Japan Parliament Approves Overseas Military Expansion
Troops will be able to support allies even if conflict is beyond country’s borders
Parliament gave final approval to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s security bills early Saturday, allowing Japanese troops wider leeway to take part in conflicts beyond Japan’s borders.
TOKYO—Japan’s parliament early Saturday gave final approval to legislation expanding the overseas role of the country’s military, a long-sought goal of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe that came despite an outcry from thousands of demonstrators.
Mr. Abe’s coalition pushed through the legislation a day and a half after a wrestling match in a parliamentary committee, where burly ruling-coalition lawmakers warded off opposition members who swarmed around the committee chairman in an attempt to block passage.
For the first time in the 70 years since World War II, the new laws will give the government power to use the military in overseas conflicts even if Japan itself isn’t under attack. Mr. Abe said that will make possible a closer alliance with the U.S. in cases such as a war on the Korean peninsula or a blockage of sea lanes that threatened Japan’s security.
ENLARGEJapanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, center, pushed for passage of legislation to expand his country’s military beyond self-defense. Despite months of protests from thousands of demonstrators, passage wasn’t ever in serious doubt because Mr. Abe’s coalition controls majorities in both houses of parliament. Photo: European Pressphoto Agency
“If you put the power of the U.S. Navy and Japan’s maritime self-defense forces together, then one plus one will finally become two,” Mr. Abe told The Wall Street Journal in an interview earlier this year. He said, for example, that Japan would be able to help protect a U.S. destroyer in the region even if the destroyer wasn’t in Japanese waters.
Japanese officials were careful to avoid provoking China, but the need to boost deterrence against a growing Chinese military was constantly in the background during the debate over the legislation, which was strongly supported by the U.S.
Mr. Abe’s popularity took a blow during the four months of parliamentary deliberations, and demonstrations outside the parliament grew louder as passage grew near. Protesters chanted slogans against what they called a “war bill.”
The protesters and the leading opposition parties argued the activities permitted by the law violated Japan’s postwar pacifist constitution, which prohibits the nation from using force to settle international disputes.
Scuffling and shouts broke out in Japan's parliament as Prime Minister Shinzo Abe prepared to pass new security bills. Photo: Getty Images
Tetsuro Fukuyama, a leading member of the opposition Democratic Party of Japan, said Mr. Abe didn’t offer a convincing explanation for why the bills were necessary. “People are worried that the democratic process is being trampled upon,” he said.
Students took a leading role in the protests, surprising many in Japan who had become accustomed to political apathy among young people. The students said they would continue their protests after passage, looking ahead to an upper house election in the summer of 2016.
“I want to make all the lawmakers who supported the bills lose their seats in the upper-house election,” said Nobukazu Honma, one of the founders of the four-month-old group Students Emergency Action for Liberal Democracy.
The 20-year-old Tsukuba University student said Friday that the movement has changed public opinion. “I feel that we are now driving politics. People outside the parliament are leading lawmakers, not the other way round,” he said. “This is what democracy is supposed to be.”
Passage of the legislation was never in serious doubt because Mr. Abe’s coalition controls majorities in both houses of parliament. The lower house passed the bills in July. Saturday’s vote in the upper house marked final passage.
“The changes in the security environment surrounding our nation brook no delay. The era in which America could be called the world’s policeman is coming to an end,” said Junichi Ishii, a lawmaker in Mr. Abe’s party, in the debate early Saturday just before the final vote.
The opposition pulled out all the stops to delay the end. One opposition lawmaker resorted to the traditional “cow walk,” taking tiny steps toward the podium to cast his vote in a stalling tactic.
