Japan steps up military presence in East China Sea

Japan is to deploy thousands of troops and build missile batteries on islands in the East China Sea, as officials confirmed for the first time that the defences were designed to check Chinese military influence in the region.

 

In response to US pressure to play a bigger role in deterring increasingly assertive Chinese naval activity in the South China Sea and East China Sea, Tokyo is to position a line of anti-ship and anti-aircraft missile batteries along 200 islands stretching 870 miles (1,400km) from the Japanese mainland towards Taiwan.

 

In addition, Japan will increase the number of military personnel on its islands in the East China Sea by about a fifth to almost 10,000 over the next five years.

 

While China is not usually referred to by name in unclassified defence documents, Japanese officials stated that a push by the conservative prime minister, Shinzo Abe, to boost Japan’s military reach was intended to keep China at bay in the strategically and economically crucial Western Pacific.

 

Once the new military hardware is in place, Chinese ships sailing from their eastern seaboard must pass Japanese missile batteries to reach the Western Pacific, an area Beijing considers vital both as a supply line and for projecting its growing naval power.

 

While Chinese warships are entitled to sail through the area under international law, they will have to do so in plain sight of Japanese missiles, a government official in Tokyo told Reuters.

 

Read More: Japan steps up military presence in East China Sea | World news | The Guardian