Japan’s Defense Ministry Puts Its Next Five-Year Plan at ¥80 Trillion, 1.8 Times Today’s, Reports Say

Photo: Guilhem Vellut, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0 (file photo, May 3, 2014). Japan’s Ministry of Defense in Ichigaya, Tokyo.

Japan’s Defense Ministry has priced its next five-year buildup at about ¥80 trillion, roughly 1.8 times the current plan, the Sankei Shimbun reported on Monday, Nov. 2, citing several government officials. The estimate, for the five years starting in April 2027, would mark another leap in Japan defense spending as Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s government rewrites the country’s three core security documents by the end of the year.

In its exclusive report, Sankei said funding is limited, so talks inside the government are expected to aim for the upper-¥70 trillion range. No official figure has been announced.

Reuters hears a ¥70 trillion to ¥80 trillion range

Reuters reported the same day, citing two people familiar with the matter, that the government and ruling coalition are considering ¥70 trillion to ¥80 trillion ($457 billion to $508 billion) for the program, up from about ¥43 trillion now, according to the version published by The Japan Times. The number could change as the budget is compiled toward year-end, the agency said, and Japan’s Defense Ministry told Reuters it had no comment.

One of the people said the extra money would pay for purchases such as large numbers of drones and that the weaker yen has raised the cost of buying equipment. The other said the final total could settle in the mid-to-upper ¥70 trillion range but questioned whether that would be enough given East Asia’s security environment. That person said more increases should be on the table in government and coalition talks before the year ends, according to Reuters’ Japanese-language report.

What the money would buy

Sankei said the ministry reached its figure by adding up line items. The biggest new costs include the “Shield” concept, which would field large numbers of air, sea and land drones; artificial intelligence, including cloud systems; and space and cyber capabilities, areas Sankei described as lagging. The ministry also wants more ammunition and spare parts, repairs to aging bases and facilities, and greater transport and resupply capacity.

The review is running a year early. Sankei cited a harsher security climate, including Russia’s war on Ukraine and China’s push at sea. The current program, adopted at the end of 2022, centered on long-range missiles for counterstrike, ammunition and parts.

By the numbers: why ¥60 trillion is the floor

A separate Sankei report on Nov. 1 showed how much of the next budget is already spoken for. Fighter jets and warships are paid for in installments over as long as five years, and government officials told the paper that about ¥16 trillion is still owed after fiscal 2027 on equipment ordered from fiscal 2023 through 2026. Pay for uniformed personnel and ministry staff is expected to reach about ¥13 trillion over the five years.

Of today’s ¥43 trillion, about ¥27 trillion goes to spending other than those fixed costs, Sankei said. Holding that core spending flat would push the total close to ¥60 trillion once fixed costs are added. “If it is under ¥60 trillion, it is effectively a cut,” a Defense Ministry official told the paper (TBR translation). The same report said there is no firm source of funding.

The Boston Report’s calculations from those figures and the Defense Ministry’s own Defense Buildup Program:

• Installments plus personnel come to about ¥29 trillion, more than a third of an ¥80 trillion plan, before any new purchases.
• ¥80 trillion would average ¥16 trillion a year, against about ¥8.6 trillion a year under the ¥43 trillion program.
• Even the low end of the Reuters range, ¥70 trillion, would be 63% above the current plan. The current plan itself was 56% above the ¥27.5 trillion program it replaced.

The ministry’s program document puts annual budgets for fiscal 2023 through 2027 at about ¥40.5 trillion in total, including about ¥8.9 trillion in the final year.

Washington presses for more

The United States has pressed Tokyo publicly. “We’re not at the finish line yet, and there’s still some heavy lifting ahead, but the momentum is headed in the right direction,” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said at the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore on May 30. “We have high expectations of our Japanese allies, and together we can and must each pull our weight,” he said, The Japan Times reported.

Hegseth raised Japan’s spending again when he met Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi in Cebu, the Philippines, on Oct. 28, Koizumi said. “We didn’t exchange views with any specific amount or conclusion in mind,” Koizumi told reporters, adding, “We’ll build up our defense capabilities concretely based on our independent judgment,” Jiji Press reported. Jiji wrote that Washington is believed to have urged Japan to reach 3.5% of gross domestic product.

Sankei reported that the government is leaning against writing that 3.5% level, which it described as the Trump administration‘s request of allies, into the plan as a target for five years out. In September, Bloomberg reported that Japan was considering a 3.5% goal, possibly matching South Korea’s pledge to reach that level over 10 years, and that a lower target such as 3% was also possible, according to The Japan Times.

What comes next

The final number will be set as the cabinet compiles the fiscal 2027 budget and adopts the revised security documents by year-end. The two allies are already deepening industrial ties, including a plan to build AMRAAM air-to-air missiles in Japan. Our war report on North Korea’s nuclear vow tracks the regional pressures behind the debate, and more defense news is on our Military page.

Sources

• Sankei Shimbun (Japanese): Defense Ministry estimates ¥80 trillion over five years, Nov. 2
• The Japan Times (Reuters): Japan weighs $500 billion defense spending plan, sources say
• Reuters (Japanese, via docomo): ¥80 trillion over five years floated in government and ruling bloc
• Sankei Shimbun (Japanese): Defense request could reach ¥70 trillion range; 3.5% of GDP not to be stated, Nov. 1
• Japan Ministry of Defense: Defense Buildup Program (English, PDF)
• The Japan Times: Hegseth says U.S. has “high expectations” for Japan on defense spending
• Nippon.com (Jiji Press): U.S. defense secretary mentions Japan’s defense spending, Koizumi says
• The Japan Times (Bloomberg): Japan considers defense spending worth 3.5% of GDP

Additional sources

• Sankei’s Nov. 1 report put the ministry’s estimate in the ¥70 trillion range, at least 1.6 times the current plan; its Nov. 2 report raised that to about ¥80 trillion. Both cite unnamed government officials.
• Reuters’ dollar figures are its own conversions; TBR has not recalculated them.
• Hegseth denied that Washington had made any request on Japanese defense spending after meeting Koizumi in October 2025, according to Jiji Press.