Japan's Military Muscle Is Tipping Asia's Balance of PowerBusiness Week Jul 7 2003 2:52AM GMT
A Japanese missile-defense system, spy satellites, and self- defense forces dispatched to global hot spots? Two years ago, any Japanese Prime Minister who backed such notions wouldn't have had his job for long. Howls of protest at home would have been surpassed only by shouts of indignation from Seoul and Beijing...
...There is no talk in Japan of deploying offensive ballistic missiles or going nuclear. Tokyo cannot afford a gargantuan U.S.-style military. But Japan seems ready to admit some obvious truths: It lives in a dangerous region, and its defense budget, $42 billion, is still one of the biggest in the world. As one U.S. State Dept. official puts it, "Japan has to react to the environment in which it finds itself."
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