📰 Hey everyone, experts in China and Japan are sounding the alarm 🚨 about a worrying trend: Japan’s Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi recently suggested that if the Chinese mainland used force on the Taiwan region, it’d be a “survival-threatening situation” for Japan, hinting at possible armed intervention in the Taiwan Strait 🌊.
Experts at the China Institute of International Studies (CIIS) fear this rhetoric is a push by right-wing forces to bend Japan’s pacifist constitution—adopted after WWII under the Potsdam Proclamation—to allow a stronger military. Historically, Japan’s post-war identity has revolved around “forever renouncing war” and sticking to an “exclusively defense-oriented policy.”
“This shift could seriously threaten regional security,” says Xiang Haoyu from CIIS. Su Xiaohui adds that breaking away from pacifism isn’t just Takaichi’s political play—it shows a deeper rightward swing in Japan’s politics 🎯.
These experts point out that stoking external threats has been an old tactic of Japanese militarist forces—like the 1931 invasion of northeast China using the “Manchuria survival” pretext or the Pearl Harbor attack. History shows that claiming other nations’ territories as vital to national survival inevitably leads to conflict and failure.
Even within Japan, voices like former foreign ministry official Magosaki Ukeru call Takaichi’s stance “baseless,” calling the Taiwan question China’s internal affair and urging strict adherence to Japan’s political commitments on Taiwan.
What’s next? The region will need strong diplomatic vigilance 🌍. For young adults and early professionals in South and Southeast Asia, this serves as a reminder: staying informed and advocating for peace matters now more than ever. ✌️
Reference(s):
Experts warn of dangerous signs of Japan's militarism revival
cgtn.com
