Published on July 26, 2019.
Based on Yoshiko Sakurai’s column in the July 25 issue of Shukan Shincho, this essay discusses the security crises surrounding Japan and the necessity of constitutional revision.
Through North Korea’s nuclear and missile threats, China’s threat to the Senkaku Islands and Taiwan, the Strait of Hormuz, President Trump’s doubts about the Japan-U.S. Security Treaty, and the attitudes of Komeito and the opposition parties, it argues that all Japanese people must think seriously about the Constitution and national security.

July 26, 2019.
He says that the people do not regard constitutional revision as the most important issue.
If politicians close their eyes to a critical situation and fail to raise the issue simply because the people are not thinking about it, then there is no reason for politicians to exist.
The following is from Yoshiko Sakurai’s serialized column published in Shukan Shincho, which went on sale on July 25.
Although Sakurai is a woman, she is someone truly worthy of being called a genuine patriot.
By contrast, although Oe Kenzaburo and Murakami Haruki are men, they are the exact opposite of patriots, people worthy of being called traitors to the nation.
She has stood on the exact opposite horizon from foolish people who grew up subscribing to and carefully reading the Asahi Shimbun and whose essence is “self-serving pseudo-moralism,” and for many years she has fought almost alone for Japan… she has lived a life of courageously confronting the utterly foolish fact that the Asahi Shimbun, which degraded Japan and sided with China and the Korean Peninsula, nevertheless ruled Japan until August five years ago… truly, there were ten million enemies, and only a few allies such as the late Watanabe Shoichi and Masayuki Takayama… she is a truly noble, brave, and strong person.
Compared with her, the weak nonsense of Oe and Murakami is extreme… though it is a common manifestation among leftist infantile-disease patients.
There is a difference as great as heaven and earth between a true realist who keeps looking at reality and a pseudo-moralist formed from GHQ brainwashing, a masochistic view of history, and the foolish editorials of the Asahi Shimbun, the headquarters of anti-Japanese thought.
The gates of heaven are for Sakurai, while Oe and Murakami are hopeless people who do not even know that King Enma is waiting for them, and who believe that they are going to the gates of heaven.
The ladies who support Komeito must, as soon as possible, realize that with their present way of thinking about the Constitution, or the way of thinking in which they are trapped, they cannot defend Japan from attacks by a Communist Party one-party dictatorship, an ancient despotic state, or a state ruled by a dictator.
They must learn from Yoshiko Sakurai’s nobility, bravery, and strength.
If they are truly Japanese and truly love Japan.
Reconsider the LDP-Komeito axis for the sake of constitutional revision.
Important international political situations are occurring here and there around Japan, and Japan is being required to respond to each of these crises.
Threats are quietly pressing in.
And yet, how lacking in tension the House of Councillors election on July 21 was.
North Korea’s nuclear and missile issues, the Senkaku Islands and Taiwan, which China is watching for any opening to seize, the tension in the Strait of Hormuz, where even our country’s oil tanker was attacked; the United States is sounding out Japan about joining a coalition of the willing, and on top of that, U.S. President Trump is voicing doubts about the Japan-U.S. Security Treaty.
Every one of these threatens the “protected peace” in which postwar Japan has immersed itself.
Who will defend Japan?
Now all Japanese people must think about this fundamental question.
It was only natural that Abe Shinzo, president of the Liberal Democratic Party, made constitutional revision a pillar of the party’s pledges in the House of Councillors election.
Under this critical situation, the prime minister’s raising of the issue should, rather, have been emphasized even more.
In reality, however, Yamaguchi Natsuo, the leader of Komeito, the LDP’s coalition partner, continued to pour cold water on it, saying that “the maturity of constitutional revision is shallow.”
He says that the people do not regard constitutional revision as the most important issue.
If politicians close their eyes to a critical situation and fail to raise the issue simply because the people are not thinking about it, then there is no reason for politicians to exist.
During the election, Yamaguchi emphasized that he would “listen to small voices,” but if discussion of constitutional revision is not mature and remains only a small voice, then is it not precisely that “small voice” that should be listened to?
Just as there are major problems with the ruling parties, the state of the opposition parties is also terrible.
The Constitutional Democratic Party, the Democratic Party for the People, the Social Democratic Party, and the Communist Party, which fielded unified candidates in single-member districts nationwide, differ completely in their degree of interest and posture regarding constitutional revision.
From the Communist Party and the Social Democratic Party, which raise the banner of defending Article 9, to the Constitutional Democratic Party, which says it will not respond to constitutional revision under the Abe Cabinet, to the Democratic Party for the People, which says that discussion should take place, they are completely divided on this important point.
The figure of unprincipled politicians.
When politicians become unified opposition candidates despite the opposition parties being this incapable of reaching unity on the Constitution, which concerns the foundations of the state and politics, which party’s policy will they uphold when the critical moment comes?
We have seen far too many unprincipled politicians until now.
For example, there is Edano Yukio, leader of the Constitutional Democratic Party.
At one point, he recognized the right of collective self-defense and even published his own private draft of constitutional revision in the monthly magazine Bungei Shunju, but before anyone knew it, he had made a great turnabout to the exact opposite position.
Omission.
Such changes of position may pass in the world of domestic abstract theory, but they do not pass in the face of the realities of international society.
The Heisei era, which began with the Tiananmen Square Incident and the collapse of the Berlin Wall, was a time when world order was maintained under America’s sole supremacy, and therefore it was tolerated to close one’s eyes to reality in the realm of abstract theory, let one’s fantasies expand, and satisfy oneself.
But now, in the Reiwa era, the United States has given up the role of “world policeman” and has begun saying that each country should solve its own problems by itself.
That is not all.
As mentioned above, from the United States, which has served as the backing for Japan’s peace, President Trump’s frank doubts about the Japan-U.S. Security Treaty have been conveyed.
Between June 24 and June 29, in less than one week, Trump spoke three times about how unfair the Japan-U.S. Security Treaty is.
It is said that he even referred to the possibility of terminating the security treaty.
Furthermore, the United States is calling for the formation of a coalition of the willing to ensure safe navigation in the Strait of Hormuz in the Middle East and to protect oil tankers.
As of July 22, after the House of Councillors election had ended, John Bolton, the president’s national security adviser, was visiting Japan and should have conveyed America’s thinking and other matters to the Japanese side.
This coalition of the willing is fundamentally different from the coalition of the willing that once bombed and attacked Iraq.
It is for the safety of the seas and for protecting each country’s own tankers.
Japan depends on the Middle East for about 87 percent of its oil, and much of that is transported through the Strait of Hormuz.
It is the responsibility of the Japanese government to protect Japanese tankers and crew members, and to protect the Japanese economy.
In order to fulfill that responsibility, Japan should hurry to prepare the legal framework for dispatching the Self-Defense Forces and other necessary measures.
It is impossible to say, “We cannot do that, so we want other countries to protect us.”
Looking at such reality, all Japanese people should now think about the nature of Japan’s security and the Constitution.
Prime Minister Abe’s emphasis on constitutional revision is solely for protecting the peace of Japan and the lives of the people.
Nevertheless, Komeito does not come on board.