Overview
- Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi met Adm. Samuel Paparo at U.S. Indo-Pacific Command headquarters in Hawaii and the two concurred the regional security environment has grown more severe.
- Koizumi delivered a keynote at the Honolulu Defense Forum, becoming the first Japanese defense minister to do so, and urged like-minded nations to link capabilities through existing frameworks.
- He outlined concerns over attempts to change the status quo in the East and South China Seas, incidents targeting Philippine vessels, and China Coast Guard patrols near the Senkaku Islands, as well as information warfare.
- Japan has already raised defense spending to 2 percent of GDP and is revising its National Security Strategy with completion targeted for 2026.
- Japan and the United States are working on upgraded command-and-control, a larger joint presence in Japan’s southwest, and equipment co-production and sustainment, with Koizumi visiting defense firms in Los Angeles before scheduled talks in Washington on Thursday.