WHEN the alarm sounded from loudspeakers in the streets and his mobile telephone around 6am on August 29th, Saburo Ito thought it was a warning about an earthquake. But when he read that a North Korean missile was passing overhead the 72-year-old taxi driver panicked and…
WHEN the alarm sounded from loudspeakers in the streets and his mobile telephone around 6am on August 29th, Saburo Ito thought it was a warning about an earthquake. But when he read that a North Korean missile was passing overhead the 72-year-old taxi driver panicked and ran out into the garden. The instruction to “evacuate to a sturdy building or basement” was all but forgotten. “I had no idea what to do or where to go, ” he says.
Japanese have been oddly sanguine about military threats, even as China has grown more powerful and North Korea has tested ever more capable missiles and atom bombs. Japanese refer to this state of mind as heiwaboke, meaning roughly to take peace and security for granted.
Such complacency may have been shaken by the North Korean missile that passed over Hokkaido before crashing into the sea about 1,200km to the east. “North Korea’s reckless action is an unprecedented, serious and grave threat to our nation, ” said the prime minister, Shinzo Abe.
It was not the first time that North Korea had fired over Japan; it had conducted similar tests four times previously (under the guise of satellite launches) . But the latest shot was a surprise, not least because recent tensions over North Korea’s testing of long-range missiles had appeared to ease of late. America has grown increasingly alarmed that its bases in Guam, or perhaps America’s western seaboard, could soon be threatened by the regime of Kim Jong Un. Japan has long lived under the shadow of his rockets. What is more alarming is the consensus among analysts that his engineers have probably mastered the technology of making a nuclear warhead small enough to fit on a missile.
The latest test is raising questions about the preparedness of Japan’s civil defences and the ability of its anti-missile systems to keep the country safe. It is also heightening the debate over whether Japan should amend its pacifist constitution.
Over the past year the government has tried to reassure citizens of its ability to protect them.
