The Oil Drum

26 comments on Revisiting the barrels per rig issue

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Leanan on November 4, 2005 - 1:22pm

Japan would probably lose. They are basically de-militarized. We forced it on them after they lost WWII, and in return promised to protect them. Some credit this as one factor behind their economic success. They had no need to spend money on defense.

Now, we are trying to get Japan forget the pacifist stuff and take responsibility for defending themselves. But they know a good thing when they see one, and are resisting.

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davidsmi on November 4, 2005 - 2:33pm

Japan is far from demilitarized. They are third in total military spending ( see http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/rankorder/2067rank.html ), some would argue second as they believe the US numbers for China are overstated for obvious reasons. And according to this site (http://www.nationmaster.com/graph-T/mil_arm_for_per) they have the 20th largest standing army. In short, it is a high tech military that goes by the name of "Self Defense Force." It is one of the best militaries in the world.

I've also read elsewhere (I'd look it up, but it makes perfect sense, so I'll leave that to doubters) that given the Japanese technological infrastructure they are probably only about six weeks away from being able to produce nuclear weapons.

Just thoughts to chew on.
David

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Leanan on November 4, 2005 - 3:23pm

Japan spends 1% of their GDP on the military. China spends over 4% of their GDP on the military. (We spend about 3% of our GDP, FWIW.)

I've no doubt Japan could build nukes if they wanted to. It ain't that hard (unfortunately). Plus, Japan made lots of weapons and sold them to all sides during past conflicts, and they launch satellites and such, so they have the expertise. And due to their nuclear power plants, they have the materials.

But Japan was on the wrong end of nuclear weapons, the only time they were ever used. It's been 60 years, but they're still kind of squeamish about nukes. I don't think they'll be arming themselves with nuclear weapons any time soon.

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sekiyu on November 4, 2005 - 2:45pm

Japan has a fairly potent military, ranking among the global top 5 in total defence budget. But countries don't go straight to a shooting war, and especially a nuclear war, without lots of steps before that. So maybe it's more realistic to think of which of the two countries, China or Japan, has the stronger capability to convince the other that it's willing to fight it out. Like America, the Chinese have fought plenty of wars over the past few decades (eg, with India and Vietnam) and so can probably sell war as an extension of politics. It's also a dictatorial regime with tight control of the media. And to top it off, the population at large has a strong sense of historical grievance against Japan.

In Japan, on the other hand, war is associated with defeat, deprivation, destruction and so on. For good reason, I might add. The threat of war would almost certainly cause a lot of today's nationalists to recalculate their positions. The hard-core nationalists would try to shout down dissent (as the Bushies did in the US), but that's hard to do in a media-saturated world.

So Japan would likely blink first. Let's hope these twits in charge here have run through the scenarios themselves, and know to avoid more pointless provocations. There are times when you have to fight, but only an amoral sleaze picks a fight and then sends other people's kids to die.