2w ago

Trump shock spurs Japan to think about the unthinkable: nuclear arms

www.reuters.com

reuters.com

In Japan and South Korea there is deepening concern over the reliability of long-time American security guarantees – whether the U.S. will come to their aid in the event of a war. This has been turbo-charged by Donald Trump’s tough treatment of traditional U.S. allies, which has some in Tokyo and Seoul calling for a reassessment of their non-nuclear policies.

Endless War @lemmy.ca

humanspiral @lemmy.ca

2w ago

Japan rulers gaslighting: Because of US war on Japan, Japan needs nuclear weapons to strike at US enemies.

www.reuters.com /investigations/trump-shock-spurs-japan-think-about-unthinkable-nuclear-arms-2025-08-20/

84 comments

Hey Canada...We should be thinking about this, also.
- I've been saying that since 2008 as a teen but man was that an unpopular opinion. We're a very naive country imo.
- I wish but.. Do you think they won't invade us at the whiff of nuclear armament?
  
  I don't trust them not to invade us without that protection, anyways.
  
  Building nukes is like unionizing; ideally you don't go public until you already have your nukes/union
  
  Do what isreal did and lie about it while building one
After the UN ramble yesterday, no one should rely on Trump and the US for anything. Every country should be looking for alternatives to US guarantees.
- I didn't watch and haven't seen anything on it. Was it Normal 2025 Trump bad, or something extra special?
You know who really needs the bomb? Canada needs the bomb. It has a hostile authoritarian military superpower on its border with 10x the population, hostile trade relations, and a stated intention by national leaders to invade and conquer core Canadian territories. Canada is in the exact situation where a nuclear deterrent is most justifiable. If nukes are ever justifiable, they're justifiable for small powers facing potential invasion by aggressive larger ones.
Canada needs the bomb.
- That's the difference between Obama's stance of "we won't use the bomb if you don't have it" and trump/Putin's "we won't take you seriously if you don't have the bomb"
  One encourages disarmormebt. The other armorment
- The worst part of the Trump regime is knowing we're in the Fallout Timeline
This is going to result in some really confused Akira spinoffs
- Oh God(zilla)
- Evangelion 2048, the Angels are Trump shaped.
  
  Replace Lilith with Trump. Ew.
I can't blame them for wanting to do it. Same with a whole lot of other countries right now.
I'd also like to point out that this will necessitate a new round of nuclear weapons tests. We're giving up on a hard won success:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low-background_steel#Present_day
World anthropogenic background radiation, caused by atmospheric nuclear testing, peaked at a level 0.11 mSv/yr (4%) above the natural 2.40 mSv/yr. It began to fall in 1963, when the Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty was enacted, and by 2008 it had decreased to only 0.005 mSv/yr above natural levels. This has made special low-background steel no longer necessary for most radiation-sensitive uses, as new steel now has a low enough radioactive signature.
- Well, France or the UK could also share their technology, or even Pakistan or India. I imagine it's easier to buy the technology from an ally than developing it from scratch.
  
  Eh. There's nothing too crazy about developing from scratch. The hard part is generating your first batch of enriched uranium. A physics grad student could probably design a basic nuke. The US actually ran a test to that effect decades ago; a couple of physicists with no specialization in the nuclear side of things, and using only publicly available material, were able to design an implosion-type device. The expert consensus was that it would have worked just fine.
As an American, I don't trust Trump to come to America's aid. I'd be sweeting bullets if I was Korea and Japan.
- Well the US did promise to come to Ukraine's aid if they gave up their nukes...and here we are.
  
  If Trump had still been president in 2022, I highly doubt we would have come to Ukraine's aid in any substantial way.
it seems that only my country (iran) having nukes is bad.
- Wrong Abrahamic DLC is all it takes.
  
  jewish isis already has, so....
- Apples & oranges honestly. Best would be no one resorts to that strategy. 2nd best is extreme regimes - especially vindicative and religious ones - don’t have such weapons.
  
  Honestly, I trust Iran to behave like a rational actor a whole lot more than I trust Trump. Yes, they're run by religious nutjobs, but they have been proven to show some restraint on international policy.
  
  I mean I am sure usa germany and japan are the most peace loving countries in the last century. unlike iran that literally didnt start a war in that last 200 years.
  sorry.
  from my perspective my country needs nukes the most of the "Candidates"
- I think Israel having Nukes is worse than Iran having Nukes but really any country having nukes is "bad"
My understanding is that Japan is de facto an nuclear armed state, they simply haven't made an warheads. They have the all the necessary technology and fuel enrichment, so they could quickly arm if they thought it would be necessary in the near future.
- How's the ICBM situation?
  
  Probably not terribly relevant if their only requirement is to drop one on Pyongyang if necessary. Japan's got planes. I don't think anyone else outside of their hemisphere is saber-rattling at them at the moment.
  From what I understand from sitting in the comfort of my own armchair, North Korea's air defenses and indeed pretty much all of their traditional military is pretty rickety at this point. They rely on the nuclear threat plus the assumed support and intervention of China, along with a battery of conventional artillery pointed directly at Seoul, to dissuade any other state from just steamrolling them. North Korea's missile game is pretty weak, too, but likewise really all they need to be able to do is hit Japan. Hell, if all they wanted to do was cause chaos in the south they'd just have to truck a bomb to the edge of the DMZ and set it off right there.
Japan having nukes is gonna be PR nightmare given their imperialistic history lol.
As for South Korea and ROC/Taiwan, sure thing. UK ot France should sell them some nuclear armed submarines lol.
- what if they launch them out of gundams? that seems like it wouldn't be quite so much of a PR nightmare
  
  No no, the nuclear-armed Gundam doesn't come until after the war with Zeon.
- I mean, not really. Barely anyone is alive who remembers these things viscerally, and people don't pay attention to history at all, if they even know the broad strokes
  
  There's still alot of animosity from South Korea towards Japan. The threat from China and American unreliability has driven them together politically but the animosity still remains on an individual level.
  
  I suppose. At the moment, most countries in East and South East Asia are wary of China because of maritime disputes. If anything, this will be a good PR opportunity for Japan to gloss its history by engaging with countries having a problem with China. Tokyo already made overtures to India and Philippines because of China.
Japan actually has the technology and know-how to rapidly spin up a nuclear weapons program because they were already doing it before signing up on their non-nuclear policies with the US.
The real question is which country is going to be the first to actually jump ship. I'm fairly certain like 95% of the UN is just going to wait out Trump's term and hope the next president will undo all his insane plans, because no one wants to lose longstanding ties with the US, even as the rug pull of 70+ years of American influence going under gets closer to reality.
Oh ffs, we don't need more nuclear powers.
- The only options for nuclear weapons are none at all, or everyone with one.
  Unfortunately, we live in a world where they exist, and as such, you cannot trust enemies or even allies to have good conscience. If the only way to guarantee your country's safety against a country with nuclear weapons is your own, then this headline was inevitable.
  
  The more countries that have them, the higher the chance of them being used.
  
  I agree. And I still think what I said in my previous comment.
Don't be silly, the US will be happy to sell weapons to South Korea and Japan. Also, they will sell to whoever attacks them!
Who's next?

84 comments