“You can’t really take the US presence for granted”

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Trump shock spurs Japan to think about the unthinkable: nuclear arms

A view of the Atomic Bomb Dome in Hiroshima where the US dropped the first atomic bomb at 8:15 a.m. on August 6, 1945. REUTERS/Kim Kyung-Hoon

It was at an 18th century Georgian manor house outside London that Japanese lawmaker Rui Matsukawa began to have serious doubts about America's commitment to defending her country.

Matsukawa, a former deputy defense minister, traveled in March to historic Fordham Abbey for a top-level bilateral conference. She said she learned from British lawmakers, diplomats and business leaders that a tectonic shift in their thinking was underway.

Now a contingent of senior Japanese lawmakers is beginning to think the unthinkable in the only nation to have suffered an atomic bomb attack: Surrounded by nuclear-armed neighbors, Japan too might have to deploy those weapons of mass destruction.

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