Given the rapidly growing threat posed by North Korea, the government is considering revising for the next decade the basic national security plan adopted in 2013, government sources said Wednesday.
The government is mulling revising the plan next year as a view is spreading within the government that the security situation in the region has become more serious than was laid out in 2013, and that "a sense of urgency" should be incorporated in a new planning document.
Through revising the National Security Strategy, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's government would likely move to bolster Japan's ballistic missile defense, increase collaboration between the Self-Defense Forces and the U.S. military, and highlight the two countries' readiness to deal with contingencies on the Korean Peninsula, the sources said.