"It will never happen that Japan's Self Defense Force would be involved in the US military strategy," said Hidenao Nakagawa, a parliament member and policy chief of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP).

"We are determined to keep to our constitution's pacifism" when the alliance between Japan and the United States is strengthened, Nakagawa said in a televized interview.

"But it is necessary to respond to new kinds of threats such as terrorism," Nakagawa added.

Involvement of Japanese troops in US military deployments abroad which have little to do with Japan's national defense, "should never be permitted under the constitution," said Yoshihisa Inoue, policy chief of the LDP's junior coalition partner, New Komeito.

The comments came eight days after the two governments adopted an interim report designed to cut US forces in the Japanese island of Okinawa, deploy a powerful missile defense radar in Japan and bind their militaries more closely together.

Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi also proposed to give Japan's military a firm legal basis by revising the pacifist post-war constitution.

Japanese opposition parties and local officials have criticized the new military agreement as lifting limits on the country's military support for the United States.

The agreement, which "authorizes Japan's support and commitment for military action by the United States, is extremely dangerous," Seiji Mataichi, secretary-general of the Social Democratic Party of Japan, has said.

Under a 1960 Japan-US Security Treaty, Japan's support for the US military is limited to activities contributing to peace and stability in the "Far East."

Japan's 1947 constitution, written after the country's World War II defeat, says "the Japanese people forever renounce war as a sovereign right of the nation and the threat or use of force as a means of settling international disputes."

As a result, Japanese troops have been limited to a non-combat, logistical role in international peacekeeping operations.

But Koizumi broke with tradition by deploying about 600 troops on a reconstruction and humanitarian mission in southern Iraq since late 2003. To avoid violating the pacifist constitution, the government says the troops operate in a "non-combat zone" within Iraq.

Under the new accord with the US, Washington will move 7,000 marines from Okinawa to Guam and relocate US bases in Japan. Tokyo is to expand the roles and missions of its military both in home defense and in international missions with the United States.

The accord comes amid tensions with North Korea over its nuclear weapons programs and growing concern over China's military buildup, which the Pentagon has said threatens the regional military balance.

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