It is a city scarred by the atomic bomb that will host this week’s G7 Summit, whose member countries are concerned about China’s military ambitions. While Japan wants to equip itself with long-range missiles capable of reaching Chinese territory, the mayor of Hiroshima criticizes this military strategy, with all the politeness characteristic of his culture.
A small brigade of employees receives The duty at Hiroshima City Hall in a most formal atmosphere. The program includes a visit to the irradiated ruins of the old town hall hit by the atomic bomb, in a crypt near the current building. An attaché politely asks us to avoid questions that the mayor cannot answer. Our interpreter gently reformulates: we cannot ask him contentious questions.
In the small living room prepared for the interview are exhibited photos of Mayor Kazumi Matsui in the company of former US President Barack Obama and Pope Francis, visiting his city. His entourage listens attentively to the interview. His subordinates become nervous, feverishly consulting their files when The duty deviates from the script to address the issue of Japan’s purchase of new long-range missiles.
Wedged in his chair, the mayor does not take offense. He abandons his prepared answers to expose his pacifist philosophy. “If we increase the threat, our military capacity, logically the other will also increase its defense capacity. We enter a vicious circle. To prevent this reaction, we must show wisdom now, ”says Kazumi Matsui, a true figure of the anti-nuclear movement in Japan. A thinly veiled criticism of the path of armed deterrence that his country is taking.
Double the army budget
The Japanese government announced in December the details of a massive rearmament plan. Anticipating a significant increase in its military budget, which will rise from 1 to 2% of its GDP in five years, Japan will equip itself with an arsenal of powerful long-range missiles, the conventional charges of which could destroy military targets up to Mainland China.
This decision marks a precedent in Japan. After its defeat in the Second World War, the country adopted a constitution strongly influenced by the American occupier. Chapter 9 explicitly prohibits any recourse to war, the maintenance of an armed force or any warlike capabilities. The new missiles are also presented strictly as a means of self-defense.
The duty met two experts close enough to the Prime Minister of Japan, Fumio Kishida, to have been consulted about this defense strategy. Both mention the theory of nuclear deterrence, according to which peace can only be ensured by the reciprocal threat of destruction.
“When Russia alluded to the use of the atomic bomb, it caused a lot of concern here in Japan,” said the dean of the School of Public and International Policy at Hitotsubashi University in Tokyo, Akiyama Nobumasa.
If a nuclear power like Russia succeeds in changing Ukraine’s borders, ignoring the international order, the fear of the Japanese is that China will do the same with Taiwan. In such a case, Japan senses that its territorial integrity could be next in line. In order to amplify the consequences of any recourse to war, the country wants to equip itself with weapons capable of responding to an attack directly on the territory of China or North Korea, its two problematic neighbours.
Ken Jimbo, professor at Keio University in Tokyo, who also served as special adviser to the Minister of Defense of Japan, arranged to meet the Duty in a conference room at the International House of Japan in Tokyo, where he directs a think tank on geopolitics. He explains that any border war in Asia “would be fatal” for Japan.
“The purpose of missiles, he said, is really to avoid war. We know we’re outnumbered [dans la région]but that doesn’t mean China can change the status quo [comme en envahissant Taïwan]. We show that we are ready for aftershocks that would be very expensive for the Chinese. This is not to punish them, but to deter them from attacking. »
Public debate
For Ito Yoshinobu, 59, a retired sailor from the Japan Self-Defense Forces – the official name of the country’s army – the debate is over: these weapons are essential to Japan’s security. “What are we supposed to do? Let an attack happen without doing anything? asks the man who now drives a taxi in the central town of Kure. The world, he believes, is far more dangerous than when he served in the Cold War.
Japan’s invitation to its G7 allies – United States, France, United Kingdom, Italy, Germany, Canada – in Hiroshima, where Justin Trudeau is arriving on Friday, is not trivial. The city where Prime Minister Kishida is from is notoriously pacifist, and is the place where a single bomb was dropped on civilians causing the death of 140,000 people in 1945. This is without counting the numerous cases of cancer detected. since that day, and which are still counted today.
The message behind the choice to hold the G7 in Hiroshima is simple, but powerful: in the current context of the war in Ukraine, peace must be maintained to avoid a repetition of the horrors of the past.
This is exactly the conviction of the mayor of this city marked forever. For him, the argument of armed deterrence does not pass. “You have to keep your cool,” says Kazumi Matsui. If this escalation occurs, it is because they [les dirigeants mondiaux] have not retained what has been done in the past. It’s important to make people feel what the people of Hiroshima felt. […] That’s what I’ll tell the leaders [du G7] : instead of creating a conflict, it is necessary to appease the conflict. »
In the grounds of the Hiroshima Peace Memorial, at the center of which stands the famous dome of the building that survived the atomic bomb, eight uniformed high school students act as guides to THE Duty, a way also to practice their English. On the subject of the rearmament of their country, they tend to agree with their mayor. “I believe that the population is against [l’achat des missiles] said one of them shyly.
Former President Barack Obama walked the lawn of this same park during a historic visit in 2016. In his speech, the 44e President of the United States had alluded to the dream of completely eliminating his country’s nuclear arsenal. “We may not achieve this goal in my lifetime,” he added in the same breath. An illustration of the contradictory thoughts that also cross Japan, torn between the theory of armed deterrence and the ideal of an unarmed world.
This report was made possible with the financial and logistical support of the Foreign Press Center of Japan (FPCJ).