Japan can now export lethal equipment to 17 countries that it has signed defense equipment and technology transfer agreements with, including the US, United Kingdom, Australia, and India. The exports permitted encompasses fighter jets, missiles, submarines, destroyers, and combat drones — the full spectrum of modern warfighting capability.

          The flagship deal is already visible. Australia signed with Japan for the delivery of three of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) upgraded Mogami-class frigates, with eight others to be jointly produced, with Australian Defense Minister Richard Marles welcoming the move as deepening their defense partnership. New Zealand has also expressed interest, as have the Philippines and Indonesia — countries on the front lines of South China Sea tension. These expanded sales offer significant implications for Japan’s involvement with countries in the South China Sea, Southwest Pacific, and Southeast Asia regions.

Japan and Indonesia

Japan’s defense relationship with Indonesia has existed within the confines of what is known as white-hull diplomacy for most of the last two decades.[7] Japan and Indonesia signed a defense equipment and technology transfer agreement in March 2021.[8] However, previously this had mostly been limited to capacity building efforts such as Japan providing patrol boats for Indonesia’s Maritime Security Agency (Bakamla) and assisting the force with monitoring illegal fishing and low-level incursions in its territorial waters.[9] The boats provided under Japanese finance schemes via JICA ranged from 24-meter and 60-meter class patrol vessels delivered as recently as 2023 but were built for law enforcement purposes, not naval engagements.[10] In addition to this, the Japan Coast Guard (JCG) had repeatedly conducted joint training exercises with Bakamla and its parallel maritime force, the Indonesian Sea and Coast Guard (KPLP) on search and rescue operations and anti-smuggling efforts, not high-end combat.[11] The cooperation resembled that of a status quo power helping a partner with constabulary duties and not an arms supplier selling weapons to a country tasked with protecting contested waters.

That has changed in recent years as Chinese assertiveness of Indonesia’s Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) surrounding the North Natuna Sea has increased. Chinese fishing fleets accompanied by People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) and coast guard ships of various types have been repeatedly spotted within Indonesia’s EEZ around the Natuna Islands, most prominently during the 2019-2020 Natuna incursions.[12] Indonesia responded to these intrusions by dispatching fighter jets and warships of its own to the area. Similar incidents happened in 2021, and Chinese fishing boats have been detained by Indonesian authorities’ multiple times for illegally fishing within Indonesia’s waters. China’s grey-zone tactics to challenge Indonesia’s maritime boundaries without sparking an armed conflict have revealed gaps in Jakarta’s ability to respond.[13] While Indonesia has maintained an adequate coast guard presence for many years, its navy, or the grey-hull deterrence component, has struggled with aging vessels and a crucial modernization backlog.[14] Examples of this include Indonesia’s fleet of Ahmad Yani-class frigates, many of which were commissioned in the 1980s (as former Dutch vessels) and the 2021 KRI Nanggala-402 submarine incident, where an attack submarine suffered from training and maintenance shortcomings that led to the submarine’s sinking and the loss of 53 crew members. Indonesia needs asymmetric deterrence that can impose costs on Chinese coercion, not just document it.[15] Japan’s removal of the lethal export ban in April 2026 answered this requirement at a time when Jakarta began exploring its options.[16]

Indonesia’s plans to acquire six South Korean-built Nagapasa-class submarines as part of its ongoing effort to replace old-generation submarines and FREMM frigates from Italy is further evidence of Jakarta’s intentions to source high-end capability from a range of suppliers.[17] In 2026, Indonesia has expressed interest in acquiring Mitsubishi Heavy Industries’ Mogami-class frigates, and with Japan’s new policy in place, any deal made would not need to be downgraded combat capabilities and lethal payload to satisfy Japanese export requirements.[18] If joint production and co-production and offset agreements were made where some vessels are constructed in Japan and others in Indonesia, it would further boost Indonesia’s Defense Industrial Base (DIB). Indonesia has pursued this model before with foreign partners, engaging in a technology transfer deal with Seoul to construct conventional submarines at PT PAL, its major shipyard located in Surabaya.[19] Indonesia could pursue a similar arrangement with Japan for the construction of Mogami-class ships or engage in the legacy asset transfer of other submarines Japan has retired from service. Beyond surface combatants, Japan can offer maritime strike drones and advanced anti-submarine warfare capabilities that could be used to monitor the Sunda Strait and Lombok Strait, two sea lines of communication connecting the Indian and Pacific oceans that would be vital to any credible interoperability framework.

          Japan’s effort to counterbalance and deal with Chinese influence in Southeast Asia particularly benefits from Indonesia’s free and active (bebas-aktif) foreign policy approach which seeks to avoid siding with any particular power bloc through non-alignment / balancing.[20] Purchasing arms from the United States risks political conditions being attached over human rights concerns, and buying Russian military equipment would put Jakarta at risk of violating American sanctions such as those imposed under Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA).[21] Japan serves as Indonesia’s third-path supplier: a capable, democratic Asian nation that historically has had no problem selling military equipment to Indonesia and does not need Jakarta to alter its political alignment in exchange for access to weapons.

Japan and Vietnam

In November 2023, Japan and Vietnam upgraded their security relationship to a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership, marking a significant milestone in bilateral trust but not necessarily arms transfers at the time.[22] From 2024 to 2025, Japan began providing Vietnam with assistance through its Official Security Assistance (OSA) program, donating non-lethal coastal surveillance radars and coast guard patrol boats to improve coastal surveillance / situational awareness.[23] Vietnam had previously accepted similar types of aid from Japan dating back to 2015, when Japan donated six used patrol vessels to the Vietnam Coast Guard and Vietnam Ministry of Defense and was set to receive another six larger vessels in 2020 as part of a ¥36.6 billion ($348.66 million) loan.[24] These efforts significantly increased Vietnam’s coastal monitoring capabilities but fell short of supplying it with anything it could use to actively discourage aggression should the need arise.

          Vietnam, by virtue of its shared land border and heavily-overlapping claims with China over the Paracel Islands and Spratly Islands in the South China Sea, faces perhaps the most immediate threat from China.[25] Vietnam does not have a mutual defense agreement with the United States like the Philippines does, leaving Hanoi little choice but to rely on its standalone deterrence capability to prevent Chinese threat.[26] As a result, Vietnam has long placed emphasis on the concept of asymmetric deterrence, or threatening to inflict significant damage on China’s far larger navy should Chinese forces attempt to intimidate Vietnam militarily. This was on display during the 2014 Haiyang Shiyou 981 oil rig crisis that ensued after China sent an oil rig into waters Vietnam claims as its own. Vietnam attempted to swarm the Chinese installation with Vietnamese coast guard and fisheries ships to interfere with Chinese operations, even as Chinese forces outnumbered and outgunned their Vietnamese counterparts.[27] Japan’s removal of the lethal weapons ban fills this niche by elevating Japan from a provider of threat sensors to one of the means to counteract the threat.

          Vietnam has the need to transfer coastal defense cruise missiles to bolster its anti-access/area denial (A2/AD) capabilities. Vietnam’s acquisition of K300P Bastion-P coastal defense armed with P-800 Oniks missiles from Russia previously demonstrated this strategy.[28] However, supplying Vietnam with Japanese weaponry would not only allow Japan to complete the coastal defense network it started with its Official Security Assistance (OSA) program but do so with an eye towards interoperability with countries like Vietnam that face similar threats.[29] Japan could also sell Vietnam legacy JSDF vessels, such as retired destroyers and submarines, providing Vietnam a boost to its navy that would take years to develop if left to Vietnamese shipyards to complete on their own. Japan’s transfer of TC-90 aircraft to the Philippines (2017) serves as a successful precedent for this kind of capacity building. Japan has become a source of reliable high-tech equipment that Vietnam can procure without necessitating explicit alignment with U.S. interests, potentially allowing Vietnam to maintain its strategic balance with China while continuing to build up capabilities that would most benefit the regional militaries who face pressure from Beijing.

          Like its fellow claimant Indonesia, Vietnam has pursued a defense procurement strategy that some have called bamboo diplomacy.[30] Vietnam has historically relied on Russian-made weapons platforms for its defense needs, but Russia’s ability to provide meaningful support for Vietnamese defense modernization efforts has atrophied in recent years due to the war in Ukraine. Vietnam has struggled to maintain and upgrade its Russian-made Kilo-class submarines and Su-30 fighters, pushing Hanoi to look towards other suppliers.[31] Japan offers Vietnam a friendly, third-path supplier alternative that comes without the political cost of provoking China by joining America’s bloc. This convergence of military necessity and strategic flexibility positions Japan not as a substitute for Vietnam’s existing partnerships, but as the critical component that allows Vietnam to harden its coastal defense, and at the same time, keeping its strategic balancing with China intact.

          Interestingly, Japan’s Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s May 2026 speech at Vietnam National University, Hanoi, has vast regional significance, as she announced Japan’s “Updated FOIP.” She carefully reminded Vietnam of the 400-year-old economic engagement between Japan and Vietnam through the South China Sea, the Taiwan Strait, and the East China Sea. She asserted that “open and free seas” have always been essential to the prosperity and stability of the region. 

Japan and Philippines

When the military bases of the U.S. were closed in 1992, the Philippines found it extremely difficult to face the responsibility of defending its territories from foreign encroachment due to a number of issues. The first was that it was thoroughly dependent on the largesse provided by the Americans for the use of the bases. Whereas other countries like Japan and South Korea provided financial support for the stationing of U.S. forces in their territories, the Philippines was the reverse as it was being paid by the Americans.^[32] The loss of the annual rental fee of approximately US $250 million was traumatically felt by the Philippine military. The second was that the Philippine military was internally directed and was more of a glamorized constabulary that ran after rebels than a full-fledged military capable of defense against external threats.^[33] Third and last was that the attempts to modernize the Philippine military were met with numerous challenges ranging from constitutional obstacles that mandated that the defense budget would always be below the education budget,^[34] the Asian Financial Crisis of 1997 practically killed that effort,^[35] and the wastage caused by corruption within the Philippine government that saw funds vanishing into the pockets of corrupt national and local leaders.^[36] For decades, the Philippine military languished as it could not measure up to its neighbors who were equipped with state-of-the-art weapons without having to rely on foreign aid.^[37] The Philippines could not even properly maintain its Vietnam War era aircraft while its navy would have been more at home in World War Two than in the 21^st Century. By the middle of the second decade of the 21^st Century, that was beginning to slowly change as another effort to modernize was done which finally brought a handful of modern armor, artillery, aircraft and ships to the Armed Forces of the Philippines. However, this was deemed not enough to face off the Chinese threat despite the fact that the modernization and capability enhancement programs were being supported by assistance coming from South Korea and the United States.

          During that same period, Japan was gradually re-evaluating its role in the security of the region and had already taken tentative steps to expand the responsibilities of its Self-Defense Forces outside of its exclusive focus on the Home Islands. In 1992, barely fifty years after the Pacific War, the first Japanese soldiers were deployed outside of Japan as peacekeepers in Cambodia.^[38] Philippine installations played a role in assisting that Japanese peacekeeping operation. During the administration of President Benigno Simeon Aquino III from 2010 to 2016, exploratory talks were being held between Tokyo and Manila as to how Japan could help in the much-troubled modernization of the Philippine defense and security capabilities.^[39]  Initial focus was on maritime surveillance and patrol and this resulted in the provision by Japan of loans to the Philippines to acquire modern patrol craft for the Philippine Coast Guard. Two classes have so far been acquired by the Philippines of which the first is the 44-meter-long Parola Class of which 10 are in service and the 97-meter-long Teresa Magbanua Class of which two are in service with three more being built.^[40]

          Following that, the pace of activities then began to really accelerate between the Philippines and Japan, and it eventually encompassed those of a military nature. Members of the JSDF were invited to be observers of bilateral and multilateral exercises held in the Philippines while discussions on a Status of Forces Agreement were held by both countries.^[41] This culminated on September 11, 2025 with the signing of the Japan-Philippines Reciprocal Access Agreement that governed Japanese troop visits to the Philippines and paved the way for their large scale participation in exercises like the annual Balikatan held in the Philippines.^[42] The 2026 iteration of the annual Balikatan exercises saw approximately more than a thousand Japanese military personnel deploy to the Philippines to participate in the activity which so far is the largest deployment of Japanese troops for exclusively military purposes and not humanitarian activities in that country since World War Two.^[43] The Japanese came fully equipped with modern weapons and ground based missile systems.^[44] Equally important especially for the capability enhancement and modernization of the Philippine military is the Acquisition and Cross Servicing Agreement that was signed in January 15, 2026 which provides the framework upon which logistics, equipment and material support would be conducted by both countries in furtherance of bilateral and multilateral activities among them.^[45] The Japanese Diet then ratified this on June 19, 2026.^[46] In addition, Japan has offered to donate to the Philippines six units of the Abukuma class of destroyers that are still in excellent condition after having decommissioned them. Should the Philippines acquire a number of these destroyers, it would greatly increase the combat power of the Philippine Navy granted that they be properly equipped and maintained by the Filipinos.^[47] This is among other donations to the Philippines consisting of patrol aircraft and monitoring systems.^[48] With Japan’s relaxing of weapons export restrictions, modern or surplus Japanese armor, missile systems and artillery may also end up in the inventory of the Armed Forces of the Philippines.^[49]

The Strategic Implications for the Indo-Pacific

These agreements and developments that Japan has with the Philippines, and a number of other countries has finally done away with Japan’s restrictive policies that were enacted immediately after World War 2 and has made it now a major and active player in the region much to China’s consternation. Japan’s transformation signals a defense posture that extends far beyond its own immediate territory. It offers regional countries, particularly in Southeast Asia, access to high-quality, politically non-coercive defense equipment.

          The strategic move also accelerates the emergence of distributed deterrence architecture in the Indo-Pacific where allies and partners are developing indigenous capabilities and industrial linkages that persist and demonstrate the willpower to contribute more to defense architecture in Japan and the Indo-Pacific not entirely dependent on the US security guarantees that is unpredictable at this very time.

          However, the domestic debate within Japan must not be overlooked. The protest against revision of Article 9 cannot be discounted as the protesters gather in front of the Diet building and demand for preservation the sanctity of article as a whole. Even as the defense industry brings revenue and jobs, Japanese society fears the risk of another war as the remains of Hiroshima and Nagasaki still persists in the national life. Takaichi’s insistence that Japan remains a “peace-loving nation” even as it exports warships and missiles reflects the political tightrope she must walk — and the limits of how far official framing can contain a genuine national debate.

          Despite this opposition, production and exports are likely only to expand. Beyond bilateral deals, Japan is embedding itself into a multilateral defense production architecture. Japan’s participation in the Global Combat Air Programme (GCAP) with the United Kingdom, Italy, and Germany to co-develop a next-generation fighter jet represents something historically unprecedented. Japan, as an originator of advanced weapons technology, can now be an exporter of advanced weaponry to Indo-Pacific countries.

Conclusion

Japan’s decision to expand weapons exports represents a significant milestone in the country’s increasingly robust approach to regional security. It will strengthen the industrial base at home, while providing opportunities for partner nations to enhance their security, with the overall effect of increasing a counterweight to China. After decades of limitation, Japan is now emerging as an increasingly active regional leader in the Indo-Pacific.

Author’s Bio:

Dr. Indu Saxena is a Senior Fellow & Chief Operation Officer at the Consortium of Indo-Pacific Researchers. She actively mentors and contributes to U.S.-India relations, South Asia, Southeast Asia, and Indo-Pacific security. She writes “Indo-Pacific Weekly Mail,” a weekly newsletter focused on the Indo-Pacific region.

Dr Leo S.F. Lin is a Senior Lecturer in Security Studies at the Australian Graduate School of Policing and Security (AGSPS), Charles Sturt University. He has published several papers on Southeast Asia and regional security. He is Fellow at Consortium of Indo-Pacific Researchers and serves on the intern committee.

Jose Antonio Custodio is a Security and Defense Consultant. He has taught, written, and commented on defense and security topics in the media on numerous occasions. He is a Fellow at the Consortium of Indo-Pacific Researchers. 

Chris Kolakowski is Senior Fellow & leads military history team at CIPR. He has written and spoken on various aspects of military history from 1775 to the present and is the author of four books on the American Civil War and World War II in the Pacific.

A special thanks to Chris Kolakowski for his valuable editorial feedback.