TOKYO: Japan is expected to announce its biggest defence overhaul in decades this week, hiking spending, reshaping its military command and acquiring new missiles to tackle the threat from China.
The policies, to be outlined in three defence and security documents as soon as Friday (Dec 16), will reshape the defence landscape in a country whose post-war constitution does not even officially recognise the military.
"Fundamentally strengthening our defence capabilities is the most urgent challenge in this severe security environment," Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said at the weekend.
"We will urgently ramp up our defence capabilities over the next five years."
The shift is the result of Tokyo's fears about China's growing military strength and regional posturing, as well as threats ranging from North Korean missile launches to Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
Key among the new policies is a pledge to boost spending to two per cent of GDP by 2027 to bring Japan in line with NATO members.
That marks a significant increase from historic spending of around one per cent, and has sparked criticism over how it will be financed.
The money will fund projects including the acquisition of what Japan calls "counterstrike capacity" - the ability to hit launch sites that threaten the country, even preemptively.
Japan has previously shied away from acquiring that ability over disputes on whether it could violate the constitution's limit on self-defence.
In a nod to the controversy, the policy documents will reportedly insist that Japan remains committed to a "self-defence-oriented security policy" and will "not become a military power".
Part of that capacity will come from up to 500 US-made Tomahawk cruise missiles Japan is reportedly considering purchasing as a backstop while it develops longer-range missiles domestically.
"GREATEST STRATEGIC CHALLENGE"
Japan has also announced plans to develop a next-generation fighter jet with Italy and Britain, and is reportedly planning to build new ammunition depots and launch satellites to help guide potential counterstrikes.
The changes will also affect military organisation, with the Nikkei newspaper reporting that all three branches of the Self-Defense Forces will be brought under a single command within five years.
The SDF presence on Japan's southernmost islands will be increased - including a tripling of units with ballistic missile interception capacity, according to local media.
The documents, including the key National Security Strategy, are expected to point to China for the shift in policy.
Japan's ruling party reportedly wanted to term Beijing a "threat", but under pressure from its coalition partner will settle for dubbing China a "serious concern" and Japan's "greatest strategic challenge".
That still represents a sea change from 2013, the document's first iteration and the last time it was updated, when Japan said it sought a "mutually beneficial strategic partnership", a phrase expected to disappear now.
Worries about China have deepened since major military drills carried out by Beijing around Taiwan in August, during which missiles fell in Japanese economic waters.
Japan is also expected to call Russia a challenge, compared to a 2013 pledge to seek cooperation and "enhance" ties.
Japan has joined Western allies in imposing sanctions on Moscow over Ukraine, sending already frosty relations into deep freeze.
The radical defence overhaul is likely to anger Beijing, which has regularly referenced Japan's wartime belligerence in criticising Tokyo.
It may also cause waves domestically, though surveys show growing support for a stronger defence strategy.
"For Japan's defence policymakers, these developments represent not a militarist resurgence but the latest step in a slow, gradual normalisation of defence and national security posture," said James Brady, vice president of Teneo consultancy.
Japan military probe finds more than 100 sexual harassment cases
TOKYO: Japan’s army on Thursday (Dec 15) fired five servicemen and punished four others in a sexual assault case brought by a former soldier, prompting a rare investigation across the Defense Ministry that found more than 100 other complaints of harassment, officials said.
Rina Gonoi filed a sexual harassment case with the Defense Ministry last year, saying she had suffered multiple assaults by several male colleagues, causing her to give up her military career.
Of the five servicemen who were dismissed from the army, four had admitted their assaults and apologised to her in October. A fifth was found to be a mastermind of the four.
Additionally, the ministry punished four others. The then-commander of the company in Fukushima that Gonoi belonged to was suspended for six months for not carrying out proper investigation, while another one was reprimanded for verbal sexual harassment and two others were reprimanded for overlooking the problem.
Army chief Yoshihide Yoshida repeated his apology to Gonoi and said, “As head of this organisation, I feel a strong sense of responsibility over (Gonoi's) sorrow and pain." He said he takes the problem seriously and is determined to “eradicate harassment”.
In one incident in August 2021, the senior male colleagues pressed the lower part of their bodies against her in a dorm at a training ground, forcing her to spread her legs, as more than 10 other male colleagues watched and laughed, but none tried to stop them, Gonoi said.
“I hope the four assailants, regardless of the seriousness of their punishment, sincerely take their responsibility,” Gonoi tweeted in response to the measure taken by the ministry Thursday.
The investigation into her case was dropped in May. After she quit the army and disclosed her allegations on social media, Gonoi submitted a petition signed by more than 100,000 people to the Defense Ministry in August seeking a reinvestigation of her allegations by a third party.
She also said that she had received information about dozens of other service members who had been harassed while on duty, as well as from parents who were worried about the safety of their daughters in the military.
Preliminary results of a ministry-wide harassment investigation launched in response to Gonoi's case found 1,414 complaints, the ministry said in a statement Thursday.
About 84 per cent of the complaints were about power harassment, while sexual harassment accounted for 116 cases, or 7.7 per cent the ministry said. By organization, the army was the most harassment-prone, with 822 cases, or 58 per cent, followed by the navy's 279 cases, or 19.7 per cent, and air force at 203 cases, or 14.4 per cent.
Gonoi said she went public because she wanted to help others who cannot raise their voices.
In a country where gender inequality persists, sexual harassment is often disregarded and the #MeToo movement has been slow to catch on as many still suffer silently.
https://www.channelnewsasia.com/asia/japan-military-sexual-harassment-probe-more-100-rina-gonoi-3147461
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