June 22, 2023

Japan’s Role in Advancing a Networked Regional Security Architecture

By: Lisa Curtis

Japan’s recent release of its National Security Strategy (NSS) and National Defense Strategy (NDS)—along with its announcement to increase defense spending to 2 percent of GDP by 2027—heralds a new era of defense prioritization for Tokyo. A reflection of its growing concern about the evolving security landscape in the Indo-Pacific, Japan’s new defense policies will allow it to contribute to a networked security architecture that will enhance deterrence and help maintain a peaceful, ruled-based order in the Indo-Pacific.

In the end, networked deterrence is not about militarization; it is about being prepared and preventing aggression and conflict.

In its new security documents, Japan is clear about the need to protect Taiwan from intensifying military intimidation and coercion. The NSS says Japan will “prevent the emergence of a situation in which any one state can unilaterally change the status quo,” while the NDS highlights the five ballistic missiles that landed in Japan’s exclusive economic zone on August 4, 2022, during China’s four-day military exercises in the Taiwan Strait following former U.S. House speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan. This situation brought home to Japan that China’s intensifying coercive military activities against Taiwan will directly impact Japan’s own security. The NSS asserts that peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait is indispensable to international peace and security, connecting the future of Taiwan directly with global stability.

Read the full article from CSIS.

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