“On Friday, Japan’s cabinet approved a record draft budget for next year, including more than 9 trillion yen ($58 billion) to strengthen defense.”, — write: www.pravda.com.ua
Illustrative photo: Getty Images Source: The Associated Press
Details: The record defense spending was to strengthen its ability to strike back and defend the coast with cruise missiles and drones amid rising tensions in the region.
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The total draft budget is 785 billion dollars (122.31 trillion yen).
The draft budget for fiscal year 2026, which begins in April, is 9.4% higher than the 2025 budget and marks the fourth year of Japan’s five-year plan to double annual arms spending to 2% of gross domestic product.
AR notes that the increase is taking place against the background of increasing tensions in Japan’s relations with China.
Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi said in November that her country’s military could intervene if China took action against Taiwan.
The Takaichi government, under pressure from the US to increase military spending, has pledged to meet the 2 percent target by March, two years earlier than planned. Japan also plans to revise its current security and defense policy by December 2026 to further strengthen its armed forces.
The Japanese parliament plans to approve the draft budget by the end of the current fiscal year.
It provides for the allocation of more than 970 billion yen ($6.2 billion) to strengthen Japan’s missile potential.
The AR publication points out that “partly due to Japan’s aging and shrinking population, as well as problems with the shortage of military personnel, the government believes that unmanned weapons are necessary.”
To protect its coast, Japan will spend 100 billion yen ($640 million) on a “massive” deployment of unmanned air, sea and underwater drones for surveillance and defense as part of a system called SHIELD, scheduled for March 2028, defense ministry officials said.
For faster deployment, Japan initially plans to rely mainly on imports, perhaps from Turkey or Israel.
Japan plans to spend more than 160 billion yen ($1 billion) by 2026 to jointly develop a next-generation fighter jet with Britain and Italy for deployment in 2035. There are also plans for research and development of drones with artificial intelligence.
Japan also allocates almost 10 billion yen ($64 million) to support the industrial base and sell weapons.
Prehistory:
- Japan’s Defense Ministry said on December 7 that Chinese warplanes twice directed fire control radars at Japanese aircraft near Okinawa Prefecture. Tokyo regarded these actions as threatening and sent a note of protest to Beijing.
- A similar case with radar guidance was recorded in 2013, when a Chinese ship targeted a Japanese destroyer in the East China Sea.
- In June, Japan claimed that Chinese accusers were getting dangerously close to a Japanese patrol plane near Okinawa.
- On November 4, China deployed more than 100 naval and coast guard ships in East Asian waters. Taiwan’s government called this build-up a direct threat to stability in the Indo-Pacific region.
- On December 10, Japan raised fighter jets to monitor Russian and Chinese aircraft conducting joint patrols in the Pacific Ocean.