Japan should be worrying about Taiwan, not Ukraine.
Japan has become one of Ukraine’s most-important financial backers, pouring in some $12.1 billion in aid to support the country’s war-battered economy and its defenses with nonlethal equipment such as anti-drone systems.
“As I often say, Ukraine of today may be East Asia of tomorrow,” Prime Minister Fumio Kishida told a joint session of the U.S. Congress two weeks ago, underlining the rationale for aligning Tokyo closely with America’s de facto proxy war against Russia.
But how does Kishida’s leadership role on Ukraine, including sanctions on Russia and a long-term commitment to support postwar reconstruction, tangibly advance Japan’s strategic interests at a time when its own neighborhood is becoming increasingly dangerous?
Oddly, there has been little debate in Japan on this issue. Yet the country’s deepening engagement with Ukraine at a time it is ill-prepared for armed conflict over Taiwan is a huge strategic mistake.
Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal, left, with Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida at the reconstruction conference held in Tokyo on Feb. 19. © Reuters
The drawn-out Ukraine war is not just impeding the U.S.-led attempt to rein in China’s aggressive expansionism, it is also stretching American resources thinly and weakening Washington’s deterrent posture in the Indo-Pacific region, thereby making a Taiwan Strait crisis more likely.
Kishida’s surprise move in December, at Washington’s urging, to ship Patriot air-defense systems to the U.S. to cover for ones being sent to Kyiv illustrates the risks of a Ukraine-centric approach.
Any Chinese operation to blockade or attack Taiwan would likely intrude into Japanese airspace and waters, conceivably pulling Tokyo into a war over the island democracy. Yet amid signs Chinese President Xi Jinping is preparing his country to go to war over Taiwan, Kishida has agreed to take weapons out of Japan’s air defenses for an increasingly hopeless war in distant Europe.
In fact, with U.S. attention and resources focused on conflicts in Europe and the Middle East, China’s efforts to alter the territorial and maritime status quo in Asia and secure strategic dominance are reaching a tipping point.
Yet some in the West myopically insist that the U.S. must first defeat Russia in Ukraine before pivoting to deter China. As if Xi would wait to move against Taiwan until the U.S. has humiliated Russia in a long war and was then ready to direct greater attention his way. Indeed, the last thing Xi would like is an end to the Ukraine war because that would leave the U.S. free to focus on the Indo-Pacific region.
This explains why China, as Washington now acknowledges, is quietly aiding the Kremlin’s war machine by supplying technologies and geospatial intelligence. The transfers suggest that, before making a move on Taiwan, Xi wants the Ukraine war to further deplete America’s weapons and munitions stocks.
The flip side to America’s deepening involvement in conflicts elsewhere is a desire to avoid direct confrontation with China. This explains U.S. President Joe Biden’s more conciliatory approach to Beijing in recent months, including a greater emphasis on diplomacy than on deterrence.
The U.S. may still be the world’s foremost military power, but it is in no position to meaningfully take on Russia and China simultaneously. According to its own official national security doctrine, the U.S. maintains the military capability to fight and defeat China or Russia with some allied support — but not both simultaneously.
In recent decades, the U.S. has waged overlapping wars, but these were against much weaker states, namely Iraq and Afghanistan. Still, these protracted wars exposed shortcomings in America’s ability to pursue two military missions simultaneously at full tempo.
In this light, Biden has stepped up his administration’s outreach to Beijing to help avert a Chinese attack on Taiwan that could result in a direct war between the U.S. and a near-peer adversary. But with the U.S. looking overextended and Xi viewing Biden’s conciliatory posture as one of weakness, the risks of failing to deter aggression against Taiwan are increasing.
The risks are particularly acute for Japan, whose southernmost islands lie close to Taiwan. As former Prime Minister Taro Aso has warned, if Taiwan falls, “Okinawa could be next.”
Japan should recall that U.S. appreciation of its generous financial support for previous missions has been fleeting.
A classic example is the 1991 Gulf War campaign against Iraq for which Japan contributed $13 billion. Yet then-U.S. Secretary of State James A. Baker III said, “Your ‘checkbook diplomacy,’ like our ‘dollar diplomacy’ of an earlier era, is clearly too narrow.”
Today, Japan needs to shed its zeal toward Ukraine and focus squarely on Taiwan. This should include not sending more Patriots or other defense systems to backstop Kyiv.
An overstretched America and a Japan straining to avert recession must persuade Europe to step up and take primary responsibility for Ukraine, its own neighbor.
To safeguard Asian security and the region’s balance of power, there can be no substitute for a prudent, balanced and forward-looking approach.
With China’s lengthening shadow darkening its doorstep, Japan needs to focus primarily on its combustible neighborhood and prepare for a Taiwan Strait contingency.
This should include assuring its ability to respond to a scenario in which Xi seeks to bring Taiwan to its knees by employing the techniques of incremental expansionism that his regime has successfully honed in the South China Sea without triggering a concerted U.S. response.
Not Ukraine, but the South China Sea of today could be the Taiwan of tomorrow. This means that Japan, without being unduly distracted by developments afar, must find effective ways to beat back China’s hybrid warfare.
Brahma Chellaney is professor emeritus of strategic studies at the Centre for Policy Research in New Delhi and a former adviser to India’s National Security Council. He is the author of nine books, including “Water: Asia’s New Battleground.”
Stagecraft and Statecraft 