Yang Zhen
According to a report by the Financial Times, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth were scheduled to hold the annual Japan-U.S. Security Consultative Committee ("2+2" meeting) with their Japanese counterparts in Washington on July 1. However, the meeting was canceled by the Japanese side following sudden pressure from the US to increase Japan's defense spending. As of now, neither Washington nor Tokyo has issued an official response to the cancellation.
Japan's Kyodo News reported that the US government has demanded Japan raise its defense budget to 3.5% of its GDP, a figure far beyond what Tokyo can realistically afford. This US move is aimed at shifting the financial burden of maintaining its global hegemony. Although the US defense budget is already approaching one trillion dollars, Washington still deems it insufficient. As the world's fourth-largest economy, Japan has a GDP of around 5 trillion US dollars. If defense spending were raised to 3.5% of its GDP, that would amount to roughly 175 billion dollars annually. A significant portion of this sum would be used to purchase US weapons. On one hand, this would reduce the financial cost of sustaining US hegemony; on the other, it would allow the Trump administration to funnel profits to the military-industrial complex, reward its political donors, and directly influence the outcome of the midterm elections.
Will Japan turn against the US for this? The answer is no. For a long time, Japan has had maritime territorial disputes with both China and Russia, as well as ongoing frictions with the ROK and the DPRK, leading to a persistent sense of insecurity regarding its surrounding environment. At present, only a handful of major powers possess the capability to equip their land, sea, and air forces with advanced technology. Although Japan is an industrially developed country, it remains a medium-level military power. Due to a lack of essential electronic components and given the complexity and high cost of conventional warfare, it is virtually impossible for a medium-level power to independently develop a full range of weapons for integrated land, sea, and air combat. As a result, Japan has to rely on the US for its defense. Although Washington's excessive demands have "angered" Tokyo, it appears to be more of a calculated bargaining strategy to create room for concessions rather than a serious shift in diplomatic posture.
Beyond Japan, the US has also been pressing other allies to sharply raise military expenditures. Such a move would exacerbate global instability. First, it poses a serious threat to international security and stability. The international community is currently entering a period marked by heightened tensions and frequent conflicts. Conflicts continue to flare across the Middle East, the fighting in Ukraine shows no sign of abating, and more. As the dividends of the third industrial revolution have been largely exhausted, countries are now locked in an increasingly intense struggle over limited resources. As a result, the global landscape is expected to remain volatile in the near term. In this context, Western countries taking the lead in boosting military spending will only aggravate already fragile regional and global dynamics, which has become an alarming trend that raises serious concerns.
Next, it encourages Western countries to rely more heavily on the use of force to resolve international disputes. Since the Age of Exploration, the West's near-complete domination of the world has rested, at its core, on the use of organized violence. As British historian Geoffrey Parker incisively observed, the key to Western ascendancy lay in its sustained advantage in the domain of organized violence, which enhanced its ability to wage war. If Western countries continue to ramp up military spending and achieve technological breakthroughs in advanced warfare, historical inertia will likely drive them toward resolving conflicts through military means rather than diplomacy.
Moreover, rising military expenditures in Western countries could further erode global security and exacerbate environmental risks. An increase in defense spending inevitably leads to more frequent military operations, and even in times of peace, such activities pose significant threats to the environment. The loss of hydrogen bombs in several US military plane crashes during the Cold War remains a haunting reminder of the grave risks posed by military expansion. In this light, the West's push to ramp up military budgets, led by the US, may have far-reaching consequences for the future of all humankind.
(The author is deputy director of Northeast Asia Research Center of Shanghai University of Political Science and Law)
Editor's Note: Originally published on china.com.cn, 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.
