Japan beefing up its armed forces

Japan Shifting Further Away From Pacifism - NYTimes:

Japan has increased military spending this year for the first time in 11 years because of China's  waxing power and assertiveness. The only problem is that Japan's birth rate fell off a cliff a long time ago. The real question is not whether Japan can defend itself now, but whether it will be able to do so in 20 years when the cohort of military-age people will be much smaller.

Meanwhile, China has a growing number of excess males. Because of China's "one child" policy, female unborn babies are aborted at a staggering rate because couples overwhelmingly want their single child to be a male.

In not much more than one more generation, China will have as many as 50 million more men than women, men with no hope of marriage and family of their own. This is a guarantee of domestic unrest in its gentlest terms, possible revolution in its harshest.

So what might the ruling class decide to do about all those excess men? Well, getting them killed off in carload lots would solve a lot of the problem, and Chinese leaders know just where to do it: Taiwan and the contested Senkaku islands, controlled by Japan since 1895, excerpt for America's post-World War II administration that ended in 1971. The islands are uninhabited. China says the islands were its own beginning in the 14th century. Discovery of fossil-fuel reserves in the islands' waters keep the dispute alive.