A Japanese political party leader and unabashed populist who admires former U.S. President Donald Trump has called for Japan to have a say in how U.S. nuclear weapons…
A Japanese political party leader and unabashed populist who admires former U.S. President Donald Trump has called for Japan to have a say in how U.S. nuclear weapons might be used in its defense. Nobuyuki Baba is hoping to shift Japanese politics to the right by transforming his Japan Innovation Party into the main opposition to Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s government in the next general election. On some key defence issues, Baba supports Kishida’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) including a proposal to amend the pacifist constitution to give official recognition to the armed forces and build a stronger military equipped with longer-range missiles to deter China and North Korea. But Baba also wants the U.S., which has a security treaty with Japan and deploys more than 50,000 troops at several bases, to agree to give Japan a say in how it deploys or could use its nuclear weapons. “The leader of Japan has to take some responsibility rather than just leaving it to the Americans to decide how they are used,” Baba told Reuters in an interview in his Tokyo party office. “I think that is the case for any country. It is something that should be properly discussed.”…
