Japan has approved its highest-ever defence budget to beef up the armed forces in response to threats from North Korea.
The budget will swell to $46bn with money ear-marked for defence systems and new cruise missiles which can strike Pyongyang.
The announcement was made today as the government unveiled its $860bn national budget for the fiscal year starting in April.
It’s the sixth year in a row that the defence budget has risen and comes after North Korea fired two missiles over Japan this year and vowed to ‘sink it into the sea.’
Japan has approved its highest-ever defence budget to beef up the armed forces in response to threats from North Korea. Pictured: A Japanese defence unit near Tokyo
This is the moment North Korea launched an intercontinental ballistic missile in July
The budget approves $1.2bn to reinforce defences against a possible North Korean ballistic missile attack.
That includes purchases of a new longer range interceptor, the SM-3 Block IIA, designed to strike ballistic missiles in space, upgrades for the Patriot missile batteries that are the last line of defence against incoming warheads and preparations for the construction of two ground-based Aegis radar stations.
Japan will also spend $19mn to begin acquiring medium-range air-launched cruise missiles able to strike sites in North Korea in a bid to deter any potential attack by Pyongyang, which continues to test ballistic missiles.
Japan has a clause in its constitution which bans it from going to war but this was re-interpreted in 2014 to allow it to help any attacked allies.
‘It is essential that we have the latest, most capable equipment to bolster our defences,’ Japanese Minister of Defence Intsunori Onodera said after he and other Cabinet members approved the new spending plan.
Japan’s government approved a record military budget today, with money ear-marked for weapons capable of pre-emptive strikes against North Korea. Pictured: A missile interceptor unit stationed in Tokyo deployed to counter North Korean rockets
The latest rocket launched by the North on November 29 reached an altitude of more than 2,485 miles before plunging into the Sea of Japan.
A spending spree on mostly US-made equipment means Japan’s defence planners are being forced to curtail domestic programmes that would help local defence contractors such as Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and Kawasaki Heavy Industries maintain their military industrial base.
That may force Japan to curtail its long-held ambition to build an advanced stealth fighter, dubbed the F-3.
In November, U.S. President Donald Trump called on Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to buy more U.S.-made weapons as his administration pushes Washington’s allies to contribute more to their joint defence.
Japan plans to allocate $2.4bn of its next budget to buy defence equipment through the U.S. government’s Foreign Military Sales system, 15 percent more than the current budget and more than double the amount spent in year that ended March 31, 2015.
North Korea under Kim Jong-un (pictured) has accused Donald Trump of seeking the ‘total subordination of the whole world’ in his new national security strategy
Japan will delay a decision to develop the F-3, which is meant to counter military technology advances by China, putting on hold a project estimated to be worth more than $40bn.
The latest defence spending plans provide the first concrete public indication that pause is underway.
A budget request submitted in August earmarked $65mn for a new large jet engine test facility that Japan’s defence ministry will need to test a prototype F-3 engine. That item was not included in the budget approved on Friday.
A proposed $21mn for other F-3 research was also trimmed to 1.6 billion yen.
‘Money is being spent in other areas and this is a sign that the government sees the F-3 as a low priority,’ a Japanese defence ministry official said.
North Korea accuses Donald Trump of seeking the ‘total subordination of the whole world’
North Korea has accused Donald Trump of seeking the ‘total subordination of the whole world’ in his new national security strategy.
Kim Jong-un’s foreign ministry hit out at the US President’s ‘criminal document’ calling it a ‘proclamation of aggression aimed at holding sway over the world’.
In the document, announced on Monday, Trump said Washington had to deal with the challenge posed by North Korea’s weapons programmes.
But in a statement released today, Pyongyang said: ‘This has fully revealed that “America first policy” which the gang of Trump is crying out loudly about is nothing but the proclamation of aggression aimed at holding sway over the world according to its taste and at its own free will.’
Kim Jong-un’s foreign ministry hit out at the US President’s ‘criminal document’ was a ‘proclamation of aggression aimed at holding sway over the world’