The Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) emphasis two realities, first the challenge of nuclear terrorism and proliferation; and second, it affirms the end of the Cold War rivalries. But the “resetting” of relationship with Moscow had created an enemy vacuum for the U.S. To fill this gap, North Korea has been constructed as an enemy which justifies the continuity of the “nuclear umbrella” in the Northeast Asian region. But as an asymmetrical, surrogate enemy it is actually the pretext to maintain ‘critical bases’ in Northeast Asia which functions as hubs for U.S. global military power projection.
Naoto Kan’s Remarks strain Relations with South Korea
Kan’s statement about sending the SDF to the Korean peninsula to rescue Japanese citizens and people of Japanese origin in the event of an emergency has raised the spectre of a possible revival of Japanese militarism.