{"id":58787,"date":"2026-07-15T20:36:07","date_gmt":"2026-07-15T20:36:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/58787\/"},"modified":"2026-07-15T20:36:07","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T20:36:07","slug":"between-chinas-blackmail-nk-threats-japan-mulls-n-option","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/58787\/","title":{"rendered":"Between China’s Blackmail, NK Threats, Japan Mulls N-Option"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"North<\/a>File Photo of U.S. Air Force B-1B Lancer bombers flanked by U.S. Marine Corps F-35 Lightning II and Japan Air Self-Defense Force F-2 fighters executing a bilateral mission over the Pacific Ocean, in direct response to North Korea’s surprise intermediate range ballistic missile launch, which flew directly over northern Japan on 14 September, 2017. U.S. Navy photo<\/p>\n

India\u2019s Defence Secretary RK Singh was in Tokyo earlier this week, following up on some of the outcomes linked to Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi\u2019s<\/a> visit to Delhi last week.<\/p>\n

Discussions focused not only on bilateral matters<\/a>. China\u2019s recent test of the 10,000-km JL-3 missile from a submarine may have also figured, given that India\u2019s land borders and Japan\u2019s maritime frontiers are already under pressure from Chinese transgressions.<\/p>\n

China\u2019s missile test has reopened an old debate in Japan: should it go nuclear? The critics say nuclear submarines are expensive, take many years to build and require a\u00a0 highly trained crew.\u00a0 Maintenance is another issue, then there\u2019s the need for a regular supply of nuclear fuel.<\/p>\n

It is also argued that Japan is better served by its 22 conventionally-powered diesel-electric submarines fitted with conventional missiles.<\/p>\n

Nevertheless, the Japan Innovation\u00a0 Party (JIP), which is in the ruling coalition, has demanded that the country build a fleet of at least eight nuclear submarines with all the bells and whistles.<\/p>\n

Senior JIP MP Seiji Maehara warned that \u201cChina is expanding its naval reach increasingly into the Second Island Chain in the Pacific, and operations there are likely to become mainstream.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Second Island Chain sits more than 2,400-km east of the First Island Chain and includes besides two Japanese islands, also the US territories of Guam, the Marianas and Micronesia. Given the growth in Chinese naval and air capabilities, the US is hardening its bases here to ensure strategic dominance and freedom of navigation.<\/p>\n

Add to that the North Korea with its Supreme Leader Kim Jong-un\u2019s tendency to issue threats targeting US, Japan and others, and firing missiles over Japan.\u00a0 Pyongyang has been advancing its nuclear weapons programme with Russian and\/or Chinese help.<\/p>\n

In that sense, Japan\u2019s plate is full.\u00a0 But a key question for the planners in Tokyo is how would the US react to Japan going nuclear?\u00a0 Since last year, the comment by an adviser to the prime minister that Japan should go nuclear, has spread.<\/p>\n

Dr Satoru Nagao, a non-resident scholar at the Hudson Institute, told StratNewsGlobal on the phone from Tokyo that \u201cJapan only needs some months to have a nuclear bomb.\u00a0 Japan already has a long range rocket for space and is developing many other types of long range missiles. It means Japan can possess a nuclear weapon within a short period.\u201d<\/p>\n

But it\u2019s never that simple.\u00a0 As Dr Nagao noted, \u201cJapan\u2019s concern is its relationship with the US. By going nuclear Japan is telling the US \u2018We do not trust your nuclear weapon\u2019. The US will see Japan as the potential enemy. Therefore, Japan\u2019s nuclear strategy remains under \u2018option open\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe can possess (a nuclear weapon) but we will not possess,\u201d Dr Nagao said adding a significant caveat that \u201cWe will possess\u00a0 only when the US abandons Japan.\u201d<\/p>\n

Keeping all this in mind, the late prime minister Shinzo Abe had proposed \u201cnuclear sharing\u201d with the US, meaning the US brings its nuclear weapons to Japan and share\u2019s them.\u201d<\/p>\n

The other idea behind this was if US nuclear weapons were on Japanese soil, any potential adversary would have to think twice before striking at Japan.\u00a0 Doing so may see the US retaliate with devastating consequences.<\/p>\n

But Abe\u2019s successor rejected the \u201cnuclear sharing\u201d idea citing constitutional constraints and non-nuclear principles. Nevertheless, it did set Japan on the path of conventional rearmament and developing offensive long range strike capabilities.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"File Photo of U.S. Air Force B-1B Lancer bombers flanked by U.S. Marine Corps F-35 Lightning II and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":58788,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[12,38421,36746,290,8,38422,27538,38423,6759,33,38424,38425,38426,2299,38427],"class_list":["post-58787","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-japan","tag-china","tag-conventional-submarines","tag-homeslider","tag-india","tag-japan","tag-jl3-missile","tag-long-range-missiles","tag-maritime-transgressions","tag-modi","tag-nihon","tag-nuclear-option","tag-nuclear-powered-submarines","tag-potential-enemy","tag-takaichi","tag-us-reaction"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58787","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=58787"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58787\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/58788"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=58787"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=58787"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=58787"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}