THE ASAHI SHIMBUN
February 11, 2024 at 17:20 JST
The junior partner in the coalition government is point-blank refusing to be bulldozed into plans by the ruling Liberal Democratic Party to supply allies of Japan with next-generation fighter jets.
Japan has agreed to develop the fighter jet with Britain and Italy to replace its fleet of aging U.S.-made F-15s.
Lawmakers from the LDP and Komeito agreed late last year to revise three longstanding principles governing the export of defense equipment. But no agreement was reached on fighter jets.
Because of its long history as a pacifist party, Komeito lawmakers have continued to waver on allowing exports of such lethal weaponry.
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida told a Feb. 5 session of the Lower House Budget Committee he wanted the two parties to reach an agreement by the end of February.
The very next day, Natsuo Yamaguchi, the Komeito leader, held a news conference at which he said, “This will be a very important policy change, but it has not yet received the understanding of the public.”
On Feb. 9, Yamaguchi told reporters, “It will be important to explain to the public how rules will be changed and why that change is necessary.”
Lawmakers from the two parties who are experts on defense matters met frequently last year before agreeing to the changes for the guidelines about exporting defense parts and equipment.
But no such meetings have been held this year.
In the past, there were like-minded lawmakers in the two parties that allowed for agreement on thorny issues, such as changing the government interpretation on the exercise of the right to collective self-defense that was approved in 2014. But those days are gone.
Others point to a recent money scandal that centered on LDP factions and fund-raising parties that significantly weakened Kishida’s political standing.
The death last November of Daisaku Ikeda, the former head of lay Buddhist organization Soka Gakkai from which Komeito sprouted as a political party, also seems to have played a role in Komeito sticking to its guns over the export of fighter jets.
Seeing as Ikeda was the founder of the party and its psychological pillar, Soka Gakkai sources suggested it would be unseemly to say the least for party officials to now make a major policy revision that goes against the pacifist ideology on which the party establishment was based.
(This article was written by Nobuhiko Tajima, Anri Takahashi and Mika Kuniyoshi.)
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