Smart Power and Japan’s Self-Defense Forces

Abstract

From Iraq to the Gulf of Aden and the South Pacific, this paper evaluates how far theoretical ideas about smart power manifest in operational missions of the Japan Self-Defense Forces (JSDF). To function within a ‘smart’ power context, this paper suggests that JSDF operates in ‘assisting’ mode, rather than the ‘threatening’ behavior of ‘hard’ power. JSDF also deployed alongside other Japanese ‘soft’ power tools – diplomatic, cultural, developmental, and NGOs, using tailored programs for different cultural and geographical contexts. Given constitutional constraints and public sensitivity towards coercive force, JSDF missions could be integrated more into a ‘whole-of-government’ approach advancing foreign policy goals through ‘smart power’.

Key Words:

• Japan Self-Defense Forces
• Smart Power
• Iraq
• Gulf of Aden
• Pacific Partnership

Acknowledgements

The author is grateful to Vice-Admiral Fukumoto Izuru, Captain Takahashi Takamichi, Captain Kuno Keiichi, Lieutenant Commander Ushirogata Keitaro, Prof. Aoi Chiyuki, Assoc Prof. Bhubhindar Singh, and Mr Watanabe Tsuneo for their assistance and advice.

Notes

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¹¹ Berger, ‘Japan in Asia’, 568.

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¹⁶ CSIS, 9.

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²⁰ Hideki Wakabayashi, The US-Japan Alliance: A New Framework for Enhanced Global Security (Washington DC: CSIS Press 2008), 5.

²¹ The author is grateful for discussions in the summer of 2013 in Tokyo with senior Japanese military officers, diplomats and academics.

²² Nye, Soft Power, 116.

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²⁴ Nye, The Future of Power, 21–2.

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²⁷ Nye, The Future of Power, 21.

²⁸ Ibid.

²⁹ Nye, The Future of Power, 227.

³⁰ Lee Hsien Loong, ‘America and Asia: Our Shared Future’, Speech at the Asia Society/US-ASEAN Business Council Gala Dinner, 3 May 2007, <http://asiasociety.org/america-and-asia-our-shared-future>.

³¹ Joseph Nye, The Powers to Lead (Oxford: OUP 2011), 40.

³² Japan Ministry of Defense, Defense of Japan 2010, 322–48.

³³ Public Affairs Division, Ministry of Defense, The World Needs the Japan Self-Defense Forces (Japan: Tokyo Sept. 2011).

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³⁵ Joseph Nye, ‘The American National Interest and Global Public Goods’, International Affairs 78/2 (2002), 241.

³⁶ Statement by Prime Minister Taro Aso, 13 March 2009, <www.kantei.go.jp/foreign/asospeech/2009/03/13danwa_e.html>.

³⁷ Cited in Jerry Esplanada, ‘10,607 Filipino seamen got protection from pirates: report’, Phillipine Daily Inquirer, 16 Jan. 2011, <http://globalnation.inquirer.net/news/breakingnews/view/20110116-314785/10607-Filipino-seamen-got-Japan-protection-from-piratesreport>.

³⁸ Cabinet Office, Conference on Anti-Piracy Response off the Coast of Somalia and Gulf of Aden ministries concerned ‘Anti-Piracy Response Report 2013’, March 2014, 19, <www.cas.go.jp/jp/gaiyou/jimu/pdf/…/report2013.pdf>.

³⁹ Citizens for Global Solutions Conference, ‘Smart Power: From Theory to Practice’, Washington DC, 17 March 2011, <www.state.gov/p/io/rm/2011/158726.htm>.

⁴⁰ Ministry of Foreign Affairs Japan, Japan’s Official Development Assistance White Paper 2012 (Tokyo: March 2013), <www.mofa.go.jp/policy/oda/white/2012/html/honbun/b1/s1_4.html>.

⁴¹ Cabinet Office Japan, National Security Strategy (NSS), 17 Dec. 2013, 1.

⁴² Ibid., 1–2.

⁴³ Ibid., 15.

⁴⁴ Yoichi Sugimoto et al., ‘Challenges for JMSDF after post-Cold War Era’, Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force Staff College Review 2 (May 2013), 6.

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⁴⁸ Cabinet Office, Conference on Anti-Piracy Response off the Coast of Somalia and Gulf of Aden ministries concerned ‘Anti-Piracy Response Report 2013’, March 2014, <www.cas.go.jp/jp/gaiyou/jimu/pdf/…/report2013.pdf>.

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⁵⁰ Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, ‘The Basic Plan regarding the measures based on the Law Concerning the Special Measures on Humanitarian and Reconstruction Assistance in Iraq’, Tokyo, Japan, 9 Dec. 2003, <http://japan.kantei.go.jp/koizumispeech/2003/12/09press_e.html>.

⁵¹ Chiyuki Aoi, ‘Japan and Stabilisation: Contribution and Preparedness’, RUSI Journal 156/1 (2011), 56.

⁵² Yoshiyuki Sakaemura, ‘A New Role for Armed Forces in a Non-Permissive Environment’, Japan Peacekeeping Training and Research Center Working Paper 201301, 15 July 2013, 7, <www.mod.go.jp/js/jsc/jpc/research/image/eng04.pdf>.

⁵³ Wolfram Manzenreiter, ‘Football Diplomacy, Postcolonialism and Japan’s Quest for Normal State Status’, in Steven Jackson and Steven Haigh (eds), Sport and Foreign Policy in a Globalising World (London: Routledge 2009), 73.

⁵⁴ Ministry of Foreign Affairs Japan, ‘Grassroots human security grant aid to Iraq (Governorate of Al-Muthanna including Samawah)’, Tokyo, Japan, 12 Dec. 2004, <www.mofa.go.jp/announce/announce/2004/12/1212.html>.

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⁵⁷ Sakaemura, ‘A New Role for Armed Forces in a Non-Permissive Environment’.

⁵⁸ Government of Japan, ‘Japan’s assistance to Iraq fact sheet’, Aug. 2009, <www.mofa.go.jp/region/middle_e/iraq/…/assistance/assist0610.pdf>.

⁵⁹ British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), ‘Warm welcome for Japan’s troops in Iraq’, 19 Feb. 2004, <http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3502471.stm>.

⁶⁰ Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, ‘Iraq: Unrest in Samawah bodes ill for handover’, 12 Aug. 2005, <www.rferl.org/content/article/1060645.html>.

⁶¹ Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, ‘Iraq’.

⁶² Aoi, ‘Japanese Participation in Peace Operations’, 77.

⁶³ Sakaemura, ‘A New Role for Armed Forces in a Non-Permissive Environment’, 3.

⁶⁴ Ibid., 2.

⁶⁵ Japan Now, ‘A Japanese comic hero cheers Iraqi children’.

⁶⁶ Sakaemura, ‘A New Role for Armed Forces in a Non-Permissive Environment’, 2.

⁶⁷ Aoi, ‘Japan and Stabilisation’, 56

⁶⁸ Aoi, ‘Japanese Participation in Peace Operations’, 79.

⁶⁹ Thomas E. Weinz, ‘Pacific Partnership 2012: Prepare in Calm to Respond to Crisis’, US Department of State, 3 Feb. 2012, <http://blogs.state.gov/index.php/site/entry/pp2012_mpc>.

⁷⁰ Government of Japan, ‘Pacific Partnership 2010: Highlighting Japan’, July 2010, <www.gov-online.go.jp/pdf/hlj/20100701/18-19.pdf>.

⁷¹ Government of Japan, ‘Pacific Partnership 2010: Highlighting Japan’.

⁷² Ministry of Defense Japan, National Defense Programme Guidelines for FY 2014 and Beyond, 17 Dec. 2013, 7.

⁷³ Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), ‘We are Islanders! For the Future of the South Pacific’, March 2009, <www.jica.go.jp/english/publications/jica_archive/…/pdf/islanders.pdf>.

⁷⁴ American Forces Press Service, ‘USS Cleveland heads home after Pacific Partnership exercise’, 1 August 2011, <www.defense.gov/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=64886>.

⁷⁵ Eileen Natuzzi, ‘Pacific Partnership: can an expensive exercise deliver more?’, Tonga Daily News, 26 April 2014, <www.tongadailynews.to/?p=5703>.

⁷⁶ Personal communication from retired senior US PACOM officer, March 2014.

⁷⁷ Nye, The Powers to Lead, 48.

⁷⁸ Akiko Yoshioka, ‘Japan’s Foreign Policy toward Iraq after 2003: Perceptions in Iraq and the Arab World’, Gulf, 2 (July 2007), 22.

⁷⁹ John De Boer, ‘The SDF in Iraq: Global Reaction’, Japan Institute of Global Communications, 8 July 2003, <www.glocom.org/media_reviews/w_review/20030708_weekly_review101/>.

⁸⁰ Cited in ‘Japan to build two patrol boats for Djiboutian coastguard’, All Africa, 31 March 2014, <http://allafrica.com/stories/201404010059.html>.

⁸¹ ‘Foreign Secretary welcomes Japan’s command of counter-piracy’, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, UK, <www.gov.uk/government/news/foreign-secretary-welcomes-japans-command-of-counter-piracy>, 28 July 2014.

⁸² ‘JMSDF vessels for anti-piracy operations in the Gulf of Aden made their first port call to the Royal Malaysian Navy base in Kota Kinabalu’, Embassy of Japan in Malaysia, 10 Sept. 2014, <www.my.emb-japan.go.jp/English/bilateral/E_SDFKK2014.html>.

⁸³ ‘Pacific Partnership 2014’s Naval Officers pay visit to Da Nang People’s Committee’, Da Nang Portal, <www.danang.gov.vn/portal/page/portal/danang/english/danang_news/news?p_pers_id=18239617&p_folder_id=&p_main_news_id=61114314>.

⁸⁴ ‘Japan Defence Minister Onodera visit to the Philippines’, Press Office, Japan Embassy, 28 June 2013, <www.ph.emb-japan.go.jp/pressandspeech/press/pressreleases/2013/79.html>.

⁸⁵ Aoi, ‘Japan and Stabilisation’, 56.

⁸⁶ Aoi, ‘Japanese Participation in Peace Operations’, 79.

⁸⁷ Ibid., 63.

⁸⁸ Aoi, ‘Japan and Stabilisation’, 55.

⁸⁹ Ibid., 52.

⁹⁰ Ibid., 56.

⁹¹ Tetsuo Kotani, ‘Reluctant Sea Power: Geopolitics in Asia and Japan’s Maritime Strategy’, in Peter Dutton (eds), Twenty-first Century Seapower (London: Routledge 2012), 150.

Additional information

Funding

Research conducted for this article was funded by a National University of Singapore Start-Up Grant [WBS R-603-000-041-133].

Notes on contributors

Yee-Kuang Heng

Yee-Kuang Heng is Associate Professor of International Relations and Assistant Dean for Research at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, National University of Singapore (NUS). Dr Heng graduated with a BSc (First Class Honours) and PhD in International Relations from the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), where he studied on a British government research scholarship. He previously held faculty positions as Assistant Professor at Trinity College Dublin, Ireland (2004–07) and at the University of St Andrews, United Kingdom (2007–11). Research interests include soft power and the role of the military in the Asia-Pacific. He has written several books, namely War as Risk Management (Routledge 2006), Risk, Global Governance, and Security (Routledge 2009), co-edited Asia-Pacific Nations in International Peace Support and Stability Missions (Palgrave 2014), and published in peer-reviewed journals such as Security Dialogue, and Review of International Studies.