War & Strategy – Page 6

Jus ad Bellum Implications of Japan’s New National Security Laws

April 24, 2021April 21, 2016 by Craig Martin

(Published in Opinio Juris, Apr. 21, 2016; re-published in The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus, Vol. 14, May 15, 2016)

Far-reaching revisions to Japan’s national security laws became effective at the end of March. Part of the government’s efforts to “reinterpret” Japan’s war-renouncing Constitution, the revised laws authorize military action that would previously have been unconstitutional. The move has been severely criticized within Japan as being a circumvention and violation of the Constitution, but there has been far less scrutiny of the international law implications of the changes.

The war-renouncing provision of the Constitution ensured compliance with the jus ad bellum regime, and indeed Japan has not engaged in a use of force since World War II. But with the purported “reinterpretation” and revised laws – which the Prime Minister has said would permit Japan to engage in minesweeping in the Straits of Hormuz or use force to defend disputed islands from foreign “infringements” – Japan has an unstable and ambiguous new domestic law regime that could potentially authorize action that would violate international law.

Questioning U.S. Support for Japan’s National Security Moves

April 24, 2021September 7, 2015 by Craig Martin

(Published in JURIST – Forum, Sept. 2, 2015)

On August 30, tens of thousands of Japanese citizens demonstrated outside of the Diet (parliament), and in other cities across Japan, protesting against draft national security legislation that would expand the permissible operations of the Self-Defense Forces (SDF). The bills are the culmination of an effort by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to expand Japan’s role in international collective security efforts. To do so, however, the government has sought to “reinterpret” Japan’s constitutional limits on the use of military force, in a manner that circumvents the formal constitutional amendment process, and thereby undermines the rule of law and constitutionalism in Japan.

It is this process as much as the substance of the bills that has provoked the protests and triggered a constitutional crisis in Japan. Yet these developments have been largely welcomed in US policy circles. The objectives may be in America’s short-term interest, but a deeper understanding of the issues and a longer-term perspective would caution against US endorsement of this illegitimate process.

Constitutional Background

To understand the issues one has to begin with the constitutional limits. Article 9 of the constitutionrenounces war as a sovereign right of the nation, and the threat or use of force for the settlement of international disputes (Art. 9(1)). It also prohibits the maintenance of armed forces or other war potential (Art. 9(2)). These provisions have been consistently interpreted by the Cabinet Legislation Bureau (CLB) (which is loosely analogous to the US Office of Legal Counsel) and successive governments since the early 1950s, as meaning that Japan was entitled to use force for individual self-defense in the event of an armed attack on Japan; and that Japan was thus entitled to maintain a minimum level of armed forces necessary for such defense. This understanding was also implicitly confirmed by the Supreme Court in the Sunagawa decision, the only decision it has rendered on the issue. But the CLB has also clearly maintained that Art. 9(1) means that Japan is prohibited from any participation in collective self-defense as authorized by Article 51 of the UN Charter, or other collective security operations as authorized by the UN Security Council under Articles 39 and 42 of the UN Charter.

Interview in AERA Magazine on Art. 9 and Revisionist History

April 24, 2021August 9, 2015 by Craig Martin

This interview, titled (roughly) “Speak Out Against the ‘It Can’t Be Helped’ Way of Thinking”, was published in the August 10, 2015 issue of AERA, Japan’s highbrow weekly newsmagazine. It was a special issue devoted to the 70th Anniversary of the end of World War II. It unfortunately attributes some of the comments I made in relation to Article 9 of the Constitution, and how the public should respond to efforts of the current government to reinterpret that provision, to my views on Prime Minister Abe’s tendencies towards revisionist history.

Hokkaido Shinbun Interview – Reinterpreting Art. 9

April 24, 2021March 12, 2015 by Craig Martin

On March 5 the Hokkaido Shinbun ran the following article based on an interview conducted in Kansas in February, on the issues surrounding the so-called “reinterpretation” and possible amendment of Article 9 of the Constitution of Japan.