Japan, US fortify military ties with drones. Will China take note?
By Justin McCurry, CS Monitor, October 3, 2013
Tokyo--Japan and the US have agreed to strengthen their alliance to address threats to regional security from North Korea's missile program and China's increasingly robust claims to disputed island territories, in the first broadening of the two powers' military alliance in nearly two decades.
The 10-page joint statement, which was finalized by the Japanese and US defense ministers in Tokyo on Thursday, included cooperation on a wide range of issues, from cyber-attacks and terrorism, to security in space and joint military exercises.
The Asia-Pacific has become vulnerable to new threats in the 16 years since the allies last revamped their defense partnership.
North Korea has continued to develop nuclear weapons and a long-range ballistic missile program, in defiance of the international community. China, meanwhile, is causing concern with its dramatic rise in military spending and aggressive claims to maritime territories.
Relations between China and Japan have deteriorated sharply in the past year over their rival claims to the Senkaku islands--known as the Diaoyu in China--in the East China Sea.
With the Senkaku dispute in mind, Tokyo and Washington agreed to deploy long-range surveillance drones to monitor the islands by next spring, in a move that could further raise tensions with China.
The revamped guidelines do not mention the Senkakus by name, but the decision to base US Global Hawk drones at American bases in Japan for the first time is a sign of growing disquiet over frequent Chinese maritime activity near the islands.
Publicly, the US has refused to takes sides over the dispute but recognizes it must help defend Japanese territory under bilateral treaty obligations. Japan administers the islands, which are uninhabited but surrounded by potentially large deposits of natural gas. Japan bought the islands from their private owners just over a year ago, and argues that China only began voicing a claim in the 1970s, when studies suggested that oil and gas deposits might be found near the islands.
Officials in China, which is marking a week-long national holiday, have yet to respond to the new agreement. The country's foreign ministry, however, has previously criticized the deployment of the first military radar system in Japan, saying it would destabilize the region.