Category: Military

The latest launching tests by North Korea of shortrange and intercontinental missiles last week has renewed concern of an arms race in Asia.

In 2003, Thomas Omestad, in an article in US News, painted this scenario: “Faced with a nuclear breakout by a hostile regime, Japan reconsiders its antinuclear taboos, fields a larger missile force of its own, and plunges into developing a shield against incoming missiles with the United States. South Korea, with one eye on the North and the other on Japan, follows suit. China reacts with more nukes and missiles of its own. Taiwan, outgunned, opts for more missiles and, perhaps, nuclear bombs. A nervous Russia shifts nuclear and conventional forces for defense against its old rivals, China and Japan. India, a foe of China, expands its nuclear forces, a step that causes Pakistan to do likewise. An Asian arms race snaps into high gear.”

Hideaki Kaneda, a retired vice admiral of Japan’s Self-Defense Forces and director of the Okazaki Institute in Tokyo, said in an article the arms race across Asia is already underway and North Korea’s testing last week confirmed it.