The US and Japan are planning the biggest upgrade to their security alliance since they signed a mutual defence treaty in 1960 in a move to counter China.
President Joe Biden and Prime Minister Fumio Kishida will announce plans to restructure the US military command in Japan to strengthen operational planning and exercises between the nations, according to five people familiar with the situation.
They will unveil the plan when Biden hosts Kishida at the White House on April 10. The allies want to bolster their security ties to respond to what they view as a growing threat from China, which requires their militaries to co-operate and plan more seamlessly, particularly in a crisis such as a Taiwan conflict.
US leadership could potentially ‘commute’ from Hawaii to Japan for this in peacetime, but they’ll need some kind of full-time joint staff based in Japan to plan, facilitate, and build trust with Japanese counterparts for a practical set of bilateral missions,” Schoff added.
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