The security competition in Asia continues to intensify. Japan has recently announced a dramatic turnaround in its traditional security policy with a new security and defence strategy document and promises to junk its old policy of keeping its military budget below one per cent of GDP. Tokyo plans to develop a plethora of military capabilities to deter and, if necessary, defeat threats from China and North Korea.
While some argue that Asian countries are not threatened by China and are not seeking to counter it, Japan’s dramatic turnaround would appear to strongly suggest the converse. Especially since Tokyo’s traditionally limited defence spending has been touted as evidence of the lack of China-balancing in the region.
Moreover, the documents, many times obliquely and a few times directly, refer to China as the key security problem that Japan faces. The National Security Strategy, for example, states that “China’s current external stance, military activities, and other activities have become a matter of serious concern for Japan.”
Also read: China’s military power is catching up with its economic might. New era is indeed one of war
India’s takeaway
There are at least three broad conclusions and lessons that can be drawn from Japan’s change in strategic direction. First, and most basically, India needs to come up with its own National Security Strategy that outlines the key challenges that the country faces and how it plans to deal with these changes.
Even China, often rightly accused of a lack of transparency, produces periodic White Papers on defence. That they are bland is a different issue. The last public document that India produced was the Group of Ministers Report on National Security, which was not exactly a strategy paper and, in any case, is over two decades old.
Such a public strategy paper serves multiple purposes. For one, it is a necessary means to coordinate actions within disparate departments of the government, which often work at cross purposes enmeshed in bureaucratic politics. A single document will not solve these internal problems, but it will go some way in putting everyone on the same page. Having to coordinate and justify programmes and actions with reference to one broad strategic outline may introduce some discipline. A “whole of government” approach is an often-touted desire in the Indian government, but it requires a road map.
Moreover, it will signal to both friends and foes where India stands. This, of course, may be one reason why Indian decisionmakers do not want to bring out a strategy paper because they think it may cause trouble, especially with potential adversaries.
Another fear may be that it will reduce India’s strategic flexibility. These are not concerns to be dismissed lightly. For example, the Japanese strategy documents have been criticised by China, Russia, and North Korea. But as the Japanese strategy papers show, creative writing can be broad enough to dismiss such criticisms, especially from a country like China that shows little indication that any formulation of words will satisfy it.
Moreover, it is actions that count, and India’s stance, such as its membership of the Quad, has anyway come in for Chinese criticism. In any case, the Indian bureaucracy is smart enough to write in a way that also does not tie its hands in future.
Also read: How far will China go to help Russia? Xi’s in no mind to prioritise Moscow’s economic woes
Avoid over-dependence on US
The second conclusion to be drawn from the Japanese documents is that all countries in the region, especially those that are capable, need to shoulder a bigger part of the burden to counter China rather than depend on the US to do the balancing.
The charge that American allies were free-riding on the US for security has been a consistent issue in US relations with its allies and partners. This has been true both during the last Cold War and in the emerging security competition with China. This was a rational response on part of US allies because, in general, no country likes to spend its wealth on unproductive expenses such as national defence. This is particularly true in democracies, where governments must meet numerous social welfare demands that directly affect electoral calculations.
The temptation to free-ride is made worse when others are available to pick up the burden. In a bipolar Cold War competition, the US was the source of this temptation. Washington had little choice but to shoulder the burden of balancing the Soviet Union and pick up the slack caused by its allies and partners. The situation has only gotten worse since then, with most NATO members failing to live up to the promise of spending two per cent of their GDP on defence.
Japan has been somewhat different. Its legacy issues of regional imperialism made it sensitive to charges of renewed militarism and provided an additional rationale to free-ride on US security shields. Thus, while keeping its defence budget below one per cent was a commitment it made to demonstrate its peacefulness in a neighbourhood that was still suspicious of Japan, this was probably not the only reason.
Despite its legacy sensitivity as well as its free-riding temptation, Japan has now decided that its security conditions are severe enough for it to do more to shore up the security partnership with the US to counter China.
This becomes a greater imperative for US partners in the bipolar competition between America and China because the relative wealth balance between the two nations is much more even compared to the US and Soviet Union. This means that the US would not be able to disproportionately shoulder the burden of balancing China as it could with the Soviet Union. If Washington’s partners in Asia, including India, do not share a sufficient weight of the burden, China will not be balanced. In an extreme case, it could lead to a reduction in US commitment to balancing China, to the detriment of Asian powers.
A change in the burden-sharing proportions also requires a change in the responsibilities of the partners, something that Washington also needs to recognise.
Until now, the US has been able to put its larger concerns about stability ahead of the security requirements of its smaller partners. One example is nuclear weapons, where the US forced even its allies to depend on its nuclear guarantees, though it is not clear that they were necessarily well served by such a sacrifice. Taiwan, South Korea, and even Japan probably regret the choices they made in giving up their nuclear capability for American security guarantees, even if these were “choices” made under US pressure.
The new Japanese documents explicitly talk of buying longer-range retaliatory capabilities, such as the US-built Tomahawk cruise missiles. There are hopeful early indications that the US would be willing to share the weapons, which suggests that it is also recognising that it needs much more capable allies who can have their own offensive capabilities.
A related third conclusion is about the need for offensive retaliatory capabilities. Japan plans to invest in both cruise missiles and hypersonics. As the Russian war against Ukraine demonstrates, the lack of a retaliatory deterrence capability can open a country up to punishment. Bombing civilians, as Russia is doing, rarely help militarily, but they do open up the civilian population to danger in the absence of a retaliatory deterrence capability. India has invested in conventional and dual-use missiles, but given the China requirement, it probably needs conventional missiles with longer ranges. Of course, India also needs larger quantities, again considering China’s stock of conventional missiles.
The author is a professor of International Politics at Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), New Delhi. He tweets @RRajagopalanJNU. Views are personal.
(Edited by Tarannum Khan)