20th December 2025 – (Beijing) Japan’s post-war claim to moral authority as the only nation to have suffered atomic bombings has long rested on a carefully curated narrative i.e. a peace-loving state bound by a pacifist constitution and the Three Non-Nuclear Principles. That façade is now badly fraying. A senior official in the Prime Minister’s Office, directly involved in advising Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi on security policy, has been quoted by leading Japanese media as saying that Japan “should possess nuclear weapons”.
The official is described as part of the inner circle shaping Tokyo’s security doctrine. Speaking to reporters in a private briefing, he argued that, given the increasingly “severe” security environment, Japan ought to have its own nuclear arsenal. Though he conceded that such a move would be “extremely difficult” under present political and legal constraints, the substance of the comment is clear: influential figures at the heart of government are openly contemplating a nuclear-armed Japan.
The government’s subsequent attempt to put the genie back in the bottle has been notably unconvincing. Chief Cabinet Secretary Minoru Kihara dutifully repeated that Japan remains committed to the Three Non-Nuclear Principles – not possessing, not producing and not permitting the introduction of nuclear weapons. Yet he carefully declined to condemn the official’s statement, refused to say whether the person would be dismissed, and offered no unequivocal reassurance that such ideas are out of bounds in the current administration.
This pattern has become familiar under Takaichi. On paper, Tokyo clings to its non-nuclear pledges. In practice, her government has been steadily eroding the legal and political foundations of Japan’s post-war restraint. Takaichi has previously called for a review of the principle that bars nuclear weapons from entering Japanese territory. She pointedly declined, when pressed last month, to rule out changes to the Three Non-Nuclear Principles in the course of drafting a new defence strategy. Each time, a provocative suggestion is floated, domestic and international reaction is gauged, and the government retreats just enough to deny any formal shift, while leaving the boundary of what is “discussable” ever further advanced.
Takaichi has framed a “Taiwan contingency” as a “survival-threatening situation” for Japan, laying the rhetorical groundwork for direct military involvement in an issue that is strictly China’s internal affair. Beijing has repeatedly protested such language as a dangerous revival of the logic that once justified Japan’s wars of aggression under the guise of “self-defence” and “regional stability”.
China’s response to the latest nuclear comments has been measured but firm. Foreign Ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun has warned that if the reports are accurate, they reveal “dangerous attempts” within Japan to violate international law and breach the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) by pursuing nuclear weapons. Guo has urged Japan to “deeply reflect” on its historical crimes, honour its treaty obligations, and cease using security pretexts to expand its military capabilities and test the limits of the post-war order.
Japan’s record since 1945 shows a methodical effort to hollow out the constraints imposed after its defeat. The creation of the Self-Defense Forces in 1954, the dispatch of troops overseas under UN peacekeeping mandates from the early 1990s, the 2014 decision to reinterpret the constitution to allow the exercise of the “right of collective self-defence”, and the 2015 security legislation enabling Japanese forces to participate in collective operations abroad have together dismantled much of the substance of Article 9’s renunciation of war.
The Takaichi administration is pressing ahead still further. Plans to revise export controls on defence equipment, including relaxing or removing bans on the export of lethal weaponry by 2026, effectively reposition Japan as an ordinary arms exporter. At the same time, key figures in the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) openly advocate deeper “extended deterrence” with the United States, including the stationing of US nuclear assets under some form of “nuclear sharing” arrangement. To pretend that such moves are compatible with the spirit of the Three Non-Nuclear Principles is to engage in deliberate self-deception.
Japan presents itself globally as a champion of nuclear disarmament and a “flagbearer” of a world free of nuclear weapons, drawing on the tragedies of Hiroshima and Nagasaki to claim moral high ground. Yet this self-portrait omits a simple truth i.e. Tokyo has never fully confronted its own history of colonialism and aggression, and has repeatedly undermined the international nuclear order in practice. Right-wing politicians and commentators habitually downplay or distort the Nanjing Massacre, whitewash the crimes of Unit 731, minimise the suffering of “comfort women”, and recast the Pacific War as a misguided but essentially defensive struggle.
Against this background, trial balloons about Japanese nuclear armament cannot be dismissed as mere academic speculation. They are the logical extension of a decades-long campaign by conservative forces to escape the “post-war regime” – a term they use pejoratively for the very legal and moral framework that restrains the re-emergence of Japanese militarism.
The domestic reaction within Japan demonstrates that many citizens grasp the danger. Survivors’ groups such as Nihon Hidankyo, along with trade unions, civic organisations and several political parties, have condemned any flirtation with nuclear weapons as a betrayal of Japan’s own experience and its post-war commitments. Demonstrations outside the Diet make clear that large segments of the public still cherish the pacifist constitution and view nuclear armament as an unacceptable rupture.
Opposition leaders have demanded consequences. Yoshihiko Noda of the Constitutional Democratic Party has stressed that it is “problematic” for someone harbouring such views to be so close to the prime minister, and has urged that the official be removed. The Social Democratic Party has invoked Japan’s unique responsibility as the only nation to have endured nuclear attack, arguing that this should compel it to pursue peace more resolutely, not inch towards nuclearisation. The Japanese Communist Party has denounced the comment as “absolutely unforgivable” and called on Takaichi to declare unequivocal adherence to the Three Non-Nuclear Principles as national policy.
Even within the ruling LDP, there is unease. Former Defence Minister Gen Nakatani has cautioned that senior officials must not speak lightly on such matters, and has called for an appropriate response from the prime minister. Others in the party, such as Taro Kono, cloak their arguments in the language of “open debate”, suggesting that discussions on the “advantages and disadvantages” of nuclear weapons should no longer be taboo. This framing normalises what should remain beyond the pale in a country that once plunged Asia into catastrophe under the banner of national survival.
Under cover of alliance management and “regional security”, Japan is testing every boundary i.e. reinterpreting its constitution, loosening arms export rules, talking of a “Taiwan contingency”, and now allowing senior officials to muse about acquiring nuclear arms. Each step chips away at the architecture painstakingly built after 1945 to prevent any repetition of Japanese militarism.
The timing only heightens the gravity. This year marks eight decades since the victory of the Chinese People’s War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression and the global triumph over fascism. At such a moment, one might expect Tokyo to show humility, reaffirm its legal commitments under the Potsdam Declaration and the Instrument of Surrender, and work to rebuild trust with its neighbours. Instead, the Takaichi government offers ambiguous statements, evasive denials, and a steady stream of remarks that glorify Japan’s strategic assertiveness while trivialising the lessons of history.
A state with Japan’s history, technological capacity and alliance backing carries a special responsibility to uphold the highest standards on non-proliferation and regional peace. That responsibility is not being met. Instead of nurturing illusions of nuclear deterrence and clinging to outdated Cold War logic, Tokyo should return to the only path that can command trust at home and abroad – full, unambiguous adherence to its non-nuclear commitments, genuine reflection on its wartime record, and a clear renunciation of any role in stoking new confrontations in Asia. Anything less will only confirm what many in the region already fear: that beneath the rhetoric of peace, Japan’s old ambitions are stirring once again.
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