Japan's Decaying Antimilitarism Ecosystem

J apan’s postwar military posture has always demanded careful analysis, given its intricacies and implications for East Asian security. Right now, it warrants even greater attention with the government’s avowed intention in its 2022 National Security Strategy (NSS) and National Defense Strategy (NDS) to “fundamentally reinforce Japan’s defense capabilities.”1 Tom Phuong Le’s Japan’s Aging Peace: Pacifism and Militarism in the Twenty-First Century forms a key part of the debate on Japan’s military trajectory and should be read by all scholars and practitioners engaged in this topic. It contains much that is valuable, innovative, and provocative. At the same time, the volume presents overextended claims and argumentation that undermine its conclusions and impact. These issues were evident upon the volume’s release in mid-2021, and events thereafter—Japan’s further “major shift” or “major transformation” of its defense posture—have confirmed these flaws.2 The essential contention of Japan’s Aging Peace is that many scholars and practitioners, and particularly “realists,” have too readily accepted the factors contributing to Japanese “remilitarization” or “normalization” but have not focused enough on the continuing and dominant strength of internal obstacles—both material and ideational—in forming an “antimilitarism ecosystem” (p. 33) that prevents Japan from remilitarizing, or at least remilitarizing along a certain trajectory. If Japan is experiencing any change in its military posture, then it is toward types of “militarism” that leave the constraints of the past intact and contribute to nontraditional security objectives, such as UN peacekeeping operations and humanitarian assistance and disaster relief.