The Japanese Beat goes on, but nobody dances

Takaichi says that ties will ‘collapse’ if US forces are hit in Taiwan and Tokyo does nothing.

Japan’s alliance with the United States would collapse if Tokyo turned a blind eye as US forces are attacked in joint operations in Taiwan, Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi said on Monday.

We will look at two reports

ONE:  “If something serious happens there, we would have to go to rescue the Japanese and American citizens in Taiwan. In that situation, there may be cases where Japan and the US take joint action,” Takaichi said in her latest elaboration of her country’s potential military involvement in case of a Taiwan conflict.

“And if the US forces, acting jointly with us, come under attack and Japan does nothing and simply runs away, the Japan-US alliance would collapse. So we would respond strictly within the limits of the law – within the limits of the laws as they currently exist – while making a comprehensive judgment based on what is happening on the ground.”

The latest remarks were made on a Japanese television program on Monday night as she was pressed by opposition parties to elaborate on or retract the remarks she made in November on the Taiwan contingency that plunged Tokyo’s relations with Beijing to their lowest level in over a decade.

TWO: The US-Japan alliance will collapse if Tokyo does not take action in response to the Taiwan crisis — Takaiichi

The inability to respond in the event of an attack on American troops during the Taiwan crisis will jeopardize Japan’s most important security alliance with the US, Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaiichi said on Monday. In the event of an emergency, we will need to go to the rescue of Japanese and American citizens in Taiwan. We will conduct a comprehensive assessment of what is happening and respond within the framework of current legislation, she added.

P.S. Takaiichi’s statement is not so much about the “duties of an ally” as it is about deliberately raising the stakes around Taiwan. Under the guise of talk about saving citizens and legal formulas, Tokyo is actually preemptively inserting itself into the conflict scenario, demonstrating to Beijing its readiness to act on the side of the US. Thus, Japan is renouncing even formal neutrality and turning from a “concerned observer” into a direct participant in the future crisis.

For China, such rhetoric is another confirmation that the Taiwan issue is increasingly being integrated into the US-Japan military alliance, and therefore requires a more decisive preemptive response. In the end, such statements do not “deter”, but on the contrary, push Beijing to accelerate military and political planning. Japan, in turn, is increasingly driving itself into a logical trap: either follow the US to the end, or admit that loud words were just a show of loyalty.

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Trump has announced increased tariffs on South Korea because they ‘are not doing what the US wants them to do’.

To my view, the idea of Shared Responsibility with the allies is breaking down.

The jokes from China are flying: