The Takaichi administration is pushing ahead with plans to create an exception to one of Japan’s three principles concerning nuclear weapons, but the move is facing resistance within the ruling party.
A senior government official said Nov. 11 the administration intends to allow nuclear weapons into Japan in certain emergency situations, and include that exception in three key national security documents due for revision by year-end.
Specifically, the exception could allow U.S. nuclear-armed ships to make emergency port calls in Japan if the government determines that Japan could not otherwise be adequately defended.
“It will naturally be a subject for discussion,” the official said.
The Three Non-Nuclear Principles commit Japan to not possess, produce or permit nuclear weapons to be brought into the country.
The current security documents say Japan’s policy of adhering to the principles “will remain unchanged.”
Although successive governments since 2010 have maintained that an exception could be made to defend Japan, but it has never been explicitly written into the security documents.
Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi has called the principle of not allowing nuclear weapons into Japan “unrealistic,” given Japan’s reliance on U.S. extended nuclear deterrence.
RESISTANCE INSIDE RULING BLOC
But the plan to formally spell out an exception has been opposed within Takaichi’s Liberal Democratic Party.
“If we put an exception explicitly in writing, it will no longer be an exception,” said a former defense minister from the LDP. “It would only create unnecessary friction with neighboring countries and further worsen Japan’s diplomatic environment.”
However, the LDP’s coalition partner, Nippon Ishin (Japan Innovation Party), has called for “realistic consideration” of the principle of not allowing nuclear weapons into Japan, citing possible future visits by U.S. nuclear submarines carrying nuclear-armed cruise missiles.
The ruling parties began talks on revising the security documents on Nov. 10.
Terumi Tanaka, 94, a representative of Nihon Hidankyo (Japan Confederation of A- and H-Bomb Sufferers Organizations), criticized the move.
“What will happen once they start tampering with the principle of ‘not permitting nuclear weapons to be brought into Japan’?” Tanaka said. “They don’t understand the horrors of nuclear weapons.”
Tanaka said Nihon Hidankyo has long called for the principles to be enshrined in law rather than left to successive governments to change.
He also said a major nationwide movement is needed to push Japan toward joining the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.