U.S., Japan Update Defense Guidelines to Expand Operations

On Oct. 8, after a year of intense effort, the Japanese and U.S. governments released an interim progress report on planned revisions to the guidelines framing their militaries’ respective roles in the joint defense of Japan. The report does not identify specific threats or discuss detailed scenarios for joint military operations, but it does provide a series of principles guiding the revisions and lists some types of cooperative activities they will cover. These principles and examples make clear that the two countries plan to expand the range of possible operations both geographically and functionally. The two governments’ foreign and defense […]