Abstract

A wave of drastic change is coming up to Japan’s defense. “Taiwan contingency” that China uses military force for Taiwan unification is becoming more realistic, and the security environment around Japan has become most difficult and complex since the end of World War II. In the meantime, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has revealed that battlefields look greatly different. Now not only tablets and social network but also advanced technology originated by private sectors such as drones and satellite internet communication has become crucial in battlefields, and we are in the era where whether we can quickly introduce them to defense equipment largely decides our predominance in security. However, Japan’s current defense system is not in a position to adjust itself to new way of battle utilizing advanced technologies at all. Japanese government revised three security-related documents in December 2022 and declared its approach toward new way of battle by setting “drastic enhancement of defense capacity”. The ultimate defense system to be aimed is “unmanned defense” minimizing human mediacy closer to zero by utilizing AI and drones. This book explains in an easy-to-understand manner for common readers, the trend of transformation of security in the world now, the latest threats Japan is facing, the trends of advanced technologies such as “drones”, “universe”, and “quantum” that influences the defense capacity in future.

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