Skip to main content

Historic Electoral Mandate for Japanese Rearmament

In the columns of The Nikkei on October 21st, foreign policy commentator Hiroyuki Akita wrote that the new Japanese prime minister’s mandate would be defined by a far more consequential challenge: forging a system of government capable of functioning under the duress of war. For Akita, emphasising the need to prepare for a ‘wartime’ regime serves to highlight that Japan is under severe stress. Tokyo has enjoyed a long period of peace and has been able to deal with peacetime crises, even largescale ones such as the pandemic of the century. The war in Ukraine has ushered in a turbulent global situation, reminiscent of the uncertainty of the 1930s. To confront this, Tokyo needs a government structure capable of rapidly shifting from peacetime routines to an emergency footing. This is a dilemma that does not concern Japan alone, but Japan finds itself in an even more perilous position than Europe [...], hemmed in by the nuclear arsenals of China, Russia, and North Korea and lacking the protective shield of a collective defence framework like NATO.

According to Akita, history clearly shows that military force alone cannot guarantee stability. In 1941, Tokyo possessed formidable land and naval forces, but a reckless national policy led the country to the brink of total destruction. Japan was unable to subordinate the military to political power and safeguard the national interest. Eighty years later, in the event of war, the prime minister must be a commander-in-chief capable of leading the nation through crisis. In this context, various Japanese governments since 2010 have passed a series of security laws to strengthen the alliance with Washington and establish a National Security Secretariat. Nevertheless, citing the assessment of Shinichi Kitaoka – a diplomat and conservative realist historian who has advised both Yasuhiro Nakasone and Shinzo Abe – Japan continues to carry the unhealthy traits of the prewar period. Among these is the precedent principle, i.e., the tendency to stick rigidly to established policy, which prevents Tokyo from responding to crises with flexibility.

The context of Akita’s commentary was the transfer of power between Shigeru Ishiba and Sanae Takaichi at the helm of the executive, following the latter’s victory as leader of the LDP. The first woman to head a Japanese government, Takaichi took office without a parliamentary majority and, shortly thereafter, was forced to deal with the decision of Komeito, a centrist Buddhist-inspired party, to break its political-electoral alliance with the Liberal Democrats, in place since 1999. This coalition was replaced by one with the Japan Innovation Party (JIP), a regionalist party based in Osaka with national-liberal positions.

A mandate for Japanese realism

According to the Financial Times, during the 110 days of her government before the early elections called for February 8th, Takaichi showed a sure political touch, despite the diplomatic crisis with China that erupted last November. She then made history a second time. Not only is she the first woman to lead the country, but she is also the first political leader to obtain a super-majority in the lower house: 316 seats, and 352 for her coalition, out of 465 contested. The Economist dedicated a flattering cover to the victor, titled The World’s Most Powerful Woman, hailing her achievement as a once-in-a-generation chance to remake the Land of the Rising Sun – an opportunity Takaichi must seize in order to face the new world disorder.

The British weekly describes as healthy the prime minister’s willingness to break taboos, including discussing nuclear weapons and increasing defence spending to 2% of GDP. But this is only part of the work: she will have to manage Donald Trump’s return to the White House and position Tokyo at the forefront of efforts to link the CPTPP and the European Union, the Trans-Pacific and European areas, creating a trade bloc covering over 30% of global output. Finally, she will have to implement deregulation measures, attract migrants and not demonise them, and avoid fiscal populism.

The formula that sums up the assessments expressed by both the Japanese and international press is a mandate for political realism, with an emphasis on pragmatism. This is also evident in the fact that the new Takaichi government is unchanged from the previous one.

For the liberal Mainichi Shimbun, while the election debate focused on inflation, the real issues are the revision of the three non-nuclear principles and rearmament. In her election speeches, the prime minister clearly stated: If we want to strengthen our defence capabilities, we need to expand the economic pie. For a senior government official, this is a pedagogical formula: Under the banner of the economic growth we will strengthen our defence capabilities and will get the understanding of the public opinion.

Japanese-style Zeitenwende

A comment published shortly before the elections in the German newspaper Die Zeit seems significant. According to the paper, Prime Minister Takaichi has sparked an internal debate in Japan on security policy, similar to the German discussion on the Zeitenwende, the epochal turning point: a country burdened by the guilt of war, which for decades has hidden militarily in the shadow of the US, now finds its pacifist image suddenly shaken. Die Zeit cites the opinions of former diplomat and LDP parliamentarian Rui Matsukawa, for whom the three major challenges to Japan’s security are China, China, and China, followed by North Korea and, finally, Russia. Matsukawa also raises the unthinkable: nuclear deterrence requires Tokyo’s involvement in American decisions on the matter. She also suggests an approach similar to that of South Korea and proposes adapting the Constitution to allow the deployment of American submarines in Japanese waters. The reference is to abandoning the third of the three non-nuclear principles, which stipulates that no atomic weapons should be introduced into Japan.

This is not a constitutional provision, but a guideline, as Takaichi herself points out; on the other hand, according to Kitaoka’s assessment, the three principles fall under the precedents whose continued observance undermines strategic flexibility. We have already noted in the past how Tokyo looks to the German and European debate, and not only to that of Seoul, although it refers to it only obliquely. The reference to the Constitution concerns Article 9, which theoretically prohibits Japan from possessing armed forces and the means to wage war, limiting its external projection.

The thousand deaths of Chudo

According to Jio Kamata, Tokyo correspondent for The Diplomat, February 8th marks the end of the long debate on Japanese pacifism. The discussion has shifted from mere possession of military sufficiency to the quality and effectiveness of defence capabilities. This is also pointed out by Yuichiro Tamaki, leader of the Democratic Party for the People (DPP) for whom the era of the DPJ has come to an end, i.e., the era of a centre-left party advocating constitutional pacifism. The successor to the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) which governed from 2009 to 2012 is the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan (CDPJ) led by Yoshihiko Noda, who served as prime minister between 2011 and 2012. He launched the Centrist Reform Alliance (known as Chudo) with Komeito.

Although oriented towards more realistic positions on defence and nuclear energy, this alliance’s electoral debut on February 8th was disastrous: from a pre-election parliamentary strength of over 160 seats, it retained just 49, including 28 held by Komeito, thanks to the loyalty of its urban electorate, which carries weight in proportional voting. In 2024, the CDPJ won 11.5 million votes; Komeito, then allied with the LDP, won almost 6 million. Today, the alliance has won just 10.4 million votes. Before resigning, Noda admitted that one plus one does not make two and that he deserved one thousand deaths for the electoral defeat.

Among voters aged 18 to 30, Chudo obtained just 4% of the vote. The JDP won 33%, thanks in part to Takaichi’s media savvy and personality, which allowed her to come across as frank and deliver simple and concise messages, encapsulated in the election slogan a strong and prosperous Japan (a clear echo of the Meiji Restoration slogan Enrich the Country, Strengthen the Armed Forces). It also proved effective to present the election as a direct election, a choice between Takaichi and Noda (who are personally acquainted). In Japanese political circles, Noda was nicknamed unagi, or river eel – prized for its meat, but elusive, hunting at the bottom of lakes and rivers. In 2012, faced with internal fragmentation within the DPJ and the Senkaku crisis with China, he decided to call early elections, which Abe won in a landslide. In effect, he performed an honourable seppuku, the ritual samurai suicide, to put an end to the factionalism within the Democratic Party and steer it towards the centre.

The Burmese tuna

There is no doubt that Takaichi also gambled on her personal popularity and used populist rhetoric, as seen in the nervous reaction of the markets – especially the bond markets – to her proposed tax cuts, particularly the cut in VAT on food. According to the government, this proposal was put forward to sterilise an issue taken up by the opposition. The same can be said of immigration. The Asahi Shimbun notes that the issue occupied barely 1% of the prime minister’s campaign rallies. Nor did the rhetoric adopt the Japanese first tone used by Sanseito, which won 15 seats in the Diet but was forced to ride the Sanae wave.

According to Stephen Nagy, a Canadian political analyst, commentator for the Japan Times, and researcher at the JIIA, a think tank of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Japanese voters knew who and what they were voting for: realism in a Japanese foreign policy grappling with a dangerous neighbourhood. This perception has been heightened by diplomatic tensions with China and Beijing’s muscle-flexing after Takaichi’s statements about a possible Japanese military role in a conflict in the Taiwan Strait. The immigration issue proved to be something of a non-issue, as public opinion is aware of the need for immigrant labour, and the government is reviewing some regulations for granting residence and work permits.

In the midst of the election campaign, the Sankei Shimbun, the most right-wing of Japan’s daily newspapers, highlighted the issue of Burmese tuna: in hundreds of fish processing companies, including tuna, 15 to 20% of the workforce is now of Burmese, South Vietnamese, or Indonesian origin, and the workforce from Southeast Asia exceeds that of Chinese or South Korean origin. According to the Mainichi Shimbun, the same is true for agricultural businesses, where the majority of workers are Vietnamese.

Lotta Comunista, February 2026

Labels:

Popular posts in the last week

Hand and Brain and Artificial Intelligence

Internationalism No. 84, February 2026 Page 1 From the series Artificial Intelligence In the introduction to Dialectics of Nature and in his unfinished essay The Part Played by Labour in the Transition from Ape to Man , Friedrich Engels outlined the evolutionary process that led from Homo Erectus to Homo Sapiens . The text stands out for the conceptual power of its materialist method, and from it we draw five fundamental concepts. First, for Engels, the brain is a product of labour . It is in the dialectical relationship of mutual action and reaction with labour – made possible by the articulation of the hand freed by man's upright posture, the result of hundreds of thousands of years of natural selection – that the brain evolved to perform the most complex functions and develop self-awareness. In turn, labour is an expression of the social relations at th...
Read more

Lotta Comunista: The Origins 1943-1952

Guido La Barbera Contents 9. Preface to the English Edition 13. Preface 19. Useful dates 21. Chapter One «ONE OUGHT TO KNOW WITH WHOM ONE IS DEALING» 25. The balance-of-power theory 27. Theory and the ‘strategy-party’ 29. Chapter Two THE FOUNDRY AND THE PARTISAN STRUGGLE 31. The Savona group 39. Passion disciplined by reason 40. Never again a tool in the hands of others 41. The Genoa group 46. The Sestri Ponente group 48. The groups in Rome and Tuscany 52. The strength of GAAP: ‘only a handful’ 55. Chapter Three LIBERTARIAN COMMUNISM: A DIFFERENT KIND OF COMMUNISM 58. Reckoning with Bordiga...
Read more

The Unitary Imperialism Issue

Chapter Six   In 1951 Europe, and the world, was shrouded in mist. The ‘Cold War’ ideology ruled, and the war in Korea made a world conflict between the USA and the USSR seem a real possibility. In France, Great Britain, Germany and Italy, the talk was of rearmament. Europe, at that time urged by the USA, was planning the EDC (European Defence Community) to keep step with German rearmament. The concept of a ‘ unitary imperialism ’ was the strategic choice that helped the small GAAP group remain politically independent. But translating this into an ‘Internationalist Third Front’ slogan was unfortunate. It facilitated a link with French libertarian communists, but could also cause confusion with its suggestion of a ‘Third Force’ between the USA and the USSR, which in Europe was supported by important bourgeois currents. Although opposition to unitary imperialism consolidated the internationalist struggle, the theory required to be developed and per...
Read more

Libertarian Communism: A Different Kind of Communism

Chapter Three LIBERTARIAN COMMUNISM: A DIFFERENT KIND OF COMMUNISM   An examination of the debate within the groups that were to create GAAP (Anarchist Groups of Proletarian Action) gives a vivid picture of the problems that between 1948 and 1951 had to be slowly and painfully faced. Three major confrontations, progressively more serious, took place between Cervetto and Masini in the autumn of 1949 and again in the spring and autumn of 1950. As preparations were being made for the National Conference at Pontedecimo – from which GAAP would be born – debate on the nature of the organisation and on theories of the State and imperialism began to define the characteristics of the new political group, but also revealed the differences. The first step had been to look for ‘a different kind’ of communism in anarchism. Along this road Cervetto , with an ever-surer grasp, would raise the issue that had been first posed by Marx and Lenin : our militant...
Read more

The Theoretical and Political Battles of Arrigo Cervetto: I

Internationalism No. 78-79, August-September 2025, Special Issue Pages I and II From the introduction to Arrigo Cervetto’s Opere Scelte (“Selected Works”) , recently published in Italy by Edizioni Lotta Comunista. I Arrigo Cervetto was the founder, theorist, and leader of Lotta Comunista. From his first involvement in the partisan war in 1943-44 until his death in February 1995, his more than 50 years of political activity can be summarised in around twenty key battles. It goes without saying that those struggles - aimed at the restoration and develop ment of Marxist theory on economics, politics, social change, and international relations - are the common thread running through this selection of his writings. His memoirs, Quaderni 198I82 (“Notebooks 1981-82”), provide an account of those battles up to 1980. First battle: the factory and the partisan war The son of emi...
Read more

The EU Commission Plans for Rearmament and a Clean Industrial Deal

Internationalism No. 71, January 2025 Page 2 From the series European news Following the European elections which took place on June 6th - 9th, the leaders of the Member States met on June 27th at the European Council. Ursula von der Leyen was nominated as president of the next European Commission, after she was chosen as the European People’s Party’s (EPP) Spitzenkandidat (“leading candidate”). The agreement also included the election of former Portuguese Prime Minister Antonio Costa as president of the European Council, and the appointment of former Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas as High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy. Subsequently, on July 18th, Parliament elected von der Leyen as president of the Commission by an absolute majority, with 401 votes out of 719 MEPs. On September 17th, von der Leyen presented her team of commissioners to the European Parliament and, two days later, the Council adopted this list of...
Read more

Historical Constants and Strategic Surprise

The Strategic Surprise of the Agreement between Beijing and Tehran and the Suggestion of a Six-Power Concert The agreement between Beijing and Tehran falls under the definition of strategic surprise , i.e., events that entirely appertain to the political realm and mark a change or an about-turn in the balance among the powers. New alliances, the breakdown of alliances, the overturning of coalitions, diplomatic openings or unexpected military sorties: these are the regular novelties of international politics that Arrigo Cervetto wrote about. However, if the agreement was an unforeseeable event in itself, the long-term objective economic and political trends. that have determined it and made it possible are entirely investigable. The invasion of Afghanistan by the USSR at the end of December 1979 was interpreted by the United States as a potential threat to the oil routes of the Persian Gulf, and it was a contemporary revival of the Great Game , which had set the British Empire agai...
Read more

The Foundry and the Partisan Struggle

Chapter Two   What forces were there for starting again, at the end of the 1940s? At the beginning of that road, you could count the core groups on the fingers of one hand: Genoa, its Sestri Ponente district, Savona, Rome. Of course, there were also Turin, Vicenza, Bologna, Milan, Bolzano, Trieste, Livorno, and a few sympathisers down South, but that was all it amounted to. Although there were periodic attempts at ‘linking up’ along the whole length of the peninsula, apart from the three Ligurian groups and the Tuscany-Lazio one, there wasn’t much more than a network of individual sympathisers. The Savona group Arrigo Cervetto , founder of Lotta Comunista and its undisputed leader until his death in 1995, was born in Buenos Aires in 1927, to a family who had emigrated from Savona. Returning to Liguria, he started work when still a boy, and in 1943 was taken on as an apprentice at the Ilva steel-making plant in Savona. The party ar...
Read more

Pontedecimo, Genoa, 1951

Chapter Four   The conference at Pontedecimo, Genoa, established the original group which in the early 1960s would go on to found Lotta Comunista. It was a working-class group, most of whom had been drawn into politics in the course of the partisan struggle: a small group, a hand-picked unit. The first thing to be done was to acknowledge the failure of everything that had gone before, in the catastrophe of the Second World War, the second to maximise the few forces available by ‘100% organisation’. Then to reaffirm internationalism, against both Washington and Moscow. On the issue of the State and imperialism, some of this group continued to follow the anarchist line: for Cervetto , it was a case of restoring the theories of Marx and Lenin . These were the first few steps towards a consistent theory and strategy. In the division of labour to prepare for the conference that would establish GAAP, Arrigo Cervetto was assigned to draft the theor...
Read more

Capitalist Chaos and Artificial Intelligence

Internationalism No. 88, June 2026 Page 1 From the series Artificial Intelligence It may seem curious that the Franciscan friar Paolo Benanti refers to neuroscience and the theories of David Eagleman, which reflect a materialistic conception of consciousness. The explanation probably lies in Eagleman’s self-definition as a possibilian , a not particularly clever neologism that seeks to distinguish itself from atheism, but also from agnosticism: we know too little, so science must keep multiple possibilities open at once. In Engels’ view, agnosticism is shamefaced materialism . The scientist, as such, is a materialist. However, outside his own field, he translates his ignorance into Greek and calls it agnosticism . Eagleman is even more circumspect, so it is understandable that religion sees an opening for itself in the possibilities left open. In Die Zeit , Benan...
Read more