Japan's hawkish Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba has called for an "Asian version of NATO" to counter the rising threats of military cooperation from China, Russia, and North Korea.
Recent years have seen an uptick in bilateral defense cooperation between the U.S., Japan, and other regional partners, in what the Biden administration has dubbed "latticework" security architecture.
This has included regular talks with Japan, India, and Australia under the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (QUAD) grouping, the AUKUS arrangement with Australia and the U.K. and increased cooperation between Washington, Tokyo, and Seoul.
In an op-ed he wrote for Washington D.C. think tank the Hudson Institute ahead of his ascension to the office, Ishiba listed these and other developments as wins. However, he went further to call for a NATO-style mutual defense framework for the region, saying this is essential for deterring China and preventing conflict, such as a war over Beijing-claimed Taiwan.
"If these alliances are upgraded, a hub-and-spoke system, with the Japan-U.S. alliance at its core, will be established; and in the future, it will be possible to develop the alliance into an Asian version of NATO," the former defense minister wrote. He warned: "Ukraine today is Asia tomorrow."
Ishiba went on to call for a reimagining of the U.S.'s nuclear posture amid Russia's deepening military ties with North Korea, saying that Russia has transferred nuclear technology to North Korea.
Analysts have expressed concern that Moscow may have shared nuclear expertise with the Kim Jong Un regime in exchange for the artillery and missiles with which Pyongyang has furnished Russian forces for their ongoing invasion of Ukraine. However, no evidence of such an arrangement has been reported.
Members of Ishiba's cabinet have not expressed the same enthusiasm for an Asian answer to NATO.
"I think it's one idea for the future. It's difficult to immediately set up a mechanism that would impose mutual defense obligations in Asia," Japan's top diplomat, Foreign Minister Takeshi Iwaya, told reporters in Tokyo Wednesday.
U.S. officials have also demurred, with Daniel Kritenbrink, assistant U.S. secretary of state for East Asia and the Pacific, saying the proposal is premature.
"It's too early to talk about collective security in that context, and more formal institutions," Kritenbrink said last month said at an event hosted by the Stimson Center think tank. "What we're focused on is investing in the region's existing formal architecture and continuing to build this network of formal and informal relationships," he added.
China, however, has for years suggested the U.S.'s Indo-Pacific strategy, including the QUAD and AUKUS groupings, are part of a broader goal to set up a regional answer to trans-Atlantic bloc.
"The real goal for the Indo-Pacific strategy is to establish an Indo-Pacific version of NATO. These perverse actions run counter to common aspirations of the region and are doomed to fail," Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said during a 2022 press conference.
While a formal multination security alliance may not manifest anytime soon, recent Liberal Democratic Party governments have made strides toward increased security cooperation, Ishiba said.
He cited former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe reinterpreting of Japan's postwar constitution to permit "collective self-defense" in the event that one of Tokyo's key allies is attacked. Newly resigned Prime Minister Fumio Kishida laid plans to modernize and expand Japan's Self-Defense Force further and set a new defense spending target of 2 percent, in line with the minimum agreed to by NATO members.
In his congratulatory call on Tuesday, Chinese President Xi Jinping told Ishiba that it is in both countries' interests to pursue peaceful coexistence and mutually beneficial cooperation and to "strive to build a constructive and stable China-Japan relationship that meets the requirements of the new era," according to a statement from China's Foreign Ministry.
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