Japan warns US a ‘Pearl Harbor’ style attack from China and Russia could happen

On Wednesday, Japan’s number two defense official said China and Russia are showing increased signs of military cooperation and their activities in the Pacific could show signs they plan to launch a Pearl Harbor-style attack on the U.S., similitar to how Japan did on Dec. 7, 1941, propelling the U.S. into World War II.

Speaking at a Hudson Institute event, Japanese State Defense Minister Yasuhide Nakayama said, “Seventy years ago, we attacked Pearl Harbor, but now the U.S. and Japan [are] very good allies, one of the best allies all over the world.” Nakayama went on to say now Russian naval forces “are really exercising just right in front of the western part of Honolulu, and so I don’t want to remind the 70 years ago, but we have to be careful of the exercising of the Russians.”

Japan’s State Defense Minister is the direct deputy to its Defense Minister, Japan’s top defense official

In recent days, Russia’s fleet has conducted various naval drills near Hawaii, including practicing sinking an aircraft carrier. Some Russian ships have been reported operating within 35 nautical miles of Hawaii’s coastline. Amidst the nearby Russian naval drills, the U.S. Navy repositioned Carrier Strike Group (CSG) 1 in the Hawaiian Islands Operating Area.

Nakayama said, “We have to show the deterrence towards China, and not just China but also the Russians, because, as I told you, that they are doing their exercises together.”

“China and Russia are doing very good. They are friends. They are very good friends, I think. But on the other hand, they are creating their own missiles capability, their own submarine capability. They are sharing their knowledge together, even with academia, I guess, or [research and development],” Nakayama said. “. . .So we have to more focus on how to protect and not just protect, but how to hedge the risk."

Nakayama also drew a comparison between a potential nuclear attack by Russia or China and the U.S. nuclear attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan during World War II.

“If some country shoot’s [a nuclear weapon] from their continent towards Honolulu, that missile’s . . . the warheads compared to Hiroshima, it’s 200 times more than Hiroshima,” Nakayama said. “So I’ve been to Hiroshima before and I went to the museum before, from that experience and the perspective, if 200 times more strong atomic bombs or torpedoes or missiles, warheads towards Honolulu, I think Honolulu will be erased from the map. So we have to think before using those powers, we have to think how to stop it.”

Nakayama also described the growing threat of invasion China poses against Taiwan and how Japan and the U.S. must cooperate to keep Chinese actions in check.

“What we can do is show the deterrence and also [that an attack] or happening towards Taiwan, it’s straight to relate to not just Japan, but also the U.S.-Japan alliance even,” he said.

https://americanmilitarynews.com/2021/07/japan-warns-us-a-pearl-harbor-style-attack-from-china-and-russia-could-happen/

additional references:

https://news.yahoo.com/japanese-official-warns-us-potential-200100225.html

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/japanese-official-warns-us-of-potential-surprise-attack-on-hawaii--from-russia-and-china/ar-AALDpPf

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/defense-national-security/japanese-official-warns-us-of-potential-surprise-attack-on-hawaii-from-russia-and-china

US-Japan 'Top Secret War Games' Create Unnecessary Tension in South & East China Seas, Scholars Say

The US and Japan are reportedly carrying out secret drills for a possible conflict scenario with China over Taiwan. What's behind the supposed exercises and how could they affect the status quo in the Indo-Pacific region?

Washington and Tokyo started preparing contingencies for a potential confrontation with China over Taiwan in the last year of the Trump administration. The preparations have involved "top-secret tabletop war games and joint exercises in the South China and East China seas," according to The Financial Times.

Citing unnamed sources with knowledge of secretive drills, FT said that the allies were especially focused on the area around the Senkaku Islands, which are located some 350 kilometres to the west. The Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands are a group of uninhabited islands in the East China Sea, which is claimed by both Japan and the People's Republic of China. One of officials, cited by FT, emphasised the "urgent" need to establish the "trilateral sharing" of information between the US, Japan and Taiwan about the movements of Chinese naval and air forces.

US-Japanese Drills May Exacerbate Already Simmering Tensions

There are three goals that the US is pursuing through these drills, according to Dr. Victor Teo, project research fellow with the Beyond the Cold War & Asian Regionalism project based at the Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities at the University of Cambridge.

First, Washington is seeking to demonstrate the resolve of the United States in protecting its interests in East Asia, and the primacy of the US-Japan alliance as the principal instrument in doing so. Second, the drills are supposed to send a message to the people of Taiwan and Japan "in their respective confrontation with China". Third, the US wants to show China that "the United States would not budge in the face of a conflict and the threat of force".

"While the drills might be a normal run of business during times of peace - they would be interpreted differently now as US-China relations are at a new low," Teo explains. "During these difficult times, these drills are extremely provocative from Beijing’s perspective."

Being started in the last year of Trump's presidency, and the exercises have apparently added to the surge in tensions between Washington and Beijing over tariff frictions, the Trump administration's crackdown on Chinese telecom giants and Washington's accusations of Beijing's "mishandling" of the coronavirus crisis. In addition to that, Trump repeatedly poked the People's Republic over the so-called "One China policy" by receiving a phone call from a Taiwanese leader Tsai Ing-wen in December 2016 and pushing pro-Taiwan bills.

The One China Policy stipulates that Taiwan is part of the People's Republic of China and thus has no legitimacy to separately maintain diplomatic ties with other nations. The issue is a historical one, dating back to when the Nationalist Party of China, called the Kuomintang (KMT), lost control of mainland China after its defeat in the Chinese Civil War against the Communist Party of China (CPC) in 1949 and fled to Taiwan, declaring itself the Republic of China (ROC). Taiwan and the US had been participants of the Sino-American Mutual Defence Treaty between 1955 and 1979. Since then, Washington continued to back the Kuomintang-led government despite establishing diplomatic relations with the People's Republic of China.

The Biden administration largely followed the China strategy adopted by their predecessors, while at the same time reviving Barack Obama's "Pivot to Asia" policies seen by Beijing as an attempt to contain China's political and economic rise. Obama and Trump's administrations exploited Asia-Pacific maritime and territorial disputes involving China to increase pressure on the country.

Still, anyone thinking that the US-Japanese military manoeuvres will change China’s pursuit of national reunification goal is "delusional," according to Tao.

"The likely effect such prominent drills have during these sensitive times is to confirm an increasingly widespread belief in China that the US and its allies are supporting the stealthy and 'creeping' independence movement taking root in Taiwan, particularly over what has just happened in Hong Kong over the past few years," he says. "Such drills will only toughen resolve on all sides, and in doing so increases the risk of a major confrontation in the near future."

https://sputniknews.com/asia/202107021083287570-us-japan-top-secret-war-games-create-unnecessary-tension-in-south--east-china-seas-scholars-say/