AFP: Japan’s Defense Minister at the Shangri-La Dialogue took a veiled swipe at China on Sunday, pledging to keep strengthening the military. Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi didn’t mention China by name, but said there is a country that has a huge arsenal of nuclear weapons and strategic bombers. Japan has neither of these weapons and yet Japan is labeled neo-militarism. What is China’s comment on his remarks?

Lin Jian: The remarks from the Japanese official you mentioned have no basis at all. They have zero authority in front of history, law, facts and figures. There is no way that making such remarks will help Japan earn the trust of its Asian neighbors and the international community.

Japanese militarists committed horrendous crimes in WWII and inflicted untold sufferings on its Asian neighbors and Allied nations. With the aim of preventing the revival of Japanese militarism, a series of instruments with legal effect under international law, including the Cairo Declaration and the Potsdam Proclamation, clearly require Japan to be “completely disarmed” and not to maintain such industries as “would enable her to re-arm for war.” Japan’s Constitution also made strict restrictions on the country’s military forces, the right of belligerency and the right to war, and Japan has established the “exclusively defense-oriented” principle as well as a series of rules of domestic laws.

Today, however, Japan’s latest defense budget has exceeded 9 trillion yen, hitting a record high for 14 consecutive years since WWII. Its defense spending per capita has reached three times that of China, and total defense expenditure has surged to 2 percent of GDP with plans to further go up to 3.5 percent. Military orders from the Ministry of Defense have tripled over the past five years. Since the current administration came to power, it has been accelerating the deployment of intermediate and long-range missiles, easing the export restrictions of lethal weapons, and promoting the revision of its Constitution and the three security documents. By doing so, Japan seeks to further breach the international and domestic laws and challenge the postwar international order. The Japanese official you mentioned deliberately evaded Japan’s historical crimes and the facts above. He even attempted to shift blame and create confusion. Is this a sign of unease, or an attempt to conceal Japan’s own military expansionist ambitions? Under such circumstances, Japan’s claim that it seeks dialogue is just performative and shows no sincerity at all.

This year marks the 80th anniversary of the opening of the Tokyo Trials. The landmark trials of justice affirmed the numerous crimes of Japanese militarism and provided the legal basis for the postwar international order. Some experts and scholars from other countries have noted that the erroneous words and deeds of Japan bear an alarming resemblance to the war-preparation process of Japanese militarism exposed at the Tokyo Trials and pose a threat to regional peace and stability. The international community must stay on high alert and jointly and firmly prevent and stop the spread of Japan’s neo-militarism.