IRAQ: Worries over North Korea Push Japan to U.S. Side

By Suvendrini Kakuchi Reprint | | Print |

Suvendrini Kakuchi

TOKYO, Apr 1 2003 (IPS) - With the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq likely to last much longer that initially thought, Japan sees no choice but to step up its support to U.S.-led troops as an insurance given the unstable situation with North Korea’s nuclear crisis.

Signs of this foreign policy position by Tokyo, despite sizeable public opposition to the war, was evident from Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi’s statement on Mar. 20, the day the invasion began, that Japan stands firmly behind the U.S.-Japan security alliance.

Now, Japan’s support for Washington seems to have increased even further and may well go beyond Tokyo’s financial support during the 1991 Gulf War.

In a telephone conversation with U.S. President George W Bush Friday, Koizumi left open the option of dispatching Self-Defence Force troops to Iraq to maintain order as requested by the United States.

Participation of these forces overseas is restricted by the Japanese Constitution due to the country’s military past, and special laws need to be passed each time for their dispatch.

In mid-April, U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney is also due to visit Japan, the United States’ strongest ally in Asia, to discuss reconstruction in post-war Iraq.

”It is of fundamental importance for us to pursue in the future a strong Japan-US alliance and multilateralism," Koizumi recently told Parliament.

The truth is that Japan has little choice but to side with Washington in its attack on Iraq, analysts say.

”A swift end to the war, with the United States emerging as a liberator in Iraq, would have eased a lot of headaches for Japan, ” says Professor Sunao Imamura, who teaches international relations at Chuo University.

”But now Koizumi must walk a tightrope between the anti-war public and appeasing Washington for its own security," he explains.

Given North Korea’s possession of nuclear weapons, Japan is acutely aware of its reliance on the U.S. security umbrella. The two countries signed a security treaty in 1960 that extends U.S. military protection in exchange for bases in Japan.

"The North Korean dictatorship poses a threat to the safety of Japan and thus a major concern this time," Taro Yayoma, a columnist at conservative ‘Sankei’ daily newspaper, says, explaining why Japan’s support for the U.S. war efforts are bigger this time around than in the 1991 Gulf War.

Indeed, the invasion of Iraq has turned into a hard lesson for Japan, a pacifist country that was also defeated under U.S. bombing that ended World War II, says Yukio Okamato, special advisor to the Cabinet. That is because Japan knows full well that Washington’s backing would come in handy with regard to instability next door in North Korea, which has been at loggerheads with the United States after its admission of a secret nuclear prorgramme and Washington’s labelling it as part of the ”axis of evil” that included Iraq.

"Tokyo has no other choice but to support the U.S. administration in this war,” explains Okamato.

In the first Gulf War, Japan managed to protect its pacifist stance by restricting its role to economic aid – 2 billion dollars – to the U.S.-led troops ousting Iraq from Kuwait. Shinichi Kitaoka, a political scientist at Tokyo University, agrees that Japan has large security stakes in staying on the U.S. side. "If the United States loses its willingness to act as a global policeman, this will be a big blow for Japan," he told an audience at a seminar on international security in Tokyo last week.

Experts point out that in many ways, the military strength of the United States has never been so important to Japan as it is now.

In the Diet or Parliament last week, Koizumi said, "The United States plays an indispensable role in assuring peace and security in the Asian region and it is our country’s responsibility to support the United States in these times."

Koizumi has also said that Japan, apart from playing a key role in the rehabilitation of Iraq, would try to mend relations between the United States and Britain and the countries opposed to their unilateral decision to go to war, including France, Germany and Russia.

But this comes across as a weak attempt at damage-control diplomacy, analysts say, and Tokyo is unlikely to have much clout in doing this.

In fact, some say Tokyo may well be assisting – when it should be stopping – the trend toward unilateralism in international affairs. Backing the United States openly could undercut Japan’s attempts to gain more clout in international diplomacy and heighten its international profile.

"What I fear the most is that Japan could now be easily linked to spreading conservatism in the United States,” says Yasuo Kurata, a senior commentator on international affairs.

Experts add that Japan faces a new dilemma over the breakdown of U.N.-centred diplomacy, as illustrated by the U.S. and British decision to attack Iraq without U.N. sanction.

Last week Tsuyoshi Saito of the Democratic Party of Japan, the largest opposition party, accused Koizumi of promoting a policy of backing the United States and ignoring the United Nations.

During questioning in Parliament, Saito argued that Koizumi’s stance would in reality work against Japan’s war-renouncing Constitution, by forcing it to side with Washington’s aggressive policies. Some here are speculating that a possible scenario brought by a United States emboldened by the invasion of Iraq is an attack on North Korea, without the blessing of the United Nations, one that would then plunge East Asia into war or instability.

In other words, said the ‘Asahi’ newspaper on Monday, ”linking support for the Iraq war with the potential North Korean threat maybe a double-edged sword”. Japan may get a backlash from Pyongyang in this situation, the paper argued.

Meanwhile, anti-war sentiment in Japan has grown to 65 from 59 percent in mid- March, according to a poll released by ‘Asahi’ newspaper on Monday. That, however, appears not to have deterred Tokyo any from backing Washington.