SCS Today : Japan should beware of the deep US vs China undercurrents Amid Growing Tension Some commentators have recently extolled the virtues of Japan’s increased military presence in the South China Sea. But this is a bad idea for Japan and the region because it will draw it closer to fight with China.
Under pressure from the United States to aid China containment, Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has stretched the envelope of its pacifist constitution, reinterpreting it to allow the use of force to defend itself and its closest ally and security guarantor, the US. Back in 2017, Takayuki Kobayashi, then defence vice-minister, said: “China is attempting to make changes in the South China Sea with bases and through acts that exert pressure is altering the status quo.”
In recent years, Japan has engaged in naval exercises with the US, Canada, France, India and several Southeast Asian states with South China Sea that rival China’s. Earlier this year, Japan sent its helicopter carrier Izumo on a tour of the South China Sea, calling at Singapore, Indonesia, the Philippines and Sri Lanka before joining a naval exercise in the Indian Ocean with India and the US. It was Japan’s largest show of force in the region.
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