TOKYO, August 6. /TASS/. The alliance between the United States and Japan creates a nuclear threat for the entire region, but the Japanese government doesn't seem to have a problem with that, as it is fully committed to this activity, Russian Ambassador to Tokyo Nikolay Nozdrev told TASS.

Washington and Tokyo "have been racing to strengthen the military component of their alliance," the Russian diplomat said as he referred to accelerated efforts on the part of the two countries to "establish a deeply integrated command, increase the strike capability of self-defense forces and merge their defense industries." "And the allies have been discussing the increased role of the so-called expanded deterrence or the use of nuclear weapons in joint operations of US and Japanese troops," the diplomat said. "This means that the alliance is projecting a nuclear threat onto Japan’s neighbors, something that the administration of [Prime Minister] Fumio Kishida has actively supported," Nozdrev explained.

According to him, such activity looks "especially cynical" ahead of the anniversary of atomic bombs being dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. "We note again that not only has the Japanese leadership been stubbornly disregarding the fact that it was the United States that prepared and staged the inhumane and unprecedented nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki but that also it has been showing readiness to plan jointly with the United States to use these weapons," he added.

The atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were carried out by the United States at the very end of World War II for the officially declared purpose of accelerating Japan’s surrender. The bombings were the only instances in history of the military use of nuclear weapons. On August 6, Japan commemorates the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima which, according to various estimates, killed between 70,000 and 100,000 people in a single day. By the end of 1945, the number of victims, according to various estimates, had increased to 140,000 people due those who died at hospitals of injuries and radioactive contamination.