The Asian paradox: Why nuclear India should learn from pacifist Japan

As China accelerates its military buildup and expands its influence across Asia, its two principal regional rivals — India and Japan — face a common challenge: how to build defense institutions capable of making fast, informed decisions in an era of high-tech warfare.

Yet an intriguing paradox has emerged. Constitutionally pacifist Japan has spent the past decade modernizing its defense decision-making apparatus and empowering military professionals within government. India, despite being a nuclear-armed state confronting an increasingly assertive China along their long, disputed frontier, continues to maintain a cumbersome system that marginalizes military expertise and concentrates authority in a civilian bureaucracy largely staffed by generalist administrators.

The result is that Japan today possesses a more streamlined and operationally agile defense establishment than India.

The roots of this divergence lie in history. Following World War II, Japan feared a return to the militarism that had driven it to catastrophe. To prevent the military from ever again becoming an autonomous political force, career bureaucrats were allowed to govern the defense ministry under a doctrine known as “Bunkan Yuyu,” or civilian bureaucratic superiority.

India’s concerns were different but produced a similar outcome. As military coups swept through newly independent states across Asia, Africa and the Middle East, India’s leaders sought to insulate their young democracy by systematically downgrading the institutional role of the armed forces. The defense ministry became the preserve of civilian bureaucrats, many of whom rotated in from unrelated ministries such as agriculture, education or rural development.

Over time, both India and Japan built defense establishments in which uniformed military officers wielded little influence over policymaking. But whereas Japan eventually recognized the costs of this arrangement, India largely has not.

Confronted by China’s aggressive rise and the North Korean........

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