US, Japan deepen strategic alliance to deter China

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Japan, already Washington’s most important ally in the Indo-Pacific, is deepening its strategic partnership with the United States in an effort to counter China, a development that will be showcased this week with a reshuffle of Corps units. US Marines in Okinawa and a The White House hugs Prime Minister Fumio Kishida.

Kishida’s visit to Washington comes as his political standing falters, his approval ratings in polls often below 40% and President Biden keen to give a stalwart partner a boost. It also follows Japan’s announcement of a major increase in defense spending and a new national security strategy that calls for a counterattack or long-range strike capability to enable it to reach targets in mainland China.

The meeting between President Biden and Prime Minister Kishida will highlight the pivotal moment we find ourselves in for the U.S.-Japan alliance, White House officials said in a statement to the Post.

Japan, which this year holds the presidency of the Group of Seven industrial democracies, has also taken important steps to hold Russia accountable for its invasion of Ukraine, becoming the first country in Asia to join Western democracies in punish Moscow. Kishida, risking the wrath of China, has spoken out publicly about the dangerous potential for conflict in Asia over Taiwan. Perhaps most remarkable of all, Tokyo has set aside decades of self-imposed constraints on the military as it faces growing security threats and the risk of war in the Indo-Pacific.

It’s about Japan essentially aligning itself with the United States, in many ways as a NATO ally, said a senior administration official, who like several other officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations.

Suspicious of China, Japan unveils new national security strategy

State and Defense Department spokespersons declined to comment.

This week, the two allies will announce the reassignment of a Marine Corps regiment based in Okinawa to be able to disperse quickly to fight in austere and remote islands by 2025, according to several American officials. The Marine Corps plans to equip the regiment with advanced capabilities, such as anti-ship missiles that could be fired at Chinese ships in the event of a conflict in Taiwan.

It is one of the most significant advances in the posture of US forces in the region in at least a decade, the officials said. Japan is significantly improving its capacity, but also providing more capacity to the United States, the administration official said. It reflects a far less ambivalent Japan, a Japan willing to play a bigger role in its own defence.

In the past, the administration official said, Japan would have resorted to a kind of checkbook diplomacy and essentially asked the United States to handle security in the region. What they’re doing now is something quite different and quite substantial, which is basically saying, count on us. And that’s a big problem.

Kishida promised Biden last May that Tokyo would embark on a substantial increase in defense spending, which Japan announced last month, officials said. Tokyo specifically asked Washington to save the marine regiment’s announcement for the two-plus-two meeting of the two countries’ defense and foreign secretaries this week to come after Japan deploys its budget and of its national security and defense strategies in a synchronized manner. , they said.

Japan is stepping up its efforts and is doing so in close cooperation with the United States, White House officials said.

But the Kishida-Biden meeting is about more than specific deliverables or topics, he said. This is an opportunity to take stock of the past year and how we have taken this alliance to unprecedented heights and beyond.

Some policymakers, such as Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-Wis.), chairman of the new select committee on China, are supportive but want to see more action. Neither this administration nor the previous one, he said, appeared to have acted with the sense of urgency required to build a credible deterrent against China.

I will praise it when it becomes a reality, Gallagher said when told of the upcoming announcement.

But administration officials say the changes Japan has pledged to make are significant. His planned increase in defense spending to 2% of gross domestic product over 5 years would make his defense budget the third largest in the world. Its decision to build its own long-range missiles and meanwhile to buy American Tomahawks as an interim step is a major advance in counterattack capability and a signal to China that aggressive moves in the region will not go unchecked. response, they said.

Japan to buy Tomahawk missiles to boost defense amid war fears

Japan’s approval of Marine Corps restructuring comes as China pursues a vast military buildup, including expanding its already world’s largest navy and nuclear program, all part of the Beijing’s goal of becoming the world’s preeminent military by 2049.

Japan and China are also engaged in a long-running territorial dispute over the Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea northeast of Taiwan, where escalation could result in the United States pledging to defend Japan in under a security treaty in a conflict with China. .

When it comes to the security partnership, Japan stands out, said a second US official. The British, the Australians are very, very important to us, but none of them provide us with the capabilities that Japan offers. None of them harbor the forces they harbor. None of them have the economic size of Japan, he said.

Senior U.S. military officials in Washington and the Pacific have been discussing a restructuring of the U.S. Army and Marine Corps for several years, particularly to counter growing concerns about Chinese military growth and unpredictable actions.

The heavy concentration of the US military in Okinawa, about half of US troops in Japan are stationed there, and a number of criminal incidents over the years have long been a sore point for the Japanese, and Okinawans in particular. The fact that they are doing it anyway shows how much the relationship has changed and that support for the alliance also extends to Okinawa, said Christopher Johnstone, president of Japan at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and former White House director for East Asia. He talks about political developments in Okinawa and the urgency of the threat.

While the total number of personnel assigned to Marine units in Okinawa remains generally stable at around 18,000, it’s not just about corps, but about capabilities, the second official said. They will move faster. With more firepower.

Over the next few years, the goal is to provide the regiment with ground-launched anti-ship missiles, part of the military plan to be able to target adversaries from multiple domains simultaneously air-to-air, air-to-ground, ground – to sea, sea to land, and so on, the official said.

The Pentagon also wants to be able to rotate Marines to some of the more remote islands southwest of Okinawa, where they will train and perhaps position equipment there, to develop the ability to deploy quickly if China attack Taiwan, officials said. Some of the southwestern islands, known collectively with Okinawa as Ryukyus, are only about 100 miles from Taiwan, about the same distance that separates the self-governing island from mainland China.

The Marine Regiment reinforces Japan’s status as by far the most important ally in preparing for a crisis in Taiwan, Johnstone said. That’s really the center of what we were doing here.

On Tuesday, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin warned that U.S.-Japan military cooperation should not harm any third-party interests or undermine peace and stability in the region.

The Okinawa reshuffle follows the creation of a similar unit in Hawaii. There, the Marine Corps took an existing infantry headquarters, the 3rd Marine Regiment, and turned it into the 3rd Marine Regiment Littoral. In Okinawa, the Marine Corps will reallocate the 12th Marine Regiment, an artillery headquarters, to create the 12th Marine Littoral Regiment. The service also plans to move an infantry headquarters now on Okinawa, the 4th Marine Regiment, to Guam, where it could serve as a base for the Third Littoral Regiment beginning in 2027, a third US official said. This unit will be called the 4th Marine Littoral Regiment.

The units comprise up to approximately 2,200 personnel each and are designed to rely on amphibious ships and other warships to conduct long-range missile strikes, coordinate air and missile defense and support other ground troops in the area. Among the weapons they are supposed to use is an anti-ship weapon known as the Navy Marine Expeditionary Ship Interdiction System, or NMESIS, which is launched from the rear of combat vehicles.

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