Over 60 postwar years, the world has become accustomed to seeing Japan weasel around in its dealings with great powers, especially China. No more. In the latest case of Tokyo calling a spade a spade, Foreign Minister Taro Aso told a press conference that China is becoming a menace. China, he said, is “a neighbor equipped with nuclear bombs and has expanded its military outlays for 12 years in a row. It is beginning to be a considerable threat.” These kinds of remarks infuriate the comrades of the Middle Kingdom, who also don’t like Japan’s move to re-write its “no-war” constitution.
The Air Force is on track to reach its annual goal of graduating 1,500 new pilots that had proved elusive to this point, one year after the service launched a sweeping overhaul of its undergraduate pilot training program, Air Education and Training Command said Sept. 14.
