Friday, September 18, 2015

Towards a Muscular Japan

In July of 2013 I wrote


Shinzō Abe's landslide victory provided him with the mandate he truly craves. No, it isn't about implementing Abenomics and its three arrows for economics has never been Abe's passion, it is about restoring Japan to its glory as a muscular and militarized nation.

(From: Executing China's String of Pearls Strategy)

Now this:

Following boisterous confrontations in the Diet and more than three days of public protest, the Upper House finally enacted two divisive security laws early Saturday that will mark a significant departure from Japan’s postwar pacifism.
Enacting the contentious laws was one of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s long-held ambitions. His goal was to find a way to remove some of the key legal restrictions that the war-renouncing Constitution imposes on the Self-Defense Forces during overseas missions in order to strengthen Japan’s all-important military alliance with the United States.
Given the ruling coalition’s strength in both chambers of the Diet, the opposition camp was essentially powerless to stop him. It was thus reduced to obstructing the voting procedures and tapping public frustration with the legislation in hopes of rallying widespread resistance.
Abe’s team submitted the two bills to the Diet in May. Since then, more than 200 hours have been spent deliberating the legislation.
The Upper House’s final plenary session was called late Friday night as the opposition camp, led by the Democratic Party of Japan, delayed Diet procedures in protest by submitting no-confidence and censure motions against Abe’s Cabinet ministers in both chambers.
According to opinion polls, a majority of the public opposes the legislation and many think the government’s efforts to explain it fell short.
A poll by the daily Asahi Shimbun from Sept. 12 to 13 found that 54 percent of the 1,994 respondents oppose the bills and 29 percent support them.
One of them amends 10 existing security-related laws to lift various SDF restrictions, including Article 9’s long-standing ban on collective self-defense.
The other creates a new permanent law that allows Japan to deploy the SDF overseas to provide logistic support for United Nations-authorized military operations involving a foreign or multinational force.
Lifting the ban on collective self-defense, or the right to defend an ally under armed attack even if Japan itself is not, was long considered banned by war-renouncing Article 9 of the Constitution. So instead of formally amending the Constitution, which was considered politically unfeasible, Abe simply had the government’s long-standing interpretation of Article 9 altered to allow collective defense.
Source: Tha Japan Times

References:
Yoshida, Reiji, and Mizuho Aoki. "Diet Enacts Security Laws, Marking Japan’s Departure from Pacifism." The Japan Times, September 19, 2015, Http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2015/09/19/national/politics-diplomacy/diet-enacts-security-laws-marking-japans-departure-from-pacifism-2/#.VfxpAfnF_1E ed., National / Politics sec. Accessed September 18, 2015.

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