On July 28, the Japan-U.S. Security Consultative Committee (SCC), the so-called “2+2” meeting, was held in Tokyo with the participation of Japanese Foreign Minister Kamikawa Yoko, Japanese Defense Minister Kihara Minoru, U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, and U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin. This was followed by the first Japan-U.S. Ministerial Meeting on Extended Deterrence.
This is a major turning point in the postwar Japan-U.S. relationship and indicates that the security environment surrounding Japan is further deteriorating. As expressed in the joint announcement, North Korea’s continued pursuit of nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs, China’s expansion of its nuclear capability without transparency, and Russia’s undermining of the existing nuclear order were all behind this development.
There has never been a situation in history like today, where Japan must communicate its needs to the United States and the U.S. must provide specific reassurances to Japan, and both countries must share the same understanding of the concept of extended deterrence.
Postwar Japan, as the only nation to be hit by atomic bombs and an ally dependent on U.S. extended deterrence, has continuously insisted that Washington ensure that its credibility has not been diminished. Nevertheless, an overview of the historical process clearly shows that the issues surrounding extended deterrence, once in a sense vague and abstract for Japan, have become concrete concerns and threats. Therefore Japan is no longer satisfied with the same U.S. response as in the past.
The fact that the first Japan-U.S. Ministerial Meeting on Extended Deterrence was held is symbolic of this. The nuclear threat is more intense and imminent than ever before, and the Japan-U.S. alliance needs to be deepened and institutionalized in order to respond to the threat.
After China’s successful nuclear test in 1964 and again during the Soviet-U.S. Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT) in the 1970s, Japan expressed concerns about the credibility of extended deterrence and insisted that the United States not undermine it. The U.S. responded by saying, essentially, that it would not. And at the time, Japan was satisfied with that.
Despite informal consultations, Japan-U.S. consultations on strategic issues were newly established after the signing of SALT I, but during the process of SALT II, even the existence of the consultations became ambiguous. Therefore, we can infer that Japan’s concerns about nuclear weapons at the time were abstract, and Japanese involvement in the issue seems to have been left to interested individuals rather than organized frameworks.
During the Cold War, the only time Japan actually had a concrete influence on U.S. nuclear policy was during the negotiations on intermediate-range nuclear forces. This was because the SS-20 medium-range missiles deployed by the Soviet Union posed a concrete threat to Japan. Of course, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, as an organization, and the Nakasone administration of the time, were heavily committed to responding to this development.
Such involvement, however, was transitory. The late 1980s and early 1990s ushered in a period when the Soviet-U.S. rapprochement and the end of the Cold War temporarily led the world to believe that the fear of nuclear war had disappeared. In fact, it is widely known that the Japanese government’s reaction to the first North Korean nuclear crisis was extremely sluggish and remarkably lacking in threat perception.
It was during the Obama administration (2008-2016) in the United States that Japan once again referred to specific threats and the nature of the U.S. extended deterrence. When the Commission on Strategic Posture, a panel of experts established by the U.S. Congress to examine and envisage a new system of U.S. strategic deterrence, asked the Japanese government for its views, Japan expressed its position in detail. Japan insisted to the commission that a unilateral reduction in the number of strategic nuclear warheads operated and deployed by the United States could have a negative impact on Japan’s security, and stressed that the United States should always keep China’s nuclear expansion and modernization in mind when negotiating nuclear reductions with Russia.
While the Obama administration indicated a policy of declining the role of nuclear weapons and actively pursuing nuclear disarmament, they still believed that nuclear deterrence was necessary as long as nuclear threats to the United States and its allies existed. They considered it necessary to provide concrete reassurances to allied countries that depend on the “nuclear umbrella” because reducing the U.S. nuclear arsenal would be a security concern for those allies. This thinking was also expressed in the 2010 Nuclear Posture Review.
In this context, the Extended Deterrence Dialogue (EDD) was established between the United States and Japan in 2010. This was positioned as a regular forum for discussing how to “sustain and strengthen extended deterrence, which is at the core of the Japan-U.S. alliance.” The EDD been held on a regular basis to date.
From the U.S. perspective, the consultations are used as a forum where more concrete reassurances can be provided, and from Japan’s perspective, the EDD is used as a forum to confirm the credibility of U.S. extended deterrence and to express its own position and views. Thus, at the administrative level, consultations on extended deterrence were institutionalized.
In February 2018, the Nuclear Posture Review was issued by the Trump administration. The review outlined a policy of expanding the role of nuclear weapons against the background of a deteriorating strategic environment. While the wording remained the same – that the use of nuclear weapons would be considered “only in the most extreme circumstances” to protect the “vital interests” of the United States, its allies, and partner countries – the review stated that “extreme circumstances” would include a significant non-nuclear strategic strike. This indicated that non-nuclear attacks would also be subject to nuclear counterattack.
Unlike the Obama administration period, which addressed the concerns and anxieties of allies arising from a reduction in the number of nuclear weapons, this was an assurance to allies’ concerns against the actual background of a growing threat. The Nuclear Posture Review then called for the need for “sustained allied dialogues” to underpin assurance of U.S. extended deterrence, and it is in this context that the EDD is considered to have continued.
The Biden administration’s Nuclear Posture Review, issued in October 2022, also considers the issue of nuclear deterrence to be of high priority. While the political desire to diminish the role of nuclear weapons is evident in places, the “sole purpose” of using nuclear weapons only in the event of a nuclear attack on the United States or its allies, and the adoption of a “No First Use” policy were ultimately omitted. Overall, it can be seen as a continuation of the Nuclear Posture Review during the Trump administration.
Returning to the late July 2024 meeting, this marked the first time that discussions on extended deterrence took place at the ministerial level. In addition to confirming the value of consultations at the administrative level and their continuation, the importance of the ministerial meeting was also emphasized. As real and substantial concerns over nuclear weapons have come to the forefront of Japan-U.S. relations, they have undoubtedly deepened and become more institutionalized. Japan faces a unique threat of nuclear violence: No other country in the world is surrounded by countries such as China, North Korea, and Russia and faces the threat of a nuclear power so directly.
As the only A-bombed nation, Japan must foster and build an environment in which nuclear disarmament can be promoted. To achieve that goal, we must first stabilize the region and, by extension, the world. In that process, war must not break out and the use of nuclear weapons must not occur. To this end, it seems to me that the medium to long term future can be seen by raising the reliability of extended deterrence as a security policy in the short term.
To ensure that a nuclear-free future arrives, we should continue to promote the integration of the Japan-U.S. alliance and the strengthening of extended deterrence.