Many Japanese might have rejoiced while watching television footage showing the recent sinking of an unidentified ship following an exchange of gunfire with Japanese Coast Guard cutters, but I was dismayed by Japan's fragile national defense system that was exposed by the incident in the East China Sea. The battle, which wounded a few Japanese Coast Guard crewmen, occurred after the cutters tracked the mystery vessel for a whole day. A Maritime Self-Defense Force patrol plane first sighted the unidentified ship, but the MSDF did not contact the Coast Guard for nine hours. The tardiness in the whole operation was stunning.
Without intelligence provided by a U.S. spy satellite, the Defense Agency would have failed to intercept radio messages from the mystery ship, and the MSDF patrol plane would have failed to detect the ship.
Diplomacy and national defense are inseparable. Japan wholly depends on the United States for intelligence, the foundation of national defense. I doubt whether Japanese lawmakers are aware of this problem.