Japan, under the new administration of Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, is on its way towards militarism and regional belligerence. With these ambitions, Japan is enhancing its intelligence services.
Introduction
The new body is formed under the National Intelligence Council Establishment Act 2026. It works within the cabinet and is headed by the Prime Minister along with nine other members. The other members include the Chief Cabinet Secretary, Minister of State for Financial Services, Chair of the National Public Safety Commission, Minister of Justice, Minister of Defence, Minister for Foreign Affairs, Minister of Finance, Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry, and the Minister of Land, Infrastructure, Transport, and Tourism.
The Sanae Takaichi administration is rapidly altering Japan’s security and force posture by completely revising the three key security documents known as the National Security Strategy, National Defence Strategy, and Defence Build-up Programme. The focus of these vital documents is now shifting towards various aspects of defence with reference to the regional developments: its regional allies and adversaries.
Japan’s Passive Pacifism and military activities
This new intelligence initiative has come at a very important time. Now, Japan has new belligerent leadership that has buried its so-called pacifism and is rapidly enhancing its aggressive military capabilities. Last year, on 26 December 2025, Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi increased Japan’s defence budget to almost 58 billion USD reaching approximately 2 percent of Japan’s Gross Domestic Product. The remilitarization is part of the plan approved in 2022 to allocate in excess of 276 billion USD to be spent on Japan’s armed forces in a span of five years. Further, Japan has significantly eased the military arms import and export legislation in recent months. It is very alarming that in preceding years, Japan has actively started to participate in military exercises. For instance, this year Japan took part in the Balikatan Exercies in April-May, it conducted South China Sea Drills along with Philippines and the United States in July, Mount Fuji Live-Fire Drills in June, and took part in the RIMPAC 2026. Japan is also an active member of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, or Quad, and is enhancing its military cooperation with Australia, the U.S., and India. All these developments are aimed at forging Japan’s aggressive military capabilities, which are mainly aimed at its historical rivals.
What is the need for a new intelligence agency?
Japan is significantly lagging behind in cyber and electronic warfare activities. It is interesting to know that during the Japanese attack on Russian Port Arthur during the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-1905, the Russians actually did electronic warfare and jammed Japan’s radio communications on 15 April 1904. The Japanese don’t forget things, and these memories still haunt the modern Japanese statecraft. To offset Japan’s historic fears, the Sanae Takaichi administration has decided to strengthen Japan’s cyber and electronic warfare activities. The main purpose behind establishing the National Intelligence Bureau is to have a centralised command centre to wage information warfare, especially against those nations that have historically bitter relations with Japan.
The Japanese policy and decision-makers are closely monitoring Russia’s Special Military Operation in Ukraine since February 2022. They are fully confident that in a near-future conflict in the Pacific, unmanned drones in the aerial, ground, surface, and underwater domains would have a decisive role to play and could decide the result of any military operation. For this, Japan unveiled the Synchronised Hybrid Integrated and Enhanced Littoral Defence (SHIELD) programme that will employ drones in all the domains. Besides the kinetic interception, the wirelessly controlled drones could be effectively stopped using electronic and cyber warfare, and this is prompting the Japanese to achieve superior electronic and cyber warfare activities.
The Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi is very eager to gain political legitimacy. Her government is a coalition between the Liberal Democratic Party and the Japan Innovation Party. Such coalitions are always volatile, and with the previous prime minister having a narrow political margin, we can well assume that Sanae Takaichi is initiating such ventures to gain domestic political momentum.
Conclusion
It is a fact that no military could operate without having first-hand intelligence. Japan is rearming its armed forces and is rapidly moving towards re-militarization. With such ambitious aims and objectives, the National Intelligence Bureau is expected to close the existing gap in its intelligence gathering and counter-intelligence activities, but such strategies seldom work.
It is a historic fact that Japan’s militarism always results in its own destruction and the killings of millions of innocent people. It led Japan to aggression and to the start of the wars against Russia, China, Korea, the United States, Singapore, and many other countries during the twentieth century, and resultantly the U.S. dropped two atomic bombs over Japan in August 1945, killing thousands of Japanese people, and the Soviet Red Army slammed the Japanese Kwantung Army at the battlefield, leading to Japan’s unconditional surrender. Also, the world has not forgotten Japanese maniac kamikaze pilots who conducted suicidal bombing operations. Apparently, Japan’s more and more investment in defence and military will not help. The only thing that Japan needs is to look inwards, seek forgiveness from the countries it once attacked, and change its hostile attitude towards its Pacific neighbours.
Simon Westwood is a graduate of Dublin City University (DCU), Ireland. He is a research assistant at DCU’s Department of History.
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