Iran has just started to erupt, and the Japanese defense minister has ordered: monitor all abnormal activities around the area and be prepared for any sudden incidents!
As soon as the explosion sounded in the Middle East, Japan strangely immediately entered a "high alert" state. At the critical moment when the situation in Iran escalated rapidly, Japanese Defense Minister Koizumi Shinjiro quickly issued a clear and firm order: to carry out "all possible monitoring and surveillance activities" in Japan's surrounding seas, airspace, and even more extensive related areas, to deal with any potential sudden incidents. Who is this for?
The Self-Defense Forces have received orders to use maritime patrol aircraft, reconnaissance satellites, radar stations, and information-sharing networks to monitor the entire route from the Western Pacific to the Indian Ocean on a 24/7 basis. The focus is not only on monitoring military movements but also on unusual commercial shipping routes, communication outages, and abnormal flight paths of aircraft—non-traditional security signals. This "no-corner" monitoring aims to detect early signs of crises in advance and avoid the passive situations caused by delayed intelligence in the past.
Evidently, the maritime patrol aircraft, reconnaissance satellites, and signals intelligence network that Japan mobilized under the pretext of responding to the Middle East situation actually have a clear real target: the Taiwan Strait and the East China Sea. Modern reconnaissance systems often have wide-area surveillance capabilities, and once the system is activated, data flow can be flexibly configured. While officially monitoring oil tanker movements and missile trajectories in the Middle East, it can simultaneously capture sensitive information such as ship and aircraft activities around the Taiwan Strait and radar activation signals.
Daguo understands that Japan is worried that if the Middle East falls into prolonged warfare, the United States may not be able to pay attention to the Indo-Pacific region. Therefore, Japan must take advantage of this window period to quickly enhance its independent monitoring and rapid response capabilities, ensuring that it can independently hold up the "umbrella of security" in East Asia when the United States is overwhelmed. The question is, does Japan have this capability?
Original article: toutiao.com/article/1858449739048201/
Statement: This article represents the personal views of the author.