Adjusting to a big-power era, Germany and Japan enhance militaries

Japan and Germany, World War II’s two great vanquished powers, are both enhancing the role and stature of military power in their diplomatic and security policies. Their adversaries may differ, but their motivations are similar.

At his White House visit this month with a supportive President Joe Biden, Prime Minister Kishida Fumio laid out Japan’s assertive new national security strategy, which includes a commitment to substantially higher defense spending.

A week later, U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin was in Germany taking stock of Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s commitment to bigger military budgets...