Japan mulls missile upgrade
North Korea missile fear sets pre-emptive strike debate in motion.
Japan is debating whether to develop a limited preemptive strike capability and buy cruise missiles — ideas that were anathema in the pacifist country before the North Korea missile threat.
With revisions to Japan’s defence plans under way, ruling party hawks are accelerating the moves.
After being on the backburner in the ruling party for decades, a possibility of pre-emptive strike was formally proposed to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe by his party’s missile defence panel in March, prompting parliamentary debate, though somewhat lost steam as Abe avoided the divisive topic after seeing support ratings for his scandal-laden government plunge.
North Korea’s test-firing on Tuesday of a missile, which flew over Japan and landed in the northern Pacific Ocean, has intensified fear and reignited the debate.
Japan has a two-step missile defence system. First, Standard Missile-3 interceptors on Aegis destroyers in the Sea of Japan would shoot down projectiles mid-flight and if that fails, surface-to-air PAC3s would intercept them from within a 20km range. Technically, the setup can handle falling debris or missiles heading to Japan, but it’s not good enough for missiles on a high-lofted trajectory, those with multiple warheads or simultaneous multiple attacks, experts say.
A pre-emptive strike, by Japanese definition, is a step preceding the two-tier defence. Cruise missiles, such as Tomahawk, fired from Aegis destroyers or fighter jets would get the enemy missile clearly waiting to be fired, or just after blastoff from a North Korean launch site, before it approaches.
Japan’s self-defence-only principle under the country’s warrenouncing constitution prohibits its military from making a first strike, and officials discussing a limited pre-emptive strike are calling it a “strike-back” instead.
Whichever the language, it could strain its relations with China, which is suspicious of Tokyo’s intentions. There are gray areas as to how far Japan can go and still
Some experts are sceptical about how it would work. North Korea’s secretive, diversified and mobile launch system makes it extremely difficult to track down and incapacitate the weapons with Japan’s limited cruise missile attacks, security expert Ken Jimbo at Keio University said in a recent article. A pre-emptive strike capability would also require trillions of dollars to set up spy satellites, reconnaissance aircraft, cruise missiles, as well as training of special units, experts say.
Abe called Tuesday’s missile firing an “unprecedented, grave and serious threat”. Defence Minister Itsunori Onodera, an advocate of bolstering Japan’s missile and strike-back capability, said more provocations by the North are likely and Tokyo must quickly upgrade its missile arsenal.
The Defence Ministry justify minimum selfdefence. has
announced a record 5.26 trillion yen ($48 billion) budget for fiscal 2018, which would cover purchase of upgraded missile defence systems such as land-based Aegis Ashore interceptors or the Terminal High-Altitude Area Defence, or THAAD, a mobile equipment Washington and Seoul have installed in South Korea. Beijing, which says THAAD’s powerful radar can reach deep into China and wants it removed, could react sharply if it is installed in Japan.
Polls show most Japanese fear North Korea’s missile threat and support bolstering Japan’s intercepting capability, but in terms of pre-emptive strike, opponents overwhelmed supporters.