In a sign of deepening military cooperation between Japan and the US, amphibious Japanese troops and US Marines yesterday practiced airborne landing assaults together for the first time.
Japan is revising a decade-old national security strategy this year in the face of China’s growing military assertiveness. The upgrade to defense policy guidelines is expected to call for the nation to take a more active role alongside Washington in regional security.
The drills in the foothills of Mount Fuji yesterday involved 400 troops from Japan’s Amphibious Rapid Deployment Brigade (ARDB) and 600 US Marines, and is part of a three-week joint exercise to hone interoperability between the allies.
Photo: Reuters
Tilt-rotor Osprey troop carriers were used during the drills.
“The real significance from this training is that the [US] Marines and the ARDB are doing serious combat training of a sort that would have been unthinkable a decade ago,” said Grant Newsham, a retired US Marine Corps colonel who advised Japan as a liaison officer when it set up its amphibious force.
“It demonstrates a more solidly linked US and Japan,” he said.
Activated in 2018, the ARDB troops are Japan’s first marines since World War II and were formed to reinforce its defense along its southwest islands at the edge of the East China Sea.
Trained to take back captured islands using helicopters, Ospreys and amphibious landing craft, the force of about 1,500 troops would likely be one of the first in action to counter any Chinese attack on Japan’s islands.
Beijing, which is locked in a territorial dispute with Japan over uninhabited islands that are controlled by Tokyo in the East China Sea, routinely dispatches ships to assert its claims.
The joint drills also come as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine raises fresh security concerns in East Asia, where China is putting pressure on Taiwan following its crackdown on Hong Kong.
Japan also faces Russia’s forces operating from Asian bases that are increasingly cooperating with the Chinese military.
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