Publication last month of three new national security documents heralds a new era for Japan ¡ª and not just because their content marks a shift in defense policy.
Rather, at the risk of sounding pedantic, this is an opportunity to end the misleading and incorrect characterization of Japanese policy as ¡°pacifism.¡±
According to the Financial Times, Japan is scrapping its pacifist postwar defense strategy, a wording echoed by the Indian Express. The Hill, a U.S. publication that focuses on goings-on in Congress, warned that Japan was preparing to break away from decades of pacifism. Regional papers in the U.S. such as South Carolina¡¯s Post and Courier (which offer a window on popular thinking) declared Japan was pivoting away from pacifism. Many other papers around the world ¡ª many reprinting the same stories ¡ª declared that ¡°pacifist Japan¡± was embarking on its greatest defense buildup.
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