Japan wants its military forces to take on a more aggressive role in world affairs.

Since the end of the Second World War, the Japanese have operated under a constitution that renounces war as a sovereign right and that limits the use of force to a strictly defensive capacity. Now that pirates are harassing Japanese cargo ships off the coast of Somalia, however, the Japanese government wants to amend its pacifist constitution in such a way as to allow the use of military force against these seafaring marauders.

Actually, such military force may be used even before such an amendment is passed. Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso has already instructed Defense Minister Yasukazu Hamada to hasten preparations so that the Japanese Self-Defense Forces can deploy to the coast of Somalia by as early as next month. Japan’s ruling coalition also plans on submitting a bill to the current Diet session that will reinterpret several key limitations on the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force.

Current Japanese legislation stipulates that the Self-Defense Force can only protect Japanese ships or foreign ships with Japanese citizens on board. These same laws also mandate that Japanese sailors only fight pirates who attack them first; they must not initiate an attack with the purpose of inflicting damage on another vessel.

This new bill, however, would eliminate these stipulations by allowing the Japanese Maritime Self-Defense Force to aggressively fight against pirates anywhere in the world, whether they are attacking Japanese vessels or not. It would also give the Japanese Defense Ministry the authority to dispatch naval forces without first asking permission from the Diet.

Somali pirates are providing Japanese lawmakers with a relatively non-threatening excuse to steadily erode away the limits that the Japanese Constitution places on the use of military force. Will this process of erosion pave the way to even bigger combat operations for Japanese troops on the world scene?

The Japanese Strategy

Neo-nationalist politicians in Japan have actually been chipping away at the foundations of Japanese pacifism for decades. As a matter of fact, the Japanese Self-Defense Force Law has been amended over 50 times since 1989. So this new legislation, if passed, will only be the latest step in a process of attrition against the military restraints that have bound Japan since the end of the Second World War. Consider the following quote from Asia Times Online:

In the past decade, a group of neo-nationalist politicians has begun to more aggressively dismantle the restrictions that have bound the Japanese military since the end of World War ii, when, uniquely among industrialized nations, Japan renounced its right to defend itself by military means. Japan’s Maritime Self-Defense Force (sdf) has helped refuel coalition forces in Afghanistan since 2003. It has sent troops to Iraq and ships to the Persian Gulf, transported coalition forces on sdf planes, cooperated with the United States on missile defense, and fired on mysterious ships that entered its territorial waters.It sports new and sophisticated hardware like tanker aircraft for in-air refueling, and has tried to purchase the latest U.S. fighter jets. Despite widespread public resistance to many of these undertakings, Japan’s neo-nationalists have grander designs. With strong encouragement from Washington, they have set in motion a process to revise the Japanese Constitution, while seeking to boost military spending and make Japan a fully “normal” military power.

These amendments are killing the limits the Japanese Constitution places on the use of military force with a death of a thousand cuts. The Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force already ranks as the second-most powerful navy in the world. When ground and air forces are factored into the equation, many analysts still rank the Japanese Self-Defense Forces as the fourth-most powerful overall military on the globe (Stratfor, January 15).

Both Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso and Japanese opposition leader Ichiro Ozawa have been ardent advocates for the development of Japan’s military capacity. In his book Blueprint for a New Japan, Ozawa warns that Japan is going the way of ancient Carthage and relying on its wealth alone to save it from catastrophe. He then argues that Japan must stop relying on the United States and must become a fully functioning military power if it is to be a truly secure nation-state. Aso has spoken in the past of reopening the debate on whether or not Japan should acquire nuclear weapons. Ozawa has gone even further and commented on the possibility of Japan producing several thousand nuclear weapons in a relatively short period of time if it felt threatened by an outside force (Stratfor, April 10, 2002).

With these statistics and developments in mind, it is clear that all it would take to transform Japan into one of the deadliest martial forces on the planet is a sidelining of Article 9 of the Japanese Constitution—in which Japan renounces the right to wage war. Forces that could bring about such a move are already at work behind the scenes.

United Asia in Prophecy

Even the United States is urging Japan to reinterpret its constitution so that it can become a stronger military ally against authoritarian regimes like China and Russia. The fact of the matter, however, is that Japan no longer regards these Asian neighbors as enemies. While tensions between the United States and Japan are mounting over a series of alleged rapes perpetrated by American soldiers stationed in Okinawa last year, relations between Japan, China and Russia have never been better.

Japan needs China and Russia as suppliers of fuel and natural resources. At the same time, China and Russia need Japanese technology and industrial might to develop their resources. For the U.S. to ignore these economic realities is naive and foolhardy. China has overtaken America as the top destination for Japanese exports, while the Russians are working to complete their first oil pipeline to the Far East.

These economic overtures between Japan, China and Russia are laying the groundwork for future military cooperation. In February of last year, Japanese chief of the Joint Staff Office of Self-Defense Forces Takashi Saito met with China’s Defense Minister Cao Gangchuan in Beijing and the two military leaders agreed to enhance military cooperation between their respective countries. With its own state-of-the-art defense force and its growing military alliance with China, Japan is swiftly approaching the point where it does not need the U.S. as a military partner.

Instead, Japan will cooperate economically and militarily with its East Asian neighbors in order to form a massive new world power bloc!

As shocking as such a change-up of alliances may sound, biblical passages such as Ezekiel 27 and 38 predict that Japan will indeed ally with Russia and China. The Japanese are the modern-day descendants of Gomer, a grandson of Noah. Ezekiel 38 says the bands of Gomer will join with Gog and Magog and the chief princes of Meshech and Tubal. In modern language, this indicates a military alliance between the peoples of Japan, China and Russia.

Some news analysts see the possibility of such a gargantuan power bloc forming. In a report titled “Europe or Japan: The Missing Geopolitical Piece,” Stratfor stated: “China and Russia, bound together into the tightest alliance, can change the regional balance in Eurasia but cannot affect the global balance …. What will Europe do? What will Japan do? One of these, drawn into an alliance with Russia, China or both, could create a dramatic shift in the global balance …” (April 16, 2001; emphasis mine).

This prophesied shift will break the Japanese-American alliance. Japan will join with the rest of Asia in a military alliance that will culminate in a 200 million-man army attacking the forces of a united Europe. For proof of this, request our free booklet Russia and China in Prophecy.