Japan's record defense budget plan sparks public concern

The Japanese government has recently approved a draft budget for fiscal 2026, with defense spending set at about 9.04 trillion yen (about 58 billion U.S. dollars), marking a new record high and sparking public concern.



An editorial published on Saturday by Japan's Shimbun Akahata noted that the country's defense budget stood at 5.4 trillion yen in fiscal 2022 and has surged by 3.6 trillion yen in just four years.



The newspaper said the latest figure is comparable to the 3.5 trillion yen allocated for measures to address the declining birthrate and the 3.8 trillion yen earmarked for nursing care payments in the budget proposal, warning that rising military spending will inevitably squeeze livelihood-related expenditures, which makes it a budget of "military prosperity at the expense of people's livelihoods."



The Ryukyu Shimpo said in an editorial on Saturday that the armament plans reflected in the new fiscal year's defense budget seriously deviate from Japan's "exclusively defense-oriented" policy and will aggravate military tensions.