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Why would there be a “secret” deal on nuclear arms in a country protected under the U.S. nuclear umbrella? Such a peculiarity aside, the Hatoyama government is likely to end up spending wasteful hours on useless debates.
First, there is a history behind Japan's sensitive nuclear politics. In return for the U.S. nuclear deterrent, post-war Japan has provided vast lands for a dozen U.S. military bases throughout the archipelago, while at the same time establishing its own defense capabilities.
It was therefore no secret that major U.S. air bases inside Japan accommodated nuclear-armed fighter planes. Toward the end of the Korean War, the U.S. aircraft carrier Oriskany, loaded with attack aircraft and nuclear bombs, frequently entered the Yokosuka Naval Base. Also a surface-to-surface missile (Honest John) battalion occasionally performed field exercises at the foot of Mt. Fuji. The missiles were capable of carrying nuclear warheads besides high explosives.
The situation was drastically altered in December 1967 when Prime Minister Eisaku Sato introduced the “three non-nuclear principles” to the Diet. His initiative reflected global concerns over the intensifying superpower rivalry in the Cold War and nuclear proliferation by the United Kingdom, France and communist China.
The three non-nuclear principles declared a commitment not to develop, not to arm and not to bring nuclear arms into Japan. Such a policy was unique among nations under the U.S. security arrangements, because of Japan's status as the only nation in the world that was devastated by atomic bombs, in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
The U.S. government then withdrew all the nuclear arms deployed throughout the Japanese archipelago. This policy, however, was not applied in Okinawa, which was under U.S. civil administration even after Japan regained its independence in 1951.
Accordingly, surface-to-surface nuclear missiles (mace), shaped like current fixed-wing unmmaned air vehicles, were constantly targeted toward the Chinese capital of Beijing. In addition, nuclear-armed fighter bombers were in battle-ready status at the Kadena Air Base, while nuclear bombs and artillery shells were stockpiled in the arsenal.
This was changed in 1972, when the U.S. government agreed to return the authority of civil administration in Okinawa back to Japan. It removed all the nuclear weapons from the Okinawa islands in accordance with the agreement that, while Japan would allow the continued stationing of U.S. combat forces in Okinawa under the Japan-U.S. Security Pact, the United States would respect Japan's non-nuclear principles, including that of not bringing in atomic weapons.
But American officials did not take it as a violation of the agreement to temporarily anchor their nuclear-laden naval ships at Japanese ports or to fly nuclear-armed aircraft over Japan's sky. For them this was within a tacit agreement, as they rightly judged that these actions did not pose any potential hazard.
Otherwise, the U.S. government has been considerate to Japan's official non-nuclear policy as well as its unique anti-nuclear popular psyche. One indication is that the U.S. ballistic missile submarines that patrol the Pacific Ocean use the Chinhae Naval Base in South Korea as their port of call for logistics and crew recreation, instead of Sasebo in southern Japan just a stone’s throw away.
Thus, in October 1974, retired U.S. Navy Admiral Gene LaRoque testified before the U.S. Congress, saying clearly that the U.S. Navy's nuclear-armed vessels occasionally entered ports in Japan. Similarly, in May 1981, former U.S. Ambassador to Japan Edwin Reischauer spoke to Japanese media to the same effect, causing uproar over a “secret deal” with the United States.
But what really would amount to “bringing in nuclear arms,” and thus would be subject to the required prior-consultation clause under the Security Pact? This was intended to include such activities as the development of nuclear missile launch sites or airbases for nuclear-armed aircraft within Japanese territory.
Besides, contrary to the expectations of the “secret deal” advocates, nuclear weapons have been withdrawn from the East Asian theater since the Okinawa deal.
In 1972, in the process of the normalization of U.S.-China relations initiated by U.S. President Richard Nixon's surprise China visit, nuclear bombs installed at Taiwan's Tainan Base were relocated to the Clark Base in Luzon Island in the Philippines. Subsequently, they were taken out to Guam Island.
In the 1990s, with the end of the Cold War in Europe, the George Bush administration took a bold initiative toward a non-nuclear Korean peninsula by withdrawing all the U.S. forces' nuclear bombs and shells out of South Korea.
These moves were not prompted by political circumstances alone. Instead, there occurred an important shift in nuclear strategy as necessitated by the development of military technology.
One of the most vital factors was the highly advanced precision-guided munitions, or PGMs – bombs, shells and missiles guided with the aid of lasers, global positioning systems and other devices. Unlike nuclear arms, PGMs do not inflict deadly collateral damage, including environmental contamination. Fewer PGM strikes can achieve more damaging effects.
For instance, an unguided 203-mm conventional shell has a circular error probable of as much as a 200-meter radius, with a lethal radius of only 50 meters, requiring many rounds to achieve hits. A 203-mm nuclear shell of 10 kilotons has a lethal radius of 2 kilometers, achieving the tactical objective by only one round but causing nuclear-related hazards. Compared with them, the GPS-guided 203-mm conventional shell has a high precision of 1-meter CEP, achieving a hit at the first shot, thus making nuclear shells nonessential.
The rate of PGMs for air and naval munitions in total ammunition expenditures jumped from 9 percent in the Gulf War to as high as 90 percent in the recent battles in Afghanistan and Iraq. Ordinary missile warheads, artillery and mortar shells have been increasingly converted to PGMs.
PGMs are sufficient to strike “soft targets” such as facilities exposed on the surface, gradually pushing aside tactical nuclear arms. But to strike “hard targets” deep in the ground, nuclear-warhead missiles or bombs are still indispensable.
Consequently, the U.S. forces stationed in South Korea may be planning to deploy bunker- buster-type nuclear warheads, army tactical missile systems, or ATACMS, in order to destroy North Korea's underground facilities including its nuclear missile silos. The South Korean government does not prohibit the Americans from bringing in nuclear arms.
Likewise, intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs), and sea-launched cruise missiles (SLCMs) have been equipped with advanced precision-guiding technology, greatly improving their range with accuracy when launched from the continental United States or the Pacific Ocean to targets deep in Eurasia.
Moreover, long-range bombers carrying air-launched cruise missiles (ALCMs) and deep-penetrating bombs would take off from the continental United States or Guam. Thus, U.S. forces would not need a nuclear-launch base inside Japanese territory. Aircraft carriers or submarines docked at Yokosuka or Sasebo ports are equipped with PGMs rather than the tactical nuclear weapons previously used.
Based on these military particulars, the emerging debate over a “secret deal” to sneak nuclear weapons into Japan is nothing but caviling of the successive governments, aimed at stirring up the people and the mass media.
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(Mitsuo Takai is a retired colonel and former researcher in the military science faculty of the Staff College for Japan’s Ground Self Defense Force. ©Copyright Mitsuo Takai.)
