The U.S. military is set to deploy its powerful Typhon midrange missile system to Kagoshima Prefecture for joint exercises with the Self-Defense Forces from Monday, a move sure to anger China.<\/p>\n
The deployment of the land-based Typhon system is seen as part of a more robust allied approach to countering China\u2019s growing military assertiveness in the region.<\/p>\n
The missile system, which can fire Tomahawk cruise missiles as far as 1,600 kilometers \u2014 effectively putting parts of China within striking distance \u2014 will initially take part in the Valiant Shield exercises from the Maritime Self-Defense Force\u2019s Kanoya Air Base in Kagoshima Prefecture. That exercise runs through July 1.<\/p>\n
The system is then scheduled to be used during the Orient Shield joint drills in September and is slated to be moved to a U.S. military base in Japan from around mid-October, according to Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI believe that temporarily deploying such assets to Self-Defense Forces facilities and conducting repeated joint training will not only enhance the U.S. military\u2019s rapid deployment capabilities but also improve Japan-U.S. responsiveness and interoperability,\u201d Koizumi told a news conference on Friday, noting that the initiative \u201cis strictly a temporary deployment\u201d for the training.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have been informed by the U.S. side that this does not constitute a permanent deployment to Japan,\u201d he said of the plan to move the system to a U.S. base in the country after the drills conclude.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The deployment will be just the second to Japan after the U.S. sent the Typhon system to the U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Iwakuni in Yamaguchi Prefecture last year.<\/p>\n
In May, China\u2019s Foreign Ministry called the latest move \u201cyet another example of Japan\u2019s accelerated remilitarization.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe deployment of Typhon, a strategic offensive weapon, will harm the legitimate security interests of other countries, threaten regional strategic security, and push up the risk of military confrontation and arms race,\u201d ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun said. \u201cIt will bring nothing but harm to peace and stability in the region.\u201d<\/p>\n
The U.S. will also reportedly deploy its High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) for both exercises. No live firing is scheduled to be conducted by either system while deployed at the Kanoya base.\u00a0<\/p>\n
In May, the U.S. Army fired a Tomahawk missile from a Typhon system in the Philippines during the Balikatan military exercises, marking the first time it had fired the launcher since its arrival in the Southeast Asian country two years ago.<\/p>\n
The U.S. military has recently been bringing some of its most advanced missile systems<\/a> for keeping Chinese forces at bay to joint training with the SDF, part of a gradual shift in policy that has also seen Tokyo deploy its own longer-range weapons.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The U.S. military is set to deploy its powerful Typhon midrange missile system to Kagoshima Prefecture for joint…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":44736,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[12,360,8,2683,6831,33,26242,2303,84,673],"class_list":["post-44735","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-japan","tag-china","tag-defense","tag-japan","tag-kagoshima","tag-missiles","tag-nihon","tag-pla","tag-sdf","tag-u-s","tag-u-s-military"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44735","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44735"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44735\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44736"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44735"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44735"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44735"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}