Time for Japan to Do More
It seems that the Japanese government no longer seems entirely comfortable relying on America for it’s defense.
A draft of Japan’s new mid-term defense policy guidelines is calling for the reinforcement of military personnel and equipment in the face of growing regional tensions, Kyodo news agency said.
The draft, obtained by Kyodo, says Japan needs to reverse its policy of reducing its defense budgets in light of North Korea’s missile launches and nuclear tests, as well as China’s rise to a major military power, the news agency said.
The document urges the government to raise the number of Ground Self-Defense Forces troops by 5,000 to 160,000, Kyodo said.
The new National Defense Program Guidelines, covering five years to March 2015, are scheduled to be adopted by the government by the end of the year.
The draft also says there is a need to “secure options responsive to changing situations” of international security, indicating Tokyo’s intention of considering if it should be capable of striking enemy bases, Kyodo said.
This is good news. Historical concerns remain, of course, but World War II ended more than six decades ago. The Japan of today is very different than the Imperial Japan of yore — the mere fact that Japanese have been so reluctant to become a normal country again illustrates the change.
There’s still a substantial distance for Japan to go. But the Japanese government is moving in the right direction.
Obviously, peace in East Asia benefits all concerned. That peace will be more sure if Tokyo is prepared to defend itself and help meet regional contingencies. It is time for prosperous and populous allies to stop assuming that Washington’s job is to defend them so they can invest in high-tech industries, fund generous welfare states, and otherwise enjoy life at America’s expense.
Who’s Going to Buy Your Debt, Mr. President?
The administration’s presumption that America can borrow its way to prosperity has taken a couple of big hits over the last couple days.
First, just as the Third World debt crisis destroyed the belief among international bankers that countries don’t go bankrupt, so is the West’s borrowing binge ending the belief among international investors that the U.S. and other Western nations are safe economic bets.
Reports the Wall Street Journal:
Britain was warned by Standard & Poor’s Ratings Service that it may lose its coveted triple-A credit rating, triggering a drop in U.K. bonds and sparking global fears about the consequences of massive debts being incurred by the U.S. and other major nations as they try to dig out from the economic crisis.
…
The announcement quickly sent waves across the Atlantic. Investors initially dumped U.K. bonds and the pound, heading for the relative safety of U.S. Treasurys. But within hours, worries about an onslaught of new U.S. bond sales and the security of America’s own triple-A rating drove down the prices of U.S. Treasurys.
The yield of the benchmark U.S. 10-year bond, which moves in the opposite direction to the price, rose by 0.15 percentage point from Wednesday to 3.355%, its highest level in six months.
The relative gloom about the U.K. and the U.S. was apparent Thursday in the market for credit-default swaps, where investors can buy and sell insurance against sovereign defaults. Five years of insurance on $10 million in U.K. debt jumped to around $81,000 a year, from $72,000 earlier in the day. U.S. debt insurance cost the equivalent of $37,500 — in the same range as France at $38,000, and Germany at $35,000.
A shot across the bow of the American ship of state, some analysts have called it.
But shots also were being fired from another direction: East Asia. The Chinese are starting to have doubts about Uncle Sam’s creditworthiness. Reports the New York Times:
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