The United Kingdom and Japan will allow military forces to be deployed to one another’s nations, as Tokyo expands bilateral cooperation with other U.S. allies amid concerns about China’s rise.
U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak will sign a major defense agreement during a meeting Wednesday in London with his Japanese counterpart Fumio Kishida. The pact — the most significant deal of its type between the two countries in more than a century — will allow planning and delivery of larger, more complex military exercises, according to a U.K. government statement.
The U.K. becomes the first European country to have such an agreement with Japan, which has a similar deal with Australia. Japan’s cabinet recently approved the country’s biggest increase in defense spending since the end of World War II in 1945, updating its national security policy and describing China as an “unprecedented strategic threat.”
