Nearly three-quarters of a century after the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, once again faces a nuclear threat, this time from neighboring North Korea.
An estimated 100,000 people were killed when the United States dropped “Fat Man” and “Little Boy” on the two cities. While the exact capabilities of North Korea’s nuclear program remain unknown, the bomb it tested in 2017 is believed to have been more than seven times as powerful as “Fat Man,” the larger of the two bombs, which was detonated on Nagasaki on Aug. 9, 1945.
Japanese fears of a North Korean attack became reality in August 2017, when Kim Jong Un’s regime flew a Hwasong-12 ballistic missile over Hokkaido, causing authorities to sound air raid sirens and send emergency texts warning people to take cover. U.S. intelligence officials said that month they had concluded the North Korean military had achieved nuclear miniaturization, a key step in mounting a nuclear warhead on a missile. Fortunately, the missile that flew over Hokkaido was unarmed and landed harmlessly in the ocean.
Renewed threats have sparked debate inside Japan as to what the country’s role should be in countering the Kim regime. The U.S. is bound to defend Japan by a post-World War II agreement, while the Japanese constitution limits the role of its military to self-defense. But a rising sentiment of nationalism is questioning the decadeslong status quo.
Daqing Yang, a professor of modern Japanese history at George Washington University, believes it is difficult to generalize the Japanese viewpoint on the nuclear issue.
“The majority of people probably agrees with the mayor of Hiroshima, who in his latest anniversary speech calls for the Japanese government to sign and approve the 2017 U.N. treaty banning nuclear weapons,” Yang told the Washington Examiner. “On the other hand, the current prime minister did not even mention the treaty in his speech for the second year in a row. The government and some Japanese apparently favor nuclear deterrence since Japan has been under the U.S. nuclear umbrella for decades and now that North Korea has developed its own nuclear arsenal.”
Shinzō Abe became prime minister in 2012, after serving for a year in 2006 and 2007, and has ridden a nationalist wave of popularity ever since. Like many of his voters, he wants to see expanded Japanese military capabilities, particularly in the wake of threats posed by North Korea’s nuclear program. He lifted a ban against engaging Japanese troops abroad in 2014, sparking protests from pacifists. For years, he has been trying to amend the constitution to formalize the Japan Self-Defense Forces as a normal military.
“My thoughts haven’t changed,” Abe told supporters in a video address in May. “I will create an environment in which all Self-Defense Force members can carry out their missions with great pride.”
He failed last month, however, to secure the two-thirds majority in the upper house of parliament necessary to amend the constitution, though he got a simple majority.
While the Self-Defense Forces are limited in their capabilities, they are still considered one of the most powerful military forces in the world. And Japan for decades has been a screw-turn away from a nuclear weapon. Experts believe North Korea’s nuclear aggression could lead to proliferation in the neighborhood.
“[T]here’s every reason for concern that if Japan did not feel itself under U.S. nuclear protection — the so-called nuclear umbrella — that Japan could very quickly counter North Korea by developing its own nuclear weapons,” Jim Hershberg, a nuclear historian at George Washington University, told the Washington Examiner.
What happens next could very well hinge on the nuclear talks between the United States and North Korea, which have been paused since the two sides reached an impasse in February. Kim’s regime has continued its weapons research, conducting four missile tests in the last two weeks alone. American officials told reporters the United States was consulting with South Korea and Japan as it monitors the situation.
