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2.
The main reason for this low defence spending
has been Japanese willingness (the Americans would
say over-willingness) to shelter under the US strategi
nuclear umbrella. Japan relies completely on American
protection (Treaties of Mutual Cooperation and Security
signed in 1951 and 1960 give Japan a great element
of security).
the Americans inspired the present Japanese Constitu-
tion one of whose articles (article 9) states aspir-
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Moreover, after the Second World War
ing sincerely to an international peace based on
justice and order, the Japenese people renounce war
as a sovereign right of the nation and the threat or
use of force as a means of settling international
disputes
3.
In order to accomplish the aim of the preceding
paragraph land, sea and air forces as well as other
war potential will never be maintained. The right
10
of beligerency of the state will not be recognised.
4.
However, the Korean war led to the development
of the para-military National Police Reserve which
became in 1954 the Japan Self-Defence Forces. But
with the agonies of defeat in 1945 and the searing
experience of Hiroshima and Nagasaki public opinion
in Japan has been loath to develop any kind of
nuclear weapon or indeed to spend money on their own
defence. (The Militaristic attitudes of the old
Imperial armed forces are still considered an anathema
to the great majority of Japanese people.)
5.
However in recent times this somewhat cosy
/attitude
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