Editor's note: Ali Unal is a former Turkish diplomat and senior journalist specializing in China, Asia-Pacific geopolitics, artificial intelligence and the global technology rivalry reshaping the world economy. He previously served as Press Counselor at the Embassy of the Republic of Türkiye in Beijing and now works as a senior journalist at CGTN's Turkish-language service. The article reflects the author's opinions and not necessarily the views of CGTN.

Japan's remilitarization has been making headlines for months: record defense budgets, new weapons purchases, closer US-Japan military coordination and repeated warnings of a harsher regional security environment. Then came a different kind of story.

A June 21 report in The Japan Times asked whether automation and artificial intelligence (AI) could help the "Self-Defense Forces (SDF)" deal with their manpower shortage. On the surface, this sounds like a technical question about modernization. In reality, it exposes something deeper: Japan is trying to expand its defense posture faster than its population, public finances and society can sustain.

Drones, unmanned systems and AI-assisted command tools may reduce personnel needs in some missions. But they cannot solve Japan's larger contradiction. The country's military buildup rests on a shrinking demographic base, a strained fiscal position, unresolved historical memory and a public still uneasy about remilitarization.

Automation is not a demographic strategy

The manpower problem is the first visible crack. In fiscal 2023, the SDF recruited just 9,959 people against a target of 19,598, barely half of its goal. Better pay and improved working conditions may help at the margins, but they cannot manufacture a new generation of willing recruits in one of the world's oldest societies.

As of October 2024, people aged 65 and above accounted for 29.3% of Japan's population, while the working-age population had fallen to 73.7 million. A modern military also needs technicians, engineers, cyber specialists, drone operators, maintenance crews and software developers. The more sophisticated the force becomes, the more it depends on exactly the skilled labor pool Japan is losing.

That is why the turn to automation should not be mistaken for seamless modernization. It is also an admission of pressure. A high-tech military does not eliminate the need for people; it changes the type of people required. AI systems still need human judgment. Unmanned platforms still need operators. Advanced weapons still need maintenance, training and command structures. Technology can stretch capacity, but it cannot reverse demography.

The fiscal trap behind rearmament

Money is the next constraint. Japan is trying to fund military expansion from a deeply strained fiscal base. Data from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development placed Japan's gross public debt at 222% of GDP in 2024, the highest among major advanced economies. In the fiscal year 2025 budget, social security accounted for 33.2% of total expenditure, while national debt service took up 24.5%. More than half of the national budget is already tied to welfare and debt before defense is even debated.

For an aging society, this matters. Defense spending competes with pensions, healthcare and household security at a time when stagnant wages and higher living costs already squeeze many Japanese citizens. Tokyo is trying to buy more weapons after the social security bill has already taken the largest seat at the table.

The macroeconomic environment is also shifting. Japan's debt-heavy fiscal model was built during an era of extremely low interest rates. That era is ending. On June 16, the Bank of Japan raised its short-term policy rate to 1%, the highest level in 31 years. For a country carrying such a large debt burden, even modest rate normalization changes the political calculation. Borrowing becomes more expensive. Debt service becomes harder to ignore. Military expansion becomes more visible to taxpayers.

Japan's Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi has said defense spending for the fiscal year ending in March 2027 would reach roughly 1.9% of GDP, close to the government's 2% target. But the real question is not whether Japan can announce a target. It is how long it can sustain it. More borrowing, higher taxes, or welfare cuts all carry political costs. Public support for stronger defense weakens sharply when voters are asked to pay for it directly.

History still shapes regional trust

There is also the historical question. Japanese leaders routinely point to regional threats: China's military rise, the DPRK's missile program, Russia's activity in the region and uncertainty over long-term US security guarantees. These concerns may explain why Tokyo wants a stronger military posture. They do not answer who will serve, who will pay and whether the region will trust Japan's intentions.

For China, Northeast and parts of Southeast Asia, Japanese remilitarization is not viewed in a historical vacuum. Memories of occupation, forced labor, wartime atrocities and Japan's uneven postwar reckoning still shape regional perceptions. Unlike Germany, Japan never built the same postwar consensus around guilt, accountability and restraint. That unfinished history means every new missile program, every defense budget increase and every debate over constitutional revision deepens the trust deficit Japan has yet to repair with its neighbors.

This is why Japan's military turn is not simply a domestic budget issue. It is also a regional trust issue. A country with unresolved wartime memory cannot expect its neighbors to treat rapid remilitarization as a normal administrative adjustment.

Domestic politics adds another limit. On May 3, Constitution Memorial Day, an estimated 50,000 demonstrators gathered in Tokyo to defend Japan's pacifist constitution against Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi's push to revise it. That resistance is not a footnote. It reflects a deeper anxiety that Japan's postwar identity is being steadily eroded.

Missiles can be purchased by government decision. Public consent cannot. Since 1945, Japan's credibility in Asia has rested less on military power than on trade, economic productivity and constitutional pacifism. Weakening that legacy may give Tokyo a larger arsenal, but it could also damage the fragile trust that helped Japan rebuild its regional position after the war.

Technology is not strategy

The danger is not that Tokyo mistakes technology for strategy; it is that some in Tokyo know exactly what they are doing. Automation can improve certain capabilities, but it cannot solve a shrinking population, an overstretched budget, contested historical memory, or a divided public. A military expansion that outpaces national capacity is not a strength. It is a deliberate gamble pressed forward by those who may understand the odds and have chosen to press ahead regardless.

Japan does not need a more expensive illusion of security. For an aging, indebted society, real security will not come from chasing spending targets or imagining that AI can fill every gap. It will come from restraint, regional trust and a defense policy that does not ask the country to become something its society, economy and history cannot sustain.

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