Prime Minister Takaichi's Cabinet has approved a record defense budget to fortify Japan's strike-back capability and coastal defense.

A fundamental change came in December 2022 when former Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s government adopted a security strategy stating the need for Japan to acquire strike-back capability with long-range missiles, a major break from Japan’s self-defense-only policy.

Rising threats are prompting some politicians in Japan, the only nation attacked with nuclear weapons, to reconsider its position.

China has been moving strategically in response to the latest spat with Japan, with a view of reshaping the world order in Asia

Beijing’s reaction was predictably harsh. It threatened that Tokyo’s intervention would end in a “crushing defeat ,” warned that “those who play with fire will perish by it,” demanded that its citizens avoid visiting Japan, and escalated its military provocations near Japanese islands.

Tensions are rising in Japan-China relations over Taiwan. It started with Prime Minister Takaichi Sanae’s statement to the Diet on November 7, 2025, in which she indicated that Japan could exercise its right of collective self-defense to mobilize the Self-Defense Forces if China used military force against Taiwan.

Yonaguni, a tiny Japanese island near Taiwan, is getting soldiers, radar and missiles. As China’s dispute with Tokyo escalates, some residents are worried.

BEIJING (Kyodo) -- China's top diplomat Wang Yi on Tuesday lashed out at Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi for "openly challenging" Chinese territorial sovereignty after the Japanese leader's remark on a Taiwan emergency heightened bilateral tensions.

What is more alarming, however, is that some lawmakers of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party genuinely believe that Takaichi's remarks align with Tokyo's long-held positions and are a continuation of Japan's postwar assertions.

China's military held large-scale drills around Taiwan this week in a warning to the island's leadership and its U.S. supporter.