"Hamada's visit could help resume military exchanges that were suspended in the wake of former Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's visits to Tokyo's Yasukuni Shrine, a place that honors Class-A war criminals," he said.

Researcher Gao Hong at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) agreed: "As a sensitive field, military cooperation between China and Japan has always lagged behind political and economic exchanges."

Chen expected that mutual trust between the two militaries will not come easy. "If the two countries have no military conflicts in the next 20 years, then we can possibly say the two sides have really achieved mutual trust."

He adds that mutual trust in military fields could contribute to economic development. "Mistrust had led to huge military budget," observed Chen. "If we can have mutual trust, military budgets will shrink significantly and the money can be invested in education and social security instead."

In the short term, however, Aso will benefit from the improved military relations with China, said Chen.

"With Japan's domestic economic and political policies in a mess, Aso has no choice but to look overseas to get a silver lining for its policy." Currently Aso's public support has dropped below 15 percent but he insisted that he will not resign.

DPRK rocket launch

Japan's Kyodo News reported on Saturday that during talks the two defense ministers called for "restraint" in the Korean peninsula.

While Japan asked China to urge Pyongyang restraint, Liang said "it would be best if the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) did not fire" the rocket, and urged countries such as Japan to "take a coolheaded attitude" on the issue, Kyodo reported.

The DPRK has said it will launch a communications satellite into orbit between April 4 and 8. Tokyo believes it is a long-range missile test and has warned it will shoot down any missile headed for its territory, while Pyongyang said it would regard any interception as an act of war.

Chen contended that Japan will use the development as an excuse to deploy interceptors.

"Japan has insisted that what the DPRK will launch is a missile instead of a satellite, without any concrete evidence. The reason is that the country wants to make use of the event to deploy long-coveted interceptors," said Chen.

However, the possibility of a Japanese interception appears slim.

Yang from CICIR outlined three reasons against the chances of an interception. "First, Japan is banned from intercepting by its pacifist constitution unless it can be proved that a DPRK missile will land within Japanese territory. Secondly, Japan has no explicit support from the United States, whose intelligence agencies believe the DPRK will launch a satellite instead of a missile. Thirdly, Japan does not have the adequate technology for a successful interception."

His view was echoed by Liu Jiangyong, a professort of international relations at Tsinghua University, saying that the Japanese constitution stipulates the country will counterattack only if it is under attack, and it is unlikely for the DPRK to initiate an attack on Japan under the current circumstances.

Chen believed that Japan is in a dilemma on whether it should shoot down the DPRK rocket or not. If it does intercept, the DPRK may retaliate by shooting down any future satellite launched by Japan. If it does not intercept, Japanese government will further anger the public, who are in favor of intercepting.