Re-Establishing Japan’s Intelligence Capability – ‘Spy Paradise’ lost?

Japan’s intelligence reform is significant on three levels. It reveals how Japan’s approach to security is becoming more self-reliant and autonomous. It will facilitate diversification of Japan’s partnerships, reducing dependence on the US-Japan alliance. Perhaps the most historically important aspect will be how it catalyses Japanese society’s readiness to reconcile the imperative of national security with longstanding hesitation about granting their government special powers to deliver it.

The first of the reform’s three stages is well under way with the law to establish a National Intelligence Council (NIC) as the command centre for intelligence activities and a National Intelligence Bureau (NIB) passing the Upper House on 27 May 2026 with the support of opposition parties (the ruling LDP lacking an upper house majority). This law imposes a hierarchy on relationships among government institutions responsible for direction, collection, assessment and analysis by strengthening centralisation and elevating this function in the bureaucratic hierarchy, placing the new bureau on par with the National Security Secretariat.

Enacting an ‘anti-spy’ law is the second stage (planned for later in 2026), and will be more contentious. Counter-espionage and counter-subversion will operate within Japanese society so have to respect concerns that intelligence and security action could be abused for political advantage. Foreshadowing this, according to Japan’s national broadcaster NHK, ‘Committees in both the Lower and Upper houses have passed a supplementary resolution to ensure personal information and privacy are not unnecessarily infringed. It also states that the government should not gather information in a way that undermines political neutrality.’

Some of the threats targeted by the new law are mediated through the expanding and somewhat borderless digital domain, with hostile foreign influence using social media to target the Japanese population on a cognitive level. Every democracy wrestles with the legitimacy of links connecting domestic dissent and foreign sources of inspiration. Japan has to do it with a population grown accustomed to liberties enjoyed under state institutions that jettisoned the practice of countering ‘dangerous thought’ several decades ago.

Despite public protests against the reform, the case for tighter counter-espionage legislation will be sufficient to pass some version of this legislation. The current system has too many vulnerabilities. As pointed out by one expert, Japan's 2014 Act on the Protection of Specially Designated Secrets, ‘only applies to information that has been actively designated as secret by a government agency. It does not criminalise acting as a clandestine agent for a foreign power or accepting payment from a foreign intelligence service.’ In addition to emerging challenges like foreign influence noted above, there are mounting concerns about electoral interference and transnational repression that would require new legislation anyway. Japan’s shift to accept larger numbers of foreign resident workers also expands the task of monitoring threats from groups or individuals connected to conflicts going on outside Japan.

The third stage of creating a fully-fledged foreign intelligence service is expected to happen in 2027. Japan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs collects information overseas, but diplomats are forbidden from seeking material in the way intelligence services conventionally would, in other words, recruiting agents through a covert approach. Japan’s network of Defence Attaches has grown but lack the legislative framework enabling their full potential. With ‘economic security’ becoming a more salient aspect of geopolitical competition impinging on national security, there is naturally a need for more information coming from the commercial world and financial institutions, which is hard to gather from a desk in Tokyo.

What is Different this Time?

Takaichi is not the first Japanese leader to try and re-establish traditional intelligence functions and anti-espionage laws in the period since the Second World War. As RUSI fellow Professor Ken Kotani wrote in 2009, similar plans attempted on a number of occasions during the Cold War failed due to opposition from public opinion, bureaucratic rivalry and leadership changes that interrupted the momentum of reform. This raises the question – ‘what is different this time?’

Sharpening threat perception extends across government and society based on the military build-up and power projection by China and North Korea, the Ukraine war and Russia-DPRK-China alignment. Add to this a sense that shifts in the global balance of power as well as an attenuating commitment to allies from the American public and institutions are leaving Japan more exposed. The fact that immigration and the foreign population in Japan emerged as an electoral issue in 2025 was a novelty, but could combine with a sense of social precarity to elicit acceptance that somebody needs to keep an eye on the threat within.

The foreign population issue was only one (likely minor) factor in Takaichi’s huge lower- house electoral victory, which gave her party a majority of unprecedented scale in the postwar era. It implies she has a mandate for reform and (since she submitted to the judgment of the electorate after being chosen to lead the party) her full term of leadership should give her the longevity to see this demanding reform program through to completion.

Demographic change is often identified as a source of crisis in Japanese society, but in this case, it is probably a progressive force for Takaichi’s mission to dispense with what remains of Japan’s post-war restrictions on security policy. Intelligence reform takes its place on her ‘to-do’ list alongside arms sales, the option to host allied nuclear weapons and reforming a constitution that prohibits Japan from maintaining ‘war potential’. Only a few older Japanese people have memories of war, but many more were educated towards pacifist and state-sceptic sentiments over the period from the 1960s to the turn of the century. Evidence indicates younger Japanese citizens are more likely to favour revision.

The broadening of the intelligence remit may improve the prospects to overcome the obstructive effects of bureaucratic rivalry on reform. To the extent information and analytical understanding is being drawn from a wider range of fields (commercial and economic, scientific, cognitive), the portion outside that normally concerned with crime will increase. This lends weight to a point ruling and opposition parties reportedly stressed, that ‘the top post of the National Intelligence Bureau must not be reserved for any ministry or agency. The concern stems from the fact that . . . the bureau’s predecessor, has consistently been headed by officials from the National Police Agency [(NPA)].’

The Implications

One consequence of these reforms will be to make Japan more self-reliant and autonomous when it comes to national security policy, extending all the way from the cognitive framework through which leaders and society interpret the world, through strategic foresight of cross-cutting opportunities and risks, to operational and technical advantage in diplomatic, military and industrial competition. The Prime Minister will be more accountable by virtue of responsibility for direct oversight of the process for setting priority information requirements to inform policy.

A more autonomous capability will inevitably engender the development of a distinct Japanese view of the world. While this was possible under the old system, a considerable amount of reliance on foreign partners – in particular the US ally – was unavoidable to fill capability gaps. As Japan generates more of its own intelligence, it improves its bargaining position to trade it not just with Americans but with all manner of partners. Stronger national capability will make Japanese leaders more sophisticated consumers of intelligence – even from allies.

A system more independent from allies increases the possibility for divergent analysis, opening gaps in policy positions that have to be managed diplomatically. Japan will (at least initially) be working without the benefits of a coordination system like the ‘5 Eyes’, which to some extent mitigates the waste of parallel collection effort and risk of disruption where operations overlap with those of allies (inside Japan and abroad).

These reforms also offer opportunities for the Japan-UK bilateral security cooperation relationship. Industrial programs like the GCAP fighter that require a high level of information security will be better supported. Japan’s proximity to China, Russia and DPRK place it in an advantageous position to collect information that would benefit the UK’s own situation awareness. Setting up new institutions and appointing more staff increases opportunities for professional relationships that bring these ‘quasi allies’ together.

As for whether these reforms catalyse Japanese society’s readiness to reconcile the national security imperative with their reluctance to trust the state with special powers denied since the 1940s, time will tell. If so, it would mark a significant turning point in Japanese post-war history. Several areas remain unclear and will demand skilful handling to ensure the reforms strengthen Japan’s cohesion as well as its resilience.

Points to watch

Some of the following issues need to be addressed urgently, others will be worked out by the end of the year, when the government is reported to be planning a National Intelligence Strategy that will serve as a medium- to long-term guideline for intelligence activities.

1. The choice of the first Director of the National Intelligence Bureau will be read as an indication of whether the Prime Minister has the power to make the selection on merit or will succumb to the habit of favouring former officials from the NPA. Related to that, there is a question of whether it is appropriate for this Director to serve under a fixed term, given that the power of appointment and dismissal would rest with the Prime Minister of the day, and whether this could affect the politicisation of intelligence.
2. Critics of the recent legislation reportedly point out that ‘mechanisms for reporting to the Diet and for oversight by an independent third-party body over the operation of [NIC and NIB] are insufficient.’ The insistence on effective oversight is likely to grow louder as the bill on counter-espionage, including rules on foreign influence, comes up for debate.
3. Whether Japan will address the issue of tasks beyond collecting intelligence that typically fall to agencies having the capability for covert action (what the Russians call ‘active measures’).
4. The extent to which Japan should duplicate collection and other work hitherto conducted by the US, the impact of more independent capability on alliance relations and the coordination mechanisms to avoid tripping over operations run by allies.
5. In a country like Japan, where few universities specialise in intelligence or even security and defence studies, success in recruiting promising students could be a proxy indicator of Japanese society’s acceptance of the need for stronger intelligence institutions. In the short term, there may be a need for a new career track, unprecedented in Japanese ministries and agencies, allowing personnel to continue specialising in intelligence collection and analysis while continuing to advance professionally.

© RUSI, 2026.

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