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Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe backed his defense minister Tuesday after the main opposition party called for her to resign for misleading parliament about her links to a controversial educational foundation.

Abe told parliament Defense Minister Tomomi Inada should fulfill her responsibility to explain the situation, but stay in her job. Inada, a former lawyer, apologized for telling a parliamentary committee she had never advised a nationalist kindergarten operator at the center of a scandal over a suspicious land deal. The defense chief said she had later confirmed that she represented the group in court years ago in place of her husband, also a lawyer with the same practice.

Documents indicate that Inada appeared in court on behalf of Moritomo Gakuen in 2004, Kyodo News reported, citing a person connected with the case.

"I didn’t remember this at all. I answered questions based on my memory, so I don’t see my responses as false," Inada told reporters earlier. "I don’t see any need to take responsibility for this."

Abe’s support levels

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in a series of media polls this month amid the scandal over the foundation, which had links with his wife. While most surveys still show approval over 50 percent and the opposition remains weak, he will be anxious to avoid a further dip in popularity, in order to maintain his party’s majority in an election due by the end of next year.

Prewar Curriculum
Parliamentary debate has been dominated for a month by questions over Moritomo Gakuen, which runs a kindergarten in Osaka that espouses elements of the prewar nationalist curriculum and explicitly backs Abe. Questions have been raised over how the group purchased state-owned land for what the opposition has said is a fraction of its assessed value, as part of a plan to open an elementary school.

The Tsukamoto kindergarten is known for making children bow to portraits of the emperor and recite a 19th century imperial

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on education -- practices dropped elsewhere after Japan’s World War II defeat. Last month, the kindergarten apologized for using expressions that "could cause misunderstanding among foreigners." Kyodo news agency reported that the principal had been questioned over alleged slurs against Koreans and Chinese.

‘False Remarks’
Abe’s wife Akie has severed her links with the school, for which she had been scheduled to act as an honorary principal. She has visited the kindergarten, but no evidence has emerged to link her or Abe to the land sale. Opposition attacks are now focusing on Inada, an Abe protegee and one of only three women in the 20-strong cabinet.

"This means she made false remarks in parliament," Hirofumi Ryu, an opposition Democratic Party official in charge of parliamentary affairs, said by phone. "It cannot be tolerated. She should take responsibility by resigning."

In a later committee session, Democratic Party lawmaker Naoki Kazama said records for Inada’s funding group showed donations from Yasunori Kagoike, the head of the educational foundation, and from his wife in 2007. Inada said she had no memory of the donations, but did recall seeing the couple at a fundraising party that year and assumed they had bought tickets.

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Blackstone said:

And just why do you wish Australia picked JP submarine over French?

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The U.S. Navy and Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF) fleets took their interoperability to a new level this month, conducting two parts swaps to show their ability to logistically support one another.

On March 11, officers from Arleigh Burke-class destroyer USS Stethem (DDG-63) and Murasame-class destroyer JDS Ikazuchi (DD-107) exchanged maintenance parts while in Guam for MultiSail 17, a bilateral exercise between the U.S. and Japan, according to a Navy news release. The two ships conducted the first-ever U.S.-Japan exchange of goods under the Acquisition and Cross-Servicing Agreements (ACSA) process earlier this month.

Under ACSA, the United States can exchange common goods such as provisions, fuel, transportation, ammunition and equipment with a foreign nation, according to the news release. The exchanges are “intended to provide acquisition options for logistics in support of exercises or contingencies.”

Stethem supply officer Lt. Nicolas Segovia, who conducted the transfer aboard Ikazuchi with his JMSDF counterpart, Lt. Takaaki Maeda, said “the ACSA part transfer was a perfect opportunity to further expand our relationship with the JMSDF.”

“In real-life scenarios, ACSA transfers give both of us the flexibility to execute the mission,” he said in the news release.
“It took the coordination of different people from multiple organizations all working in concert to pull this off. Our next step is to provide greater support, whether that is multiple items, repairables, or even food subsistence items.”

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, these transfers generally take place during “wartime, combined exercises, training, deployments, contingency operations, humanitarian or foreign disaster relief operations, certain peace operations under the [United Nations] Charter, or for unforeseen or exigent circumstances,” and, as a result, are usually executed by the regional combatant commands.

Conducting the transfer at a ship level instead of at the COCOM level – in this case, U.S. Pacific Command – could prove important, particularly between two ships that operate out of Yokosuka, Japan, as the two fleets constantly seek better interoperability. The MultiSail exercise taking place in Guam was designed for “improving interoperability between the U.S. and Japanese forces. This exercise benefits from realistic, shared training, enhancing our ability to work together to confront any contingency,” according to a Navy photo caption.

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Three CV-22s that had been scheduled to deploy to Yokota AB, Japan, in 2017 will not be stationed there until fiscal year 2020, the Department of Defense

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Tuesday. The three Ospreys were to be the first of 10 for a

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at Yokota, according to a 2015 DOD plan. At that time, the Department said it was deploying the CV-22s to “provide increased capability for US Special Operations forces to respond quickly to crises and contingencies in Japan and across the Asia-Pacific region.” Neither the DOD nor Yokota responded to queries about the reason for the delay. It’s not clear if the delay also will push back final delivery, which was originally slated for 2021.

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The Japanese Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF) commissioned its second Izumo-class helicopter carrier, JS Kaga (DDH 184), on 22 March in a ceremony held at the Japan Marine United (JMU) shipyard in Yokohama, near Tokyo. The first of class, JS Izumo (DDH 183), was berthed adjacent to Kaga during the event.

Built by JMU and launched in August 2015, Kaga is 248 m long, has a beam of 38 m, and will displace 24,000 tonnes at full load. Powered by four GE LM2500 gas turbines in a COGAG arrangement, it is estimated to have a top speed of 30 kt, according to Jane's Fighting Ships . It will have a complement of 520 officers and enlisted men.

The two Izumo-class vessels are the largest warships to enter Japanese service since the Second World War.

Although classified helicopter-destroyers by the JMSDF, these vessels have the appearance of a carrier rather than a destroyer. The flat-top is designed to operate helicopters in various roles.

Kaga is expected to embark a mix of Mitsubishi-Sikorsky SH-60K Seahawk anti-submarine warfare helicopters and AgustaWestland/Kawasaki MCH-101 for mine-countermeasure operations.

The JMSDF also anticipate using the ship for disaster relief, not only to deploy helicopters and personnel but also to exploit its capabilities as a command platform.

The armament of Kaga is limited to short-range self-defence systems, with two Raytheon Sea RAM missile systems and two Vulcan Phalanx multibarrelled 20 mm guns.

Kaga is the first Japanese naval ship to take that name since the Second World War aircraft carrier that took part in the Pearl Harbor attacks and was lost at the Battle of Midway.

In addition to the Izumo class, the JMSDF have two smaller 18,000-tonne helicopter-destroyers of the Hyuga class, which are capable of carrying up to 10 helicopters. Three 14,000-tonne Osumi-class tank landing ships (LST) are also flat-tops that can operate helicopters, but have no hangar facilities.

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Jura said:

according to Jane's
Japanese navy commissions second Izumo-class helicopter carrier
... and I don't have an access to the rest of the source which is

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