How to Draw a Aircraft Carrier Step by Step
Introduction
Japan's decision to upgrade two helicopter-carrying destroyers to launch jet fighters has proved highly controversial.1 Because a weapon's usefulness is relational to the presence of the means to blunt, deflect or repel it, analysts contend that carriers, with their large radar signatures, are vulnerable to long-range missiles,2 not to mention drones or their increasing susceptibility to submarines, mines and potentially cyberattacks too.3 David Richards, the U.K.'s former chief of defense staff, sardonically dismissed his own country's carriers as 'unaffordable vulnerable metal cans".4
More particular to the Japanese case, domestic critics have castigated the move as a breach of Japan's avowed constitutional position to never possess senryoku (war potential).5 A lead editorial by the Japanese daily Asahi Shimbun called the carrier conversion "unacceptable," since it represented, "a clear break from Japan's strictly defensive postwar security policy."6 Some of Japan's neighbors have also voiced their ire. Following the conversion program's announcement, China's foreign ministry spokeswoman, Hua Chunying, spoke of Beijing's "strong dissatisfaction and opposition" to the move, urging Japan "to adhere to a purely defensive policy."7
Given that certain naval analysts believe technological developments have made aircraft carriers obsolete,8 and on top of the backlash against the decision, why did the administration of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe seek to take Japan back into the carrier business? The answer to this question is far from trivial. Anticipating which capabilities are likely to feature in future Japanese military planning will be a major factor in the evolving regional military balance in East Asia. Indeed, the extent to which Asia-Pacific states are responding militarily (or not) to China's rise is a question of crucial significance for twenty-first century peace and stability.9
After his return as prime minister in an unexpected landslide election victory at the end of 2012, Shinzo Abe set out his administration's intention to make Japan a "first-tier" power again.10 Keen to demonstrate this goal to Japan's strategic ally, the U.S., he announced to a Washington D.C. think tank audience that "Japan is back."11 The passage of his administration's landmark security legislation in 2015, which includes breaching the constitutional ban on collective self-defense, has received considerable scholarly treatment.12 Scholars and analysts, however, are divided over whether Abe's moves were a proportionate response to Japan's emerging security environment13 or revisionist posturing to restore Japan's international status rather than a practical security option.14 The case of the carrier conversion program provides a further window into this debate.
To preview our main conclusion, we argue that possessing carriers – even light carriers – makes a non-trivial contribution to Japan's territorial defense. However, the military rationale is insufficient on its own to explain the decision. Splicing theories associated with the inter-subjectivity of certain weapons and empirical evidence from interviews with serving or retired Japanese defense officials, military officers, and national security experts, we instead show how the Abe administration intended to leverage carriers' symbolic status for political ends.
To lay out our nuanced explanation of Japan's carrier renaissance, the article proceeds as follows. We first place our argument within the wider theoretical discourse about the symbolic value of weapons and weigh up the extent to which this has historically motivated political actors in their defense program choices. The next section contextualizes the carrier conversion decision within Japan's evolving strategic posture. Following on from this, we analyze the military rationale for light carriers in relation to Japan's emerging threat landscape before moving to discuss the political benefits the government – and especially the former administration of Shinzo Abe – might be feasibly trying to accrue through carriers' enduring symbolic value. The final section, which forms the conclusion, discusses this paper's contribution to the scholarly literature and current understanding of the emerging balance of power in East Asia.
Symbolic Weapons: Beyond Rationalism?
Under dominant rationalist interpretations of strategic affairs, governments constantly recalibrate their primary national security tool – the military – to best address their state's security environment.15 Usually, the overriding long-term security consideration is the external threat posed by other states, especially from those deemed to harbor hostile intent. Whether or not states – or, more to the point, those acting on their behalf – ultimately make the wisest choices is unimportant for rationalist theories; the assumption is that they are always trying to. To be sure, states and their leaders may (and often do) make mistakes about the efficacy of certain weapons or doctrines, overestimating the capabilities of certain weapons or capabilities and underestimating the abilities of others to blunt, repel or defeat them.
More recently, however, a growing minority of scholars have attacked these presuppositions. For some, key choices about a nation's defense may be subservient to the interests of sub-state actors, most prominently the various services that make up a country's armed forces.16 The need to appease these constituents may knowingly result in sub-optimal decisions regarding defense output.17 Others take issue with the lack of attention given under rationalist interpretations to normative considerations in defense choices. This second strand of critical scholarship contends that ideas are often more important in explaining political phenomena than rationalist theories admit – even in the realm of national security decision-making.18 In the nuclear proliferation literature, this perspective is most often associated with what Scott Sagan has called the "The Norms Model," which emphasizes the symbolic rather than the military value of nuclear weapons in this case.19 In particular, the Norms Model argues that states are driven to acquire certain weapons because they represent a significant symbol of state modernity and identity. Possessors will receive recognition commensurate with the respect that such symbolic weapons command.20
The empirical record for the importance of leveraging the symbolism of high-profile weapons as a motivating factor seems compelling. Mao Zedong, founder of the People's Republic of China, stated that his country built its bomb in part for international status.21 In a similar vein, Iraqi president, Saddam Hussein was interested in weapons of mass destruction for their capability to deter or wage war but also for their benefits for his prestige among the Arab states.22 Away from WMDs, the symbolic value attached to high-status conventional weapons helps explain why all sides in World War II, but especially the Axis powers, invested so heavily in large battleships. Such 'majestic dinosaurs'23 were thought of as sacred vessels. Their size and guns had come to be considered representations of national power.24
The idea that states often forgo their direct interests for the sake of prestige – that is, backing projects that demonstrate modernity, engaging in conflicts over status, or building weapons that are grand but impractical – has a longer lineage in IR scholarship than is usually recognized. Indeed, in the 1940s and 1950s Hans Morgenthau and other realists emphasized the importance of prestige.25 Prestige or related concepts like status and reputation – which can all be thought of as the expected products of possessing symbolic weapons – has increasingly gained traction as a missing element in current theories of international politics.26
When discussing leaders' anticipated benefits accrued from possessing a symbolic weapon – whether this is prestige or the signaling of some message to an intended audience – it is important to separate the tangible from intangible. A benefit of symbolic weapons, such as prestige, status, or reassurance to allies, is not literally a commodity; it involves not just what one has done in material terms but how others interpret why one does it, and a set of expectations about how each other is likely to interpret the act. In this way, intended politically useful byproducts of these weapons are derived from more than simply the military power produced by the artifact but also their symbolic value.
There is a good case to be made that this behavior – the attempt to accrue non-material benefits by building a visible and imposing weapon – explains why some countries adopt aircraft carriers. The current 'aircraft carrier club" has members who possess only one or two carriers, and these vessels appear to address no real security concern.27 In the extreme case of Thailand, its single carrier is not even kept on operational status. In the sections below, we evaluate the extent to which the carrier conversion decision was in part taken for intangible, non-material motives. Japan's conversion program provides a useful case for testing the relative strengths of military rationalism versus the so-called "Norms Model" because we can largely discount the third possibility: that the decision was taken to appease a powerful domestic constituent – the Maritime Self-defense Force (MSDF). The civil-military power balance is such in Japan that the various services within the self-defense forces have only a marginal influence over key defense decisions.28 Before turning to the main analytical sections, we provide a brief overview of the carrier conversion decision in the context of Japan's evolving defense posture.
Contextualizing the Carrier Conversion Decision
In 2013, Japan's MSDF launched the JS Izumo helicopter carrier and its sister ship, the JS Kaga, two years later. Designed to carry an air wing of a maximum of fourteen helicopters and ostensibly built for anti-submarine warfare, the two 27,000-ton (full load) Izumo-class multi-purpose destroyers (22DDH) were acquired as command-and-control ships that could also be used in humanitarian assistance and disaster relief (HADR) missions.29 After conversion, JS Izumo – and later JS Kaga – will be able to operate a variant of one of the world's most advanced fighter aircraft, the F-35Bs, an American short take-off and vertical landing (STOVL), or jump jet (AV-8B Harrier).30
Although the ships will be able to carry only a dozen or so of these aircraft apiece – and thus they are best thought of as "pocket" or "light" carriers – the announcement marks a step change in Japan's post-1945 naval development, giving the MSDF a capability it has not possessed since the Second World War: the ability to launch fixed-wing aircraft from flat-top ships. In isolation, the decision is laden with much significance. Domestic critics and some neighbors view this move as evidence that Japan is shifting to a more assertive or even offensive posture.
Article Nine of Japan's 1947 constitution, which rejects the "use of force to settle international disputes," forbids the country from possessing senryoku (war potential).31 Rearmament in the postwar period was justified in terms of the need to have the wherewithal for territorial defense and no more. Indeed, the Self-Defense Forces (SDF) were created – as their name makes clear – with an exclusively defensive mission (senshu bōei). With no specific types of weapons or capabilities explicitly prohibited by the constitution, however, successive Japanese governments have been left to decide what was appropriate for self-defense. Debates seeking to clarify the difference between forces built for self-defense and those with senryoku have regularly occurred in the Diet (Japan's parliament).32 Prohibitions against possessing senryoku – for example, the long-standing restriction against the MSDF having senkan (battleships) – became more problematic during the Cold War as Japan's maritime interests required a naval presence well beyond its shores.33 To cut a path through these constraints, the Japanese government interpretation of Article Nine has always been loose.34
Japanese lawmakers and constitutional experts – not to mention IR scholars35 – have long disagreed over the criteria for designating a weapon as offensive. Assessments about what constitutes an offensive land weapon have typically used the combination of mobility and firepower, which, when put together, can be termed 'striking power".36 But attempts to apply such principles to naval warfare fall down on the differences between land and sea. Navies by their nature are mobile and much of the sea on which they travel are global commons rather than sovereign territory. Although Alfred T. Mahan observed that "[t]he navy, by its mobility, is pre-eminently fitted for offensive war," navies can engage in a range of aggressive and passive operations.37 As one naval analyst notes about carriers more specifically: "They can be moved around the globe like queens on a chessboard, responding to disasters, minor aggressions, and showing the flag either in threat or in support."38
The Japanese government has a record of employing semantic cover to weapons that could be perceived to have offensive characteristics.39 Following this practice, Japanese government officials have made vigorous attempts to show how the converted ships will be used for defensive purposes and thus do not breach the constitution.40 Critics employing Thomas Schelling's point that even weapons proclaimed to be defensive often "embody equipment or technology that is superbly useful in attack and invasion,"41 claim that carriers possess war-making potential regardless of stated intentions. In the Japanese public's imagination, there is little subtlety when it comes to carriers; they are simply offensive weapons, and, for detractors, the clearest illustration yet that Abe and his successors are determined to move the SDF's role away from one of purely senshu bōei. "The modified Izumo ship will obviously be an 'aircraft carrier" (in violation of the constitution) as long as it can launch fighter jets to attack opponents", states one leading academic critic.42 As such, domestic opposition to the carriers should be viewed in the context of ongoing debates about Japan's recent national security changes. From a significant loosening of a decades-old ban on arms exports to a landmark decision allowing for the limited exercise of collective self-defense, former Prime Minister Abe's contentious policies in defense and security remain a source of intense debate within the country, with the carrier conversion being foremost among them.43
The carrier conversion decision represents the latest in a series of major revisions to Japan's national security posture that were pushed under Abe's second administration and have continued under his successors and protégé, Prime Ministers Yoshihide Suga and Fumio Kishida. Whilst sensitivities over Japan's pacifism have declined in recent years, it is still a powerful force in domestic politics.44 The carrier decision also runs counter to Japan's long-standing policy of avoiding displays of military strength that might provoke a reaction in neighbors. Indeed, for much of the postwar era, Japan has pursued a policy of military self-restraint aimed at reassuring its neighbors that its intentions remain limited when it comes to the use of force.45 Why then did the Abe administration press ahead with the refitting of the Izumo at Yokohama shipyards at the risk of provoking hostility at home and abroad?46 Do the carriers make a significant enough contribution to Japan's national defense to justify the program on these grounds?
The Military Case
From a realist standpoint – one which carries more of a normative prescription than realists often care to admit – military policy, and more narrowly the acquisition of weapons systems, should be a state's rational efforts to best defend and enhance national interests. This, in turn, should be based on available resources and in response to external stimuli (i.e., the threat posed by others). Does Japan's acquisition of a light carrier capability meet this standard? Is there still a valid military rationale, for a regional navy such as Japan's to move into the carrier business?
Territorial Defense
There is a case to be made that the possession of carriers – even light carriers47 – are a boost for regional navies, especially if they provide an asymmetric advantage over foes.48 Indeed, Japanese defense officials defending the conversion program emphasize its tangible contribution to Japan's defense. Furnished with the formidable F-35B, and similar in many ways to USS America and her sistership Tripoli,49 the Izumo carriers will provide Japan with a moveable air defense system. It is not difficult to imagine a range of defense scenarios in which Japan would benefit from such organic fighter cover.50 Light carriers could prove useful in a conflict involving disputed small islands, as the deployment of the U.S. Navy's USS Wasp on an exercise in the South China Sea appears to foreshadow.51
Japan's smaller islands to the south – most importantly the Senkakus, claimed by both China and Japan – cannot support airfields and thus the Izumo could patrol these waters, offering organic air cover. These islands are far from any major SDF base and, despite increases to the Air Self-Defense Forces (ASDF) presence in Okinawa, are difficult to protect from Chinese actions.52 At any rate, a major move by China on the Senkaku Islands would almost certainly be preceded by an attempt to neutralize the ASDF Okinawa base, leaving the islands exposed (ASDF aircraft on the more distant Japanese islands of Kyushu and Honshu can provide defensive air cover only with the help of aerial tankers). In such a scenario, which Japanese defense planners fear greatly, a carrier would close the distance between Japan's air bases and its vulnerable territory (see Figure 1).53 As one defense analyst has concluded: 'From this perspective, the carrier makes sense, since it enlarges Japan's defensive range and provides it with some level of resiliency".54 For Japan, they could deter aggression against the disputed islands in Japan's southwest island chain.55
Unraveling Japan's aircraft carrier puzzle: Leveraging carriers' symbolic value
Published online:
09 October 2021
Figure 1. Refitted JS Izumo with F-35Bs operational scenario.56
![]({"type":"image","src":"/na101/home/literatum/publisher/tandf/journals/content/fasi20/0/fasi20.ahead-of-print/14799855.2021.1982897/20211019/images/medium/fasi_a_1982897_f0001_oc.jpg"})
Figure 1. Refitted JS Izumo with F-35Bs operational scenario.56
Being "on the spot" Japanese forces can also better respond to a range of naval contingencies, blocking Chinese paramilitary forces or some other state-directed adventurers before they occupy one or some of the islands under a spurious pretext, ala Argentina's 1982 occupation of South Georgia in the South Atlantic, which sparked the Falklands War. In short, having a carrier in the region would provide a powerful deterrent. The JS Izumo, for example, could offer highly symbolic as well as real military backing to Japan's well-equipped Coast Guard.
Deterring Adversaries, Confronting Regional Threats
The balance of power in Northeast Asia is shifting with startling speed. Japan now finds itself facing potential adversaries with growing capabilities.57 Added to North Korea's testing of ballistic missiles, which have become more aggressive in recent years, Japanese planners are increasingly occupied with Chinese actions.58 This change in threat perception has led to an incremental but significant shift in defense planning59 and renewed questions about the viability of Japan's deterrence strategy in the absence of an ability to strike back.60 The grand strategic bargain – that the U.S. will provide the military capability to strike offensively from Japanese bases while Japan's military will maintain the capability to defend its home islands – remains under some doubt.61 Indeed, Japan's conversion decision chimes with Abe's push for greater self-reliance (jijo seishin) in defense and Tokyo's cognizance that the U.S. may not risk war with China over small, uninhabited islands.62 According to Sheila Smith: "As American political leaders openly debate their commitment to allied defenses, Japanese politicians are beginning to argue for greater military capability, including limited strike capability, to ensure potential adversaries do not miscalculate SDF readiness".63 But while Japan's ability to independently strike back may be enhanced by its carrier conversion, this program may be a less-than-optimal option when it comes to best defending its national interests based on available resources.
For a maritime nation such as Japan, a carrier is one means of developing a retaliatory capability. However, in the context of the expanding A2/AD net of potential adversaries, carriers, of any size, seem an increasingly poor investment for offensive operations. It is more likely Japan would choose to develop a longer-range missile capability if it is determined to acquire an offensive strike capability for deterrence. This deterrence could be established by the threat of punishment or by a preemptive attack against an adversary's impending ballistic missile launch.
If not contributing to Japan's ability for preemptive or retaliatory strike capabilities, the refitted Izumo and its sister ship could potentially conduct carrier warfare operations outside of Japan's territorial waters.64 Light carriers, in fact, might be appropriate in scale for protecting vital convoys traversing the vastness of the Pacific against sporadic air and submarine attacks using their onboard fighters and helicopters respectively.65 Operating in the vast Western Pacific, the light carrier with its maximum complement of F-35Bs, on paper, packs serious combat capability.66 The Japanese MoD, however, has stressed that the Izumo will operate the F-35B only when necessary and will continue to operate mostly helicopters.67 Indeed, accommodating F-35Bs entails tradeoffs in space onboard the ships, compromising their ability to perform other tasks.68
Moreover, the MSDF lacks appropriate accompanying screening and logistical ships necessary for such operations. To use aircraft carriers in an offensive capacity requires they form up around their own battle group, which is hindered in Japan's case by the possession of diesel subs that can only patrol close to home waters rather than picket the carrier.69 Indeed, few states have ever had a large enough carrier force to implement independent carrier warfare.70
There are additional obstacles for Japan adopting carrier warfare. It will take time to efficaciously operate the ships as fixed-wing carriers even within the relatively benign conditions of its own waters – let alone in the open seas. As Michael Horowitz writes: 'operating a floating airfield and the ship itself, plus coordinating with support ships, is simply a much harder set of tasks than lining up the big guns of a battleship and firing".71 Few states in history have adopted the core organizational practices associated with learning how to launch and recover airplanes from mobile airfields.72 Carrier battle group operations are especially tricky, presenting the complex systems integration challenge of coordinating air assets and accounting for logistical ships; it can only be mastered after a lengthy period of constant training and experience.73
The task is made more difficult in Japan's case by the fact that whilst the MSDF will operate the ships, the ASDF will be responsible for the F-35Bs. The significance of this division of labor should not be understated. As one former MSDF officer noted:
Yes, the F-35Bs will likely be hosted on the MSDF-commanded carrier but piloted by ASDF pilots. The air wing will be ASDF, the commander of the vessel will be MSDF. This is the only option available as the MSDF has very little money and no trained personnel to pilot the planes. The ASDF has more funding and experienced pilots who know how to operate F-35As. They can more easily be trained to operate the F-35Bs. The ASDF and MSDF cooperation and joint operations is tentative, necessary and potentially revolutionary. However, a joint operations structure with joint staff started about 10 years ago so this concept is not entirely new.74
Because of infrastructure support demands, limitations of the F-35Bs, tacit knowledge requirements, and the daunting systems integration challenges, it is unlikely the Japan will be able to adopt independent carrier warfare in the near-term.75
Despite the potential detractions listed above, it is practicable for Japan to acquire light carriers for potential use in hostilities beyond its own waters when operating alongside the U.S. Navy. For one thing, it would avoid Japan needing to form up an independent battle group. An Izumo-class carrier could deploy in tandem with an equivalent U.S. small flattop, such as USS Wasp. The ability of the Izumo-class conversions to operate the F-35B is also militarily significant to the U.S., which currently only has a few flat-tops operating the F-35B. If the JS Izumo and JS Kaga are added to this, the number of vessels carrying the aircraft quickly multiplies. In aggregate, they could produce more organic air power than the sum of their parts.76 One former MSDF flag officer explains how this might work in practice:
[T]he converted Izumo would be used in concert with the USS Wasp. They are both amphibious assault ships with naval and marine contingents as well as (in the case of the Izumo) ASDF pilots and planes. If only one ship with ten planes was sailing it can only field five planes offensively and five planes remain for defense. However, if two ships of the same class sail together, five planes can play defense while 15 planes can play offense.77
Acquisitions that are interoperable with U.S. forces makes sense for Tokyo. Japan's military planners believe sustaining U.S. military dominance is the best hope for Japan's security in the face of a militarily powerful and bellicose China. As such, they believe Japan should develop capabilities that compliment U.S. military power in the region.78 Beyond cooperation with U.S. forces, the carriers could be used to further inter-operability with other partners – above and beyond that already taking place in various countries under the guise of maritime security and coast guard training.79 This includes Japan's Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (the Quad) partners of India, Australia and the U.S. but also, critically, partners like the Royal Thai Airforce and perhaps the Vietnamese.80 In practical terms, it is currently almost impossible to train with these partners in Japan given various sensitivities about noise or military posture. As one former member of Headquarters, U.S. Forces Japan noted:
Everything in Japan is very close together. The Americans have been experiencing this problem for years. Frankly, given the current situation, it would be an enormous political challenge for Tokyo to invite another country's military for large-scale training together with the SDF on Japanese soil. And sending fighter craft abroad to train with neighboring countries' air forces, for example, also presents challenges. As such, carriers may provide a way to build longer-term and more practically useful military relationships with their [Japan's] partners further afield while avoiding some of these long-standing issues.81
Summary of Military Rationale
The light carriers are certainly not useless, especially for Japan's territorial defense. They potentially provide Japan with an asymmetric advantage over certain adversaries, provide greater deterrence and act as a force multiplier when operated in concert with U.S. naval forces. However, as noted, there are cheaper and arguably more effective ways for Japan to frustrate an attack by utilizing A2/AD technologies. As for tasks away from Japanese waters, any advantages accrued through possessing light carriers are hamstrung by a lack of investment in upgrading the rest of the fleet.82 The expected military benefits are not insignificant but, in isolation, seem a poor motive for this decision.
Nevertheless, while former MSDF admirals and officers have disagreed about where upgrades are needed for the fleet, no one has ever stated that an aircraft carrier with fixed-wing fighters is irrelevant or inappropriate for the MSDF.83 Indeed, the MSDF has long wanted a carrier, regardless of the military rationale behind that choice.84 The nature of civil-military relations in Japan, however, means the SDF has scant lobbying power to press for its preferences. At any rate, the impetus for carriers came down from the prime minister's office rather than up from the SDF and Ministry of Defense.85 This suggests motives apart from carriers' military utility were likely at play. The following sections explore the explanatory validity of the anticipated political benefits derived from the ships' symbolic value.
Leveraging Carriers' Symbolic Value
In comparative assessments of military power, carriers are accorded a high place. Revolutionizing the means of delivering explosive force from sea – resulting from the transition from ship-mounted guns to munitions launched from planes – the ships have become emblems of military might.86 Nations that acquire carriers are deemed to have passed a certain military status threshold, i.e., they have become first-rank naval powers.87 A shared meaning between the principal actors in international affairs has emerged about the prestige attached to aircraft carrier possession.88 This tracks with the aforementioned Norms Model, whereby states acquire weapons like carriers because they represent a significant symbol of state modernity and identity.
Given the importance of reputation in international affairs, acquiring weapons for their prestige is not without some logic.89 Carriers, as one expert notes, are 'big, impressive, and prestigious, which is why, despite their expense and presumed vulnerability, countries that can are either building or buying them".90 The Thai navy's carrier, HTMS Chakri Naruebet, the oldest in Asia-Pacific, and which has mostly resided in port for much of its 20-year career, is an example – perhaps an unusual one – of a carrier acquired for prestige rather than military function.91 The below sections analyze three possible political benefits which the Abe administration may have sought to derive from the inter-subjective status accorded to carriers.
Reassuring Allies and Attracting Partners
The fact that the decision to refit the ships came from the prime minister's office lends weight to the proposition that the government wishes to extract political benefits from the carriers. It is worth restating again what a highly unusual departure from standard Japanese acquisition processes this was.92 Indeed, there is reason to suspect that political considerations were prioritized over defense needs when decisions were made regarding the conversion of Japan's carriers. Retired Vice Admiral Yoji Koda, a former commander of a MSDF fleet, criticized the Izumo's refitting because the Ministry or Defense had accepted this program without first having conducted sufficiently detailed naval combat simulations by military experts. For Koda, "A defense build-up program must be based on the assumption that those [weapons] can actually be used in an emergency situation. Just showing off [a military presence] is not a legitimate way of thinking."93 In other words, the Izumo-class carriers, according to Koda and others connected to the MSDF, are less a game-changing weapon in the SDF's arsenal and more of a diplomatic showboat, akin, in one naval expert's depiction, to "floating ambassadors."94
It is plausible that the Japan's government believes ports of call visits by one of the carriers replete with F-35Bs to the Philippines or Vietnam will send a strong signal of Japan's credibility as a reliable strategic partner in the region.95 As one Japanese defense analyst observes, "the combination of Izumo and F-35B is a very effective way to show Japan's presence in the Indo-Asia Pacific region."96 Indeed, every year since 2017, Izumo and its sister ship Kaga, have conducted long-term deployments in the Indo-Pacific region for about two months alternately.97
The decision may have been intended as a more focused message to Washington about Japan's willingness to shoulder more of the security burden in East Asia than its actual ability to do so. The U.S. has been calling on Japan to enhance its military capabilities for decades and was particularly vocal on this point under the Trump administration – what better way to signal this than by leveraging the carrier's symbolism? This speaks to Waltz's observation that, "Strategy is at least partly made for the sake of attracting and holding allies."98
The refitted carriers could be used to further high-profile and symbolically important training between various arms of the Japanese SDF and their counterparts in Southeast Asia, as noted in the previous section. Therefore, Tokyo is likely leveraging the carriers' symbolism to show that Japan has skin in the Indo-Pacific game. This is not only relevant in the context of the U.S.-Japan alliance; it is also intended as a signal to Southeast Asian and Indian Ocean partners.
Signaling to Adversaries
The incorporation of one weapon should not usually, by itself, signal a major change in a nation's military posture. As Jack Levy has argued: "What is important […] is not the characteristics of an individual weapon, but rather the aggregate impact of all weapons systems in a given arsenal."99 Yet, as noted above, aircraft carriers possess a special symbolism in international affairs. This is even true of Izumo-class carriers. Although able to perform a variety of tasks, a carrier, of any size, is thought of first and foremost as an "airfield at sea," supporting a ground fight ashore or conducting an air campaign over hostile or disputed territory.100 For these reasons, the carrier decision was far from politically costless. Regardless of Japan's entreaties about its defensive motives for acquiring carriers, the decision will continue to provoke strong reactions.
The conversion decision has stoked anger in China and fueled some suspicion elsewhere in the region about Japan's long-term return to militarism. The original Izumo's launch in 2013 had previously sparked controversy, having been described by Chinese officials as an 'aircraft-carrier in disguise".101 There was good reason to suspect that the Izumo was designed to operate F-35Bs from the design stage: its aircraft elevators conveniently fit the size of the plane and withstand its weight.102 China suspects that by classifying the ships as helicopter destroyers, Japan was trying to escape the scrutiny that comes with being labeled an aspirant "carrier" power.
Indeed, Japan's refitting of its Izumo-class carriers with STOVL capabilities as well as U.S. fighter jets, and American-made/installed Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR) platforms, signal processing, sensors and data fusion, would mean Tokyo possesses aircraft carriers superior, albeit not in displacement weight, to any of China's own. With F-35Bs, these light carriers, one expert on the evolving military balance in Asia-Pacific argues, are "head and shoulders better than anything else out there" and serve as a direct and strong a warning message to Beijing.103 In addition, the refitted carriers' potency will be amplified when operating with the U.S. Pacific Fleet. In short, China, which is only now in the process of building two more aircraft carriers (without STOVL capabilities) in addition to the Liaoning, a refurbished ex-Soviet carrier, is monitoring the conversion process closely. Senior Colonel Ren Guoqiang, spokesperson for the Ministry of National Defense of the People's Republic of China, stated, "because of historical and realistic reasons, Japan's movements in military and security areas have always been under close attention of its Asian neighbors and the international community, especially Japan's development of offensive weapons beyond its purely defensive defense demands. It is worthy of keeping much more alert of this movement of Japan."104
One reason Beijing may oppose Tokyo's carrier conversion program is because it believes it opens the door for the Japanese acquisition of more potent weapons. For China, the conversion program signals an important step toward Japan becoming a more capable military contributor to the U.S.-led alliance system in Asia. When coupled with Japan's keenness for naval inter-operability with the U.S. and their mutual Quad partners, China sees an embryonic alliance intentionally targeting it.105
Whilst Japan's military credibility in the eyes of China is an important byproduct of the conversion program, it is unlikely Tokyo wishes to antagonize its neighbor by steaming a carrier through the South China Sea. In possessing carriers, Japan must strike a delicate balance of sending a message of firm resolve to China but not provoking her. Claims that the carriers are purely defensive will not be readily accepted in Beijing. For when a country builds weapons that it thinks are defensive in nature, potential rivals invariably think those steps are offensive.106 Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Hua Chunying, responding to a question about Japan's carrier conversion, urged Japan " … to adhere to its policy commitment to 'dedicated defense,' adhere to the path of peaceful development, and exercise caution in the field of military security."107
Because hardline policies are seen as affecting the security dilemma's severity, the policy prescription for security seekers is simple: they should adopt overtly defensive military postures to demonstrate their preference for the status quo. Indeed, this premise has greatly influenced Japan's postwar posture. Arguments for beefing up naval capabilities are largely a reaction to China's own moves in this domain. "The Chinese need to remember," one regional expert quipped, "that they started this whole carrier arms race and it's now gotten away from them."108 Tokyo was probably well-prepared for Beijing's shrill condemnation of the Izumo refit. After all, China has missed few chances to criticize Japan and its defense acquisitions over the decades, utilizing anti-Japanese sentiment and Chinese nationalism in the process. For instance, Senior Colonel Wu Qian, Deputy Director of the Information Office of China's Ministry of National Defense (MND), responding to a question about the conversion of the JS Kaga, noted it carried the same name as an Imperial Japanese aircraft carrier. "I do not understand why the Japanese side is so obsessed with the names used by its military during WWII. Is it because the Japanese side does not want to have a clear break from its militarist history, or is it a deliberate provocation meant to hurt the feelings of the people of victimized countries of WWII? Japan's resurrection of the ghost of the militarism is worthy of high vigilance."109 Provoking Beijing was not Tokyo's aim, however.
Political and Strategic Effects
As noted, the strong domestic objection to the carriers is based on the idea that such ships are offensive weapons and thus violate the constitution. Such opposition rests on the presupposition that possession of offensive weapons, such as aircraft carriers, increases incentives to strike first,110 exacerbate tensions, breed mistrust, and, as a corollary, increases the chances of inadvertent war.111 Japan's constitutional prohibition on possessing senryoku is based on these premises.112 Counterintuitively, an additional political motive behind the decision may have been the use of the conversion program to test the limits of domestic opposition in changes to Japan's future military posture.
By opting to convert helicopter-carrying flat-tops into light carriers, the Abe administration may have gambled that it was pushing the boundaries of what was domestically feasible without provoking outright condemnation. Striking out from the beginning on a large-scale carrier project might have pushed things too far. This way, the decision is usefully provocative. Incremental changes suit Japan best, one Japanese analyst and former MSDF officer argues, because Japanese still tend to mistrust and dislike the military.113
Rumors were circulating even prior to the launch of the JS Izumo as a helicopter carrier in 2013 that it would be converted to a fixed-wing carrier. These rumors, along with accompanying op-eds and analyses in the Japanese media, gauged domestic and international public opinion.114 The worsening regional security environment likely made the conversion decision more politically feasible when it was announced at the end of 2018. As one retired MSDF admiral comments:
The more China acts assertively in the region, the more chance Japan will react and upgrade, convert or buy new defensive kit. The Japanese SDF and government are already considering larger carriers. However, the Izumo-class conversion is a test case. How will the public react? In other words, the government has an ongoing reactive strategy based on the actions of China, on the one hand, and Japanese public opinion's reactions to those [same] Chinese actions, on the other, as well as the related moves by the Japanese government to acquire new capabilities in order to counter any Chinese threat to Japan.115
Conclusion
In the decision to refit the Izumo-class ships to launch and recover fixed-wing aircraft, the current government had to make a complex calculation about the potential political benefits and costs versus anticipated military gains. Given common perceptions about what carriers symbolize – weapons for offensive action – criticism from domestic and regional opponents was predictable. Efforts to mollify this opprobrium by pointing to the defensive nature of the light carriers have largely failed to convince critics that acquiring an aircraft carrier of any size is anything but a breach of Article Nine of the constitution, which forbids Japan from possessing senryoku. Hostility at home to Japan acquiring more potent weapons has nevertheless partially subsided given China's bellicose words and actions across the region. Indeed, Japan took the decision to refit the ships in part to counter perceived threats from China by enhancing its defensive capabilities, especially around its remote islands, and making a more meaningful military contribution to the U.S.-Japan alliance. Yet, our testing of the relative strengths of military rationalism versus the 'Norms Model" point to the fact that tangible military benefits on their own are insufficient to explain the decision. Rather we see the anticipated inter-subjective benefits for Tokyo as having also driven this step change in naval posture. That is, the Izumo-class conversions are, firstly, an attempt by Japan's leaders to accrue the non-material benefits that come from building and operating an aircraft carrier, i.e., the prestige and related political power that come with it. Second, the conversions demonstrate Japan's commitment to upholding former Prime Minister Abe's signature foreign policy: a "free and open, rules-based" Indo-Pacific in concert with its Quad partners. Third, these actions establish Japan's credibility as a useful security partner to its neighbors and – to the U.S. – that it is a reliable partner willing to share security burdens in East Asia.
That the JS Izumo's conversion by itself does little shift distributions of military power in the region is perhaps irrelevant, meaning that Abe and his cabinet advisors had other plans. They include diplomatic "showboating" in port visits in places ranging from Vietnam to Sri Lanka to the Middle East,116 and using the light carriers as a new platform for defense cooperation with Southeast Asian states.117 As highly symbolic weapons, the refitted carriers imbue Japan with prestige and status to friends and adversaries alike, making them politically useful byproducts. As such, by taking into account this wider set of motives, Japan's decision to get back into the carrier business can be understood as offering both military gains and political benefits. Whether the conversion program represents a stepping-stone to more potent future Japanese defense acquisitions or the outer boundary of what is politically possible will largely depend on Japan's external threat environment and its faith in the U.S. security commitment.
1. This decision featured in Japan's most recent five-year defense plan, published in December 2018.
2. The Chinese DF-21D anti-ship ballistic missile can theoretically threaten shipping at ranges of up to 1,500 kilometers. See Andrew Erickson, Chinese Anti-Ship Ballistic Missile (ASBM) Development: Drivers, Trajectories, and Strategic Implications (Washington, DC: Jamestown Foundation, 2013).
3. Moreover, the frequent need to resupply carriers at sea makes them vulnerable to the destruction of logistical vessels. See for example, Robert Farley, "All of the Reasons America's Aircraft Carriers Are Doomed," National Interest, September 22, 2019, https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/all-reasons-americas-aircraft-carriers-are-doomed-82621.
4. Quoted in Richard Norton-Taylor, The State of Secrecy: Spies and Media in Britain (London: Bloomsbury, 2020).
5. Other security reforms have produced a higher pitch of domestic criticism, such as the reinterpretation of the constitution, but on the narrower question of possessing offensive weapons, this decision has arguably generated the most opprobrium. On the politics of recent Japanese security reform, see Christopher Hughes, Japan's Foreign and Security Policy Under the "Abe Doctrine": New Dynamism or New Dead End? (Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015); and Leif-Eric Easley, "How Proactive? How Pacifist? Charting Japan's Evolving Defence Posture," Australian Journal of International Affairs 71, no. 1 (2017): 63–87.
6. "Editorial: Japan Should Draw the Line at Possessing an Aircraft Carrier," Asahi Shimbun, November 30, 2018, http://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/AJ201811300025.html.
7. "'Useless and Provocative': Japan will Deploy its First Post-War Aircraft Carriers but it's a Deeply Controversial Move," AFP, December 19, 2018, https://www.scmp.com/news/asia/east-asia/article/2178610/useless-and-provocative-japan-getting-its-first-postwar.
8. David Isenberg, The Illusion of Power: Aircraft Carriers and US Military Strategy (Washington DC: Cato Institute, 1990); David B. Larter and Joe Gould, "With Mounting Questions about Cost and Survivability, a Shifting Political Landscape for US Aircraft Carriers," Defense News, May 6, 2019, https://www.defensenews.com/naval/2019/08/06/with-mounting-questions-about-cost-and-survivability-a-shifting-political-landscape-for-us-aircraft-carriers/; and Kyle Mizokami, "New Pentagon Study Spells Doom for Two Aircraft Carriers … and Maybe More," Popular Mechanics, April 23, 2020.
9. On the importance of this question and the challenges of gauging whether so-called secondary states in the region are balancing against China, see Adam P. Liff, "Whither the Balancers? The Case for a Methodological Reset," Security Studies 25, no. 3 (2016): 420–59.
10. Adam P. Liff, "Japan's Defense Policy: Abe the Evolutionary," Washington Quarterly 38, no. 2 (2015): 79–99.
11. Shinzo Abe, "Japan is Back," Speech Delivered at Center for Strategic and International Studies, Washington DC, February 22, 2013. Transcript of speech accessed at: https://www.mofa.go.jp/announce/pm/abe/us_20130222en.html. See also: Kenneth B. Pyle, "Japan's Return to Great Power Politics: Abe's Restoration," Asia Policy 13, no. 2 (2018): 69–90.
12. Christopher W. Hughes, "Japan's Strategic Trajectory and Collective Self-defense: Essential Continuity or Radical Shift?" The Journal of Japanese Studies 43, no. 1 (2017): 93–126; Adam P. Liff, "Policy by Other Means: Collective Self-Defense and the Politics of Japan's Postwar Constitutional Reinterpretations," Asia Policy 24 (2017): 139–72; and H. D. P. Envall, "The 'Abe Doctrine': Japan's New Regional Realism," International Relations of the Asia-Pacific 20, no. 1 (2020): 31–59.
13. Kitaoka Shin'ichi, "The Turnabout of Japan's Security Policy: Toward 'Proactive Pacifism,'" April 2, 2014, http://www.nippon.com/en/currents/d00108/; Hosoya Yuichi, "Bringing 'Internationalism' Back," June 23, 2014, http://www.nippon.com/en/currents/d00122/; Paul Midford, "Japan's Approach to Maritime Security in the South China Sea," Asian Survey 55, no. 3 (2015): 345–47; John Nilsson-Wright and Kiichi Fujiwara, "Japan's Abe Administration: Steering a Course Between Pragmatism and Extremism," research paper, Chatham House Asia Programme, September 2015, https://www.chathamhouse.org/sites/files/chathamhouse/field/field_document/20150914JapanAbe AdministrationNilssonWrightFujiwara.pdf.
14. Thomas U. Berger, "Abe's Perilous Patriotism: Why Japan's New Nationalism Still Creates Problems for the Region and the U.S.-Japanese Alliance," A Japan Chair Platform Special Edition, October 2014, http://csis.org/files/publication/141003_Berger_AbePerilousPatriotism_Web_0.pdf,p.8; and Richard J. Samuels, "Who Defi nes Japan's Past, and Future," The National Interest, May 26, 2015, http://nationalinterest.org/feature/who-defines-japans-past-future-12964.
15. See for example, Kenneth N. Waltz, "Reflections on Theory of International Politics: A Response to my Critics," in Neorealism and its Critics, ed. Robert O. Keohane (New York: Columbia University Press, 1986), 330–31; and Miles Kahler, "Rationality in International Relations," International Organization, 52, no. 4 (1998): 919–41.
16. Such rivalry may also drive military innovation. On this point, see: Marc R. DeVore, "Reluctant Innovators? Inter-Organizational Conflict and the USA's Route to Becoming a Drone Power," Small Wars & Insurgencies 31, no. 4 (2020): 701–29; and Owen Coté, The Politics of Innovative Military Doctrine: The U.S. Navy and Fleet Ballistic Missiles (Ph.D. Dissertation, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1996).
17. Certain authoritarian governments may also purposefully weaken and divide their armed forces as a coup-proofing measure. Such discussions are beyond this paper as they have little relevance for the case of modern Japan.
18. Peter J. Katzenstein (Ed.), The Culture of National Security: Norms and Identity in World Politics (New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 1996); and Joelien Pretorius, "The Security Imaginary: Explaining Military Isomorphism," Security Dialogue 39, no. 1 (2008): 99–120.
19. Scott D. Sagan, "Why Do States Build Nuclear Weapons? Three Models in Search of a Bomb," International Security 21, no. 3 (1996), 54–86.
20. Karsten Frey, "Nuclear Weapons as Symbols: The Role of Norms in Nuclear Policy Making," Institute Barcelona D'estudis Internationals, IBEI Working Papers, 2006.
21. Alastair Iain Johnston, "China's New 'Old Thinking': The Concept of Limited Deterrence," International Security 20, no. 3 (1995–1996): 5–42.
22. Susan Turner Haynes, "The Power of Prestige: Explaining China's Nuclear Weapons Decisions," Asian Security 16, no. 1 (2020): 35–52.
23. Victor Davis Hanson, The Second World Wars: How the First Global Conflict was Fought and Won (New York: Basic Books, 2020), 158.
24. Robert L. O'Connell, Scared Vessels: The Cult of the Battleship and the Rise of the U.S. Navy (New York: Routledge, 1991), 277–316; and Robert Art, The Influence of Foreign Policy on Seapower: New Weapons and Weltpolitik in Wilhelminian Germany (Beverly Hills: Sage, 1973), 36–39.
25. Hans Morgenthau, Politics among Nations (New York: Knopf, 1948); and Reinhold Niebuhr, The Structure of Nations and Empires (New York: Scribner's, 1948).
26. Daniel Markey, "Prestige and the Origins of War: Returning to Realism's Roots," Security Studies 8, no. 4 (1999): 128–32; Barry O'Neill, Honor Symbols and War (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1999); Jonathan Mercer, Reputation and International Politics (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996); Dana Eyre and Mark Suchman, "Status, Norms, and the Proliferation of Conventional Weapons," in The Culture of National Security: Norms and Identities in World Politics, ed. Peter Katzenstein (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996), 186–215.
27. Lilach Gilady, "Naval Procurement, Aircraft Carriers and Veblen Effects," (Paper presented at the 98th Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, Boston, MA, 2002).
28. Out of the three services, the Ground Self-defense Forces probably the strongest voice. But this, at any rate, makes it less likely that MSDF successfully lobbied the government for carriers at the expense of the resources allocated to the GSDF. Indeed, the MSDF was unable to procure any carriers until the 1990s. Yoji Koda, "A New Carrier Race?" Naval War College Review 64, no. 3 (2011), 31-60.
29. Displacing 27,000 tons (full load), the Izumo-class DDH are the largest ships as well as the flagships of the MSDF. They have a length of 248 meters, accommodations for up to 970 (including crew and troops) and can carry and deploy up to 14 maritime helicopters such as the SH-60K.
30. The flight deck will be heat-treated to withstand the high-temperature exhaust heat that the F-35B blows out upon landing, and the close-in weapon system (CIWS) fitted at the bow might be relocated to another location.
31. For a synopsis of the main arguments against the light carriers, see Brendon J. Cannon and Ash Rossiter, "Offensive or Defensive: The Debate over Japan's 'Aircraft Carrier' Upgrade," East Asia Military Monitor 2, no.1 (2019), 5-6.
32. Attempting to distinguish between offensive and defensive weapons became a serious handicap for Japanese military planners as the role of the SDF and its required capabilities grew. On this point see Sheila A. Smith, Japan Rearmed (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2019), 32.
33. This particularly became apparent after 9/11. The Special Measures Law for Preventing Terrorism at SEA was passed into law on 2 November 2001, allowing the MSDF to participate in refueling operations. The mission, which lasted for eight years, involved fourteen ships and about 2,400 MSDF personnel. See "Tero taisaku kaijō sōshi katsudō ni taisuru hokyū shien katsudō no jisshi ni kansuru tokubetsu sochihō ni motozuku hokyū shien katsudō no kekka" [The results of refueling operations based on the Special Measures Law for Preventing Terrorism at Sea], Ministry of Defense, Japan, April 2010, http://www.mod.go.jp/j/approach/kokusai_heiwa/hokyushein/pdf/kekka.pdf.
34. Smith, Japan Rearmed, 8.
35. For a classic discussion on this problem, see Jervis, "Cooperation under the Security Dilemma," 186–214; Glaser, "The Security Dilemma Revisited," World Politics 50, no. 1 (1997): 185–88; and Sean M. Lynn-Jones, "Offense-Defense Theory and Its Critics," Security Studies 4, no. 4 (Summer 1995): 660–91.
36. See Keir Lieber, "Grasping the Technological Peace: The Offense-Defense Balance and International Security," International Security 25, no. 1 (2006): 71–104; and Stephen Van Evera, Causes of War (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1999). As weapons systems have become more complex it is arguably harder to separate defensive from offensive. A good example to illustrate this point is ballistic missile defense. "Defence" is in the title, but others may consider such a system as aiding the offensive by allowing a state to pursue a first-strike capability.
37. Alfred T. Mahan, "Naval Administration and Warfare," Objects of the Naval War College (1888), 194.
38. Robert Rubel, "The Future of Aircraft Carriers: Consider the Air Wing, not the Platform," Center for International Maritime Security (CIMSEC), December 3, 2019, http://cimsec.org/the-future-of-aircraft-carriers-consider-the-air-wing-not-the-platform/42469.
39. For example, in Diet deliberations, the Japanese government described the earlier proposal of a Harrier carrier with a flight deck for helicopters as a "defensive" aircraft carrier. Smith, Japan Rearmed, 29.
40. For example, then-Defense Minister Takeshi Iwaya, at a press conference about the carrier refitting, attempted to clarify differences from "attack-type carriers" versus the refitted Izumo-class carriers. See "Press Conference by Defense Minister Iwaya," Ministry of Defense of Japan, December 11, 2018, https://www.mod.go.jp/e/press/conference/2018/12/11a.html. Japan's Medium-Term Defense Program (FY 2019 – FY 2023) and its National Defense Program Guidelines (FY 2019 and beyond) also go to great lengths to differentiate Japan's refitted carriers from the carriers used by other navies.
41. Thomas C. Schelling, Arms and Influence (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2008 new edition), 249.
42. Comments made by Hideki Uemara of Ryutsin University quoted in Keita Nakamura, "Japan Shrugs Off Constitutional Concerns, but Questions Remains: Are Aircraft Carriers Necessary?" Japan Times, December 19, 2018, https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2018/12/19/national/japan-shrugs-off-aircraft-carrier-constitutional-concerns-question-remains-warships-necessary/.
43. On the importance of Abe's role in transforming Japan's defense and security posture, refer to: Michael J. Green, Japan is Back: Unbundling Abe's Grand Strategy (Sydney: Lowy Institute, 2013); Sheila A Smith, Japan's New Politics and the U.S.-Japan Alliance (New York: Council on Foreign Relations, 2014); Ash Rossiter, "The 'Free and Open Indo-Pacific' Strategy and Japan's Emerging Security Posture," Rising Powers Quarterly 3, no. 2 (2018): 133–56; and Andrew Oros, Japan's Security Renaissance (Columbia University Press, New York, 2017). For an account that depicts a more incremental approach to Japan's shifting strategy, see Adam P. Liff, "Japan's Defense Policy: Abe the Evolutionary," Washington Quarterly 38, no. 2 (2015): 79–99; and ibid, "Japan's Security Policy in the 'Abe Era': Radical Transformation or Evolutionary Shift?" Texas National Security Review 1, no. 3, (2018): 8–34.
44. See for example, Paul Midford, Rethinking Japanese Public Opinion and Security: From Pacifism to Realism? (Stanford University Press, Stanford, 2011).
45. Sheila Smith, 157.
46. Multiple Japanese industrial giants such as Japan Marine United (JMU) Company with Sumitomo, Ishikawa Heavy Industries and Hitachi Shipyard Group are participating in the overhaul at the Yokohama shipyards.
47. The term light carriers is employed here to simply mean smaller aircraft carriers often meant for secondary support operations in navies with larger fleet carriers or as a substitute for fleet carriers in primary fleet operations when the navy does not possess fleet carriers.
48. For example, INS Vikrant required Pakistan to deploy a large proportion of its naval assets against the carrier in the 1971 war. Indeed, Vikrant sank several Pakistani ships and launched strike operations against coastal targets. See Ashley J. Tellis, "The Naval Balance in the Indian Subcontinent: Demanding Missions for the Indian Navy," Asian Survey 25, no. 12 (1985): 1186–213.
49. These are technically Landing Helicopter Assault (LHA) vessels, super-sized amphibious assault ships that, if the Navy wants, can be crammed with an F-35B air wing and used as a light aircraft carrier.
50. Both the JS Izumo and JS Kaga will be refitted as carriers for fixed wing fighters in order to allow the Izumo, for example, to make port visits in the Indo-Pacific while the Kaga patrols home waters. During periodic maintenance, Japan will also always have at least one carrier afloat. Authors' interview with Teruaki Aizawa, Senior Program Advisor (Capt. Ret. JMSDF), Ocean Policy Research Institute, Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo, 13 June 2019. Authors' interview with a retired JMSDF senior flag officer, Tokyo, 21 June 2019.
51. In 2019, the USS Wasp, a Landing Helicopter Dock (LHD) amphibious assault ship, carrying 10 F-35Bs took part in the annual Exercise Balikatan with the Philippines and sailed near the disputed Scarborough Shoal. This could be a good alternative to risking a full-sized carrier group.
52. Indeed, the closest Air Self-Defense Force base is in Okinawa (the 9th Air Wing). On this refer to: 'Japan Defense Focus No. 74ʹ, Ministry of Defense, Japan, March 2016, http://.mod.go.jp/e/jdf/pdf/jdf_no74.pdf. As for increases in ASDF presence in Okinawa, see Franz Stefan-Gady, "Japan Forms New Air Wing to Fend off China's Advances in East China Sea," The Diplomat, February 1, 2016, https://thediplomat.com/2016/02/japan-forms-new-air-wing-to-fend-off-chinas-advances-in-east-china-sea/.
53. Because the smaller islands far to Japan's south (near the Senkakus) cannot support airfields, plans are for the Izumo to patrol these waters at least some of time. Author's interview with a retired JMSDF senior flag officer, Tokyo, 21 June 2019. This military rationale for the carrier conversion was also echoed during the authors' interview with Tokuhiro Ikeda (VAdm, Ret. JMSDF), Tokyo, 25 June 2019.
54. Jeffrey H. Hornung, "Does Japan need an Aircraft Carrier?" Defense One, October 5, 2018, https://www.defenseone.com/ideas/2018/10/does-japan-need-aircraft-carrier/151,802/.
55. By deter, here we mean deterrence through denial rather than deterrence through punishment. On the concept of deterrence by denial see Mike Gallagher, "State of (Deterrence by) Denial," Washington Quarterly 42, no. 2 (Summer 2019): 31–45; and John Mearsheimer, Conventional Deterrence (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1983).
56. Defense of Japan, Ministry of Defense (Tokyo, 2019), 220.
57. For an overview of China's naval buildup in the context of the Indo-Pacific, see Michael McDevitt, "Chinese Capabilities in the Indian Ocean: 'Seeing an Acorn, and Imagining an Oak Tree'," Policy Recommendations by the Quadripartite Commission on the Indian Ocean Regional Security: Appendix (Tokyo: The Sasakawa Peace Foundation, 2017), 213–32. See also Michael Beckley, "The Emerging Military Balance in East Asia: How China's Neighbors Can Check Chinese Naval Expansion," International Security 42, no. 2 (Fall 2017): 78–119.
58. See multiple chapters in Robert S. Ross and Øystein Tunsjø (Eds.), Strategic Adjustment and the Rise of China: Power and Politics in East Asia (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2017).
59. See Andrew L. Oros, Japan's Security Renaissance: New Policies and Politics for the Twenty-First Century (New York: Columbia University Press, 2017).
60. On what constitutes an effective deterrent for Japan, see statement of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on 8 May 2013 in the Upper House Budget Committee, cited in Defense of Japan 2013, Ministry of Defense, Japan, http://www.clearing.mod.go.jp/hakusho_data/2013/2013/html/nsoo4000.html. [check this hyperlink].
61. The ambiguity surrounding the U.S. defense of Japan applying to the Senkakus was partially removed when U.S. President Joe Biden and Japan's Prime Minister, Yoshihide Suga, reaffirmed the fact that Article V of the Treaty applies to the Senkaku Islands on April 16, 2021. For more on doubts about the U.S. commitment to Japan, see Richard J. Samuels, Securing Japan: Tokyo's Grand Strategy and the Future of East Asia (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2007).
62. In addition to numerous statements in the Diet, Abe's thinking on self-reliance can be found in his book Atarashii kuni e [Toward a New Country] (Tokyo: Bungei Shunju, 2015).
63. Smith, Japan Rearmed, 16.
64. Carrier warfare is defined here as the combined use of fleet aircraft carriers and an array of logistical ships for the purpose of conducting strikes against enemy naval assets and establishing sea control.
65. Sebastien Roblin, "The U.S. Navy's 'Light' Aircraft Carriers can Launch F-35s (And More)," The National Interest, August 3, 2019, https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/us-navys-light-aircraft-carriers-can-launch-f-35s-and-more-71136.
66. Mike Yeo, "Aircraft Carriers or Not?".
67. Yoshihiro Inaba, "Japan Takes First Steps towards Refurbishment of JMSDF Destroyer Izumo," Naval News, December 30, 2019, https://www.navalnews.com/naval-news/2019/12/japan-takes-first-steps-toward-refurbishment-of-jmsdf-destroyer-izumo/.
68. More hangar and storage room are taken by the needs of ammunition, spare parts and other equipment. The ships will need to house personnel required to support the F-35Bs as well.
69. Operating fast jets from a carrier requires a large logistics support tail based on board the ship. Authors' interview with Ippeita Nishida, Senior Research Fellow, International Peace and Security Department, Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo 13 June 2019.
70. Geoffrey Till, "Holding the Bridge in Troubled Times: The Cold War and the Navies of Europe," Journal of Strategic Studies 28, no. 2 (2005); 326.
71. Michael C. Horowitz, The Diffusion of Military Power: Causes and Consequences for International Politics (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2010), 62.
72. Barry R. Posen, The Sources of Military Doctrine: France, Britain, and Germany between the World Wars (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1984).
73. As naval analysts have noted: "In order to keep this network alive and coordinated, it must be kept connected and integrated horizontally (e.g., across squadrons), vertically (from maintenance and fuel up through operations), and across command structures (battle group-ship-air wing)." Refer to Gene I. Rochlin, Todd R. La Porte and Karlene H. Roberts, "The Self-Designing High Reliability Organization: Aircraft Carrier Flight Operations at Sea," Naval War College Review 40, no. 4 (1987); 76–90.
74. Authors' interview with Teruaki Aizawa, Senior Program Advisor (Capt. Ret. JMSDF), Ocean Policy Research Institute, Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo, June 13, 2019.
75. Horowitz, The Diffusion of Military Power, 72. It is also doubtful that the Izumo-class carriers will move to the acquisition of a larger carrier later. Japan's rapidly aging population means that manning a full-size aircraft carrier would be difficult; in ten years it may become impossible. Authors' interview with a retired JMSDF senior flag officer, Tokyo, 21 June 2019.
76. Although the total complement of F35-Bs would be 20, only five are needed for air defense of the ships, leaving 15 for other operations. Operating separately, they would both have to keep five for air defense of the ship, meaning each ship would only be able to generate five F35-Bs for other missions.
77. Authors' interview with a retired JMSDF senior flag officer, Tokyo, 21 June 2019.
78. On this point, see Smith, Japan Rearmed, 196.
79. Authors' interview with Kuni Miyake, Research Fellow, Canon Institute for Global Studies, Tokyo, June 11, 2019.
80. On engagement between small and medium powers with the Quad, see various chapters in Ash Rossiter and Brendon J. Cannon (Eds.), Conflict and Cooperation in the Indo-Pacific: New Geopolitical Realities (London: Routledge, 2020).
81. Authors' interview with Joe Orcino, analyst, Sasakawa Peace Foundation, and former member of Headquarters, U.S. Forces Japan, Tokyo, June 5, 2019.
82. Authors' interview with Tokuhiro Ikeda (VAdm, Ret. JMSDF), Tokyo, June 25, 2019.
83. Intra-service disagreements about carriers in Japan, where they exist, revolve around whether the money spent to refit the Izumo-class carriers would have been better spent on a new, bonafide aircraft carrier – at greater capital expenditure but more capable. Indeed, it may have been cheaper to have built light carriers from scratch, if that was the intention all along – as some suspect it was – rather than this two-step process. The current budgetary rift in the MSDF, however, is between those who wish to see the scarce resources invested in anti-submarine warfare (ASW) capabilities and refurbishing the rest of the flotilla versus those who prefer greater investment in Frigate Multi-Purpose/Mine (FFM) ships.
84. "It's no secret that the MSDF, like all navies, wants a carrier." Authors' interview with a retired JMSDF senior flag officer, Tokyo, June 21, 2019.
85. Authors' interview with a retired JMSDF senior flag officer, Tokyo, June 21, 2019.
86. Horowitz, The Diffusion of Military Power, 65.
87. Ibid.
88. On the importance of shared knowledge among actors in the international system in assigning value to material objects, see Alexander Wendt's classic work "Constructing International Politics," International Politics 20, no. 1 (1995): 71–81.
89. See Petr Suchy and Bradley A. Thayer, "Weapons as Political Symbolism: The Role of US Tactical Nuclear Weapons in Europe," European Security 23, no. 4 (2014); 509–28.
90. Rubel, "The Future of Aircraft Carriers".
91. The HTMS Chakri Naruebet was constructed by Navantia in Spain and commissioned in March 1997. Similar to the Spanish carrier Principe de Asturias, it is fitted with a 12° ski jump to operate the Royal Thai Navy's (RTN) fleet of AV-8S Matador (Harrier) jets. It was used after the 2004 Indian Ocean tsnuami and in rescue operations after flooding in Thailand in 2010 and 2011.
92. This top-down approach was possible because PM Abe headed the strongest government in Japan in decades, until his retirement in late 2020. His political power allowed him to reshuffle ministries as well as create or expand them. Thus, while Abe had the power to propose the carrier refit, the MSDF was largely on board because they have wanted a carrier for decades. Authors' interview with Tokuhiro Ikeda (VAdm, Ret. JMSDF), Tokyo, 25 June 2019. See also Tokuhiro Ikeda, "Recommendations of former JMSDF personnel: Consider an aircraft carrier 'DDH Izumo,' [in Japanese: Kaiji singata goeikan no ninmu to nouryoku]," Sekai no Kansen, June (2019), 102–107.
93. Reiji Yoshida, "Japan's Plan to Remodel Izumo-Class Carriers: Needed Upgrade or mere Show of Force?" The Japan Times, May 23, 2019. https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2019/05/23/national/izumo-needed-upgrade-mere-show-force/#.Xq_syKgzbIU.
94. J.J. Widen, "Naval Diplomacy – A Theoretical Approach", Diplomacy and Statecraft 22, no. 4 (2011), 730.
95. Authors' interview with Kuni Miyake, Research Fellow, Canon Institute for Global Studies, Tokyo, June 11, 2019. Miyake's view was seconded by the authors' interview with a retired JMSDF senior flag officer, Tokyo, June 21, 2019 and with Tokuhiro Ikeda (VAdm, Ret. JMSDF), Tokyo, June 25, 2019. Ikeda noted that the converted carriers, without an entire fleet upgrade, were "political symbols."
96. Yoshihiro Inaba, "Japan Takes First Steps towards Refurbishment of JMSDF Destroyer Izumo," Naval News, December 30, 2019, https://www.navalnews.com/naval-news/2019/12/japan-takes-first-steps-toward-refurbishment-of-jmsdf-destroyer-izumo/.
97. Ibid.
98. Kenneth N. Waltz, Theory of International Politics, Reissued (Long Grove IL: Waveland Press, Inc. 2010), 165.
99. Levy, "The Offensive/Defensive Balance of Military Technology," 226.
100. Robert C. Rubel, "The Future of Aircraft Carriers," Naval War College Review 64, no. 4 (2011): 12–27.
101. Mike Yeo, "Aircraft Carriers or Not? Flattops in the Pacific," The Diplomat, September 8, 2013, https://thediplomat.com/2013/09/aircraft-carriers-or-not-flattops-in-the-pacific/.
102. Yoshihiro Inaba, "Japan Takes First Steps towards Refurbishment of JMSDF Destroyer Izumo," Naval News, December 30, 2019, https://www.navalnews.com/naval-news/2019/12/japan-takes-first-steps-toward-refurbishment-of-jmsdf-destroyer-izumo/. In fact, neither of Japan's "flat-top ships" – the Izumo and Hyuga class – were originally equipped with well docks for landing craft, increasing suspicion that they were designed to one day carry fixed-wing aircraft. See Yeo, "Aircraft Carriers or Not?".
103. Authors' interview with Richard A. Bitzinger, Visiting Senior Fellow. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), Singapore, December 4, 2019.
104. Ministry of National Defense of the PRC, "Defense Ministry's Regular Press Conference on March 29," March 30, 2018, http://eng.mod.gov.cn/news/2018-03/30/content_4808299.htm.
105. Zhiqin Shi, "Bainian wei you zhi da bianju yu Zhongguo shenfen de bianqian [The great change unseen in a century and evolution of China's identity]," Xueshu qianyan [Frontiers] 2019, no. 7 (2019, April): 13–20; See also Guihong Zhang, "Yidai Yilu changyi yu Yintai zhanlue gouxiang de bijiao fenxi [Comparative analysis of concepts of Belt and Road Initiative vs. Indo-Pacific strategy],' Xiandai guoji guanxi [Contemporary International Relations] 2 (2019): 26–34; and Huasheng Zhao, "Yintai zhanlue yu da Ouya: Renzhi yu yingdui [Indo-Pacific strategy and great Eurasia: Cognition and response]," Eluosi dongou zhongya yanju [Russian, East European & Central Asian Studies] 2 (2019): 27–46.
106. See John Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, updated edition, 2014).
107. Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the PRC, "On December 18, 2018, Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Hua Chunying Held a Regular Press Conference," December 18, 2018, https://www.fmprc.gov.cn/web/wjdt_674879/fyrbt_674889/t1623018.shtml.
108. Authors' interview with Richard A. Bitzinger, Visiting Senior Fellow, S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), Singapore, December 04, 2019.
109. Ministry of National Defense of the PRC, "Defense Ministry's Regular Press Conference on March 30," March 31, 2017, http://eng.mod.gov.cn/Press/2017-03/31/content_4777097.htm.
110. Increases in the offensive capacity of an adversary may also create incentives for a defensive state to act first out of fear that if they do not it will be too late.
111. Most versions of the security dilemma predict that other states, perceiving there to be an increase in the threat environment due to the acquisition of offensive arms, will respond to this external stimulus by engaging in internal or external balancing behavior, which also increases the prospects for war. Again, see the seminal article by Jervis, "Cooperation under the Security Dilemma," 167–214.
112. This logic has led to efforts to limit or even ban weapons considered manifestly intended for aggression. Participants at the 1932 League of Nations Conference for the Reduction and Limitation of Armaments, for example, sought to abolish offensive weapons on the grounds that they were conducive to war. See J. W. Wheeler-Bennett, The Pipe Dream of Peace (New York: William Morrow, 1935); and Jack S. Levy, "The Offensive/Defensive Balance of Military Technology: A Theoretical and Historical Analysis," International Studies Quarterly 28, no. 2 (1984): 226.
113. Authors' interview with Teruaki Aizawa, Senior Program Advisor (Capt. Ret. JMSDF), Ocean Policy Research Center, Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo, June 13, 2019.
114. Authors' interview with Ippeita Nishida, Senior Research Fellow, International Peace and Security Department, Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo, June 13, 2019.
115. Authors' interview with a retired JMSDF flag officer, Tokyo, June 21, 2019.
116. The ruling Liberal Democratic Party endorsed a draft plan in December 2019 for an independent mission to dispatch a Japanese Self-Defense Forces unit to the Middle East. The initial report stated that the JS Izumo would refuel in Salalah, Oman, pending negotiations with Oman. That was later changed to "helicopter-carrying destroyer." Kyodo, "Japan's dispatch of SDF unit to Middle East set for Cabinet approval on Dec. 23," Japan Times, December 13, 2019, https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2019/12/13/national/japan-sdf-dispatch-to-mideast-dec-23/#.XrPsAWgzbIU.
117. Authors' interview with Ippeita Nishida, Senior Research Fellow, International Peace and Security Department, Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo, June 13, 2019.
How to Draw a Aircraft Carrier Step by Step
Source: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14799855.2021.1982897
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