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Former Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe’s assassination at an election campaign event in Nara is both shocking and puzzling. It is shocking because Japan has known almost no political violence for at least half a century and because gun ownership in the country is tightly controlled. It is puzzling because Abe, having stepped down as prime minister in 2020, had no formal government role; yet the killing was plainly a political act.

Abe’s death is unlikely to have any impact on tomorrow’s elections for Japan’s upper house, the House of Councillors, which the ruling Liberal Democratic Party was already expected to win comfortably. The tragic loss of the LDP’s former leader and prime minister may add some sympathy votes by increasing turnout, but it has primarily astonished and bewildered a country that is completely unaccustomed to such violence.

Abe’s legacy from his record-setting tenure as prime minister—which was divided between an unsuccessful year in 2006–07, followed by a triumphal return from 2012 to 2020—is more notable for its effects on Japanese foreign and security policy than on domestic affairs. To be sure, Abe was a good salesman for his economic-policy agenda, which he successfully promoted under the banner of ‘Abenomics’; but, in the end, it was his foreign policy, not his economic program, that was transformative.

Abe brought clarity, strength of purpose and—by dint of his longevity in office—credibility to Japanese foreign policy. The fact that the term ‘Indo-Pacific’ is now commonly used to describe security and diplomatic strategy in Asia is largely owing to Abe, who took a pre-existing Japanese effort to build a stronger relationship with India and used it to reframe and extend his country’s position both regionally and globally.

That stance was dictated by China’s rise and its increasingly assertive rhetoric and actions in and around the South and East China Seas. Under Abe, Japan committed itself to defining a strategic and diplomatic arena that would be harder for China to dominate. Deepening ties with India was part of that strategy, as were Abe’s efforts to strengthen Japan’s military. He was a leading proponent of proposals to amend the country’s constitution so that its military could play a bigger role alongside that of its key ally, the United States.

Abe was undeniably a nationalist. He originally courted controversy with somewhat revisionist views about Japan’s wartime history, especially regarding the hot-button issue of ‘comfort women’ whom the Imperial Japanese Army forced into sexual slavery in occupied countries. Once in office, however, he largely played down his earlier views. Moreover, he built closer and deeper diplomatic relationships across Southeast Asia, improving ties even with the country’s prickliest neighbour and former colony, South Korea. While relations with China were often tense—especially when Abe visited Japan’s controversial Yasukuni Shrine for its war dead—Sino-Japanese dialogue was nevertheless maintained.

It is always difficult to guess the motives of a lone assassin. The man arrested for Abe’s murder, 41-year-old Tetsuya Yamagami, appears to have used a large, homemade shotgun. Given that Japan is one of the world’s safest countries, security at political events tends to be light, even for a former prime minister, which presumably explains how the gunman was able to pull it off.

According to news reports, Yamagami served for three years in the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force, until 2005. While the motive for the killing is not yet clear, Yamagami reportedly told police he held a ‘grudge’ against a group he believed Abe was connected to.

Although Abe was no longer in office, he was undoubtedly still the country’s most prominent and well-known advocate of a stronger military capability and efforts to revise Article 9 of the constitution. In that capacity, he often expressed a determination to complete the work started by his grandfather, Nobusuke Kishi, who, as prime minister in 1960, shepherded through a revision to the country’s security treaty with the US, with a view to reinforcing Japanese defence.

Sadly, it is perhaps not coincidental that the last Japanese prime minister to fall victim to a violent attack was Kishi, who was stabbed by an assailant six times shortly after the revised security treaty was approved. Unlike Abe, however, his grandfather survived.

The Japan–Australia–US–India Quadrilateral Strategic Dialogue, or ‘Quad’, has gained increasing salience in Tokyo’s efforts to advance its own vision of a Free and Open Indo-Pacific (FOIP), and its broader diplomatic objectives. With the next quadrilateral leader’s summit, to be held in-person in Tokyo tomorrow, it’s worth examining why Japan has so assiduously placed the Quad at the forefront of its regional diplomacy.

Japan initiated the FOIP in 2016 as an unprecedented diplomatic initiative based around three core pillars—rule of law, economic prosperity and peace and stability. The US, and then Australia and India have progressively endorsed this approach and now the FOIP has become codified as the formula around which Quad cooperation has coalesced. The Prime Minister’s Office of Japan (Kantei) has launched a new Quad website in which advertises its mission statement as ‘practical cooperation in various areas, including quality infrastructure, maritime security, counter-terrorism, cyber security, and humanitarian assistance and disaster relief, with the aim of realizing a “Free and Open Indo-Pacific (FOIP)”.’

Uniting its Quad partners around its own vision for the Indo-Pacific must register as a significant success for Japan’s reinvigorated diplomatic agenda. It is also indicative of the greater efforts that Japan is investing in its external relations as part of its avowed ‘proactive contribution to international peace’.

The FOIP encompasses a range of policies and practical agreements that explicitly serve to shape the Indo-Pacific in the direction of a ‘rules-based order’. Such an order, as exemplified to in Quad statements, places emphasis on respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity of all states, freedom from military, economic and political coercion, and promotion of regional stability and economic prosperity. With increasing challenges to this order—ranging from Chinese assertiveness in the East and South China Seas to North Korean nuclear-missile development and Russian aggression in Ukraine—Tokyo (along with its partners) has stressed the need to prevent the region being governed by the axiom of ‘might makes right’.

Two further dimensions to order-building through the Quad on the FOIP model are pertinent. The first is the material balance of power in the region. As China’s strategic weight waxes relative to the US and its allies, bringing India into alignment with the American alliance network—as an individual strategic partner and through the Quad—assists in redressing the shifting power balance in a way favourable to Japan. This is not to suggest that the Quad will be formalised into an ‘Asian NATO’ as its critics claim, but that quadrilateral cooperation does provide a measure of strategic reassurance for Tokyo.

The second is the ideological dimension to Quad cooperation. For Tokyo, uniting four of the region’s most significant democracies is seen as desirable in a world in which democratic liberalism is endangered, human rights are violated and free trade is imperiled. Indeed, Tokyo has long sought to build an ‘Arc of Freedom and Prosperity’ (in 2007, when the Quad first convened) or a ‘Democratic Security Diamond’ (in 2012, upon the return of Shinzo Abe as PM). Upholding such principles, and thus the progressive consolidation of the Quad, tangibly supports Tokyo’s implementation of ‘values-based diplomacy’.

From this, it’s clear why Japanese diplomacy places such a premium on the Quad given the intersections with its own foreign, economic and security policy objectives (as stated in the 2021 diplomatic bluebook). In other words, Japan has much to gain from championship of the Quad.

But in return, Japan has much to offer its Quad partners on the basis of the shared interests and values identified above.

Japan has been undergoing a quiet revolution in terms of its national security strategy over recent years. The combination of domestic security reforms, new security legislation and the restructuring and re-equipping of the Japan Self-Defense Forces makes Japan a far more forward-leaning and capable partner to the other Quad members. The proposed doubling of the Japanese defence budget, if it eventuates, will be a game-changer in Japan’s national security posture.

Thus, all the Quad partners collectively and individually benefit from what Japan brings to the table in terms of achieving common aims. Here, I identify just three ways in which Japan can purposefully contribute to aspects of the Quad agenda.

First, Japan’s economic contribution will be impactful in terms of its technological prowess and its ample official development assistance polices and investment capacities. Japan’s’ existing Partnership for Quality Infrastructure policy is indicative of the contribution it can make to providing the pressing needs for developmental and infrastructure needs in Southeast Asia, the Pacific Islands and beyond (through the Quad Infrastructure Coordination Group). Japan is also well positioned to contribute to the Quad’s mandate for advanced technological collaboration in relation to green technology, clean energy, robotics, artificial intelligence, quantum computing, cyber, space, the electromagnetic spectrum and other emerging defence technologies.

All of this capability will assist in the Quad’s aspirations to establish a ‘secure technology ecosystem’ and to share standards through the Quad Senior Cyber Group, as well as to assist members to collectively keep pace in the unfolding technological competition in the Indo-Pacific.

Reinforcing this, as economic security concerns become increasingly salient in regional strategic competition, Japan’s proven record with regard to multilateral economic institutions and regimes positions it well to contribute to shared Quad objectives in areas such as rules/standards-setting and increased connectivity initiatives. Thus, Japan’s own efforts to deepen cooperation, including economic integration with Southeast Asia, through the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership and the ASEAN outlook on the Indo-Pacific, reinforce the Quad’s objectives to recognise ‘ASEAN centrality’. The same applies to the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework and Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership.

Japan can also make a significant contribution in the maritime sphere. With impressive naval and coast guard capabilities, it can confidently help deal with issues including law enforcement, maritime domain awareness, partner capacity-building, and humanitarian assistance and disaster relief. It is well practised in responding to natural disasters, for example, both domestically and overseas, often in tandem with Quad partners, such as the 2004 core group response to the Boxing Day Tsunami. The Quad discussed HADR for the Ukraine earlier this year. As a maritime nation, Japan can do its part in the Quad shipping taskforce, designed to establish low-to-zero-emission shipping corridors and green and decarbonise the shipping value chain (in coordination with the Quad climate working group).

Recognising that regional challenges cannot be addressed by any country alone, Japan is a keen proponent of Quad cooperation in terms of the national benefits derived from minilateralism and as an active and meaningful contributor to its mandate. Indeed, Tokyo’s sustained championship of minilateral cooperation through the Quad and other mechanisms is testament to the emergent leadership role the country has assumed in regional affairs.

The Australian and Japanese prime ministers met virtually on 6 January and signed a reciprocal access agreement (RAA) that makes it easier for each nation’s troops to operate in each other’s country. As important, it strengthens the political and psychological groundwork for increased military cooperation between the two nations.

It’s the first such agreement Japan has signed with a country besides the United States. And it took a while.

An agreement in principle was reached in November 2020 between Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga and Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison—after six years of negotiating. It took another 14 months to finalise the deal.

The door is now open wide in both directions for practically any initiative the two sides desire.

One should remember, however, that the Japanese and Australian militaries are not strangers. Japanese forces have been training in Australia since the early 2010s, which included sending ships and troops to Talisman Sabre and other exercises. Japanese ships have also exercised alongside the Royal Australian Navy in the Indian Ocean Malabar Exercise and in the South China Sea.

Individual Australian Defence Force personnel have been assigned to Japan for decades. And Royal Australian Air Force aircraft have used US bases in Japan (under United Nations auspices) in recent years while enforcing North Korea sanctions. And in September 2019, a detachment of Australian F-18s conducted the first-ever joint combat exercise with the Japan Air Self-Defense Force in Japan.

A decade ago, most observers considered a Japan–Australia RAA and all the above activities to be impossible.

Chinese threats, pressure and sabre-rattling do indeed have a silver lining.

Now that the deal has been signed, the important thing is what both sides make of it.

There are some easy things to start moving forward with.

An Australian Army liaison officer is now assigned to the Japanese Ground Self-Defense Force’s Ground Combat Command in Japan. But that’s not so useful. It will be better to see an Australian liaison officer or two assigned to the Japan Self-Defense Forces headquarters in Tokyo.

The right officers, doing some pushing and persuading—and with some help from the US Marines and US Navy—can move the Australia–Japan defence relationship forward on a far broader front than just army to army.

And when the Americans and Japanese finally establish a joint headquarters in Japan (hopefully before hell has frozen over), the Australians should be an integral part of it.

Another helpful initiative would be sending a RAAF squadron to Japan on long-term deployment and, vice versa, a Japan Air Self-Defense Force squadron to Australia. Bringing the Australian army and navy to exercise in Japan is also easy.

Besides the favourable optics of the JSDF and ADF operating together, Japan benefits from deeper exposure to another military and different ways of doing things. And both benefit from the psychological and political ties that come from deeper military-to-military relations.

The JSDF needs opportunities for realistic training to better professionalise itself. It can’t do this in Japan, owing to limited training areas and excessive local restrictions.

Australia offers excellent opportunities for all three JSDF services to train by themselves, together and with other militaries.

Australia’s Northern Territory, in particular, is the best place in the entire hemisphere for the sort of unrestrained, combined arms training that Japan desperately needs. The JSDF’s only alternative is to make the trip to Southern California—and even then, US training facilities are not as good as those in the Northern Territory.

Here’s one idea: combine Japanese and Australian amphibious forces into a joint task force to master the complex air–sea–ground coordination that is part and parcel of amphibious operations—but also applicable to a broader range of military operations.

Send a Japanese amphibious ship—even an older tank landing ship—and a battalion of Japanese ‘marines’ from the Amphibious Rapid Deployment Brigade down to Australia for six months and operate out of Darwin, as well as over in Queensland, with Australia’s amphibious force. It’s a good way to give the new unit some real experience outside Japan, in an unfamiliar environment and with foreign forces. That’s how a military improves. Australia’s amphibious force can also use the practice.

Maybe the two could operate the Australian–Japanese task force up into Southeast Asia or throughout Oceania, with training in humanitarian assistance and disaster response as one of its missions. That’s urgently needed as Chinese influence steadily expands in the region.

This is all far preferable to the canned exercises in Kyushu or Hokkaido—with ‘commissars’ at JSDF headquarters in Ichigaya nearby to keep the training as ‘safe’ (in other words, unrealistic) as possible—while cowering in fear that somebody might complain the training is ‘too noisy’ or ‘scary’.

But isn’t the Talisman Sabre exercise enough? Maybe just make it bigger?

No. Talisman Sabre is a good exercise. But for the participants, such exercises can become like a piano player who practises only one song. They might play it perfectly, but it’s still just one song. Moreover, it’s a song opponents have had time to study.

The RAA is politically important. Rather than giving in to Beijing’s threats and bullying, two of Asia’s key democracies are deepening their defence ties—with the potential for creating real operational capabilities—and employing them around the region.

The RAA also belies Beijing’s shrill claims that regional nations dislike Japan because of World War II and fear a remilitarised Japan. The Australians have as much reason as anyone to hold a grudge, but they’ve long since recognised that today’s Japan isn’t 1930s or 1940s Japan. Take away Korea and China, and that’s the feeling throughout most of the Indo-Pacific, if one looks closely.

The RAA is also good news for the Americans.

For starters, US forces are overstretched regionally and worldwide. Whatever the JSDF does in or with Australia feeds into the United States’ desperate (though unstated) need for a more capable JSDF. That means a JSDF capable of fighting in its own right, and also as an ally. And this is no less beneficial to Australia—which is game, but not big enough to defend itself against an angry China.

As important, increased Japan–Australia activities break down the hub-and-spoke nature of the US presence in the Pacific. That’s a construct that has American forces operating too often bilaterally with Asia–Pacific nations (the ‘spokes’).

The spokes need to operate together—creating a more durable web—without the Americans driving things. Doing so improves capabilities and also deepens the psychological and political ties that come from military-to-military engagements between like-minded nations.

This doesn’t mean the Americans are excluded or unnecessary, but rather it bolsters the US presence as part of a more complex and stronger web of defence relationships. It should be seen as cross-bracing rather than as a replacement or a hedge.

The web approach is particularly important because, given that the countries involved are democracies where policies can change with elections, the more there are overlapping defence relationships, the more likely the region as a whole can continue to build its defence posture even if the government changes in one of the partners.

Beijing is of course displeased with the RAA and will use its levers to try to stifle it before it can fully form.

Japan’s once powerful pro-Beijing constituencies in the political, official and business worlds are quiescent for now, but that can change. Given this, one wonders if Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s administration might put a brake on attempts to do more with Australia on the military front.

Something similar may even play out in Australia should the Labor Party win the next election. Laborites say they won’t, but one wonders.

Also, hopefully, the Japanese government doesn’t see the RAA as meaning Japan needs to do less defence-wise.

Kishida needs to allow the JSDF to up its game considerably. Japan’s military still needs more money (for training and personnel) and to meet recruiting targets that it has missed by 25% annually for years. The JSDF is still not ready to fight a war—needing, among other things, a joint capability (which it doesn’t have).

Too often it seems that signing an agreement is an end in itself.

So here’s an idea. A year from now, let’s hold another press conference and see what has actually been accomplished out of the RAA—and what the Japanese and the Australians are doing with each other—that could only have happened because of the RAA.

Sometimes it’s good to keep score.

Ninety years ago, on 18 September 1931, a junior Japanese military officer detonated an explosive that had been carefully laid by a Japanese-owned railroad near the northeastern Chinese city of Shenyang (then known in the West as Mukden). The blast did little damage, but that wasn’t the point. The Japanese blamed Chinese soldiers for the explosion, which they used as a pretext to capture Shenyang and occupy the entire territory, known as Manchuria.

Though Manchuria was a Chinese territory, controlled by warlords loyal (in name if not in reality) to China’s nationalist government, thousands of Japanese soldiers were stationed there under the terms of an earlier treaty. This enabled Japanese forces to overrun the area quickly. Within weeks of the Manchurian Incident, they controlled the southern part of Manchuria, with the north following by early 1932.

This was no imperial invasion, the Japanese claimed. Rather, it was a response to the cries for help coming from the people of Manchuria, who were suffering under the warlords’ iron-fisted rule. Japan merely wanted to help oppressed people to establish an independent state that would liberate them from the maelstrom of corruption that enveloped the rest of China.

Japan even had a name for this new state: Manchukuo, or ‘land of the Manchus’. To add lustre to their vision, they recruited the most famous Manchu around—China’s last emperor, Puyi—to lead it. (Having been deposed in 1912, Puyi was available for alternative monarchical engagements.)

The effort to create an independent Manchurian state became an international cause célèbre, and a test for the League of Nations, the precursor to the United Nations tasked with preserving peace after World War I. The League sent a commission, led by British diplomat Lord Lytton, to investigate the situation. The commission concluded that Japan had effectively staged a coup.

Japan was undeterred. It withdrew from the League of Nations, and held onto its Manchurian puppet state until its defeat in World War II. At that point, the Soviet Union took over, occupying the territory for a year.

At the same time, however, the long-running war between the Chinese Nationalists and Communists was heating up again, with Mao Zedong’s forces claiming more and more territory, beginning in the northeast. By the time the Communists established the People’s Republic of China in 1949, the Manchurian provinces were firmly within their grasp.

But the Chinese have not forgotten the 14-year occupation of Manchuria. In fact, official Chinese doctrine establishes the 1931 Manchurian Incident as the beginning of World War II. And every year on 18 September sirens wail in Shenyang and other cities in the region to commemorate not just the explosion itself but the atrocities that followed. These include the horrific experiments that Unit 731—the Japanese army’s research-and-development unit for biological and chemical warfare—carried out on live subjects.

What do these memories mean today? Within China, the message is clear: before the People’s Republic was established, the country was weak and vulnerable to foreign invasion. A major museum in Shenyang, which tells the story of those who died fighting the Japanese occupation, reinforces the narrative that China’s Nationalist leaders did little to protect the country from humiliation by invaders.

But while China’s leaders are eager to use the Manchurian Incident to advance their favoured narrative of the past, they hesitate to acknowledge echoes of the event in the present, particularly when it comes to the actions of China’s close military and strategic partner, Russia. In 2008, when Russia invaded Georgia, Chinese leaders, perhaps quietly seething over the distraction from the start of that year’s Olympic Games in Beijing, refrained from voicing strong support for its actions (unlike other Kremlin allies such as Belarus). But they didn’t push back either, merely calling for all sides to remain calm.

Likewise, in 2014, China refused to denounce Russia’s occupation and annexation of Crimea from Ukraine, or the Kremlin-organised plebiscite, unmonitored by any neutral body, that endorsed it. When the UN Security Council considered a resolution condemning the referendum, China abstained.

Of course, China itself has been known to redefine territorial questions to its own benefit. But, unlike Russia, China has avoided brazenly crossing internationally recognised borders. Yes, it has pushed hard at boundaries in the Himalayas and the South China Sea. But it has reserved its harshest aggression for areas clearly within its territory, such as Hong Kong and the Xinjiang region, and its strongest threats for the one place, Taiwan, where the Cold War left some level of ambiguity.

This is another legacy of the Manchurian Incident. The direct violation of an international land border remains an uncomfortable prospect for the Chinese.

China’s remembrance of the Manchurian Incident raises one more question: how do its current leaders believe the international community should have responded? In general, they take the position that disputes should be settled through dialogue and negotiation, rather than military action. They pour scorn on American interventions, such as in Afghanistan. Given this, it’s harder for China’s leaders to argue that, after the League of Nations’ attempts to dissuade Japan failed, the international community should have taken stronger military action in 1931.

To be sure, America’s interventions in Afghanistan and Iraq had their own dynamics; they were by no means repeats of the Japanese invasion of Manchuria. But it’s striking that, for China, the Manchurian crisis of 1931 remains such an important cause for national remembrance but doesn’t yield easy lessons for reflection, let alone obvious analogies for dealing with today’s geopolitical challenges.

The 11th of March 2021 marks the 10th anniversary of the earthquake and tsunami that devastated northeastern Japan, killing more than 16,000 people and leading to the Fukushima nuclear accident. On hearing of the disaster, Australia’s well-practised and disciplined crisis-response mechanism swung into action. The government decided to send an urban search and rescue, or USAR, team, which was to fly to Japan on a Royal Australian Air Force C-17 heavy transport aircraft.

In Japan, unsurprisingly, there was a great deal of confusion. The devastation was widespread, communication systems were down and the government was mobilising national resources to respond to the catastrophic event. The Japanese were also attempting to coordinate the many offers of assistance they had received from around the world, all the while enduring multiple aftershocks. In the 24 hours following the initial quake, more than 70 aftershocks above magnitude 5.0 were recorded.

Australia was fortunate that a year earlier a RAAF group captain had been sent to Yokota Air Base, a US facility in western Tokyo, and appointed to head United Nations Command–Rear, a small unit responsible for supporting international forces should they need to respond to a crisis on the Korean peninsula.

Despite having no role or authority to do so, UNC–Rear accepted responsibility for managing the arrival of the C-17 and the USAR personnel. Being co-located with US Forces Japan enabled UNC–Rear to coordinate with the Australian embassy and liaise directly with American and Japanese officials to guarantee the entry of the C-17 and the USAR team. In addition, the New Zealand embassy contacted UNC–Rear and requested that it support a small New Zealand USAR team, arriving on a commercial flight, that would marry up with the Australian contingent. This task was also accepted.

The delivery of the USAR team could have been the completion of the mission for the RAAF, but Chief of Air Force Mark Binskin approved the C-17 to remain in Japan if it could be employed to support relief operations. Following a short conversation with the US Air Force colonel responsible, arrangements were made for the RAAF aircraft to integrate into the USAF relief effort, with UNC–Rear providing coordination and support.

The C-17 remained in Japan for two weeks and flew 23 sorties, ranging from Okinawa in the south, to airfields north of the disaster area, and to Sendai, in the disaster area itself. It carried more than 450 tonnes of crucial relief supplies as diverse as water, baby formula, nappies and food. It also carried Japanese military vehicles and 135 personnel to support the relief efforts.

The Fukushima nuclear disaster added a further level of complexity to relief efforts. For RAAF personnel in Japan, it meant operating in an uncertain environment where understanding and managing risk became hugely important. No one had operated in a potentially radiologically ‘hot’ environment before, so techniques and procedures had to be rapidly developed.

The nuclear accident also added another layer to Australia’s response. Keeping the Fukushima reactors cool to prevent a meltdown was a major focus of the Japanese authorities and more pumps to keep them doused with water were required. US engineering firm Bechtel offered to supply an unmanned water cannon, which was located in Perth, and the US sent a request through UNC–Rear asking whether the RAAF could transport it to Japan.

The RAAF response was swift. The two available C-17s were diverted from their planned tasking to RAAF Base Pearce near Perth and an air load team worked day and night to develop the structures and supports needed to load the pumping equipment and pipes onto the aircraft—a task that had never been done before. As soon as they were able, the C-17s left Australia for Japan and delivered their cargo. They remained in Japan for a few days before departing and were soon followed home by the original C-17 with the USAR team on board.

Among all of the nations that supported the relief effort, the Australian contribution stood out. Australia was the only nation aside from the US that made a direct contribution of military forces, and the RAAF integrated seamlessly with its US and Japanese counterparts.

Why did it work so well? First, there was a determination by all the Australians involved that they were going to assist and wouldn’t take no for an answer. Second, military-to-military relationships are built on two pillars: the structural, which comes from agreements, memorandums of understanding and so on, and the personal, which comes down to trust. The RAAF had been investing in its relationships with the US and Japanese air forces for many years and had built both the structural and trust frameworks needed to get the job done.

While the RAAF had worked with the Japan Air Self-Defense Force before, it had not carried any Japan Ground Self-Defense Force equipment—but the USAF had in its C-17s. Tripartite sharing of information, common standards and high levels of trust meant the RAAF could move Japanese forces without any undue concerns on anyone’s part.

Australia had a choice; it did not have to respond in the wake of the earthquake and tsunami, and when it did the contribution of the USAR team would have sufficed. It must be remembered that in 2011 the RAAF operated only four C-17s (it now has eight). In the middle of the crisis, three were deployed to Japan and the fourth was in Australia undergoing heavy maintenance and couldn’t fly. To commit Australia’s entire available C-17 fleet came with a level of risk, but also demonstrated a significant level of commitment, and the contribution they made in a short period of time was invaluable. Japan noticed what Australia did.

The RAAF personnel understood how to work with their US and Japanese counterparts, they acted whether it was in their job description or not, and they accepted responsibility for the task. By integrating an Australian air component in the middle of a triple disaster and operating in uncertain conditions, they demonstrated agility, flexibility, professionalism and compassion.

In the aftermath of the disaster, the majority of the accolades and formal honours went to Australian embassy staff in Tokyo, and the contribution of the RAAF and UNC–Rear was largely overlooked. Yet, arguably, the air force contribution, enabled by the UNC–Rear staff, was the defining factor that demonstrated to Japan that Australia was not only a committed friend, but also a highly competent security partner—and that view has set the tone of the relationship ever since.