The Hiroshima Peace Memorial is ground zero of the bombing of Hiroshima in 1945. As Japan’s role as a World War II aggressor ended soon after the bombs were dropped here and in Nagasaki, the country has since taken a pacifist stance in matters of global armed conflict.
Meanwhile, a survey conducted by the Tokyo Broadcasting Television network on March 6, 2022, showed that 86 percent of those polled were worried that China could act like Russia over territorial claims with Japan.
There was also overwhelming support — 86 percent — for accepting refugees from Ukraine. The same poll revealed that just 26 percent favored Japan pursuing an individualist policy to a decline of four percentage points from a similar survey taken in late February.
At the Diet recently, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida noted, “China and Russia have maintained close relations and promoted military cooperation around Japan. We need to watch them closely.“
Japan has shaky relations with its big neighbors Russia and China, both of which are led by autocratic leaders. Despite peace treaties and close economic ties, Japan has territorial disputes with both countries. Sino-Japanese ties are dogged by historical issues such as Beijing’s claim over the Senkaku islands, or Daioyu in Chinese. Friction from this dispute is causing naval clashes between the two countries in the Sea of Japan.
Japan has also been demanding from Russia the return of four islands belonging to the Kuril island chain since the end of World War II. The islands lie north of Hokkaido and are referred to collectively as Northern Territories by Japan.
Regular missile launches by Pyongyang toward Japan over the past years have added to Tokyo’s worries.
Once the aggressor
Since the end of World War II, however, Japan has retreated to the sidelines in matters concerning armed conflict. One of the aggressors in the Second World War, the country lost to Allied troops and was forced to take a pacifist stance.
Article 9 of the postwar Japanese Constitution reads: “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.“
“In order to accomplish the aim of the preceding paragraph, land, sea, and air forces, as well as other war potential, will never be maintained,“ it continues. “The right of belligerency of the state will not be recognized.“ The charter maintains as well that Japan’s Self-Defense Forces are restricted from participating in joining conflicts overseas.
Japan’s defeat in August 1945 also led to the U.S.-Japan security treaty that was first signed in 1960 and is the lynchpin in Asia supporting democracy and a rules-based international order. But changes are being pushed in response to the Ukraine war that Miyake, a national security and foreign affairs expert, views as “expanding the bilateral security treaty” as Japan works closely with the West.
At this point, Japan has already announced that it will limit imports of Russian oil and gas. Japan has extended all-out cooperation in the sanctions against Russia imposed by the countries led by the United States and is accepting Ukrainians fleeing the war. It is also banning exports of oil refining equipment to Russia and dual-use products to Russian ally Belarus, as well as imposing sanctions on the Belarusian Defense Ministry.
Marking an even rarer move, the Japanese government will be providing defense equipment to Ukraine such as bulletproof vests, a decision made by the National Security Council, according to Japanese media reports. “Our nation will continue to collaborate with the Group of Seven nations and the international community toward an improvement in the situation,“ Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno said during a March 8, 2022 press conference.
The nuclear bogey
The decision by the European Union to also extend military weapons — for the first time — to the Ukrainian government now fighting Russia has led to reopening the debate among conservatives and pacifists in Japan on the taboo topic of accepting U.S. nuclear weapons.
Sources: Tokyo Broadcasting Service, The Mainichi
The United States has several military bases across Japan. The Japanese government considers them as enhancing the country’s security, but not one among the bases has nuclear weapons. Other U.S. bases in Asia also do not host nuclear weapons full-time. There are, however, U.S. nuclear weapons currently deployed in Europe.
On March 3, influential former prime minister Shinzo Abe, who heads the largest support group in the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, referred to the policy of nuclear-sharing of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Said Abe: “It is only natural to discuss how to protect the independence of our people and Japan, considering the reality we are in.“
However, such talk is upsetting the likes of Professor Tadashi Okimura of the Hiroshima Peace Institute, who would rather the government follow an individual policy on the war in Ukraine that respects Japan’s pacifist security stance. This is even as the Hiroshima Peace Institute has issued a declaration denouncing “Russian President Vladimir Putin’s statement and actions suggesting the possible use of nuclear weapons.“
Hiroshima, along with Nagasaki, experienced the trauma of nuclear weapons when the United States dropped atomic bombs on the two cities at the end of World War II. The top officials of the two cities lead the international nuclear non-proliferation movement.
While he condemns Putin’s war-mongering and the threat it has posed to the rules-based international order, Okimura insists Japan must stand firm in its support for a peaceful end to the ongoing war.
“By siding with the West, Japan has shut out its role to lead in a ceasefire process,“ says the international relations expert. “I strongly believe the way forward for Japan, in the long run, is working more closely with international organizations that focus on bringing peace and order in conflicts.“
Social worker Kayuki Kondo also has reservations about Tokyo’s actions in support of the West-led policy regarding the war in Ukraine.
People in Shibuya, in Tokyo, march against the Russian invasion of Ukraine in March 2022. While only less than two percent of the yearly refugee applications from other nationalities are accepted in Japan, the country is more open to receiving displaced persons from Ukraine.
Kondo is the spokesperson for the International Social Service Japan, a social welfare organization that has long lobbied for the rights of international refugees to enter Japan. She points to the swift decision to accept Ukrainians fleeing the war as a sign of politics taking priority over humanitarian needs.
“I am very surprised at the quick political decision taken for Ukrainians,“ she says, “when it has taken many years for other nationalities to be recognized.“ Japan accepts less than two percent of refugee status applications annually.
“Japan’s Ukrainian war policy needs a more comprehensive public debate,“ Kondo says.
Eight displaced Ukrainians have already arrived in Japan, and many more will be accepted to live and work in Japan, according to government policy. Companies have also begun offering them jobs.
Ukrainians already living in Japan have voiced support for Japan’s decision to impose sanctions on Russia and Belarus. Maryna Amauri, who runs a restaurant, says that she is hoping her mother who is still in Ukraine will soon join her in Japan.
She says, “I am grateful to Japan’s extension of support.“ ●
Suvendrini Kakuchi is a Sri Lankan journalist based in Japan, with a career that spans almost three decades. She focuses on development issues and Japan-Asia relations.
