Taiwan Crisis Planning Forces Japan to Close Its Pacific Gaps

On February 28, the United States struck Iran. President Donald Trump said Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei had been killed and urged Iranians to topple the regime. How will this show of force affect Beijing, and how will it impact the calculations behind a potential Taiwan crisis?

A day earlier, on February 27, the Japan Institute for National Fundamentals convened its Comprehensive Security Project study group. The panel analyzed the China threat from three angles. These include the current state of the People's Liberation Army (PLA), the Chinese Communist Party's (CCP) internal power structure, and the wider international environment.

Its conclusion was stark. The likelihood of a Taiwan invasion in 2027 is rising, and fast. It argued that this sense of urgency needs to be shared broadly with the public, not confined to specialists.

Maritime Militia as a First-Line Tool

In a Taiwan contingency, Beijing's top priority would be to deny US forces access. That would put Japan in the crosshairs, as China seeks to disrupt any moves that help US intervention.

One lever is the maritime militia. In late December 2025, about 2,000 Chinese fishing vessels converged in the East China Sea, then maneuvered into a formation stretching roughly 470 kilometers (292 miles). Similar gatherings followed in January and February, each time occurring closer to the Japan–China median line.

That analysis came from Dr Aki Mouri, an assistant professor at the University of Tsukuba and a member of the China Frontier Strategy Research Group.

Mouri argued that the massed fishing fleets had been trained as maritime militia, acting under guidance tied to directives from Chinese leader Xi Jinping. Following plans set to begin in April, she said, such militia activity would expand in the East China Sea. She warned that this could leave Japan Coast Guard and Maritime Self-Defense Force vessels facing interference from thousands of fishing boats.

In that scenario, Japan's ability to cooperate with and support the US military during a Taiwan crisis would be sharply constrained.

Pushing the US Back

China's intent is to push US forces back to turn the East China Sea into a de facto Chinese sphere. Maki Nakagawa, a researcher at the institute, traced that ambition through a close reading of the 2025 PLA training.

In late December, four amphibious assault ships from the PLA's Southern Theater Command deployed to waters north of Palau. Around the same time, the Liaoning carrier group, tied to the Northern Theater Command, operated in the western Pacific. The pattern points to coordination between the two commands. Taken together, the moves suggest a push to harden China's ability to deny US forces access to the Second Island Chain. That arc runs roughly from the Ogasawara Islands to Guam.

Training across the PLA is increasingly geared to real combat. The air force offers one example. Patrols now include H-6 bombers and aerial refueling tankers. This gives crews the ability to shift quickly from routine sorties to strikes on Taiwan or to missions east of the First Island Chain, the arc running from Japan through the Philippines.

PLA forces are also drilling live-fire preparation elsewhere. The Rocket Force repeats operational strike training while army units cycle through amphibious landing exercises. 

In effect, the drills amount to a two-track rehearsal. One track is to keep US forces back near the Second Island Chain. The other is to create a window to put troops ashore in Taiwan. Visible in both the training tempo and the steady flow of new equipment, the scale of preparation is beyond what many imagine.

US Signaling

Analysts in the international community long expected that Xi Jinping could choose 2027 as the year to move on Taiwan.

In December 2025, the US said in its National Security Strategy that the era in which America could uphold the entire world order "like Atlas" was over. Washington said in its National Defense Strategy released in January that its core priority was defending the Western Hemisphere. Against China, it framed its approach as "deterrence by strength" in the Indo-Pacific.

US strikes on Venezuela and Iran also fit that deterrence-by-strength frame. With American capabilities now demonstrated so publicly, how might Xi revise his assumptions? What, specifically, should allies watch for?

Xi's Shrinking Circle

At the institute's security forum on February 27, Makoto Yoshida, vice chairman of Sojitz Corporation of America, warned that China's civil-military balance is fraying.

"If healthy political-military relations were intact, there would be room to challenge Xi's decisions," he said. "But after five of the seven members of the Central Military Commission were purged, no one is left to offer counsel. A situation has emerged in which Xi's decisions are carried out immediately."

No one is left to offer a candid warning to Xi. That is the vulnerability built into his absolute grip on power.

This year is expected to bring four US–China leaders' meetings. However, China's preparations for a Taiwan operation are likely to deepen through 2027, from fishing fleets trained as maritime militia to the core units of the PLA. As that military posture advances, it is also likely to strengthen Xi's confidence.

2027 will also be a milestone year for Xi. It is set to mark the start of his fourth term as general secretary of the CCP. The odds are high that he will fixate even more on what he casts as his historic mission of unifying Taiwan. Disunity in the West could further inflate his confidence. Japan is entering a genuinely dangerous phase.

Rewrite the Postwar Playbook

What Japan should do in this moment is clear. Defending Taiwan means defending Japan and the wider liberal bloc. Japan should treat the task of supporting the United States as a path to national renewal, not just as crisis management. That means finally taking on the unfinished work it has avoided throughout the postwar era.

Constitutional revision is the long-term task. The immediate priority, former Ground Self-Defense Force chief Kiyofumi Iwata argues, is to strengthen defenses along the First and Second Island Chains ahead of a Taiwan crisis. Japan must quickly close military gaps on its eastern, Pacific-facing flank so US forces can deploy.

Top priority is to keep the Pacific from becoming a sea dominated by Chinese or Russian surface ships and submarines. Doing so would require placing long-range drone hubs, air-defense radar, and electronic-warfare equipment on remote islands such as Minamitorishima, the Ogasawara Islands, Iwo Jima, and Minami Daito.

This is the moment to treat national defense as a personal matter. That remains true under the harsh working assumption that Xi could move on Taiwan as early as 2027.

RELATED:

• Two 5,000-Ton China Coast Guard Ships Seen Near Senkaku Islands
• Robert Eldridge: How China Seeks to Win Without Firing a Shot
  
  
  

(Read the article in Japanese.)

Author: Yoshiko Sakurai, Japan Institute for National Fundamentals