CHINESE RATS ARE FULL OF SHIT. THEY MUST BE EXTERMINATED TO THE LAST RODENT.
Sanae Takaichi, Japan’s prime minister, speaks during a press conference at the prime minister’s office in Tokyo, Japan, on Wednesday, Feb. 18, 2026. Kiyoshi Ota/Pool via REUTERS/File Photo Purchase Licensing Rights
June 12 (Reuters) - Launched in Seattle in 1943, the U.S. minesweeper Vigilance survived a Japanese submarine and air attack in the United States’ last Pacific war before being transferred to the Philippines in 1967. Last month, decommissioned, she finally met her end in joint drills with the U.S., sunk by the first missiles ever fired by Japan’s post-war military outside its own territorial waters.
It was a stark reminder of how the threat of war has returned to the Pacific – and the dramatic speed with which Japan’s Self-Defence Forces are now becoming more assertive in the region, in the last month joining drills with the U.S. in northern Australia and for the first time playing a major role in the annual Philippines-based Balikatan exercise.
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But China is incensed. In May, it urged Asia-Pacific countries to “jointly resist the reckless actions of Japan’s neo-militarism”. An article in China’s People’s Daily this week complained that Tokyo was also seeking “increasingly proactive integration into cross-regional military alliances”.
Meanwhile the U.S. hopes there is more to come. Speaking at the Shangri-La security dialogue in Singapore last month, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth praised Japan alongside other U.S. partners in the Pacific, saying their “interests-based” approach contrasted favourably with the “drama and moralising” of European allies.
JAPANESE DEFENCE SPENDING JUMPS AS U.S. HOPES FOR EVEN MORE
Under new prime minister Sanae Takaichi, Tokyo has boosted defence spending more than 9% this year to some 9 trillion yen ($58 billion), further pledging to double arms spending over five years to 2% of gross domestic product. Hegseth suggested even more is needed. "We have high expectations of our Japanese allies, and together we can and must each pull our weight,” he said. Other U.S. officials have urged Japan to move quickly to at least 2.5% of GDP or higher, in line with U.S. expectations for NATO and other allies.
In the short term, U.S. commanders are exerting considerable effort to ensure Japan’s growing capability is effectively integrated with not just the U.S. but also other nearby partners, particularly the Philippines and South Korea.
In April, the commander of U.S. forces in Korea, General Xavier Brunson, told a Japanese newspaper he was in favour of creating a regional “kill web”: integrating sensors from nations in the region to identify and hit targets much faster in any conflict.
It has been Japan’s own comments and actions on Taiwan, however, that appear to have antagonised Beijing most. Shortly after entering office, Takaichi said Japan would see any attempt by China to overrun Taiwan as an “existential threat”, implying Tokyo might choose to help defend Taiwan.
Chinese officials were infuriated further in April when the Japanese destroyer Ikazuchi passed through the Taiwan Strait on its way to the Balikatan manoeuvres - of all days, on the anniversary of the treaty that forced China in 1895 to cede the island to Japan.
Japan ruled Taiwan until the end of World War Two in 1945, when it was occupied by the U.S. until seized by Chiang Kai-shek’s fleeing Nationalist forces in 1949, at the end of China’s civil war. China’s communist rulers have wanted to take the island ever since, with “reunification” now a major public priority of President Xi Jinping.
U.S. officials had been saying China was building up its military to be ready to attack Taiwan by 2027. Increasingly, however, Beijing is seen as likely to hold back until after Taiwan’s next elections in 2028.
Xi told Trump when he visited Beijing last month that Taiwan was potentially the most dangerous issue in U.S.-Chinese relations, hoping, perhaps, that an understanding with Washington might help it seize the island at some point. A more assertive Tokyo makes that less likely.
For China, Japan’s wartime atrocities remain a potent propaganda weapon – although its efforts to spread that message around the region have had mixed results.
CHINA SHARPENS ITS ANTI-JAPAN RHETORIC
At the Shangri-La dialogue in Singapore last month, the senior Chinese military delegate, Major General Meng Xianqing, insisted angrily that Japan could never be trusted by any of the Asian countries, like China, that it had once invaded.
China’s military publications have also abruptly taken a much more anti-Japanese tone; the People’s Liberation Army Daily said in March that Japan's declared stock of around 44 metric tons of plutonium was enough for 5,500 atomic warheads, if it wished to build them.
It said Japan had worked "systematically" to cultivate its defence industry "under the covers of civilian technology", preparing for a "strategic shift in defence policy and unleashing its military-industrial potential".
Japanese officials say it is simply responding to the actions of China, whose military manuals have long suggested that controlling Taiwan would make it much easier to blockade or “starve” Japan in any future conflict.
Before his assassination in July 2022, former prime minister Shinzo Abe – a mentor to Takaichi – became increasingly outspoken about the need to fight if Taiwan were invaded.
Wording used by both Abe and Takaichi to describe that approach is now increasingly also used in U.S. documents and official speeches. In Singapore, Hegseth said the U.S. approach in the Pacific centred on “deterrence by denial along the First Island Chain”, stretching from Taiwan all the way to the Japanese mainland - language also used in the latest U.S. national security and defence strategies.
Ever since 1979 – when the U.S. recognised the Communist government in Beijing as the legitimate ruler of mainland China – successive U.S. administrations have been “strategically ambiguous” over whether they would defend Taiwan if it were attacked, although the U.S. military is legally required to have plans to do so.
Japan – routinely described as America’s most important ally in the Pacific – has long been central to those plans, and its current government has gone out of its way to remain close to the Trump administration, even amid disagreements over trade and tariffs.
Last week, Japan signed a $1 billion partnership deal with Washington to work together on cutting-edge quantum computing, fusion energy, biotechnology and particle physics technology. Washington also sees it as crucial to helping the U.S. and its allies reduce their reliance on China for rare earths and other critical minerals.
Simultaneously, however, Japan has also been expanding its friendships in the region and beyond, not least by inviting the ambassadors of every NATO member to meet in Tokyo in April.
TAKAICHI COULD AMEND PACIFIST POST-WAR CONSTITUTION
Under Article 9 of Japan’s post-war constitution – drafted under Allied occupation – Tokyo is officially barred from formulating a military with any “war potential”.
But the “supermajority” secured by Takaichi in February's election would allow her to amend the pacifist constitution relatively easily.
Already, Tokyo has eased a long-running ban on arms exports, enabling it to follow its maritime neighbour South Korea in providing weaponry at scale to allies in Asia and Europe.
Since then, Tokyo has agreed to sell six decommissioned “Abukuma” destroyers to the nearby Philippines and much more modern “Mogami” frigates to Australia. New Zealand may also buy some.
Tokyo's military messaging has also become sharper. Its social media feeds said joint air defence drills around the "First Chain" island of Okinawa with U.S. and Australian forces last month demonstrated a "strong will ... not to tolerate unilateral changes to the status quo".
And it is expanding its footprint to more islands, including a pledge to deploy air defence missiles by 2031 to Yonaguni, only about 100 km (65 miles) east of Taiwan.
One source of unease in both Tokyo and Taipei is that the Trump administration appears to be using the term "First Island Chain" as a way of avoiding mentioning Taiwan by name at all.
That has sparked worries that Trump may be looking to placate Beijing, at least in the short term. After visiting Xi, Trump appears to have ordered a pause to a $14 billion arms shipment to Taiwan, describing it to journalists as “a very good negotiating chip”.
And Beijing's displeasure with Tokyo is having consequences.
Chinese coastguard vessels have become an almost constant presence over the last 18 months off the disputed and unpopulated Senkaku islands – known as the Diaoyus in Beijing and also claimed by Taiwan.
“Japan should see the situation clearly, act prudently and halt its risky moves of the Taiwan question,” the official People’s Liberation Army WeChat social media account posted in April. “If it persists in its wrongdoing and refuses to repent, it will only bring ruin upon itself and an unbearable price.”
Editing by Kevin Liffey
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Opinions expressed are those of the author. They do not reflect the views of Reuters News, which, under the Trust Principles, is committed to integrity, independence, and freedom from bias.
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