Declan Hayes explores the threats Japan faces in the coming decades, particularly if the United States downscales its military presence in the region. Since Japans defeat and occupation at the end of World War II, the Land of the Rising Sun has developed only limited military capability. Constrained by a new constitution dictated after the war by the occupying forces, Japan has not been able to rebuild its former military might. Japan has become a toothless tigerseemingly fierce, but actually powerless.