Nuclear disarmament policies: Japan at odds with Australia over ‘pre-emptive strike’ issue
Australia, Japan in nuclear rift
The Age DANIEL FLITTON
September 4, 2009
AUSTRALIA and Japan are at loggerheads over the use of nuclear weapons in war, with Japan – the only country to have suffered atomic attack – determined, for now, to keep a broad deterrent role for the world’s deadly arsenal.
The split has emerged in talks at the International Commission on Nuclear Non-proliferation and Disarmament, a panel of experts put together by Prime Minister Kevin Rudd last year and jointly sponsored by Tokyo to chart ways to rid the world of nuclear arms.
At issue is the ”first use” nuclear posture, under which nations such as the US declare the circumstances in which they would unleash a nuclear strike.
The Age believes most of the 15-member commission, including Australia’s co-chairman, former foreign minister Gareth Evans, plan to call on nuclear-armed states to change their defence doctrine and declare they will only use atomic weapons when faced with direct nuclear attack.
But Japan’s co-chairwoman, ex-foreign minister Yoriko Kawaguchi, has refused to back the proposal, reflecting common official fears in Japan that the change would diminish the protection offered by the US nuclear umbrella from large armies in countries such as North Korea.
Major nuclear powers such as the US currently reserve a right to conduct a first strike with nuclear arms in response to chemical, biological or major conventional threats.
…………Close observers of the talks have told The Age the first-use question is a fundamental point of contention and expected to be a focus of talks in Hiroshima next month, before a final report due at the end of the year.
http://www.theage.com.au/national/australia-japan-in-nuclear-rift-20090903-f9yw.html
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1 This month
of the week – Disrupting War & Militarism in Oceania. Active solidarity. Radical practice.
Antinuclear 
The likelihood of North Korea or China invading Japan is probably zero.
While delivery of missiles armed with chemical or biological weapons may be slightly greater than zero, the U.S. has sufficient conventional air power to deter such an attack or punish the attacker severely.
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