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In gaffe, Abe refers to SDF as ‘military’

by

Staff Writer

Perhaps it was a slip of the tongue or just a simple mistake, but despite Japan’s official view that the Self-Defense Forces’ legal nature makes it different from the militaries of other nations, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe last Friday called the SDF “our military.”

What has been widely perceived as a gaffe came during a session of the Upper House Budget Committee, when Abe was speaking about the SDF’s increased frequency of joint training with other countries in recent years.

“It has yielded significant results to increase transparency of our military,” Abe told the committee, answering a question posed by Yuichi Mayama, a member of Ishin no To (Japan Innovation Party).

Without correcting himself, Abe continued to answer questions during the session.

Article 9 of the Constitution stipulates that “land, sea and air forces as well as other war potential will never be maintained.”

Due to the charter, the government has maintained the view that the SDF is a “necessary minimum” for defending Japan and that it is not a military — despite its might as one of the world’s best-equipped contemporary armed forces and the size of the country’s defense budget. Under the Constitution, the SDF is allowed only the minimum use of force to defend the country.

The ruling Liberal Democratic Party wants to recast the SDF as a “national defense force,” or kokubogun, according to its draft of a revised Constitution released in 2012.

Abe made another gaffe last Wednesday, saying during an Upper House session that “user fees” for the prime minister’s office’s Facebook account are paid for by the government while he pays for his own account, revealing his lack of basic knowledge about social networking services that carry no fees.

Photos

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Shinzo Abe | AFP-JIJI

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  • 151E

    I’m sure that was no gaffe. Abe was probably just testing out dropping the doublespeak charade.

  • Ron NJ

    Gaffe or 本音, you be the judge.

  • Hendrix

    It was a Freudian slip, it’s just a matter of time that the SDF becomes a full on military able to wage war, all under Abes watch.

    • Manfred Deutschmann

      Yes, let’s get it over with. Have Japan attack Chinese vessels and in turn receive the nuclear smackdown it deserves for the whole Ishihara shenanigans and Abe / Aso loudmouth propaganda.
      Time to move on and stop wasting time on trying to guess the posturing of these petty little people.

      • Paul Johnny Lynn

        If Abe and Co think their forces will give anyone a bloody nose they’re in for a rude shock. Despite the budget slice for the Defence Forces being one of the largest in the world they have had zero experience in combat since 1945. Perhaps they should start small, for practice, New Guinea maybe? On a T.V. show I watched several years ago a group of…”experts”…were comparing Japan”s forces to others around the world. They came to the conclusion (naturally) that Japan had the best forces in the world. Their reasoning for this??? The food in the Japanese ration packs was better……….

  • Testerty

    Well, if Japan can call an invasion as an advancement, why can’t it call its defense force anything it wanted?

  • Charlie Sommers

    I don’t understand why this would create any kind of controversy. When I was in the USAF stationed in Japan almost fifty years ago it was a common thing to call JASDF and JGSDF the Japanese air force and the Japanese army. A rose by any other name smells as sweet and that is what they appear to be.

    • Manfred Deutschmann

      But they have to pretend Japan is now a pacifist country. As with generally all things Japan, the names don’t mean what we are used to them meaning in the West. It’s the culture of the “polite smile”, mind you.

  • Tomoko Endo

    We cannot approve the statements. Japan was an axis of evil and we must not dispatch our miritary abroad.

    • 151E

      “we must not dispatch our miritary (sic) abroad.”
      So you agree then with Abe that the JSDF are the nation’s military. No reason to be coy about calling it what it is. Reasonable individuals can debate what the military’s role should be, but it is absurd to try to conceal plain fact behind linguistic obfuscation.

    • Manfred Deutschmann

      Thank you. Please make your opinion count in the next election. If there ever is another.

  • R0ninX3ph

    The Australian Defence Force is the name given to the collective Navy, Army and Air Force of Australia, the ADF. Nobody says the ADF isn’t a military, just as the JSDF, while being currently primarily defensive in nature, is still a military.

  • Paul Johnny Lynn

    Several years ago I had a somewhat heated debate as to the nature of the S.D.F. with a group of students. One of them said “But Japan has no military, we have no tanks.” I told him to wait a second while I retrieved my latest copy of a magazine called Panzer, which featured pictures of Japanese tanks in a fire drill at Mount Fuji. Unmistakeably Japan, undeniably tanks, unequivocally military.

    • Manfred Deutschmann

      Let me guess, the student still refused to acknowledge it despite being presented facts?

      • Paul Johnny Lynn

        I took his silence as an indication of refusal to acknowledge, yes. In fact I think someone (him or another) said “Are you sure it’s Japan?” to which I pointed to the kanji on the tank, the generally unmistakable shape of Fuji, and the accompanying text in Japanese. But you know the old saying : “There are none so blind…” Now I can accept that some people have no knowledge/interest in things military, and wouldn’t know a tank from a tanker, but the evidence in the photo directly contradicted the groups assertion that Japan had no offensive military capability. Tanks are an offensive weapon, not defensive.

  • Scott Reynolds

    Abe’s “waga-gun” remark reminds me of the song from Kubric’s film Full Metal Jacket: “This is my rifle, this is my gun. This one’s for fighting, this one’s for fun!”

  • J.P. Bunny

    Fighter jets, torpedo laden submarines, tanks, armor plated fighting ships, a lot of people with guns that are trained to fight……military seems to be the correct word.