by KYLE MIZOKAMI
Japan recently announced that it is building a new, larger “helicopter-destroyer” to complement the Hyuga-class destroyers in service or under construction. The new destroyer, which is to have a flight deck of 248 meters and a displacement of 19,500 tons, will begin construction shortly. It will be the largest naval vessel built by Japan since the Second World War, and there has been some speculation that it might be the first Japanese ship of the post-war era to embark fixed-wing aircraft — in this case, F-35 multirole fighters.
Japan has had a long history with aircraft carriers. Aside from the United States, no other country is so closely associated with them. Until the Battle of Midway, Japan had the largest, most powerful and most effective carrier fleet in the world. Seventy years later aircraft carriers are still useful, and on the face of it, it’s natural to assume that Japan might acquire them in the near future. There are many good reasons why it won’t.
Aircraft carriers are tools of offensive warfare
Japan chooses to interpret Article 9 of its constitution, which prohibits “land, air, and sea forces, as well as other war potential” as allowing defensive naval forces but disallowing “offensive” weapons, specifically “offensive aircraft carriers.” This presumably means carriers that can embark fighters like the F-35. (“Helicopter-destroyers” that primarily carry anti-submarine helicopters are defensive in nature.)
There is no policy that would drive the need for an aircraft carrier
America’s protection of Japan has allowed Japan the luxury of choosing its security issues, and Japan chooses sparingly. Japan has not defined any naval mission in support of any policy that would require anything like a carrier. The recent anti-piracy missions in Somalia and refueling mission in the Indian Ocean aside, Japan is generally not interested in projecting military power more than a few hundred kilometers beyond Japanese soil. Anything beyond that is left to the Americans.
Most of Japan’s potential adversaries are right on its doorstep
These include China, Russia and North Korea. Japan does not need an aircraft carrier to defend itself from adversaries. Japan itself is the aircraft carrier. Japan can defend its interests, as currently defined, using land-based aircraft.
Aircraft carriers are extremely expensive
Japan has a self-imposed, 1-percent GDP limit on defense spending, and could not possibly hope of keeping that cap and buying an aircraft carrier at the same time. Not only would it have to budget for the carrier, it would have to buy escorts, support vessels and the embarked air wing. Then it would have to wrestle with the hard math of having to purchase three carriers to ensure that just one would be available at all times. For a defense force that rarely looks beyond its own borders, there are better ways to spend money.
Aircraft carriers are from a chapter of Japan’s past it would rather forget
From the perspective of the Japanese, carriers have a negative association. Without aircraft carriers, Pearl Harbor would not have been possible. Aircraft carriers are the embodiment of Japan’s aggressive past, which Japan has sought to disassociate itself from as much as possible.
Historically, carriers are a great way to kill a lot of Japanese people
Despite its proficiency with aircraft carriers during the war, Japan was not successful in keeping a single use-able carrier around until V-J Day. From the perspective of the Japanese, aircraft carriers sink a lot, and when they go down you lose thousands of men at a time. The Japanese are much less likely to view carriers with the “aircraft carriers are invincible” mindset many carrier advocates in the West have.
Japan already has aircraft carriers
Japan already has eleven of the best aircraft carriers money can buy. These are the aircraft carriers of the U.S. Navy. Japan chooses not to build a formidable, long-range naval force to defend its strategic interests, chiefly the sea lanes that carry food, raw materials and imports into Japan, and Japanese exports abroad. Instead, it lets America, which shares almost all of those interests, do all the hard work.
(Photo: U.S. Navy)
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I read somewhere these helicopter-destroyer are too small to carry F-35′s, for one they don’t fit in the elevators (the B model has no foldable wings, so that makes sense).
However, by the time China gets up a decent Navy and scares Japan enough to change policy (which is likely will), we might actually see some small stovl UCAV’s, lighter, cheaper and more advanced than the F-35s everyone will have spent their money on. The advantage of a late build-up
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Perhaps the point for Japan in expanding its military, including building these large ships, is to increase their ability to deter China themselves in the seas between the two so Japan will not have to rely on us so heavilly. China’s immediate, external, strategic goal is to eliminate or severly limit US naval power in the seas bounded by China’s east coast and the line generally from the Korean Penninsula to Japan, Taiwan and the Phillipines, and also in the South China sea. Japan’s unsoken long-range strategic goal is not to continue its militry alliance with us. It is to reach an arrangement with China giving Japan access, hopefully preferential access, to China’s huge without becoming so dependent on China that she dominates them. One way Japan can do this is to shuck their alliance with us because that serves China’s goal, in exchange for market access. The stronger Japan is militarilly, the better she will be positioned to negociate that market access and perhaps a whole regional strategic alliance with China.
Keep in mind also that Japan has major strategic goals with repect to Russia as well in the far east, starting with return of Japan’s northern islands which the Russians took at the end of WWII. Military strength gth may help Japan solve these this issue and pave the way for economic agreement with Russia and perhaps Japan’s joining with Russia and China in the strategic alliance those two already have.
As you say, “Japan already has aircraft carriers”.
As Britain proved in 1982, you can do alot with a couple light carriers and an excellent surface fleet.
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