Eyeing China, US to deploy new mobile Marine unit in Japan's Okinawa island

The United States has said it will deploy a newly mobile Marine unit in Japan's southern island of Okinawa in a bid to respond better to what it said are rising threats led by China. 

Forces will be reorganised by 2025 into a "Marine Littoral Regiment" in response to "an increasingly challenging security environment," Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin told a joint news conference on Wednesday after talks with the Japanese defence and foreign ministers.

Austin also said he seriously doubted that ramped up Chinese military activities near the Taiwan Strait were a sign of an imminent invasion of the island by Beijing.

"We've seen increased aerial activity in the straits, we've seen increased surface vessel activity around Taiwan," Austins said. "But whether or not that means that an invasion is imminent, you know, I seriously doubt that."

Earlier on Wednesday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Secretary of Defense Austin hosted Japanese Foreign Minister Hayashi Yoshimasa and Japanese Defence Minister Hamada Yasukazu for the 2023 US-Japan Security Consultative Committee meeting at the State Department in Washington, DC.

Speaking at the same news conference, Blinken said both Washington and Tokyo will consider space attacks as triggers for their mutual defence treaty amid rapid Chinese progress on satellites.

Incidents in space "present a clear challenge" and could trigger Article Five of the US-Japan treaty that considers an attack on either an attack on both, Blinken said. 

He applauded Japan's decision to double defence spending by 2027, adding the United States was set to sign a new agreement with Japan later this week on cooperation in space. 

READ MORE: Japan approves record budget as military spending gets a boost

Biden-Kishida talks

The Japanese delegation was in the US ahead of planned talks later this week between President Joe Biden and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida.

The two nations are revising their joint defence posture as they confront rising threats from North Korea and increasing influence in the region from China.

Kishida, on a weeklong trip to visit allies in Europe and North America, signed a defence agreement with British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak on Wednesday that strengthens military ties between their two counties, also in response to China's increasing military assertiveness.

Also on Wednesday, Japan said it would soon begin constructing a pair of runways on the small southern island of Mageshima where the two militaries are to conduct joint exercises, including those of F-35B stealth fighters, amphibious operations and missile interception beginning around 2027.

The construction could start as early as Thursday, it said. 

The island, off the southwestern coast of Kagoshima on the southernmost main island of Kyushu, will be a hub for troop deployment and munition supply in case of a conflict like a Taiwan emergency.

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