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Exercise Team Samurai

Team Samurai '04, the twelfth Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI) training exercise, was hosted by Japan which was hailed as the first Asian nation to take the lead in Weapons of Mass Destruction deterrence. Participants included Japan, U.S., Australia, and France, with 18 other countries representatives acting as observers. Although invited, China and South Korea did not attend, not wanting to antagonize North Korea while trying to re-energize the six party talks as Pyongyang lobbed warnings that this show of military force was an "illegal attack" on their sovereignty. While some countries in the region remain wary, Japan has spearheaded the anti-proliferation efforts by meeting with and training Southeast Asian countries as well as South Korea in PSI doctrine. With the U.N. Security Council passage of Resolution 1540, the PSI effort will gain speed in requiring all governments to adopt measures to prevent illicit trafficking in weapons material and delivery systems. The multi-nation exercise under the PSI banner was recently held on 26-27 October 2004, hosted by Japan, the first time an Asian country had taken the lead in the training. With the U.S., Japan, Australia, and France as the major participants, representatives from Cambodia, Canada, Germany, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, the Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Russia, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, Thailand, Turkey and the United Kingdom were present to act as observers. The exercises are part of a U.S. administration effort to block shipments of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons, the material and equipment needed to make them and missiles that could be used to carry them. This initiative gained legal ground with the U.N. passing resolution 1540 in April 2004. Nine ships from Japan, the United States, Australia and France joined in the exercises off Tokyo under Proliferation Security Initiative. The maneuvers, the first in East Asia, have been criticized by nearby North Korea as a "provocation." While officials said the exercises are not directed at any one nation, U.S. Undersecretary of State John Bolton, in a speech to the Tokyo American Center, said the measures were needed to foil nations like North Korea, the world's foremost proliferator of ballistic missiles and related technology. The "Team Samurai" drills, held in Sagami Bay south of Tokyo, involved a scenario focusing on the interception and boarding of two ships suspected of transporting sarin, a deadly nerve gas. As Japan Coast Guard ships crossed its bow, a squad of specially trained troops rappelled down from helicopters to board the first target ship, which flew a skull-and-cross-bones flag. Boarding teams from the U.S. Coast Guard, along with Australian and French units, took control of the second ship, racing to it in speed boats and climbing onto it from rope ladders. Attesting to Washington's strong interest in pushing the initiative, Bolton and Rear Adm. James Kelly, commander of the U.S. aircraft carrier Kitty Hawk, were aboard the Izu, the second of the two targets. Eleven similar drills have been held since September 2003, when Australia hosted the first exercises in the Coral Sea after the initiative was formally backed by 11 nations. Drills have also been held in the Arabian Sea, where heavily armed U.S. and Spanish troops used military helicopters to track, board and search a vessel disguised as a merchant ship carrying concealed chemical and biological weapons. The 11 nations that initially backed the PSI initiative last year are Australia, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Spain, the UK and the US.