East Asia was not peaceful in September. Japan had just thrown out a record defense budget, and Tsai Ing-wen quietly flew to Tokyo as a "private identity". Time is approaching, and it is necessary to think about it.

China's response is intriguing, and only said four words: "Be careful in words and actions". This is not lack of emotion, but restraint to the extreme. At present, Japan's military expenditure is soaring and the situation in the Taiwan Strait is tense.

Are these two things coincidences or other plans? For East Asian security, this may not be a simple diplomatic episode, but a release of strategic signals.

Defense budget soars again

The checks were written in Japan this time. In the 2026 fiscal year, the Japanese Ministry of Defense applied for a budget of 8.8 trillion yen, equivalent to about 380 billion yuan.

is 8.3% more than last year, almost doubled compared to 2015. This increase is no longer explained by "normal growth".

More importantly, the places where money is spent can see Japan's ambitions. For example, they will arrange long-distance reconnaissance drones on the southwest islands to cover the direction of the Taiwan Strait.

To extend the range of the Type 12 anti-ship missile from 200 kilometers to 1,000 kilometers, and directly hit the coast of China. These are not "defense" gadgets, and they already have obvious "out-of-defense strikes" capabilities. The offensiveness of these equipment cannot be underestimated.

Looking at Japan's actions over the years is also very telling. In 2022, the Maritime Self-Defense Force was re-planned and a "quasi-marine Corps" was created. In 2023, it announced that it would launch a ballistic missile with a range of 3,000 kilometers.

The Financial Times' analysis hits the nail on the head: Japan not only wants to "guard the doorstep of its home", but wants to build an army that can fight long distances and strike three-dimensionally.

Such a transformation has completely deviated from the principle of "defensive defense". In the past, Japan has always under the banner of a "peace constitution" and emphasized not to take the initiative.

But now it seems that the peace rhetoric on paper is simply inconsistent with the numbers in the budget. To put it bluntly, Japan has stopped pretending and has begun to move towards a military power in a real way.

Tsai Ing-wen's "family tour"

Just the second day after the Japanese budget was announced, Tsai Ing-wen appeared in Tokyo in a low-key manner. According to her office, this itinerary was a "family trip" and there were no official arrangements, but such a "coincidence" did not look like a simple vacation.

This is not the first time Tsai Ing-wen has engaged in such a "low-key exit". As early as 2023, she visited the United States in her "private name", but she sat down and chatted with many American politicians. This time she went to Japan to perform the same script again.

To put it bluntly, this "private itinerary" has become her usual trick. On the one hand, it does not directly challenge the international red line, and on the other hand, it can promote "informal contact" between Taiwan and Japan behind the scenes.

Many island media also pointed out that the timing is sensitive, which is likely to be used to take advantage of the rising momentum of Japan's military spending to test whether Tokyo is willing to engage in deeper interaction with Taipei on security issues.

From the outside perspective, Tsai Ing-wen's move is not only to use Japan's power to "foster courage", but also to cooperate with certain Japanese political forces to test China's bottom line.

This "using foreign countries to seek independence" can be seen through in the eyes of the mainland. Some experts from Xinhua News Agency also pointed out that this behavior is essentially a "Taiwan independence attempt under political packaging", which is both dangerous and irresponsible.

In other words, this "family tour" is not simple. It is an operation with a strong signal on a very political node.

Chinese four-word response

Faced with this "military and political linkage" that seems to be in power but actually echoing each other, China's response is very limited, but it is meaningful. The spokesman of the Ministry of National Defense Jiang Bin used four words: "Be careful in words and actions", and the short four words are restraint and a warning.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs' statement did not go around the corner: it required Japan to deeply reflect on history and follow the path of peaceful development. This wording has been very sensible in China-Japan diplomacy in recent years. It not only expresses its position, but also does not escalate the situation.

From the response style, China does not choose emotional confrontation, but instead responds to the surrounding unstable factors with a high degree of strategic determination. This calm treatment is not only to show the rationality of a major country to the outside world, but also to send a signal to the inside: we can see clearly and calm down.

But this does not mean that the situation is not tense. Japan's deployment on the southwestern islands has become increasingly closer to China's East China Sea, breaking the original military balance.

In particular, the deployment of drones and missile systems with long-range strike capabilities is equivalent to "pre-positioning" the situation in the Taiwan Strait and pushing the original "line of defense" to the doorstep of China.

More notable is that if other countries follow suit, this military expansion is likely to trigger a new round of arms race. According to the Wall Street Journal, some Southeast Asian countries have internally evaluated whether to adjust their defense budgets to deal with this change in the situation.

Tsai Ing-wen's behavior undoubtedly added a fire to this turbulent waters. Her interaction with external forces not only complicated the situation in the Taiwan Strait, but also increased the risk of misjudgment. Especially in the context of increasingly dense military deployment, a small misunderstanding may ignite a flame that should not be lit.

The lessons of history are not far away. The pain that Japan's former expansionism brought to Asia is still vivid in my mind. Now that we are back on the old path of military expansion, it not only alerts neighboring countries, but also causes concerns in the international community.

If Japan tried to cover up its strategic intentions in the past, then its current actions are no longer covered. The reason why China maintains restraint is because it is clearer that this game is not a short-term confrontation, but a deep adjustment to the regional security pattern.

Japan's defense budget soared, and Tsai Ing-wen's sudden visit to Tokyo. Although these two things seem to be independent on the surface, it is not difficult to see the echo of them in connection with the time nodes and strategic background.

The interweaving of military means and political operations shows that the "Taiwan independence" forces are trying to rely on external forces to support, and some Japanese forces are also willing to cooperate with this temptation.

But history has proved that military expansion and "independence" fantasy will not have good results. If Japan insists on breaking through the peace constitution, it will only be self-isolated in Asia; if the Tsai Ing-wen administration continues to collude with external forces, it will only push Taiwan to the brink of danger.

What East Asia needs is not military confrontation, but mutual respect and stable coexistence. Otherwise, this land that should have developed peacefully will only be dragged into a deeper quagmire by ambitions and misjudgments.

Information source:

Tsai Ing-wen recently visited Japan. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs: Japan should be cautious in its words and actions and not send wrong signals to the separatist forces of "Taiwan independence" 2025-09-10 20:03·Jinyang.com

Beware! Japan proposes a record defense budget of 122.4 trillion yen 2025-09-05 08:40·Beijing News

The Japanese Ministry of Defense requires the preparation of the largest defense budget in history 2025-08-19 18:01·CCTV News