Military Adventure Could Lead Japan into Own Trap

Posted by AsiaViews | Sep 7, 2017 | 0 |

China Daily

Sep 1, 2017

Japan’s Defense Ministry is seeking by far its highest budget for fiscal 2018 beginning next April, which, if approved, will be the sixth consecutive increase in the country’s defense expenditure, reflecting Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s penchant for military expansion. The proposed 2.5 percent hike will raise the budget to 5.26 trillion yen ($48 billion), which the ministry says is needed to pay for upgraded missile interceptors, six F-35 stealth fighters, four V-22 Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft, and new naval vessels, including a submarine and two compact warships.

A country constitutionally bound to maintain armed forces purely for defensive purposes certainly doesn’t need such military equipment for national security, most of which anyway is provided by its military ally, the United States.

Yet Japan, under a bellicose Abe, has been setting one record after another not only in increasing military budgets but also in leading Japan on the dangerous path of militarism. Instead of sincerely reflecting upon Japan’s wartime past and atoning for the atrocities the Japanese army committed before and during World War II, Abe has made every effort to revise Japan’s pacifist Constitution, so that he can build a strong military.

To justify Abe’s military expansion plans, many Japanese media outlets have accused China of posing a threat to Japan. They have used Japan’s maritime dispute with China in the East China Sea as an excuse for the hikes in Japan’s defense budgets, disregarding the fact that Tokyo was solely responsible for escalating the dispute.

The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, too, is high on Japan’s blame list, and by test-firing a missile over Japan on Tuesday, Pyongyang seems to have played into the hands of Tokyo. The DPRK deserves the strongest condemnation for its provocative action, but it remains unclear as to how great a threat it poses to Japan. More importantly, countering a potential threat by building a bigger arsenal could lead to counterproductive and even dangerous outcomes, not only for Japan but also for the whole of Northeast Asia.

The current deadlock over the Korean Peninsula nuclear issue shows using military action as an option to resolve it will worsen and complicate the situation further. To salvage the situation, which seems to have reached a tipping point, the parties involved need to exercise strategic patience and establish communication.

But what Japan is doing, instead, could trigger an arms race, throwing the strategic equilibrium in the region off balance, setting alight the tinderbox that the peninsula has become.

Should such a scenario become reality, Japan will find the consequences of its military ambition almost impossible to swallow

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EXTRICATING NDONESIAN CHILDREN FROM ISIS INFLUENCE ABROAD

Indonesia urgently needs to revisit the possibility of repatriating the neediest of its young citizens stranded abroad, whose families had earlier joined ISIS. Most of these children are in camps in northern Syria but there are also small numbers in the Philippines, Afghanistan and Iraq. “Extricating Indonesian Children from ISIS Influence Abroad”, the latest report from the Institute for Policy Analysis of Conflict (IPAC) argues that the government could begin by bringing back small groups of unaccompanied children under ten years of age, who pose minimal security risk and are most vulnerable to deteriorating conditions in the camps.“The problem is that health and security conditions are worsening by the day in the Syrian camps, and the children are growing older,” says Dyah Kartika, IPAC analyst. “They need access to schools, a nurturing environment, and medical attention. If the government waits too long, the children will be further exposed to ISIS ideology.” The new report examines a 2019 list of Indonesians in camps and prisons run by the Kurdish Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). The Indonesian government has been trying to verify their citizenship, but with pseudonyms, misspellings and bad transliterations, it is a daunting task. At the time the data was collected, between March and June 2019, there were 555 Indonesians in SDF camps and prisons, including 367 children. Among the children, approximately 277 were under the age of ten and 34 were unaccompanied. In June 2021, there are fewer than ten children who are both unaccompanied and under the age of ten that could be prioritized for return. Bringing back children of ISIS families is no easy task. The report analyses the main challenges faced by the Indonesian government. These include definitional issues, bureaucratic competition, the difficulty of verifying nationality, evaluating the toll of exposure to conflict, assessing security risk, and finding relatives or others willing to provide care once the children are returned. In addition, COVID has meant stringent restrictions on travel, placing further obstacles in the way of repatriation. There are several models for rehabilitation of children exposed to violent extremism in Indonesia that could be modified to accommodate the needs of children repatriated from abroad. The report examines these models and argues that the government does not need to have every detail of rehabilitation programs in place before it starts extricating children from ISIS influence. It can start by bringing back the most vulnerable children and then modify programs as needed.

“It’s important that the government see these children as victims” says Dyah. “They deserve a chance to be children again.”

Military Adventure Could Lead Japan into Own Trap