President Ronald Reagan and Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher forged a robust friendship that solidified the foundation of the Western alliance against Soviet imperialism. They demonstrated that strong leaders working together can make a decisive difference in strengthening each nation’s national security.
Today, President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Sanai Takaichi are similarly poised to carry a mantle of friendship and strategic alliance against common security threats. Each leader is making a mark that defines strong leadership and a vision for a secure, prosperous future.
During her recent visit to the U.S., Takaichi and Trump cemented a commitment to preserving stability in the Indo-Pacific. She forcefully declared that disengagement by the U.S. in the region would cede to China a commanding position in economic power. The “China Dream” pursued by Chinese President Xi Jinping aims to establish Chinese global economic supremacy, upending a rule-based international order and turning other nations into tributaries. Neither Japan nor the U.S. can afford that outcome. Countering that imperialistic ambition requires from both nations’ military and economic strength.
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Takaichi highlighted Japan’s support for the U.S.’s regional strategy, notably in seeking energy market stability, even as it builds its defense capacity. Her posture strongly resonated with Trump, who fulsomely praised Takaichi as a “popular, powerful woman” and a “great leader.” Trump clearly perceives that a strong alliance with Japan presents a strategic opportunity.
A Japanese-American alliance helps ensure that the U.S. focuses on the more urgent challenges emanating from Asia, and avoids the trap of being distracted by threats in Latin America and the Middle East. While important, China presents the more urgent challenge. The U.S.’s latest National Security Strategy (NSS) and National Defense Strategy (NDS) documents confirm that the Indo-Pacific remains the preeminent theater.
Trump’s fragile detente with China presents the most serious strategic challenge. Japan can play a key role in ensuring that U.S. action avoids undermining the interests of regional partners, with whom mobilizing an alliance is essential. Already, Tokyo is working with its Asian and European partners to blunt moves embracing the idea of a “G2”, by which Washington and Beijing alone decide global affairs. That is a nightmare scenario for major and middle powers alike who want to keep their seats at the decision-making table.
Defense and political reforms, driven by Takaichi and her Defense Minister, Shinjiro Koizumi, signal Japan’s status as an indispensable ally to Trump. While hardly a multilateralist, even War Secretary Pete Hegseth has praised Japan for pushing spending to 2% of its GDP. Under the auspices of the Five-Year Defense Buildup Plan, such spending supports Japan’s rapid rearmament and the development of its domestic defense industry, which is an increasingly prodigious exporter to like-minded partners such as Australia.
The results are meaningful. The Takaichi government has allocated approximately $6.5 billion for stand-off missiles in support of the Self-Defense Forces’s long-range strike capabilities. Now, $450 million is being spent on unmanned assets as the world learns, from the battlefields of eastern Ukraine, how the conduct of warfare is experiencing revolutionary change.
Japan’s strong posture carries major strategic implications. Approximately 60% of all global trade passes through the region, and American companies have invested over $1 trillion across its constituent nations. Skepticism of multilateralism aside, Trump cannot afford to allow China to dominate the global economy’s main artery. Japan is doing its part to checkmate such expansionism.
Japan’s contribution to Indo-Pacific stability is essential. In addition to hosting U.S. bases, Japan’s geography enables it to play an essential role.
Worth noting as one assesses Trump’s posture is that MAGA circles in the U.S. embrace Japan’s vision of a Free and Open Indo-Pacific, which was launched by the late Prime Minister and Trump ally Shinzo Abe. Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio are aligned with its strictures on freedom of navigation, quality investment, and the protection of national sovereignty. To its standing as a nation marked by commercial and technological brilliance, Japan is adding the hard power assets this new era of geopolitical confrontation requires.
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Takaichi openly models herself on Thatcher, the “Iron Lady” whose strong leadership made her an ideal partner for Reagan. They did not always agree, but their alliance enabled each nation to project unprecedented power and technological excellence that helped bring down the Soviet Union. Takaichi and Trump share common interests in containing Chinese imperialism, which is bolstered by China’s technologically supercharged economy.
Trump has successfully asserted American preeminence in the Western Hemisphere. As he focuses on Asia, it will be evident that Takaichi and Trump can and must build a much-needed U.S.-Japan partnership that provides a robust counter to Chinese imperialism.
James P. Farwell is an expert in strategic communication who has advised the Department of Defense (now War), U.S .Special Operations Command, and U.S. Strategic Command on the Middle East, Africa and Pakistan. He is an attorney and a political consultant who has worked nationally and internationally at the presidential level. He is also a senior fellow at Sympodium Institute for Strategic Communication in London.