Moscow said Friday it had lodged a “strong protest” with Japan over a joint military exercise with the U.S. near the borders of Russia in the Far East region.
The Russian Foreign Ministry said the locations of the military exercise, codenamed Keen Sword 25, situated “in the immediate vicinity” of the country’s borders. The military drill will be held from October 23 to November 1 and will take place throughout Japan’s territory, from the main island of Hokkaido to the north to the island of Okinawa in the southwest.
Hokkaido is surrounded by the Russian territory across the sea from three directions. To its west is the Far East region’s mainland, while Sakhalin Island lies about 27 miles to the north. The Kuril Islands, including four disputed islands, are located to the east.
The U.S.-Japan drill came as Shigeru Ishiba, the newly elected Prime Minister of Japan, called for an “Asian version of NATO” to counter the threats of military cooperation between Russia, China, and North Korea, which are all Japan’s neighboring countries.
Last month, Russia and China, which formed a quasi-alliance as an opposition to the U.S. and its allies and partners, staged at least three joint military maneuvers in Japan’s nearby waters, including in the Sea of Japan to the west and in the Sea of Okhotsk to the north.
Japan Self-Defense Forces members practice transporting an injured person with the Osprey tiltrotor aircraft during the Keen Sword exercise on Okinawa Island on November 15, 2022. Russia had lodged a “strong protest” with Japan over this year’s Keen Sword exercise.
Kyodo via AP Images
In the protest message to the Japanese embassy in Moscow, the Russian Foreign Ministry said conducting military drill with the U.S. near Russia “was categorically unacceptable.”
It pointed to the involvement of non-regional NATO member states in the exercise. The Japanese military announced that Canada, another founding member of the transatlantic alliance, will deploy military units for the exercise, together with troops from Australia.
Observers from France, Germany, Italy, Lithuania, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, and NATO are also expected to be invited. The U.S.-Japan alliance’s annual exercise will involve 12,000 American and 33,000 Japanese troops, as well as 40 ships and 370 aircraft.
The Russian Foreign Ministry claimed it has warned the Japanese side about what it called “inevitable adequate countermeasures” that Moscow will take to protect its sovereignty.
Keen Sword 25 takes aim at countering China’s threats to the Japanese southwestern islands as well. U.S. military newspaper Stars and Stripes reported that the Osprey tiltrotor aircraft will fly to the island of Yonaguni, Japan’s westernmost territory, for the first time.
Yonaguni is located less than 70 miles away from the east coast of Taiwan, a self-ruled island that China has long viewed it as a breakaway province. The Chinese military on Monday held a large-scale show of force exercise in waters and airspace around Taiwan.
The heightened tensions in the Taiwan Strait have turned Yonaguni into a front-line island. The government of Japan has been working on contingency plans to evacuate its citizens from Yonaguni and nearby islands amid concerns over China possibly invading Taiwan.
Osprey tiltrotor aircraft will simulate civilian evacuation from Yonaguni to Naha, a city on Okinawa Island, during the exercise, the report said. The U.S.-origin Osprey is capable of flying as a fixed-wing aircraft while conducting takeoffs and landings as a helicopter.
According to the U.S. Forces Japan, the Keen Sword is a field training exercise conducted throughout mainland Japan, Okinawa prefecture, and surrounding waters since 1986. It is designed to increase combat readiness and interoperability of the U.S. and Japan forces.
