Keidanren chairman, who advocated constitutional reform, emphasized, “We contribute money to politics, but we will also have a say.”

Keidanren Chairman Hiroshi Okuda (second from the right) giving a report on the government, labor, and management agreement to Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi in 2002. Image from the website of the Prime Minister’s Office of Japan.

In 1998, military contractors such as Mitsubishi Heavy Industries appealed to the Japanese government to allow weapons exports to the US. They argued that the US was Japan’s ally and that there should be no issue with exporting weapons that contractors from the two countries had jointly developed and produced.

However, the government would not easily relax its export rules, even for the US. Japan’s “three principles” on arms exports were based on Article 9 of its constitution and aimed to “avoid exacerbating international conflicts, from the perspective of Japan as a pacifist nation,” according to Prime Minister Takeo Miki’s explanation to the National Diet in 1976.

But Keidanren would not give up.

In July 2004, the business federation published recommendations titled “Future Direction of Defense Buildup,” in which it claimed Japan’s defense industry was facing financial difficulties as budgets for defense-related equipment and technology trended down.

As an example, Keidanren compared Japanese corporations’ defense-related sales ratios with that of their Western counterparts: Against Lockheed Martin’s high ratio of 87.8%, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries — Japan’s largest military contractor — was a lowly 13.4%.

The document also noted that 10 Japanese subcontractors had ended their involvement in defense-related business in recent years.

Keidanren called on the government to relax its “three principles” on arms exports, stating, “Rather than a blanket ban, it is necessary to re-examine export controls, technology exchange, and investment practices in a manner consistent with Japan’s national interests.”

Three months after releasing its recommendations, in October 2004, Keidanren took a step further through Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi’s advisory body “Council on Security and Defense Capabilities.” There, Keidanren suggested “relaxing the ‘three principles’ on arms exports with the US at the very least.”

The chair of this advisory body was Tokyo Electric Power Company Advisor Hiroshi Araki, and the acting chair was Toyota Motor Corporation CEO Fujio Cho. Japan’s business leaders were trying to open the door for arms exports by appealing directly to those in power.

“Renouncing military forces shows divergence from reality”

The next year, 2005, Keidanren went even further, targeting the Constitution’s Article 9 — Japan’s famous renunciation of war and on which its arms export principles are based. The federation proposed constitutional revision.

“Article 9 Paragraph 2, which renounces maintaining military forces, shows obvious divergence from reality, and its interpretation, along with various special measures laws, has become a major constraint on advancing the international contributions and cooperative activities that Japan should undertake going forward,” the federation wrote in a policy document titled “Looking to Japan’s Future: Keidanren’s Perspective on Constitutional Policy Issues.”

“It should also be explicitly stated that the role and duty of Japan’s Self-Defense Forces are to protect Japan’s sovereignty and independence, preserve peace, and both contribute to and cooperate with the international community in activities for international peace,” the document continued.

Behind Keidanren taking on the Japanese Constitution was Toyota Chairman Hiroshi Okuda, who became chairman of Keidanren in 2003. Although a previous Keidanren chairman, Gaishi Hiraiwa, had paused the federation’s practice of mediating political donations in 1993 following a bribery scandal involving the construction industry and politicians, Okuda revived it. An advocate of constitutional reform, Okuda noted, “We contribute money to politics, but we will also have a say.”

Top 10 companies receiving defense-related procurement orders from the Japanese government from 2001 to 2005.

The upper section shows order value, and the lower section shows donations from the company to the National Political Association (a political finance organization that handles corporate and group donations to the LDP).

Note:
・Order values are compiled from Defense Agency materials, etc.
・Orders received and donations made by subsidiaries are consolidated to the current parent company.
・Former company names have been aligned with current company names.

(Originally published in Japanese on October 26, 2024. )

Buying Policy: All articles