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Gleri posted:
Well, I know literally nothing about the Japanese Supreme Court, but I would guess that parliament would have to make a "LAW for establishing an Army/Navy/Air Force/Mecha Squadron". That law could then be put before the Supreme Court, which should strike it down as a violation of Article 9. That it hasn't done so about the SDF does not mean that it couldn't. The article that forbids Germany from waging wars of aggression has no provision for its enforcement either, but the Government is required by oath and law to uphold the constitution, and can be sued if they fail to do so. I would assume that similar constructs exist in Japan.
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May 2, 2013 16:34
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Is there a constitutional provision re: Gundam?
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May 2, 2013 17:09
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Gleri posted:Amending Article 9, which seems to be the most prominent, would be pretty meaningless. Well, the political symbolism of it runs deep, but from a pure legal perspective it seems meaningless. Japan has an army right now, a rather large one in fact. Also, Article 9 is largely cosmetic anyway, so far as I am aware, given that it is not enforceable. At least, I don't think that there has been a successful lawsuit against the government under Article 9. If you can't sue under something, it is legally meaningless; "no right without a remedy". And, I don't think a court would or really could enforce Article 9. I don't think if Japan were to build a nuclear bomb, for instance, that a court would enjoin the construction or seize the bomb or anything. I can't find any instances of that. There's a bunch of people here who know modern Japanese history way better than I do, though. It wouldn't exactly be meaningless. It would allow Japan to take part more fully in UN peacekeeping, allow for more of a budget when necessary, and allow for the purchase of more offensive weaponry. As is Japan's arms are fairly limited, and they have virtually no offensive capabilities.
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May 2, 2013 23:36
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LimburgLimbo posted:It wouldn't exactly be meaningless. It would allow Japan to take part more fully in UN peacekeeping, allow for more of a budget when necessary, and allow for the purchase of more offensive weaponry. As is Japan's arms are fairly limited, and they have virtually no offensive capabilities. That's kind of funny that you mention that--this is totally anecdotal, but just last weekend I was talking with a friend of mine who's in the SDF and was saying that he really hopes that the size of the military remains the same because if it got any bigger they'd be expected to participate in those sorts of things. Specifically he was most concerned about not getting dragged into any of America's wars. (which given the US' military adventurism in the past decade, is I guess an understandable worry) I have to wonder if that's a common sentiment in the SDF--if they really want to expand or not. Seems like at the moment they're in a pretty good spot to be as a military; they get access to a lot of really top-grade technology through their partnership with the US, they've got enough force to defend the country and intimidate their neighbors into leaving them alone, and all without any of the risk that comes with a military that's able to project its force.
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May 3, 2013 01:15
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Protocol 5 posted:The JSDF already has participated in UN peacekeeping missions, dude. I'm not trying to be a dick about it or anything, but you could at least check the wikipedia page. Because of Article 9, they're forbidden to actively participate in combat unless fired upon first, and are only permitted to carry small arms for personal defense. The various branches of the JSDF have been active in UN peacekeeping and humanitarian efforts in several countries, including Iraq during the war, and Indonesia after the tsunami. Public opinion has been split, obviously, though most people don't seem to mind the purely humanitarian stuff that isn't taking place in war zones. Edit: You're right, this was a dumb post. I actually knew the JSDF was in Iraq, so I don't know what I was thinking. I'm surprised to see they have a base in Djibouti though. Gleri fucked around with this message at 12:59 on May 3, 2013 |
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May 3, 2013 03:59
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The JSDF already has participated in UN peacekeeping missions, dude. I'm not trying to be a dick about it or anything, but you could at least check the wikipedia page. Because of Article 9, they're forbidden to actively participate in combat unless fired upon first, and are only permitted to carry small arms for personal defense. The various branches of the JSDF have been active in UN peacekeeping and humanitarian efforts in several countries, including Iraq during the war, and Indonesia after the tsunami. Public opinion has been split, obviously, though most people don't seem to mind the purely humanitarian stuff that isn't taking place in war zones.
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May 3, 2013 10:06
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So is the yen expected to keep dropping this month or has it about stabilized relative to the USD?
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May 4, 2013 11:03
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Arbite posted:So is the yen expected to keep dropping this month or has it about stabilized relative to the USD? Amature opinion, but I'd say it's stabilized for the time being.
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May 4, 2013 11:10
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Last thing I've read is that "analysts suggest" it might go down to 135 Yen/€ (it's at 130 right now, with $1.31/€), but it's been hovering between 128-130 for a couple weeks now. I think until there's some new developments it'll stay that way.
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May 4, 2013 11:13
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It was pretty stable around 125-130 ten years ago before everything went into free fall, so expecting it to hang around there is a fairly reasonable position to take. Who knows though, right?
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May 4, 2013 11:24
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So this is interesting. LDP Aims to Materialize Voting Age of 18 for Constitutional Change The LDP is going to pass a bill (remember they have a majority in both houses now so I imagine its free reign) to drop the age for constitutional amendment voting from 20 to 18. The only reasoning that I can think of for this change is that while they have 90% support in their party for changing Article 96, the recent polls have shown the public isn't too wild on it. I can't help but wonder if in internal polling, they found that younger groups were actually more in favor of revision than middle aged people and seniors and so they want to open up the more possible people to support the changes. And in other news Japan's nuclear plan unsettles the US Japan is starting up a massive nuclear fuel processing plant in Aomori. With no freaking plants running in the country...its "hard to imagine" what they'll do with tons of plutonium. When I figured Article 9 would be revamped, I never imagined that Japan/the LDP might also consider going nuclear. Nor can I imagine the public being too wild about the idea either, but it sure as hell seems that way.
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May 4, 2013 19:26
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A reprocessing plant isn't necessary to make nuclear weapons, regular plants can do that just as well. Reprocessing plants are useful if like Japan you have a shitload of waste material and no place to store it. It's also good if they want to re-use the fuel in plants.
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May 4, 2013 19:37
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Of course its not necessary, but the point is that only 2 of the power plants in the country are running and for the forseable next few years they're only going to have a few plants starting up. So reprocessing into higher grade stuff seems nuts at this point. I also haven't really heard anything about Japan having an issue with storage of current waste. The only problem waste they have is all the radiated water they have at the Fukushima plant, but you can't reprocess that. In addition, they just got done buying who knows how many tons of MOX fuel rods from France. And then, waste storage isn't an issue either I imagine since I've read that they send waste to the US (they pay them to take it on). Plus if this was simply an issue of no fuel or storage available, I doubt the Obama admin. would be bothered by this; Japan being one of the most anti-nuclear armament country for years. Its possible its just the WSJ fear-mongering though.
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May 4, 2013 20:18
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If you'd actually read the article you'd see that the main concern isn't Japan going nuclear, its South Korea, China and Taiwan engaging in nuclear showmanship in response. To be quite frank additional Chinese nuclear weapons aren't that big a deal (they already have the theoretical ability to kill everyone on earth and the rocket technology to deliver bombs wherever so at that point who cares about even more bombs) and SK and Taiwan gaining nuclear capability would be a good thing as far as I am concerned.
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May 4, 2013 21:30
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Woah, Japan! I think the People's Daily's got your number! People's Daily yesterday published a call for a review of Japan's sovereignty over the island of Okinawa.  Checkmate. SCMP posted:The article in the Communist Party mouthpiece argued China may have rights to the Ryukyu chain, which includes Okinawa. How long before they cite ancient tribute missions as reasons why ALL OF JAPAN IS CHINA?
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May 9, 2013 05:55
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Bloodnose posted:Woah, Japan! I think the People's Daily's got your number! People's Daily yesterday published a call for a review of Japan's sovereignty over the island of Okinawa. Arn't they conflating tributary with vassal status? This article seems to correctly state that they had a tribute relationship with China (http://opinion.huanqiu.com/1152/2012-07/2950432.html well bloomburg seems to think so, can't read chinese). And doesn't the same basis for the claims over Okinawa claim all of Korea as well (as Korea was a tributary state as well which china had to drop in the Treaty of Shimonoseki). Also here's a good article on the counter Zaitokukai protests. http://www.japanfocus.org/events/view/181 (based on your questions earlier in the thread about why didn't Japanese counter protest the racist shitheels, looks like there are social media groups forming to do anti-racist protests) (also funnily enough my anti-virus protection won't let me view scmp.com). Wibbleman fucked around with this message at 07:47 on May 9, 2013 |
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May 9, 2013 07:44
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If you take anything China says seriously then... welp. Some of the stuff that China says comes off as North Korean-levels of retarded. Edit: except Taiwan, those guys are cool and also the true legitimate successor state. Sheep fucked around with this message at 07:46 on May 9, 2013 |
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May 9, 2013 07:44
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Australian Aborigines have been around for over 40,000 years, since well before the land bridge connecting Australia and the Asian landmass went under water. They're said to have migrated from further north back in the day. I'm pretty sure China with its 5,000 years of history was a vassal state of the Aborigines back in the beginning, and that if we ask the Aborigines, we'll be sure to discover that part of their oral histories describe their suzerainty over the land of short Asian people to the north. China belongs to Australia. Indisputable proof, wrap it up Maoamailures.
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May 9, 2013 10:11
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I see this land dispute stuff as basically the same as the old lines of succession for monarchies, only they are still a serious part of the modern world. It's just that stupid. But, now China, Japan and Korea's nationalist egos are all wrapped up in it, so gently caress.
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May 9, 2013 10:16
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I think someone else mentioned it earlier in the thread but if European states tried this stuff with tributaries and vassals from hundreds to thousands of years ago nothing would ever get done.
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May 9, 2013 11:10
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LP97S posted:I think someone else mentioned it earlier in the thread but if European states tried this stuff with tributaries and vassals from hundreds to thousands of years ago nothing would ever get done. You just don't understand Japan's unique culture. Probably a product of your western upbringing gaijin
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May 9, 2013 11:51
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This kind of stuff is really funny as an outside observer. Riling up Japanese nationalists is never a bad idea for Chinese nationalists, since they can just point to whatever idiotic stuff the ultra-right wingers say and go, "See, see, we told you they were evil fuckers." Two groups of whackjobs pissing on each other's legs while their respective governments are rolling their eyes and getting on with business as usual.
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May 9, 2013 14:45
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Protocol 5 posted:This kind of stuff is really funny as an outside observer. Riling up Japanese nationalists is never a bad idea for Chinese nationalists, since they can just point to whatever idiotic stuff the ultra-right wingers say and go, "See, see, we told you they were evil fuckers." Two groups of whackjobs pissing on each other's legs while their respective governments are rolling their eyes and getting on with business as usual. I sort of wonder if this piece wasn't intended as some sort of joke in response to Abe's comments about aggression/invasion, though. mystes fucked around with this message at 16:02 on May 9, 2013 |
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May 9, 2013 15:58
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Is there some sort of upside for China if Japan gets rid of Article 9 and increases military spending? That's the only other motivation I can see for this article besides jingoism.
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May 9, 2013 16:42
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Ganguro King posted:Is there some sort of upside for China if Japan gets rid of Article 9 and increases military spending? That's the only other motivation I can see for this article besides jingoism.
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May 9, 2013 17:09
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I think a key point is that there is no such thing as "China says". They aren't a hive mind, and their bureaucracy has grown large enough that the left hand doesn't know what the right is doing. I wouldn't be surprised at all if there are a bunch of people in the Foreign Ministry going  because they were literally never informed that the People's daily would be running this kind of article.So basically don't make this out to be Chinese policy just yet.
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May 9, 2013 17:16
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Korea frequently shits on Japan for internal politics too. Normal stuff. There is no upside for China to antagonize Japan into militarizing. They're big trading partners and Japan's military is already the best in East Asia. But China's internal issues are almost certainly more of a threat than any foreign ones, so it makes sense to focus that way. It's not like Japan has anything to gain from fighting either. Not that any of that reliably stops wars, as World War 1 amply demonstrated. But nationalist making GBS threads on each other is par for the course over here so I wouldn't read much into it. I live in northeast Asia so I don't hear much from the other countries but Korea/China/Japan constantly say this kind of poo poo about each other. They all still trade and make money off each other, no matter what slights real or imagined their mouth-breathing nationalists scream about. Hopefully it never escalates to anything.
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May 9, 2013 17:16
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ArchangeI posted:I think a key point is that there is no such thing as "China says". They aren't a hive mind, and their bureaucracy has grown large enough that the left hand doesn't know what the right is doing. I wouldn't be surprised at all if there are a bunch of people in the Foreign Ministry going In the same way that every Japanese apology for WWII gets invalidated in the eyes of their neighbors, by some crank in Japan, this is "China" making policy.
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May 9, 2013 17:41
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ocrumsprug posted:In the same way that every Japanese apology for WWII gets invalidated in the eyes of their neighbors, by some crank in Japan, this is "China" making policy. Or by the literal Prime Minister saying roughly "it depends on whose perspective you're looking at, when it comes to deciding whether to call the war aggression or not," as was noted a few pages back. Granted, he backtracked on that statement, but it's hardly as though dumb views on responsibility for the war are limited to a lunatic fringe.
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May 9, 2013 17:50
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But again, statements like that aren't really for our ears. They aren't even for most of the people in their own country. They're for a very small but very powerful and sometimes violent group of people inside each respective country, who apparently must be constantly appeased. Us getting angry about it doesn't really do anything, unfortunately. edit: vvv yeah, I guess you're right, this kind of talk has that function as well in China. Probably not Japan or Korea though, their countries can stay together pretty well without a constant barrage of nationalism. Samurai Sanders fucked around with this message at 18:23 on May 9, 2013 |
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May 9, 2013 17:56
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It's pretty easy to forget that China has a lot of problems with the diverse ethnic groups within its territory that are dissatisfied with the status quo, as well as a laundry list of environmental and economic issues that people are disgruntled about. Whipping up nationalism and focusing that discontent on Japan is a good way to channel all that anger away from the government. Conversely, in Japan nationalism tends to focus on right wingers overcompensating for their deeply wounded masculinity from the aftermath of the war and scapegoating immigrants for all of society's ills. Neither government actually wants to do anything that would seriously impact the extremely lucrative trade between the two, moronic statements by politicians aside.
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May 9, 2013 18:07
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Samurai Sanders posted:edit: vvv yeah, I guess you're right, this kind of talk has that function as well in China. Probably not Japan or Korea though, their countries can stay together pretty well without a constant barrage of nationalism. Korea's not in danger of breaking apart, but there is absolutely a constant barrage of government sponsored nationalism here. I'm not sure what exactly they're hoping to accomplish by it.
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May 10, 2013 01:32
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mystes posted:Holy poo poo, this is insane. Since everyone is talking about Abe's new idea to first revise Article 96 as an allegedly easier way to revise Article 9 but he has actually said things about needing to replace the whole constitution which is supposed to be outdated or forced on Japan by the US, I was wondering what else he would try to change, but I wasn't expecting something quite so nuts. Sorry to bring this up again, but I was discussing this with a Japanese friend. Linking him the article. He basically read 2/3rds of the first page and then went "ウソ" ("Lies!") and Google'd up some other page, which I assume is probably a whitewash of the matter. (Didn't have the time to go trough it - but seeing it linking to the LDP's website I assume it's a whitewash. Here: The blog in question Now I've been scrambling for other sites to back up my "claims", as my reading is still slow and the Orwellian word twisting doesn't make it any faster. Does anyone know some good resources (in Japanese) to help me back up my arguments? (Any other dirt on Abe is welcome, too!)
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May 10, 2013 01:50
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VomitOnLino posted:Sorry to bring this up again, but I was discussing this with a Japanese friend. Linking him the article. I will say that having looked at the section on the Emperor carefully, the revisions for that section may actually be much more conservative than they appear (the only real significant change appears to be to ensure that the Emperor can definitely attend events, but worded to avoid resolving the issues of whether this falls under the Emperor's constitutionally enumerated functions and therefore the cabinet's authority, or more generally whether the Emperor can do things that don't fall under this). I hope to get around to trying to make sense of the other sections including human rights (for the moment I'm not even going to try to evaluate the argument presented in your link). At this point I am willing to give the LDP a bit more benefit of the doubt than I was before, but that doesn't mean I'm yet convinced that their draft is a good idea. In my opinion, even if in reality their draft turns out to be perfectly reasonable, the difficulty of evaluating it in the first place highlights the absurdity of their claim that their goal in reducing the barrier to constitutional amendments is that they simply want to be able to "propose" changes that voters will then decide on: aside from the fact that voters can't actually initiate an amendment in the first place, if voters can't hope to understand the ramifications of the changes they're voting on, how can they possible hope to participate in the process of revising the constitution in a meaningful way. Maybe the LDP has put out more explanation that I haven't seen, but I don't really like that they are making all these rather technical changes without a lot of argument as to why they are necessary. In fact, if the changes do turn out to be trivial minutiae when interpreted properly, that raises the question of why they are so critical in terms of adapting the constitution to allegedly novel problems that a slightly old document isn't supposed to be able to address. (I liked the idea of "加憲" that someone from I think the 公明党 proposed on a news program I saw: they suggested adding any specific new human rights that might be required to modernize the constitution). Edit: Also, I'm not sure but it's quite possible that the parts of the draft that appear to impose requirements on citizens would not be interpreted as having any legal significance (there are already a couple parts like that in the existing constitution). However, it doesn't help that some people have come out and expressed the idea that the entire concept of a constitution existing to restrict the power of the government is obsolete, casting suspicion on these additions, regardless of their actual import. (BTW, for real laughs, check out the Sankei Shimbun's proposed constitution which espouses this view among other batshit crazy stuff and outright declares Japan to be a constitutional monarchy.) It's apparently already gotten to the point where LDP people seem to feel the need to preemptive throw a defense of 立憲主義 in their comments to the press to defend against the allegation that they're part of this craziness. Actually they also seem to have reached the point of preemptively denying the assertion that this is all a trick to make it easier to amend Article 9 which really doesn't bode well for this whole thing. mystes fucked around with this message at 04:40 on May 10, 2013 |
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May 10, 2013 04:12
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The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs has now come out to defend (though not explicitly endorse) the Okinawa article, so looks like the governments are definitely not rolling their eyes at it at this stage.Grand Fromage posted:Korea's not in danger of breaking apart, but there is absolutely a constant barrage of government sponsored nationalism here. I'm not sure what exactly they're hoping to accomplish by it. Nationalism is the oxygen of Korean politics, that's just the frame in which it operates. Every successive administration has appropriated some kind of nationalism as the basis of its legitimacy, and every oppositional force has moved to reshape it rather than abjure it. Point is, not everything has to be instrumental.
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May 10, 2013 04:29
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That article is basically saying that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is using the Okinawa thing as a new tack to get leverage on the Diaoyu/Senkaku issue. I'm not privy to the inner workings of the current negotiations between the two countries (much though I would like to be), but I would hypothesize that China wants to wring some trade concessions out of Japan, and are using the territorial disputes to apply diplomatic pressure. Governments do this kind of thing all the time, and Japan has had a similar history of this kind of thing with Russia over the Sakhalin islands. Rhetoric is going to have to ramp up a lot higher than this for me to actually get worried about it.
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May 10, 2013 15:45
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Well isn't Hashimoto one delightful motherfucker http://sankei.jp.msn.com/west/west_affairs/news/130513/waf13051319370013-n1.htm Edit: For those of you who don't read Japanese: Hashimoto (read about him in the OP) said that Japan should use more prostitution to help control the sexual energies of US troops in Japan. LimburgLimbo fucked around with this message at 14:08 on May 13, 2013 |
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May 13, 2013 14:03
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LimburgLimbo posted:Well isn't Hashimoto one delightful motherfucker On the basis of certain Air Force veterans I've met, I think it's safe to say that something needs to be done.
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May 13, 2013 14:30
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LimburgLimbo posted:Well isn't Hashimoto one delightful motherfucker It's not like this would be the first time they did it. There was an organized program to do this in the immediate post-WW2 era.
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May 13, 2013 15:06
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They'd do a lot better by trying to stop Japanese oyaji from molesting Japanese women all over the goddamn place before bothering to worry about the odd case where a member of the American military happens to do something. Going by Hashimoto's (lack of) logic, the only thing keeping this country from descending into a sexual assault free-for-all is the fuzoku establishment, since Japanese men are the only people that can actually get into 99% of those places.Stringent posted:On the basis of certain Air Force veterans I've met, I think it's safe to say that something needs to be done. The foreign crime rate in Japan, including people covered by SOFA, is a fraction of the Japanese crime rate. I last did the math in 2010, and found that Japanese commit either ~4x or 16x as many crimes as foreigners, depending on if you include visa-related offenses or not. So yeah they should definitely channel their energies into domestic sexual education and fostering some kind of respect for women, honestly.
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May 13, 2013 15:23
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