War issue a nightmare for Japanese government

War issue a nightmare for Japanese government

By Harvey Stockwin

TOKYO (JP): The longevity of Japan's current coalition government is increasingly in doubt, while the coalition's inability to rule effectively is increasingly apparent.

This proposition initially became self-evident at the time of the great earthquake in the Kansai region, around Osaka and Kobe, on Jan. 17. The delayed reaction of the Japanese politicians to the disaster was almost unbelievable, given that politicians are always supposed to be closely attuned to the electorate's suffering.

The fact that so much foreign assistance was turned aside was lamentable, demonstrating as it did the insular, mercantilist and xenophobic attitudes which Japan normally tries to keep hidden, even as it seeks to keep foreigners and foreign goods at arm's length.

In many other democracies the government would have fallen in the wake of the calamity, because of its inadequate response. But the coalition staggered on. Last week it once again demonstrated its inability to get its act together on an important issue.

As Tokyo, Seoul and Washington try to harness their policies towards North Korea, one missing link is that Japan does not have any formal diplomatic relations with North Korea. Even the Americans and the North Koreans are well on their way to establishing liaison offices in each other's capitals.

Japan's relationship with the North languishes where a political delegation, led by the former mastermind of the Liberal Democratic party (LDP) Shin Kanemaru, left it way back in 1990.

The North Koreans somehow persuaded the naive Kanemaru that Japan should not only pay compensation to Pyongyang for the period of Japanese colonialism. The declaration issued at the end of the visit also committed Japan to compensate the North Koreans "for losses inflicted upon the Korean people since 1945".

At the beginning of this past week it rather looked as if the Japanese were about to make another effort to break the ice in the relationship. It was announced that a delegation, representing the three parties in the current ruling coalition, would be leaving for North Korea on March 16.

For some optimistic observers it looked as if Japan was playing its 'North Korean card' in the convoluted international politics of East Asia. It was even said that the North Koreans had agreed that former Japanese Foreign Minister Michio Watanabe, who had strongly criticized the Kanemaru's effort, would head the delegation.

But then on March 14 the Socialists announced that they would not be going to Pyongyang. Their precise reason for this stance is still not clear. It is said that the Socialists were concerned because the North Koreans had not yet conceded that they would not insist upon post-1945 compensation for Japan's cold war hostility.

But if this was a continued sticking point, why had the delegation's visit been announced in the first place? Further, the Socialist stance was strange, given that, until very recently, the Socialists only recognized North Korea, and disdained the South.

Whatever the reason for the Socialists refusal to go along, the Sakigake (New Frontier Party) then announced that since the Socialists were not going, they would not be going either. Finally, on March 15, the LDP admitted that it would not proceed to Pyongyang on its own. All of which left the coalition looking even more disheveled and incompetent.

The biting irony is that while neither the Kansai earthquake nor the North Korean diplomatic fiasco are likely to be bring the government down, World War II might well do so.

Two weeks ago Socialist Prime Minister Tomiichi Murayama touched on an explosive issue which could end up blowing apart the current coalition government of Japan.

He did this as he urged the annual LDP convention to back a war-renouncing resolution to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the ending of World War II.

With only five months to go, a coalition consensus is nowhere in sight on such a resolution -- which was agreed in principle when the coalition was formed last summer. The Socialists would like to produce the first draft for debate by the end of March but even this is doubtful.

The only aspect of World War II on which most Japanese politicians do agree is that Japan will do everything possible to trumpet its role as a victim of the atomic bombings at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, thereby aiming to obscure Japan's role in events from 1931 to 1945 leading up to the bombing.

Already a group of at least 161 LDP politicians, more than half the party's combined strength in both Houses of the Diet, has been meeting to oppose any such resolution. The group counts among its leading members former LDP ministers who had to resign for insisting that Japan never committed aggression, or that the Nanjing Massacre never happened.

It is already clear that Murayama cannot count on parliamentary assistance from the recently formed Shinshinto (New Frontier Party), despite its pledge to acknowledge Japan's past aggression. Already a small group within Shinshinto has also been formed to oppose the as-yet undrafted resolution.

Yet, for Murayama, the resolution is vital on two counts. First and foremost, the resolution will be an acid test of Socialist unity. The political fallout from the Kansai Earthquake in January has delayed the breakup of the Socialist Party. If Murayama gives in to opposition to the resolution, he will quickly revive the threat of disintegration.

Secondly, the resolution is the one area in which the left- wing socialist faction, which Murayama leads, counts upon the Prime Minister to display leadership.

In the leftists' eyes, Murayama has given way to the LDP on the Socialist pledge to not raise the consumption tax. He has given way on the longtime leftist opposition to the security treaty with the United States.

Murayama has also been obliged to forget longtime Socialist opposition to recognizing the legitimacy of Japan's Self-Defense Forces.

So a resolution by the coalition government, apologizing for past Japanese aggression and reiterating Japan's dedication to peace and renunciation of war, is seen as a last chance for the Socialists to show that their principles do still count for something.

By contrast, many of those 161 LDP politicians are also backing a movement which seeks to delete the war-renunciation clause nine from the current Japanese constitution.

Clearly indicating the LDP's shift to the right, the party has deleted a key phrase from its campaign pledges for the forthcoming local elections. The deleted phrase expressed approval for Murayama's pledge last year that Japan's past "acts of aggression and colonial rule brought unbearable pain and sorrow upon many people".

So, in a nutshell, the promised resolution highlights the incongruity of the LDP-Socialist alliance. In their dogmatic and ideological way, the Socialists do at least recognize Japan's wartime failings, whereas the LDP majority is increasingly unwilling to do so.

Whether the coalition government can survive the process of creating a 50th anniversary resolution, and whether that resolution can bring any credit whatsoever upon Japan as a nation, are both very much in doubt.