Yeah, I think there is too much emphasis on US strength. There's plenty of room for Japan to become stronger since the defense budget is going up but still at about 1%. Just going to 1.5% would give Japan a budget about as big or maybe a little bigger than Russia. So a lot of stuff can be purchased with that kind of increase.
Cam Rahn has demonstrated its ability to handle big ships when JS Izumo visited last year in May I think it was. The Japanese government recently said it was looking into F-35Bs, seems quite likely JS Izumo will put some on board.
I stopped posting regular updates because the crowd as a whole (not everyone but too many) is not worth my efforts to contribute to. I post updates at the following site. Don't mind the warning, just click ignore and proceed, it's safe.
http://www.tank-net.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=42676&page=4
I used the quotations to imply that I don't actually agree on the meaning of the words.