Kirk Spitzer

USA TODAY

TOKYO — The Japanese government approved a record defense budget Tuesday as new laws went into effect, easing restraints on Japan’s military and permitting Japanese troops to defend the United States for the first time since World War II.

The $44 billion defense budget is Japan’s largest ever and is the fourth straight annual increase under conservative Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.

"The security environment surrounding our country is increasingly severe. … In a world where no one nation can protect themselves by themselves alone, this legislation will help prevent wars," Abe said told reporters after Japan’s parliament passed a record $853 billion spending plan for the 2016 fiscal year, which begins Friday.

The security law allows Japan's military to fight alongside U.S. and other allies under foreign attacks under an arrangement called "collective defense."

Abe is scheduled to meet in Washington this week with President Obama and South Korea President Park Geun-hye to discuss North Korea’s nuclear weapons and long-range missile programs and China’s increasingly assertive territorial claims in the region.

Abe and Park also will take part in the 2016 Nuclear Security Summit that will include Obama and leaders from 50 other countries.

The new defense budget will continue a restructuring of Japan’s armed forces — still officially called “self defense forces” in deference to Japan’s pacifist constitution — that will include increased surveillance and reconnaissance capabilities and an amphibious warfare unit modeled on the United States Marine Corps. Abe’s defense agenda has drawn domestic opposition but has been welcomed by the Obama administration, which looks to Japan for help in countering a resurgent China.

On Sunday, Japan opened a new radar surveillance base close to a group of disputed islands in the East China Sea, drawing a sharp rebuke from Chinese authorities. The uninhabited islands, called Senkakus in Japan and Diaoyu in China, are administered by Japan but claimed by China.

Abe devoted most of his press conference Tuesday to new or expanded social and welfare programs included in the new budget that are designed to remedy Japan’s rapidly aging population and allow more women into the workforce.

"We will put a brake on the declining birth rate amid an aging population and create a society where everyone can live a meaningful life," Abe said.

Abe reiterated his goal of ending two decades of economic stagnation and boosting Japan’s annual GDP to $5.2 trillion by 2020, an increase of about 20%.

"The Japanese economy is on a recovery track and that should become clearer after the second quarter (of 2016)," said Tomo Kinoshita, chief Japan economist for Nomura Securities, at a press briefing in Tokyo last week.