JAPAN: COLLECTIVE SELF-DEFENSE

WHAT IS ABE'S REAL MOTIVE FOR COLLECTIVE SELF-DEFENSE?

Editorial

The Asahi Shimbun, February 9, 2013

The administration of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has taken a first step toward allowing Japan to exercise its right to collective self-defense. At Abe's request, an advisory council of experts has begun to discuss the issue.

Abe says the move is aimed at strengthening Japan's security alliance with the United States.

In what way, then, does he want to change the bilateral alliance? Won't the change that he envisions set the stage for a gradual erosion of the pacifist principles of the postwar Constitution?

Abe should offer clear answers to these and other key questions at the outset of the policy debate on this issue.

If Japan were to exercise its right to collective self-defense, it would regard an attack on the United States, Japan’s ally, as an attack against itself and mobilize its Self-Defense Forces to fight against the attacker along with the United States.

In the postwar period, Japan has consistently held the position that its use of armed force must be limited to the minimum necessary for self-defense under the restrictions imposed by the war-renouncing Constitution.

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