By Miya Tanaka,
The United States seeks to modernize the command structure of its decades-old security alliance with Japan to deal with a "much more assertive China" including toward Taiwan, U.S. Ambassador to Japan Rahm Emanuel said Friday as the two countries look to discuss the issue at an upcoming summit in Washington.
Speaking ahead of Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida's visit to the United States next week as a state guest, where a series of agreements are expected to showcase the robust ties of the close allies, the ambassador told reporters, "We are literally in the first chapter writing a new era."
Without going into the details of how the military command framework will be modified, Emanuel said, "The change is to deal with a series of challenges -- ones we know and ones we don't know, and you have a much more assertive China, not just in the Taiwan Straits."
The envisioned change is not meant "for just one contingency," but "it's built around the security in the Indo-Pacific," he said, also touching on China's repeated incursions into Japanese waters around the Senkakus, a group of East China Sea islets controlled by Tokyo but claimed by Beijing, and clashes between Chinese and Philippine vessels in the disputed South China Sea.
Concerns have also grown over a possible invasion of Taiwan by Beijing, which views the self-ruled democratic island as its own territory.
"We believe whatever we do working with Japan in this new fashion will better enhance the way we do a plan," the ambassador said.
According to sources close to the matter, the modification to the alliance would involve strengthening the authority of the U.S. Forces Japan, which has so far lacked operational control of military units in the Asian nation with its role largely focused on administering the status of forces agreement governing U.S. personnel stationed there.
Currently, the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, based in Hawaii, has authority over forces assigned to its vast area of responsibility that includes Japan, and the different time zone and physical distance has been seen as not efficient for interaction with the Japanese Self-Defense Forces.
The revamp is expected to come in conjunction with Japan's planned setup of a joint headquarters by March 2025 to unify the command of its ground, maritime and air forces.
Apart from defense issues, cooperation in areas including technology, space and clean energy is expected to be on the agenda when U.S. President Joe Biden hosts Kishida for talks and a state dinner on Wednesday. It will be the first visit to the United States by a Japanese prime minister as a state guest since 2015.
The ambassador also said the United States and Japan plan to set up a "central depot" of resources to respond to natural disasters and climate events in the region, recalling the powerful earthquake that rocked central Japan on Jan. 1 and one that recently hit Taiwan.
"We haven't done this with any other country. We don't know where it will go, etc.," he said, but noted that the idea is to basically put medical resources, tents, water and other items in a warehouse so they can be "deployed immediately" and "anywhere in the region" that is affected by a disaster.
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