The International Dimensions of Japan’s Anti-Nuclear Weapons Policies: Issues in Disarmament and Nonproliferation

Tokyo’s intention to pursue the abolition of nuclear weapons at the end of the Cold War notwithstanding, it has fallen far short of the expectations of Japanese anti-nuclear weapons organizations and other disarmament advocates. Tokyo’s decision in the second half of the 1990s to deepen its security alliance with the United States quickly became a major impediment standing in its path to abolish nuclear weapons. Although Tokyo has understood that nuclear nonproliferation is integral to disarmament, its attention has discernibly shifted away from the latter and toward the former. This change in Tokyo’s nonproliferation and disarmament policy corresponds to the heightened emphasis that Washington has recently placed on nuclear counterproliferation. For example, the Koizumi government was quick to respond to the Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI) that the Bush administration announced in May 2003. Not only was Japan one of the countries initially involved in formulating the structure of the PSI, a counterproliferation program designed to intercept the transport of weapons of mass destruction, but it also hosted the first Asian exercises in October 2004. 1 These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.