International Network of Engineers and Scientists Against Proliferation

Bulletin 19 - Missile Defense and North-East Asia

Does Japan Need Missile Defense or Missile Control?

Hiromichi Umebayashi

The fundamentals of the prevailing security scheme in North-East Asia are simple and closely linked with the military decisions of the United States. The United States, a non-indigenous player of the region, dominates the region through two bilateral military arrangements that are more than fifty years old, the US-Japan Security Treaty and the US-ROK (Republic of Korea) Mutual Defense Treaty. This is a very divisive scheme. An obvious drawback resulting from this is the absence of a standing diplomatic mechanism for security dialogues among concerned nations. Accordingly, any political-military developments with security implication in this region necessarily emerge against that obsolete military backdrop to start with.

Although the vital importance of any fora for regional cooperative security dialogues with participation of all the concerned parties is recognized by many observers, presently there exists no political momentum which may advance the state of play in this direction. On the contrary, political events are even adding obstacles to already formidable challenges.

Many factors are entangled here. The Japanese administration fears its lack of power to control the conservative factions within the coalition in the case that the past conduct of the Japanese Imperial Army should surface as a critical issue in the course of regional dialogues. Tokyo is also well aware that it risks strong US reaction if it goes too far. Both the ROK (South Korea) and the DPRK (Democratic People's Republic of Korea or North Korea) have many issues of priority between the two, ranging from separated family issues to political steps for reunification, which alone require enormous political deliberations and energy. While the security environment surrounding the Korean Peninsula has significant impact on these specific issues, one cannot deny that the North-East Asian regional developments are more subordinate to the inter-Korean developments, and not the opposite. Politically, China is placed more in the context of the global security, looking at Washington and Moscow, particularly because of the global implication of Taiwan issues and its nuclear arsenals. Also its priorities tend to revolve around the domestic economic and social development.

Under these circumstances, the benchmark to evaluate any on-going steps for regional security should be whether they would open a new window for regional cooperation. In this sense, the US Ballistic Missile Defense (BMD) plan which assumes that North-East Asia is one of the target areas is the worst example. By its very nature, the BMD concept physically singles allies out for protection and others for attack. State-of-the-art technologies are mobilized to perpetuate the division of the Cold War era.

However, an attempt with too obvious faults could serve as an alarm clock which has the potential to reach a far wider audience.

The impact of the Bush BMD version on Japan

After President Bush's speech at the National Defense University on May 1, 2001, the Government of Japan was forced to renew its official stance on the US BMD, because the speech suggested a possible contradiction with Japan's past explanation on why the US missile defense plan is consistent with long-standing Japanese nuclear disarmament policies. The renewed statement consists of five points.^[1]

(1)  Japan welcomes the further reduction of nuclear arsenals, which the Bush Administration has announced to undertake in a new strategic framework including Missile Defense (MD).

(2)  Japan shares the recognition with the US that ballistic missile proliferation poses serious threats on their security.

(3)  Japan understands that the US, while making various diplomatic efforts, is developing MD systems in order to counter such threats.

(4)  Japan intends to continue the US-Japan joint technical research on BMD.

(5) Japan hopes that the MD issues will be dealt with in such ways as contribute to the improvement of the international security environment, including arms control and disarmament efforts. In this context, Japan welcomes the US intention that it will discuss the matter fully with others including its allies and Russia.

The above statement is addressed to the Japanese audience and reflects the reality of public concerns that the Administration has to take into consideration. Item (5) above is particularly interesting. If literally interpreted, statement (5) does not exhibit any definite endorsement of the US MD plan, but sets some plausible pre-conditions for dealing with any missile defense plan. In other words, statement (5) implies a cooperative approach to the regional security. Moreover, it contradicts with Japan's own policy to continue the US-Japan joint technical research stated in item (4), because the continuation of the joint research is neither dealing with the issue so as to "contribute to the improvement of the regional security environment," nor does Japan discuss the matter with regional concerned parties such as China and the DPRK to such an extent that they understand the Japanese position. In this regard, the Japanese position is very much vulnerable to the domestic and regional opposition and susceptible to a more cooperative scheme.

Japan's nuclear disarmament policy and BMD

Statement (5) above results from Japan's cosmetic attempt to bring its policy on BMD on line with its nuclear disarmament policy, which is one of the pivotal subjects of Japanese diplomacy and is always under public scrutiny.

When then-Foreign Minister Yohei Kono welcomed Clinton's postponement of the NMD deployment decision at the UN Millennium Assembly in September 2000, he based his argument on similar considerations. He stated, "Japan hopes that this announcement will inspire a further deepening of the discussion on issues surrounding NMD. I hope other countries respond to this move by taking actions to avoid a vicious circle of an arms race, and to create a beneficent circle toward nuclear disarmament." However, Bush's BMD plan made matters worse. As Bush's possible abrogation of the AntiBallistic Missile (ABM) Treaty appeared to make nuclear disarmament difficult, Japan was forced to make it a precondition that the BMD should "contribute to the improvement of the international security environment, including arms control and disarmament efforts" while avoiding to express outright concern about the US policy.

However, Tokyo has never explained its position explicitly in relation to the ABM Treaty and START process after President Bush took the office. When Japan officially decided in December 1998 to go forward with the US-Japan joint research on technologies related to Navy Theater Wide Defense (NTWD), an upper tier sea-based system of Theater Missile Defense (TMD), one of its key rationales was that it was not related to the controversial US National Missile Defense and was compatible with the ABM Treaty. The system does, however, lo longer fit into Bush's BMD architecture.

Obviously, Japan was forced to shift from its publicly announced emphasis on the salience of the START process to its groundless expectation of a new framework which will lead to further nuclear disarmament. To underline this, the Government of Japan (GOJ) conspicuously expressed its welcome when Bush talked about a new strategic framework that included further reduction of nuclear weapons (afore-mentioned Statement (1)). Presently Japan is just waiting for an eventual settlement of the US-Russian negotiations with a hope that it will see an outcome consistent with its nuclear disarmament policy. On Nov. 13, 2001, President Bush and Russian President Putin agreed that both would reduce their operationally deployed strategic warheads to a level of 1,700 to 2,200. Although the GOJ intends to take full advantage of this agreement in order to appease the Japanese public concern, it will be faced with strong oppositions, given the disagreement between the two leaders regarding the treaty-based reduction and the preservation of the ABM Treaty. Also the announced pace of ten years for the reduction was too slow compared with START III which was planned to complete similar reductions by 2007.

Risks of US unilateral 'bilateralism'

The so-called unilateral approach of the Bush Administration is eroding the credibility of the bilateral relationship between Japan and the United States, although things are still proceeding under the surface. The perception of erosion might have significant implication in the regional security policy of Japan including its position on BMD. It will not mean any possible drastic change of the US-Japan relationship in the near future, but it will tend to give more room to the thinking of officials and experts in the administration to embrace arguments for the cooperative security approach in North-East Asia. The recent history relating to the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) is significant in this respect.

The White House intention to kill the test ban treaty has serious implications not only for the multilateral forum but also for the Japan-US bilateral relationship. For more than a decade, there has been a constant systematic pressure from the United States upon Japan that Japan should take more responsibility for global security issues. It has come to the point that the US touches the most sensitive domestic constitutional issue of Japan. Namely, an expert bipartisan policy report suggested Japan to alter its interpretation of the Peaceful Constitution that collective self-defense is unconstitutional. The report, issued in October 2000 and often tagged as Armitage Report,^[2] says, "Japan's prohibition against collective self-defense is a constraint on alliance cooperation. Lifting this prohibition would allow for closer and more efficient security cooperation." On one hand it says, "This is a decision that only the Japanese people can make," but on the other hand it pushes Washington to clearly encourage Japan "to make a greater contribution and to become a more equal alliance partner."

A landmark document for this trend is considered to be the 1996 Japan-US Joint Declaration on Security - Alliance for the 21st Century," signed by Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto and President Bill Clinton. The declaration has paved the way for the Japan Self-Defense Force to show presence more and more beyond its territorial border. The Japan-US security cooperation on global issues is not necessarily limited to military issues. It struck balance, even though insufficiently, by introducing the cooperation in other fields, including arms control and disarmament, at the center of which has been the CTBT. The two countries established the "US-Japan Commission on Arms Control, Disarmament, Nonproliferation and Verification," in March 2000 through the initiative of Japan. The immediate priority of the Commission was "strengthening the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) regime and bringing about the early entry into force of the CTBT"^[3] according to the joint press statement. Japan was enthusiastic about this development, saying in the press statement, "Today is a historic occasion." This was unilaterally discarded by the Bush Administration.

Independent and cooperative approach: missile control

Given the technological uncertainty, the enormous economic burden at the deployment stage, and the already predictable security instabilities, all of which is incompatible with Japan's long-standing nuclear disarmament policy, the only reason left for Japan's position of cautious 'understanding' of the US BMD plan and continuation of the joint technical research is considered to be Japan's belief that it enhances the credibility of the US-Japan security relationship. However, the credibility will not be a persuasive element to the public any more on the background of the recent history of the US "unilateralism." Rather, all the political circumstances surrounding the problem of regional missile threats encourage Japan to take a more independent and cooperative approach, including missile control and other means of missile threat reduction.

In discussing missile control and disarmament in North-East Asia, the following groundwork will be important for clarification:

1.   To draw a broad regional picture of threats of missiles and WMD (weapons of mass destruction). Which are the real threats from whom to whom? We have to look at long-range, intermediate-range and short-range capabilities with various warheads. Also we have to look at cruise missiles as well as ballistic missiles.

2.   To study the interrelationship between missile control and disarmament and the non-proliferation and disarmament of WMD in the regional context, with reference to a possible nuclear weapon-free zone.

3.   To discuss immediate practical measures toward confidence building such as test launch information exchange, test moratorium, and cessation of provocative military exercises.

This paper was written for the conference "Moving Beyond Missile Defense" in Shanghai on Nov. 30/Dec. 1 2001.

Hiromichi Umebayashi is President of Peace Depot, Japan, and International Coordinator of PCDS (Pacific Campaign for Disarmament and Security), Peace Depot, 3-3-1 Minowa-cho, Kohoku-ku, Yokohama, 2230051, Japan, tel. +81-45-563 51 01, CSJ15621@nifty.ne.jp.