Yakuza gang plans overseas military activities

New gang, new goals.

“Until now, gangsters have existed domestically for the purpose of not letting undesirable foreigners run rampant, to maintain order in the underworld,” Yoshinori Oda, the head of the newly formed Ninkyo Dantai Yamaguchi-gumi, tells Flash (June 6). “But now things are in a state of disarray.”

As a result, Oda is taking operations overseas — and he has the formation of a private military company (PMC) on his mind.

“Outside of Japan, PMCs already exists in the United States and Europe,” he says. “Since we can not enter the United States, we will establish a branch office in Southeast Asia and establish a contract with that office separately. Upon receiving a request for bodyguard or security services for Japanese nationals, we will be dispatched.”

The Ninkyo Dantai Yamaguchi-gumi formed in April following the defection of bosses from the Kobe Yamaguchi-gumi, which itself is a splinter gang.

In September of 2015, more than a dozen affiliate gangs of the Yamaguchi-gumi left to form the Kobe Yamaguchi-gumi. Since that split, law enforcement had been taking measures to alleviate violence between the two gangs.

Should the proposal by Oda regarding the formation of a PMC come to fruition, it would certainly be a new development.

“Last year, we had repeated meetings with right-wing members, former Self-Defense Force (SDF) officers and former French troops,” the boss tells the magazine. “Thereupon, nearly all participants welcomed the idea, expressing intent to get on board. It is a private military plan.”

“Anxious days”

In April, Japan began withdrawing SDF troops from war-battered South Sudan. The more than 350 troops had been a U.N. mission tasked with assisting in infrastructure construction over a five-year period. The withdrawal followed escalating violence and killings described as a genocide.

Oda says that he visited South Sudan in February. “I wanted to see what kind of security could be performed on the spot with my own eyes,” he says. “But under Article 9 of the Constitution, it is impossible to do enough as far as acts of combat, and family members of SDF troops must have spent many anxious days [worrying about their safety].”

The gang boss says there is general precedent for his plan, claiming that ninkyo — meaning chivalry in addition to comprising part of the gang’s name — has been present in the civilian sector in Japan’s history of entering conflicts. He says that in the post-World War II era Kazuo Taoka, the third Godfather of the Yamaguchi-gumi, contributed to the maintenance of security within society.

Appointed in 1946, Taoka began to control construction and dockside labor in the gang’s base of Kobe and initiated expansion nationwide as Japan rebuilt itself following the devastation of World War II.

Times have changed

However, times have changed. According to reports, the Ninkyo Dantai Yamaguchi-gumi formed due to internal squabbles among management of the Kobe Yamaguchi-gumi. Similar reasons were cited for the split of the Yamaguchi-gumi the year before.

“For the future of young people, we must leave the Yamaguchi-gumi,” Oda says. “In turning around the country, I can not betray the young people who follow me.”

Source: “Ninkyo Dantai Yamaguchi-gumi daihyo: Oda kizuna yakuza kakumei dokuhaku!” Flash (June 6)