By Da Zhigang
Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi published a signed article in the online edition of the Financial Times recently. In the article, she not only likened herself to Japan's "Iron Lady," but also claimed that export controls targeting Japan constituted "economic coercion" and proposed ideas such as a G7 joint reserve of critical minerals, including rare earths. Ahead of visits to the UK and Italy and her attendance at the G7 summit in France, Takaichi's proposals and stated determination were clearly intended to signal goodwill toward other G7 members. At a deeper level, her objective is to further bind Japan to the G7 framework, seek greater latitude for Japan's remilitarization, and coordinate with Western efforts to contain China. These developments warrant close attention.
As the only Asian member of the G7, Japan appears intent on using Takaichi's first visit to Europe as prime minister to project a "new role" for Japan: no longer content to serve merely as a US ally in East Asia, but seeking instead to position Japan as a frontline executor of the G7's Indo-Pacific agenda and a strategic bridge linking Europe and North America. Japan may seek both to capitalize on the spillover effects of G7 initiatives in areas such as energy route security and the restructuring of critical supply chains, thereby positioning itself as a strategic foothold for Western involvement in the Indo-Pacific, and to use the G7 framework to institutionalize defense, defense-industrial, and intelligence cooperation with European partners, facilitating a sustained NATO presence in the Asia-Pacific.
Through these efforts, Takaichi may hope in the short term to elevate Japan's economic cooperation with G7 members into comprehensive strategic alignment encompassing political, security, and geopolitical dimensions. At the same time, she may seek to loosen the constraints of the postwar order, secure G7 support on issues such as regional disputes in East Asia and maritime rule-making, and leverage G7 backing to strengthen Japan's longer-term strategic pressure on China.
By seeking G7 support, Japan aims to secure Western endorsement for expanding its remilitarization agenda. The Takaichi administration has continuously upgraded Japan-NATO and Japan-Europe bilateral and multilateral ties while steadily expanding defense cooperation with relevant countries. The intention is to use the collective diplomatic platform of the G7 to rally bloc-based support for Japan's remilitarization.
Japan may have realized that the US-Japan alliance alone is insufficient to shed the historical constraints stemming from its wartime defeat. However, with the backing of the G7 as a whole, Japan could portray its expansionary moves including strengthening the Japan Self-Defense Forces' long-range strike capabilities, easing restrictions on exports of lethal weapons, and pursuing overseas military deployments as contributions to the collective security interests of the Western camp.
Japan may continue to invoke such justifications as safeguarding supply chain security and protecting "freedom of navigation" to provide political cover for constitutional revision and military expansion. At its core, such rhetoric serves to obscure the resurgence of neo-militarism behind ideological narratives.
Meanwhile, Japan may seek to use the G7 framework to institutionalize the cross-border exercise of the right of collective self-defense, gradually hollowing out the constraints imposed by the pacifist Constitution and its "exclusively defense-oriented" principle, while creating external justifications for potential future military involvement in regional affairs.
What is particularly concerning is that the different interests of G7 members have resulted in a serious lack of restraint by the organization on Japan's remilitarization ambitions. The US, facing strategic retrenchment and showing less willingness to bear the burden of defense responsibilities in the Western Pacific, may seek to further cultivate Japan as a geopolitical frontline outpost, allowing it to share frontline military costs while generating demand for the US defense industry.
European countries such as the UK, France, Germany and Italy remain heavily preoccupied with the Russia-Ukraine conflict, which continues to consume both defense resources and financial capacity. With limited power-projection capabilities in the Indo-Pacific, they may view cooperation with Japan as a means of reducing the costs of expanding their presence in the region. As European defense cooperation enters a new stage, many countries have chosen to work more closely with Japan to lower development costs and gain access to advanced technologies.
Under such circumstances, in the face of Japan's increasingly assertive moves, other G7 members have remained silent or even acquiescent. As a result, Japan's remilitarization risks being reframed as part of the G7's so-called democratic security cooperation, while any meaningful constraints on Tokyo's actions could become largely ineffective.
In the absence of effective constraints, a further deepening of Japan's alignment with other G7 members could significantly increase the likelihood of Tokyo taking risks on sensitive issues. With political backing from G7 countries, Japan may intensify promotion of narratives such as "a Taiwan contingency is a Japan contingency" and further encourage the normalization of European military deployments to the Asia-Pacific. As a result, the space for peaceful dialogue and consultation in regions such as Northeast Asia could continue to shrink, while the risks of bloc confrontation and an arms race may rise sharply. External support could further embolden right-wing populist forces in Japan, weakening the social foundations of pacifism and contributing to a continued rightward shift in the country's political discourse.
(The author is a research fellow at the Institute of Northeast Asian Studies, Heilongjiang Provincial Academy of Social Sciences)
Editor's Note: Originally published on huanqiu.com, this article is translated from Chinese into English and edited by the China Military Online. The information and opinions in this article do not necessarily reflect the views of eng.chinamil.com.cn.