Japan Enacts Bill to Rename ASDF to Air and Space SDF

Tokyo, June 26 (Jiji Press)–The Diet, Japan’s parliament, enacted a bill Friday to reorganize the Air Self-Defense Force as the Air and Space Self-Defense Force. With the reorganization, Japan aims to ramp up capabilities for space operations in light of the growing importance of space in national security. The bill to revise the Defense Ministry establishment law was approved at a plenary meeting of the House of Councillors, the upper chamber of the Diet, following its passage in the House of Representatives, the lower chamber, in April. The ASDF will be renamed by the end of fiscal 2026, which ends next March, marking the first name change for any of the Air, Ground and Maritime SDFs since the SDF was established in 1954. The bill also increases the number of state ministers of defense from one to two in order to better prepare for emergency responses to disasters. “We will transform the organization so that we can respond to the most severe and complex security environment of the postwar period,” Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi said at a press conference. END [Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]