Japan, Military | featured news

North Korea has plenty of military firepower even if its threat this week of a pre-emptive nuclear strike on the United States is a hollow one, with South Korea most at risk from the isolated regime's artillery and rockets.

Washington has urged the governments in Tokyo and Seoul to increase cooperation. But the pact triggered an uproar in South Korea, where resentment of Japan’s early 20th-century colonization remains raw and the public regards any sign of Japan’s growing military role with deep suspicion.

A treaty between South Korea and Japan will encourage the sharing of military data on their common concerns: North Korea’s threats and China’s military expansion.

Japan needs to focus on the rise of China and not the Cold War threat of Russia in defining its security goals, according to new defense guidelines announced Friday.

Japan and the United States agreed on Saturday on a plan to relocate a controversial U.S. airbase on Okinawa, broadcaster NHK said, but the deal faces resistance from local residents and the government's coalition allies.

Japan's prime minister said Tuesday that it will be impossible to move all parts of a key U.S. Marine base out of Okinawa, breaking with past promises to relocate the facility outside the southern island.