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Should Japan go Nuclear?
DefenceTalk.com ^

Posted on 10/30/2006 9:53:40 PM PST by DTAD

TOKYO: Japan said Tuesday it has the legal right to develop nuclear weapons despite its pacifist constitution but has no intention even to consider the long-taboo idea.

Prominent lawmakers have called on Japan, the only nation to suffer nuclear attack, to debate the nuclear option after communist neighbor North Korea on October 9 said it had tested its first atom bomb.

(Excerpt) Read more at defencetalk.com ...


TOPICS: Foreign Affairs; Japan; News/Current Events; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: atombomb; godzilla; japan; nuclear; wmd
It needs the weapon for protection!
1 posted on 10/30/2006 9:53:41 PM PST by DTAD
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To: DTAD; Jet Jaguar; AmericanInTokyo; TigerLikesRooster; All

Hey they already got nuke his name is Godzilla


2 posted on 10/30/2006 9:54:41 PM PST by SevenofNine ("Step aside Jefe"=Det Lennie Briscoe)
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To: DTAD
My irony meter just broke.
3 posted on 10/30/2006 10:00:08 PM PST by JAWs (Ytringsfrihed er ytringsfrihed er ytringsfrihed. Der er intet men.)
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To: DTAD

Japan shouldn't go nuclear.


4 posted on 10/30/2006 10:03:32 PM PST by Jedi Master Pikachu ( How is the background changed on FR homepages?)
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To: DTAD; DTogo

ping.


5 posted on 10/30/2006 10:03:54 PM PST by Jedi Master Pikachu ( How is the background changed on FR homepages?)
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To: DTAD

Japan's Defense Force is only for defense. Nuclear weapons are hardly defensive (though in some situations that could be). They are under the American nuclear umbrella. That should be enough.


6 posted on 10/30/2006 10:05:46 PM PST by Jedi Master Pikachu ( How is the background changed on FR homepages?)
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To: DTAD

Affirmative.


7 posted on 10/30/2006 10:44:48 PM PST by GSlob
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To: Jedi Master Pikachu

I disagree. Japan is a close ally of the USA, and a good ally against China. Why shouldn't we want them to have a strong military and nuclear threat ?

In the coming decades, China will be a major foe. Japan's interests are close to ours, let them become a regional factor in that struggle. It will benefit Japan and the USA.


8 posted on 10/30/2006 10:50:20 PM PST by jbarntt (Tagline:optional, printed after your name on post): -30-)
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To: jbarntt
Japan is a close ally, and should remilitarize. However, they should not develop nuclear weapons. The United States should try to restrict, as much as it can, the number of states with nukes, even if those states are friends. As was pointed out on a similar thread, once a country gains technology, removing it, should that become necessary or expedient, becomes much more difficult than simply preventing the acquisition of the technology now. Although a friend today, will Japan be an ally twenty years from now? A hundred?

Granted, for Japan it is largely theoretical and on principle: the Japanese are estimated to be able to develop a nuclear weapon without American help in around a month.

9 posted on 10/30/2006 11:00:32 PM PST by Jedi Master Pikachu ( How is the background changed on FR homepages?)
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To: DTAD

Yes. No question that it should. So should south Korea (which refuses), Australia, and Taiwan.


10 posted on 10/30/2006 11:08:32 PM PST by TBP
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To: TBP

Japan could come up with those little molitive coctail nukes. They could hit anywhere in the world. Just smaller , but everywhere.


11 posted on 10/30/2006 11:20:04 PM PST by AGP ((formerly AGreatPer))
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To: DTAD

Moot question. Japan, and Austraila too for that matter, has everything they need to go nuclear except for assembled weapons. Numerous sources say either one of them could bring an operational nuke online in less than 30 days if they decided too.


12 posted on 10/31/2006 12:14:08 AM PST by atomic_dog
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To: atomic_dog

Knowing Japan, I would say they have everything in place and would just have to "snap" it together.


13 posted on 10/31/2006 12:30:31 AM PST by Rahmulus
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To: Jedi Master Pikachu

Not so sure the U.S. is a reliable ally.
If the Dems were to control both houses and the presidency, and the chi-coms went after japan for past present and future imagined grivences do you think Japan could rely on the U.S. for anything?


14 posted on 10/31/2006 2:39:41 AM PST by Joe Boucher (an enemy of islam)
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To: DTAD

How soon we forget...ask a WWII Pacific war vet...


15 posted on 10/31/2006 2:47:13 AM PST by dakine
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To: Joe Boucher
And that is why Japan should remilitarize, definitely. They could even be sold nukes by the United States if some sort of safeguard could be made to prevent them from reverse engineering the technology (opinion).
16 posted on 10/31/2006 3:05:52 AM PST by Jedi Master Pikachu ( Do you see a background picture on a FRhomepage? If not, can you freepmail?)
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To: Jedi Master Pikachu

Ya know the loonies at the U.N. would go ape shit if we were to sell nukes to any country.
But it would sure be worth the criticism just to watch the chi-coms and north koreans.


17 posted on 10/31/2006 4:59:09 AM PST by Joe Boucher (an enemy of islam)
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To: DTAD
No, but Japan should debate the it and seriously consider it in order to scare the Chinese.

If a nuclear Japan is a credible threat, China will take disarming North Korea much more seriously.

Of course, we need to make it clear through back channels that we will rein in Japan if China reins in North Korea.

18 posted on 10/31/2006 3:05:14 PM PST by curiosity
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