Japan's Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba speaks to the media at the prime minister's office in Tokyo, Japan, Friday, March 14, 2025.(Kyodo News via AP)
Japan’s Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba speaks to the media at the prime minister’s office in Tokyo, Japan, Friday, March 14, 2025.(Kyodo News via AP)
SEOUL, South Korea — Japan launched a new joint command structure for the country’s armed forces Monday that is designed to address decades of inter-service rivalries and communications failures.
The Japan Joint Operations Command was established in the Defense Ministry in Tokyo with 240 personnel under General Kenichiro Nagumo.
“We will respond to situations seamlessly, from peacetime to a contingency, to defend the lives of our citizens and their ability to live in peace as well as our nation’s territory, waters and airspace,” Gen. Nagumo said at a ceremony during which he received the JJOC’s unit banner.
“Our nation is facing the most severe and complicated security environment in the postwar era,” and the launch of the new command is of “great significance,” added Gen Nakatani, the country’s defense minister.
Japan was deeply shaken by Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine. It is also threatened by nuclear-armed North Korea and Chinese expansionism around Taiwan as well as Japan’s own southern island archipelagoes.
Prior to Monday’s development, the chief of the Joint Staff of the Japanese Self Defence Force was responsible for coordinating combined operations of the Japanese navy, army and air force.
However, 2011’s disastrous earthquake and tsunami, compounded by a nuclear meltdown in Fukushima, demonstrated that the chief’s workload could be unmanageable in cases of large-scale crises, Kyodo News opined.
The JJOC looks designed to fix this.
“Through Unity of Command, seamless response and Cross-domain operations are accelerated,” Japan’s Ministry of Defence noted on its website.
The JJOC has been hailed by pundits.
“This marks a shift towards a more integrated and responsive military,” Hiroshi Sakamura, who writes on regional policy and naval affairs, stated on X. “This is part of a broader strategy to boost [Japan’s] defense capabilities.”
Others said it was long overdue.
“It’s probably 10 years later than it should be, but it ought to allow the JSDF’s component parts to finally cooperate,” said Grant Newsham, a retired U.S. Marine colonel with extensive experience in the Indo-Pacific theater.
The JSDF boasts impressive niche capabilities, Mr. Newsham said — notably submarine and anti-submarine warfare, maritime patrol, missile defense and space.
But, “owing to the inability of air, sea, and ground forces to operate together well, the JSDF has not been ’the sum of its parts’ — despite looking impressive on paper.”
During World War II, Tokyo was torn between the competing strategic priorities of its army and its navy.
Some commentators say similar problems afflict the modern SDF.
“Japan’s political class didn’t really want a ’joint’ JSDF — and understandably so for many years — since a powerful military establishment got them into the disaster of World War II,” said Mr. Newsham, author of 2023’s “When China Attacks.” “There was a brake on JSDF getting too capable for many decades.”
But quiet change is underway.
Since 2014-2015, when Tokyo undertook a “reinterpreation” of its pacifistic constitution, the JSDF have been acquiring the power-projection assets it has not fielded since World War II.
Japan’s navy, the Maritime Self-Defense Force, is converting two so-called “helicopter destroyers” to the light carrier role, complete with air wings of F35B stealth fighters. In 2018, a marine unit — the Amphibious Rapid Deployment Brigade — was activated by the Ground Self Defense Force.
Marine operations demand especially close cross-service coordination, and potential interoperability with partners and allies.
In recent years, a series of military exercises in Japan — some with U.S. and British troops — have focused on “retaking captured islands.”
More broadly, Japan’s forces have, for over a decade, been undertaking a postural about-face.
Post-1945, Tokyo’s strategic focus had customarily been on the Russia-facing northern island of Hokkaido. Now, units and capabilities are re-deploying to the country’s southern flank, the Ryukyu Archipelago.
The archipelago dominates key straits between the coast of China and the open Pacific — straits Beijing’s naval assets would have to transit in order to blockade or encircle Taiwan.
Considerable bilateral goodwill links Japan and Taiwan, though there is no formal no alliance between Taipei and Tokyo.
The Ryukyus are also proximate to the uninhabited but disputed Senkaku Islands, administered by Japan and claimed by China.
The Senkakus, which China calls the Diaoyus, are a locus of “gray zone” conflict, fought without kinetic force between Japan’s Coast Guard, on one hand, and China’s Coast Guard and Chinese fishing fleets, on the other.
All these issues argue for a more cohesive JSDF.
“If JSDF can get [joint command] right it will be a far more formidable force than it has been,” said Mr. Newsham, who consulted to the JSDF when it was creating its marine force. “It might also spark a psychological change in JSDF so the idea of joint operations becomes ’normal.’”
Even so, a command-grade hole gapes in Japan’s military capabilities — one related to its relationship with its key ally.
South Korea hosts the Combined Forces Command — a U.S.-led body that ensures seamless integration between American and South Korean troops if the Korean War reignited. No such umbrella body exists to unify the command of Japanese and U.S. forces.
“For a successful defense of Japan and surrounding areas it is imperative that Japanese and U.S. forces can operate together effectively,” Mr. Newsham said. “Despite decades of the US-Japan alliance, the two nations’ militaries still can’t conduct joint operations anywhere near what is needed to fight a war. This is scandalous.”
• Andrew Salmon can be reached at asalmon@washingtontimes.com.
Copyright © 2025 The Washington Times, LLC. Click here for reprint permission.