Japan has rejected a report by the U.S. intelligence community saying that Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s remarks that Japan could intervene militarily in a Taiwan crisis represent “a significant shift” for a sitting Japanese leader — a sign that the allies remain apart on the issue.
The report — and Tokyo’s rejection of it — came just ahead of a key summit between Takaichi and U.S. President Donald Trump in Washington on Thursday.
Takaichi’s “specific comments carry weight in Japan’s system because the phrase ‘survival threatening situation’ serves as a possible legal justification for military authorities,” the U.S. Office of the Director of National Intelligence said Wednesday in its annual report on global threats.
“Her comments represent a significant shift for a sitting Japanese prime minister.”
Japan was quick to deny that Takaichi’s comments signaled any change.
“The government has consistently taken the position that it will determine what constitutes a ‘survival threatening situation’ based on a comprehensive review of all information available,” Chief Cabinet Secretary Minoru Kihara, the government’s top spokesman, told a news conference Thursday. “The claim that there has been a significant shift in policy is inaccurate.”
Takaichi herself has maintained that her remarks were specifically about “worst-case” scenarios and do not represent a deviation from the government’s previous position.
The U.S. report devotes a large section to Sino-Japanese relations, which have plummeted to their lowest point in recent memory following Takaichi’s remarks in parliament on Nov. 7 that the Self-Defense Forces could be deployed under the right to collective self-defense in “worst-case” scenarios, such as a Chinese naval blockade of Taiwan, which the prime minister said would constitute a “survival threatening situation” for Japan.
The comments, the first by a sitting prime minister to detail a specific case of how Tokyo might respond to a Taiwan Strait crisis, triggered outrage in Beijing.
In response, China has quickly dialed up the pressure on Japan, turning to a familiar playbook of coercive measures — warning Chinese tourists not to visit the country, reimposing a ban on seafood exports and barring the export of some dual-use products that have military and civilian applications.
The report offered an ominous prediction, saying that China’s “multidomain coercive pressure … probably will intensify through 2026, aimed both at punishing Japan and deterring other countries from making similar statements about their potential involvement in a Taiwan crisis.”
China “probably is concerned that Prime Minister Takaichi’s comments will bolster Taiwan’s independence movement,” according to the assessment.
The report highlighted a divide between the Takaichi administration’s strident approach to Japan’s relationship with China and Trump’s more kid-gloves approach to Beijing.
China and Taiwan — Beijing’s most sensitive issue — are expected to be…