Japan would once again have a force described as the "military" six decades after the US stripped it of the right to keep armed forces, in the first revision of the post-World War II Constitution proposed yesterday.
The revision will mean little practical change for Japan, which has skirted its 1947 Constitution by calling its military the "Self Defense Forces," but marks a symbolic milestone in breaking another post-war taboo.
US occupation forces "compiled the current Japanese Constitution within nine days," said former prime minister Yoshiro Mori, who led the constitutional revisions for the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP).
"We cannot possibly say the Constitution was created by the Japanese people's own hands," Mori told the party faithful at a Tokyo hotel. "Finally now the time has come for us to compile our own constitution."
Mori formally presented the draft before a 50th anniversary celebration for the LDP, the conservative party which has ruled Japan almost continuously since 1955 and which won an overwhelming majority in September elections.
The Constitution is nearly certain to pass parliament, with the main opposition Democratic Party also backing revision. It would then be submitted to a referendum, with opinion polls indicating it would easily pass.
But the constitutional revisions risk raising tensions with neighboring countries, which accuse Japan of not atoning for its past aggression.
Pacifist groups have vowed to put up a fight, promising rallies and an international campaign to defeat the revised constitution in a referendum.
The draft constitution maintains Japan's official pacifism, keeping a clause that says: "The Japanese people forever renounce war as a sovereign right of the nation and the threat or use of force as means of settling international disputes."
Other than in name, Japan already has one of the world's best funded militaries, devoting close to US$44 billion to defense a year.
Despite imposing the pacifist Constitution, the US has since 1951 encouraged a greater military posture for Japan, one of its most loyal allies. The Self Defense Forces now have more than 253,000 personnel.
The draft revision would keep the "Self Defense Forces" terminology but also use the word "military."
It omits a paragraph in Article Nine of the original document that says "land, sea, and air forces, as well as other war potential, will never be maintained."
Instead, the draft says: "In order to secure peace and the independence of our country as well as the security of the state and the people, military forces for self defense shall be maintained with the prime minister of the Cabinet as the supreme commander."
In light of the revision, the LDP will also seek to create a Cabinet-level defense ministry.
Japan now has a "Defense Agency" which has a lower status than other ministries.
Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi has tried to boost Japan's image as more than an economic power. He has deployed some 600 troops on a reconstruction and development mission to Iraq.
"In this time of major changes, it is our responsibility to carry out reforms to deal with society's changes while maintaining peace," Koizumi told a crowd of LDP stalwarts at the meeting, which featured an orchestra and an opera singer attempting the party anthem.
The LDP's Buddhist-oriented partner New Komeito, which calls itself the "pacifist party," had previously opposed military deployment overseas before joining the coalition but later conformed to the LDP position.
"We are still holding talks on how to deal with Article Nine," New Komeito leader Takenori Kanzaki told the LDP meeting, saying that the party would come up with its own proposal next year.
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