Japan Touts 2% GDP Military Build-Up as Growth Engine Against China, Russia and North Korea
Updated
Updated · CNN · Aug 4
Japan Touts 2% GDP Military Build-Up as Growth Engine Against China, Russia and North Korea
3 articles · Updated · CNN · Aug 4
Summary
Japan’s latest defense white paper casts the military expansion as an economic strategy, saying arms production, startup funding and wider use of commercial technology can boost growth as well as security.
The shift comes as Tokyo prepares a new national security strategy centered on threats from China, Russia and North Korea, with the paper calling China Japan’s “greatest strategic challenge.”
Defense spending has already risen to 2% of GDP under Japan’s biggest postwar buildup, with much of the money going to missiles able to strike targets more than 1,000 km away.
Further increases are expected to favor drones and other unmanned systems, but Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi has yet to show how a larger expansion would be funded without straining public finances.
That budget pressure is sharpened by Japan’s record 122.3 trillion yen budget and a 3.1 trillion yen supplementary package for energy-cost relief, underscoring the trade-off between defense and domestic spending.