/ world today news/ Only 13% of Japanese agree to defend their native Japan
Recently, one of the participants in the talk show “The Big Game” on the 1st channel of the Russian TV stated that Japan has allegedly already announced its readiness to go to war for Taiwan. The expert’s speech, as they say, was a little too much.
To date, only Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s words on this matter are known, when, after US President Joseph Biden confirmed his intention to “protect taiwan”including by force of arms, he said that in this case Japan would not be able to stand aside.
Kishida chose his words carefully when asked if the Japanese side was ready to send troops to defend Taiwan, and said he would like to avoid talking about it.
I contacted my Japanese colleague, a well-known political science professor in my country, asking him to comment on the Russian expert’s statement. And I got the following answer: “Japanese diplomats, guarding themselves, do not make such risky statements. There is no such information.”
Japan’s position in the event of an escalation of the situation around Taiwan is also of interest to the Europeans. My attention was drawn to an article in the French Le Monde that read: “Deciding to abandon the pacifism enshrined in law because of the threat from China, Japan developed a new military strategy. With this move, it has two goals: to strengthen defenses and to show Washington that Tokyo will be loyal to it in the upcoming US war with China.
How loyal though? Now Kishida is scaring the Japanese: “Tomorrow the Far East may become today’s Ukraine”. The authors of the article in Le Monde recall that the prospect of Tokyo’s intervention in a potential conflict became more likely in 2015 and call this date “strategic turning point”.
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s government then urged Japan to acquire the right to “collective defense”. This concept, enshrined in legislation in September of that year, allows the Japanese Self-Defense Forces, until then limited to the defense of the archipelago, to participate in military operations alongside an ally that has been attacked by a third country.
The author of these lines does not believe that the direct participation of the Japanese Self-Defense Forces in the battles in Taiwan and in the surrounding waters with the army and navy of the People’s Republic of China is inevitable. However, it is not excluded that Tokyo will take over the role of a base for the material supply of the US armed forces and the treatment of wounded American soldiers.
Japanese hawks think otherwise. “We must send a clear signal to Beijing that we have the necessary military means to destroy the invader.” said Kuni Miyake, a former counselor at the Japanese embassy in Beijing and now a political television commentator. He has no doubt that in the event of a Chinese attack on Taiwan, “Japan will be drawn into the conflict regardless of the degree of American response”.
Le Monde quotes the opinion of Daisuke Akimoto, a specialist at the Institute for Security and Development in Stockholm, who is also categorical: “If China attacks Taiwan and the US intervenes, Japan will immediately enter the war as America’s ally.”
The aforementioned Kuni Miyake believes that the state of public opinion allows politicians to make even stronger statements: “pro-Chinese capitalists retired or died. They gave way to a generation more determined in favor of strengthening the country’s strategic potential.”
For example, if the adoption in 2015 of the law on the right to “collective defense’ led to large-scale opposition actions, the publication of the new strategic documents at the end of 2022 provoked only modest protests.
It must be recognized that if the Americans use their armed forces directly in the event of the unification of Taiwan with the PRC through non-peaceful means, they can demand that Japan send its self-defense forces to the front.
The World writes: “In the event of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan, which is about 100 kilometers from the southernmost island of Japan’s Yonaguni archipelago, Mr Michishita of the Grips Institute for Policy Studies identified three possible scenarios: ‘Either Tokyo decides to stay out of the conflict, which is highly unlikely, either with a 30% chance of offering logistical support to US troops based in Japan or sending its soldiers alongside US forces…” The same Mr. Michishita considers the latter scenario the most likely.”
However, the prospect of a third Sino-Japanese war in history is not so clear. I would like to recall the comparison of the commander of American troops in Japan, Joel Vowell: “Japan is like Poland. The Philippines is like Romania. China is like Russia. And Taiwan is like Ukraine.
This refers to a situation where the United States will pump weapons into Taiwan and, without going to war, will limit itself to providing intelligence to Taipei and sending military advisers. Another thing is that the tiny island of Taiwan could quickly be occupied by Chinese troops and blockaded by the Chinese navy, making it difficult to provide any US military assistance.
French analysts cannot avoid the question of whether the Japanese will agree to die for Taiwan. “Public opinion polls (in Japan) show lack of unanimity,” says sociologist Paul Jobin of the Institute of Sociology at the Academia Sinica in Taipei. “China, more than North Korea or Russia, is seen by the Japanese as a threat, but their sympathy for Taiwan does not mean they are ready to support military intervention to protect the island.”
According to the World Values Survey, the Japanese, like the Germans, are the least pro-war. In 2019, when asked “Are you ready to fight to defend your country?”, only 13% of respondents in Japan said yes; 48% chose no and 38% said they were undecided. In China and Taiwan, respectively, 90% and 70% of respondents answered positively. Moreover, the question was not about participating in a war somewhere abroad, but about the defense of Japan itself.
Panic-mongering about a supposedly imminent Chinese invasion of Taiwan is artificial. Beijing has developed plans to return the rebel province by peaceful means, as it did with Hong Kong, for example. Beijing can resort to armed force only in one case: if the Taiwanese authorities, encouraged by Washington, decide to declare their island an independent state.
Translation: ES
Subscribe to our YouTube channel:
and for the channel in Telegram:
#Tokyo #SinoJapanese #war
