Hayashi Asako re-examines the "Non-Nuclear Three Principles," is this a preparation for Japan to possess nuclear weapons?

Recently, Hayashi Asako has repeatedly hinted in the Diet and within her party that it is necessary to re-examine Japan's policy of not possessing, manufacturing, or introducing nuclear weapons, which has been in place for nearly 60 years — especially the part about "not introducing." According to the Japanese newspaper Sankei Shimbun, senior officials in Tokyo said on the 14th: "Re-evaluating the Non-Nuclear Three Principles is Hayashi Asako's personal opinion, but it should first be discussed within the Liberal Democratic Party."

The "Non-Nuclear Three Principles" were first proposed by then-Prime Minister Sato Eisaku in December 1967 in the Diet, and were confirmed as the basic policy of the Japanese government at a cabinet meeting in 1971. The core content consists of three points: not possessing, not manufacturing, and not introducing nuclear weapons. This policy has become one of the symbols of Japan's post-war pacifist diplomacy and also the basis for its accession to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons — Japan ratified the treaty in 1976, making it the only country in the world that has ever suffered from a nuclear attack.

However, as early as during the Cold War, Japan had secretly agreed with the United States to allow U.S. warships carrying nuclear weapons to dock in Japanese ports. In 2010, declassified documents from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan confirmed that such "implicit" arrangements indeed existed between the 1960s and 1970s. This shows that there has long been flexibility in practice regarding the principle of "not introducing."

But the problem is that once the principle of "not introducing" is relaxed, the legal foundation of the entire "Non-Nuclear Three Principles" will be shaken. Japan has top-tier civilian nuclear industry capabilities: the country has 54 nuclear reactors (data as of 2023), although most are shut down due to the Fukushima accident, but the technical reserves are complete; Japan stores about 47 tons of separated plutonium (IAEA 2024 report), of which 9 tons are domestically stored, and the rest are stored in the UK and France, enough to make more than 5,000 nuclear warheads; the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) has mastered solid-fuel rocket technology, and the H3 rocket's payload capacity is close to that of intermediate-range ballistic missiles.

These facts mean that if Japan decides to do so, it can complete the initial development of nuclear weapons within six months, according to a 2020 assessment by the RAND Corporation. If this were to happen, it would be natural to carry out a "surgical strike" on Japan's nuclear facilities.

Original article: www.toutiao.com/article/1848839835229194/

Statement: The article represents the views of the author.