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Tokyo, Oct. 2 (Jiji Press)--The Japan-Philippines acquisition and cross-servicing agreement, or ACSA, signed this year will be applied for the first time at an upcoming bilateral drill, Japanese Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi said Friday. At the six-day Doshin-Bayanihan 6-26 exercise set to kick off Sunday in the Philippines, the country's Air Force will provide Japan's Air Self-Defense ...
Tokyo, Oct. 1 (Jiji Press)--Japanese Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi and his Mongolian counterpart, Damba Batlut, agreed to advance defense cooperation between their countries in a meeting at the Japanese Defense Ministry in Tokyo. In Wednesday's meeting, the two also confirmed their intention to work together to maintain and strengthen a free and open international order based on the rul...
Tokyo, Sept. 30 (Jiji Press)--The U.S. military is planning to bring a Typhon mobile intermediate-range missile launcher to its Kadena Air Base in Japan's southernmost prefecture of Okinawa as early as mid-October for storage there. The Japanese Defense Ministry is seeking understanding for the move, stressing that it will strengthen the deterrence and response capabilities of the Japan-U.S...
Naha, Okinawa Pref., Sept. 27 (Jiji Press)--A Chinese marine research ship was spotted within Japan's exclusive economic zone off Okinawa Prefecture on Sunday, the Japan Coast Guard said. The research ship Kexue was seen dropping what appeared to be a wire into the sea within the EEZ about 72 kilometers north of the southernmost prefecture's Ishigaki Island, according to the 11th Regional C...
Tokyo, Sept. 24 (Jiji Press)--The government of Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi plans to ramp up the country's defense capabilities in its southwestern region following the election of a conservative governor in Okinawa Prefecture, southernmost Japan, for the first time in 12 years. The so-called Nansei shift is aimed at countering increased Chinese military activities, but some loca...
Chinese panellists and experts at the Xiangshan Forum have warned against Japan’s remilitarisation amid reports that Tokyo is considering raising its midterm defence spending to 3.5 per cent of GDP. Japan might raise its midterm budget to 3-3.5 per cent of the country’s gross domestic product in line with Nato and other US allies, Bloomberg reported earlier this week, as the US pushes its allies in Asia and Europe to boost their own defences. At the three-day defence gathering in Beijing on...
Tokyo, Sept. 16 (Jiji Press)--Japan's Air Self-Defense Force concluded on Wednesday that the Global Hawk reconnaissance drone that lost communication and went missing crashed off the western prefecture of Tottori. The ASDF will set up an accident investigation committee and continue searching for the unmanned aircraft in areas around the presumed crash site. According to the ASDF, the ai...
Tokyo, Sept. 15 (Jiji Press)--Japanese Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi has condemned pro-Iran Houthi rebels in Yemen, which are stepping up its attacks in the Bab el-Mandeb Strait and other locations. In phone talks with Yemeni Foreign Minister Afrah Al-Zouba on Monday, Motegi said that the Houthis are posing a significant threat to free and safe navigation. The Bab el-Mandeb Strait is a...
The risk of a conflict over Taiwan is shaping Japanese defence planning, with Tokyo shoring up security at home and abroad for a potentially prolonged fight. But there are economic, demographic and political constraints on how far its military transformation can go. In the third of a three-part series, Gabriel Dominguez examines the various challenges confronting Japan in its bid to expand its military. Driven by the growing risk that a conflict over Taiwan could draw Tokyo into a high-intensity...
By 2045, Japan’s Self-Defence Forces (SDF) could shrink to 130,000 personnel – nearly half today’s strength. But Tokyo has already ruled out one think tank’s controversial fix: recruiting foreign nationals. The proposal formed part of a report written by a panel of senior former defence bureaucrats and military chiefs, released by the Sasakawa Peace Foundation on September 2. It attracted widespread comment, both supportive and critical, before Defence Minister Shinjiro Koizumi made the...
The risk of a conflict over Taiwan is shaping Japanese defence planning, with Tokyo shoring up security at home and abroad for a potentially prolonged fight. But there are economic, demographic and political constraints on how far its military transformation can go. In the second of a three-part series, Gabriel Dominguez examines how Tokyo is building military resilience within its territory. Japan’s recent purchase of a former Nippon Steel site to build a sprawling new defence hub points to a...
Tokyo, Sept. 8 (Jiji Press)--Japanese Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi on Tuesday strongly urged Iran to exercise maximum restraint over attacks on civilian vessels passing through the Strait of Hormuz, a key chokepoint for crude oil shipments. During phone talks with his Iranian counterpart, Seyyed Abbas Araghchi, Motegi expressed his concern about the continuing attacks on civilian ship...
Chinese cities must brace for a potential nuclear attack, a new study has warned, singling out Japan for “sending a major danger signal” to the world. The report, from a People’s Liberation Army medical team, said the likelihood of a large-scale global nuclear war was relatively low. “However, the possibility cannot be ruled out that small or medium-sized nuclear-armed or potentially nuclear-armed states, driven by geopolitical or religious conflicts, could carry out a single nuclear-weapon...
Tokyo, Sept. 7 (Jiji Press)--Japan, the United States and South Korea kicked off their Freedom Edge 2026 joint military exercise on Monday with an opening ceremony at the U.S. Air Force's Yokota Air Base in Tokyo. This year's exercise, the fourth of its kind and the first since last September, is apparently intended to demonstrate trilateral cooperation amid concerns over North Korea and Ch...
Japan’s Mogami-class warship is turning out to be a hot item among global navies. Australia is buying 11, New Zealand is considering putting in an order – and now, even the United States is showing interest. According to a US Naval Institute report published on Tuesday, government and naval planners are looking at three possibilities: Japan’s Mogami-class frigates, South Korea’s Chungnam guided-missile frigate and Turkey’s Istanbul-class warship. This is the first time since World War II that a...
Washington is considering using Japanese, South Korean or Turkish frigate designs to expand the country’s naval fleet as the American shipbuilding industry struggles to meet demand, according to US media reports. The move comes after President Donald Trump signed a National Security Presidential Memorandum on August 13 calling for the use of foreign shipbuilding capacity and investment. However, the plan is likely to face strong opposition in Congress. Potential contenders for the US Navy’s new...