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2024 July 24 - 30 TOP3 [POLITICS]

JCP Koike criticizes 2+2 for strengthening expanded deterrence

Japanese Communist Party Secretariat Head Koike Akira on July 28 severely criticized the Japanese and U.S. governments for deciding to strengthen U.S. expanded deterrence, including with nuclear weapons, at a meeting of the Japan-U.S. Security Consultative Committee (“2+2”) held in Japan between both countries’ foreign and defense ministers.

Koike made this criticism at a JCP rally in Hiroshima City on the same day.

He said, “Upgraded and expanded deterrence with the U.S. nuclear umbrella will trample on A-bomb victims as well as on the wishes of A-bomb survivors (Hibakusha) and second-generation Hibakusha, who still suffer from radiation-related health effects, calling for the elimination of nuclear weapons from the earth.”

Koike said that the strengthening of expanded deterrence, in complete disregard of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki peace declarations (issued last August) which scathingly criticized the nuclear deterrence theory, “should not be allowed to stand.”

Noting that the two countries in the 2+2 meeting agreed on a policy to reorganize the U.S. forces in Japan to be a joint military command, he warned, “This is precisely aimed at waging a war together with the U.S. military. Japan’s Self-Defense Forces will be under the command of the U.S. military.”