Pacifist Japan moves to create a stronger military presence

TOKYO -- The ruling Liberal Democratic Party formally unveiled a revised draft of Japan's pacifist constitution yesterday that would allow the country to have an official military for the first time since World War II and give the armed forces a more assertive international role.

The proposed revisions, the first since the constitution was drafted by US occupying forces and adopted by the Japanese in 1947, would keep intact Japan's renunciation of war as now stated. But it would grant the country's 240,000-strong Self Defense Forces -- whose role has been strictly limited to defending Japan's home islands for the past half century -- the higher military status as well as new authority to participate in overseas peacekeeping missions.

More importantly, the revisions would open the door for a broader interpretation of the constitution permitting Japan to engage in so-called ''collective self defense" -- or coming to the military aid of an ally.

The most likely beneficiary would be Japan's closest ally, the United States, which has privately urged Japan to adopt such measures.

Changes in Japan's constitutional status would have major significance in the region, particularly in the event of a conflict between China and the United States over Taiwan.

''In addition to activities needed for self defense . . . the defense forces can take part in efforts to maintain international peace and security under international cooperation, as well as to keep fundamental public order in our country," the draft says.

The revised charter, released on the 50th anniversary of the Liberal Democratic Party's founding, still faces major hurdles and probably will take a year or more for its fate to be decided. It must still be presented to parliament, where it will require two-thirds approval by both the lower and upper houses and where the debate is likely to be a highly emotional one.

New Komeito, the Liberal Democrats' coalition partner since 1999, has been hesitant to change the constitution's key Article 9 dealing with the military, suggesting new clauses and refinements would suffice.

Even after parliamentary approval, the draft would still require majority support from the public through a national referendum.

But the release of the full version of the draft by the LDP, which has ruled the country for most of the post-World War II era, nevertheless marked a significant turning point in the crusade to give Japan global clout commensurate with its status as the world's second largest economy.

Although Japan has already dispatched small, noncombat forces on international peacekeeping missions in Iraq and other locations by passing special legislation, the revisions presented yesterday would ground such rights, and expand them, in the constitution. ''Today, a major step was taken toward the revision of the constitution," Taku Yamasaki, a Liberal Democratic lawmaker and a key adviser to Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, told reporters in Tokyo.

The draft maintains language defining the emperor, once considered divine, as only a symbol of the state.

But it waters down language separating church and state, a measure apparently aimed at making it easier for sitting prime ministers to visit Tokyo's Yasukuni Shrine, which honors Japan's military dead including World War II criminals. Koizumi's annual visits to Yasukuni have caused outrage in China and South Korea and sparked a host of lawsuits.

Officials in both China and South Korea have additionally voiced concern about the Liberal Democrats' planned revisions relating to the military, particularly because it comes as conservative Japanese leaders and the public are embracing a new sense of patriotism here.

China's official New China News Agency yesterday described the draft as a document ''designed to provide legal support for [Japan's] ambition of playing a greater political role on the global stage and of boosting the defense force's status."

The draft also would make it easier to amend the constitution in the future, requiring only majority approval in both houses of parliament to approve changes instead of the current two-thirds. The stipulation for a national referendum on constitutional revisions would remain unchanged.