Gashes run deep on the hillside of a subtropical forest, where rows of beige barracks now stand.

A new base of the Ground Self-Defense Force opened in March on Ishigakijima island, the commercial hub of the Yaeyama islands near Taiwan and southwest of the Okinawa mainland.

With a population slightly shy of 50,000, Ishigakijima has been at the center of missile deployment controversy since Japan’s ability to attack enemy bases was spelled out last December in the government’s three revised documents on national security.

WAVERING OVER MISSILE DEPLOYMENT

When the city of Ishigaki agreed to host a new GSDF base in 2018, it was explained that the missiles to be deployed there would be of a “defensive nature” to prevent enemies from landing on the island.

But now that these missiles could have a range capable of reaching beyond Japan, they may well turn Ishigakijima into a target of enemy attack.

The Defense Ministry keeps reiterating that it has yet to decide where to install the long-range missiles. But the Ishigaki municipal assembly has approved, by a majority vote, a memorandum flatly refusing to accept the long-range missile deployment.

Manami Miyara, 30, born and raised on Ishigakijima, returned to the island five years ago after graduating from a university in Tokyo. She has since been working on regional revitalization while holding down a local job.

Together with her contemporaries, Miyara recently formed a group that is demanding a referendum on the GSDF’s planned deployment of the missiles.

The group has so far gathered signatures of support from about 40 percent of voters, but not from the municipal assembly and the municipal government. The group is now involved in a lawsuit over the matter.

Even among group members, some are in favor of the base while others are against it. But Miyara believes in demanding a referendum because the people need a chance to express their opinions.

“The plans to host a GSDF base and deploy the missiles (on Ishigakijima) have proceeded in such a way that we, the islanders, have been kept in the dark, as if we aren’t entitled to our own opinions or we don’t even exist,” Miyara said.

Even among islanders who were initially in favor of hosting the GSDF base, doubts and fears began to grow when the administration of Prime Minister Fumio Kishida decided to allow the nation to possess the capability to strike enemy bases.

The decision effectively voided Japan’s fundamentally “purely defensive” defense policy under the pacifist Constitution. Any misstep in the decision-making process could cause the nation to launch a pre-emptive attack in violation of international laws, and even invite a retaliatory attack.

POSTWAR UNWRITTEN RULES?

In revising the three national security documents, Kishida boasted that he was bringing about a historic transition to Japan’s postwar security policy, but he never started a national debate that such a major transition would warrant.

Even during the ensuing regular Diet session, the prime minister repeatedly avoided explaining his position clearly, insisting he couldn’t “show his hand.”

Against this background, the new policies introduced by the three national security documents are now being fleshed out at a rapid pace.

The proposed doubling of the security-related budget, which was to start in fiscal 2023, was realized at the end of March with a massive 1.4 trillion yen ($10.3 billion) increase from the previous year.

The long-held postwar unwritten rule of “not getting into debt to fund the defense budget” was broken for the first time by issuing construction bonds to foot the costs of building destroyers and other military hardware.

Also, separate from the government’s official development assistance (ODA) for developing nations, a new framework known as “official security assistance” (OSA) was created to provide free military assistance to nations that are recognized as “doshikoku”--literally, nations that share the same goals as Japan.

And bills to reinforce support for the defense industry, such as by encouraging exports of defense equipment, have been presented to the Diet. The ruling Liberal Democratic Party and its junior coalition partner, Komeito, have started discussing arms export deregulation.

Traditionally, Japan had its own rules in place to prevent unconstrained military expansion. For instance: no government bonds were to be issued to fund defense spending; assistance for developing nations was to be limited only to helping their economic and social development; and strict conditions must be attached to exporting arms and providing military technology.

But all such self-imposed rules that once enabled Japan to remain a pacifist nation have been “disabled” one by one. This may well change Japan’s very character.

And we cannot overlook the fact that all this is proceeding in the absence of any thoughtful discussion of opposing views and without any information disclosure or explanation of the potential risks involved.

NATIONAL CONSENSUS-BUILDING CRUCIAL

North Korea keeps launching ballistic missiles. China remains on its track of rapid military expansion and thinks nothing of arbitrarily changing the status quo by armed force. And then there is the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Probably sensing the severity of the security situation now surrounding Japan, more Japanese citizens today are in support of possessing enemy base attack capabilities and accepting massive defense budget increases.

But what lies ahead for the nation when the government does not even bother with consensus-building and appears to just take advantage of the people’s anxiety?

The war in Ukraine has forced some European nations to review their national security policies.

Germany, which like Japan based its postwar national reconstruction programs on its deep remorse for its wartime doings, has scrapped its traditional principle of not supplying weapons to conflict zones and started providing arms to Ukraine.

Sebastian Maslow, 40, a German native who now teaches international relations at Sendai Shirayuri Women’s College, noted that while he could appreciate the German government’s decision as an emergency measure, it was regrettable that there was no time to form a national consensus.

“Proceeding without the people’s understanding will weaken democracy,” he explained. “Any initiative formed without national consensus building will prove short-lived when ‘support fatigue’ eventually sets in. There is also the danger of inviting the emergence of some extreme political force, which in the end will lead exactly to the outcome desired by Russia.”

“The enemy nation” is not the only thing we should be afraid of. What we truly must fear is a government that ignores the people, trivializes public debate and explanations, and keeps changing and eventually destroying the nation’s most important principles.

--The Asahi Shimbun, May 3