ABSTRACT
We have seen in the previous chapter how Prime Minister Nakasone took the initiative in articulating Japanese national identity within a discourse establishing a role for Japan as a ‘normal state’ (zairaigata kokka). The fear of Nakasone’s critics that, under the new, less stringent limitation on defence spending, the 1 per cent limit would continue to be broken, was not realized, owing to the economic downturn at home and the ending of the cold war internationally. In fact, military spending only broke through the barrier in 1987 and the following two years, before again dipping below 1 per cent. 1 In place of such increased rates of military expenditures in the 1980s, in the early 1990s the changing role of Japanese military forces came to symbolize militarization for many Japanese. True, militarization continued in terms of the quantitative and especially qualitative improvement of Self-Defence Forces (SDF) equipment, as seen in the deployment of the Aegis, and growing military cooperation between Japan and the United States, as evident in the 1994 RIMPAC exercises. Of far greater importance, however, were the political and legislative activities surrounding the task of eroding the constraints on the SDF’s activities, and restoring legitimacy to the military as an instrument of state policy. Indeed, for the first time in the post-1945 era, militarization crystallized around the issue of the actual deployment of Japanese military forces. As we have seen in earlier chapters, this quest to establish Japan’s position in the world as a ‘normal’ military power is at the heart of the contradiction between ‘identity’ and ‘normality’ in the ‘militarization’ versus ‘demilitarization’ debate.
