00:00What does Japan's participation in this exercise say about Tokyo's efforts to reform its defense policy and its security arrangements?
00:06Well, Japan has actually been doing this for several years. It's not just during the current Prime Minister Takaichi's term.
00:15We all know that at a minimum, the U.S. and Japan have an alliance since 1951 and the Quadrilateral
00:23Security Dialogue of 2007.
00:24But since, let's say, in the last five or six years, Japan has become sort of like a new mini
00:33hub and spoke country for the Indo-Pacific region,
00:37where it set up reciprocal access agreements and acquisition and cross-service agreements with many, many countries.
00:44What we see here is now a sort of like a another big step for Japan, because Japan has never
00:53deployed, first of all, in this exercise ever.
00:57That's been an observer for many years. But one, you know, 1,200 or so troops involved in this exercise.
01:06First time ever.
01:06We've seen a sharp deterioration in relations between Beijing and Tokyo, with Beijing going as far as issue statements warning
01:12neighboring countries about the threat that a remilitarized Japan can pose to the region.
01:16How do recent actions and Japan's participation in these drills affect those tensions?
01:20Well, I wouldn't say it's a deterioration of Japan-China relation. I would say it's the pushback that China is
01:31doing because it doesn't like it when countries around it are allying with themselves because of China's aggression in the
01:40region.
01:41China has been very aggressive in the South Sea. So it's not that Takeichi created this tension.
01:50It's China creating the tension that Japan is responding to. So Japan's big rearmament, right?
01:57We're talking about 2 percent of its GDP and China is spending 7 percent of its GDP.
02:02So it's not, again, it's not Japan's massive rearmament. It's response to China's massive rearmament that's been going on for
02:1225 years.
02:14China is responding not just in the verbal or in the sort of the information space.
02:19They are actually doing things right now. They had a ship cross in the Miyaka Straits into the Pacific,
02:26demonstrating that they can punch through the first island chain, missiles firing over Japan just before the exercise started, Russian
02:34ship aircraft floating around Japan's airspace.
02:38These are all in response to Japan's willingness to get more involved in the defense of itself and also its
02:46neighbors.
02:47Looking at Japan and other countries, what is the value of participating in multilateral exercises such as these?
02:52This is a very important exercise because it's the first time that Japanese and Filipino and American and several other
03:01countries are participating in a exercise that level sets tactics, techniques and procedures,
03:11not just for war, but also humanitarian disaster relief for logistics for and on the military side, amphibious operations, missile
03:23defense.
03:24These are all, in effect, really defensive exercises dealing with the threat that China poses and not just to Japan.
03:34So there's a lot of things going on here where everyone has to understand what their role is, how to
03:41make sure that they work together, avoid fratricide and achieve the maximum results possible based on their capabilities and the
03:51capabilities of others.
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