Over the next year, Japan will provide Southeast Asian countries with military equipment and more infrastructure investment, and may even deploy its own assets to the region, which will improve these countries' defense capacities but further deteriorate Japan's relationship with China. As Japan continues to evolve its national security doctrine, it is looking not only at its immediate neighborhood but increasingly at Southeast Asia. On Dec. 16, Japan and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) celebrated 50 years of ties by upgrading relations to a ''comprehensive strategic partnership,'' the highest possible tier. As part of this upgrade, Japan committed to stepping up its infrastructure, technology and defense aid to ''like-minded'' Southeast Asian countries under Tokyo's Overseas Development Assistance (ODA) and its newly implemented Overseas Security Assistance (OSA) programs....
