US-dependent security “normalization”

The background of this renewed focus on the revision of Article 9 from the late 1990s and the early 2000s was the growing consensus among the US-Japan alliance managers that the Japanese SDF needed to be increasingly integrated into the US military strategy in East Asia and beyond in order to cope with the challenges presented by the changing security environment in the post-Cold War era.

Almost as soon as the conservative LDP regained the premiership in its unlikely coalition with the Socialists, Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto met with President Bill Clinton and issued the US-Japan Joint Declaration on Security— Alliance for the 21st Century in 1996. The goal of the joint declaration was to redefine the US-Japan relations in the post-Cold War world with a clearer focus on its character as a military alliance. Its scope was also to be expanded from the Far East to the Asia-Pacific region and beyond. While confirming the continuous US presence in Japan and the region, greater integration of the Japanese SDF with the US forces was to be sought.

A major concern at the time was the nuclear and missile development pro­grams of North Korea, and the joint declaration was quickly followed by the revising of the Guidelines for US-Japan Defense Cooperation, the alliance man­ual, as it were, in 1997, with a particular focus on the so-called “situation in areas surrounding Japan” - a crisis in the Korean peninsula to be specific. The LDP government further enacted the Situation in Surrounding Areas Law to provide the legal basis for a possible operationalization of the US-Japan military alliance outside of Japan, in the surrounding areas.

The pressure for the transformation of the US-Japan military alliance did not end there, however. In 2000, an influential special report published under the auspices of the Institute for National Strategic Studies, National Defense University of the US Department of Defense, by a bipartisan study group led by Richard L.

Constitutional amendments in Japan 33 that stated that “we see the special relationship between the United States and Great Britain as a model for the alliance.”^[99]

A further boost to this line of reasoning by the US-Japan alliance managers resulted from the shocking terrorist attacks in the US on September 11th, 2001. The Japanese government led by Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, who boasted a strong personal tie with US President George W. Bush, embarked on a series of Emergency Legislations, starting with the Counter-Terrorism Special Measures Law in November 2001 that enabled the Japanese SDF to provide “rear area support in non-combat zones” for the US and its allies, including most notably refueling missions in the Indian Ocean. Koizumi also enacted the Iraq Special Measures Law in 2003 to enable the SDF to take part in humanitarian recon­struction and peace-keeping missions in non-combat areas.

The move was followed by further Emergency Legislations in 2003 and 2004. In 2003, three sets of emergency laws were passed, including the Armed Attack Situation Law, which defined the various armed attack situations (including the situation in which armed attack is anticipated) and laid down the responsibilities of the state, local authorities, and designated public organizations (e.g. infra­structure). They were complemented by another seven emergency legislations, including the Protection of People Law in 2004. These laws set out the powers, responsibilities, and procedures for the state and other public authorities to evac­uate the citizens, but also to facilitate the military operations of the US military as well as the Japanese SDF in armed attack situations. It bears noting that these Emergency Legislations were opposed by the smaller, leftist opposition parties, which questioned the constitutionality of the bills, but supported by the main opposition, the Democratic Party of Japan.

These laws were clear indication of the accelerating trend of Japan's integra­tion with the US military strategy since the late 1990s. It was as if the demands and priorities of the US-Japan security alliance took precedence over the Japanese Constitution and its pacifist tradition. Tellingly in 2005, Koizumi stated at a joint press conference with Bush that

There is no such thing as U.S.-Japan relationship too close. Some people maintain that maybe we would pay more attention to other issues, prob­ably it would be better to strengthen the relationship with other countries. I do not side with such views. The U.S.-Japan relationship, the closer, more intimate it is, it is easier for us to behave and establish better relations with China, with South Korea, and other nations in Asia.^[100]

Reflecting these political developments, in the Asahi newspaper poll of 2005, 56% of the respondents agreed that the revision of the constitution was neces­sary against 33% who did not think it necessary.^[101] More specifically on Article 9, 51% replied that there was no need for revision, while 36% said that it should be revised.

In 2005, the LDP published its first proposal for a new constitution.^[102] It pro­posed to remove the second paragraph ofArticle 9 altogether and inserted instead a direct reference to the maintenance of a Self-Defense Military. It also sought to lower the bar for the revision of the constitution to a simple majority in both houses for a national referendum (as opposed to the required two-third majority in both houses) by revising Article 96. Article 20 that stipulates the separation of state and religion was also targeted for revision to allow for the prime minister to make official visits to the Yasukuni Shrine - which is unconstitutional under the postwar Constitution.

In the same year, on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of its founding, the LDP adopted a new party platform that advocated “the enactment of a new constitution,” “proud and ambitious Japanese,” and “small government” among other things, and specifically stated that “we shall strive for the formation of a national consensus in order to enact a new constitution on the basis of an inde­pendent national awareness.”^[103] Koizumi was then succeeded by Abe, who went on to revise the Basic Law on Education to include the “love of country” as a goal of education, upgraded the Defense Agency into a full-fledged Ministry of Defense, and enacted the National Referendum Law and set up the Commission on the Constitution in both houses of the Diet - thereby making it procedurally possible to initiate the formal process of constitution revision.

Abe's single-minded pursuit of “a beautiful country” - his focus on the revi­sionist agenda that centered around his ambition to revise the Constitution - quickly hit a wall, however. Public opinion was far more concerned about the bread-and-butter issues, namely, the widening gap between the rich and the poor that the Koizumi structural reform agenda left behind, the issue of missing pen­sion records, and the various ministerial scandals, which Abe neglected at his peril. After merely a year in office, he suffered a landslide defeat at the hands of the rival DPJ in the Upper House election and was forced to resign citing ill health.

Now that the DPJ was in its ascendance, it had no interest in joining in the cross-partisan debate over constitutional amendment that would only assist the LDP to cling to power. The Commission on the Constitution did not func­tion at all, and the tide for the constitution revision waned. In the Asahi poll

Constitutional amendments in Japan 35 of 2008, only 23% of the respondents said that they were in favor of revising Article 9 against 66% who opposed it.^[104]

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