The US-Japan alliance turned fifty this week, and the allies celebrated by steering the conversation away from Futenma and releasing a 2 + 2 joint statement that reiterated why the alliance matters in the first place.Kurt Campbell, the assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific Affairs, also gave a press conference Tuesday that …
Tag: MSDF refueling mission
The Hatoyama government tackles the alliance early
With US President Barack Obama scheduled to visit Japan at the start of an East Asian swing in November — he will stop in Tokyo before going to Singapore for APEC and then concluding his trip with meetings in China and South Korea — the Hatoyama government is working hard to hammer out positions on …
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The DPJ will bring the ships home — and open Japan’s economy to the US?
After weeks of signs that the DPJ might wholly embrace the foreign policy status quo, Hatoyama Yukio announced on Wednesday that, when the current special measures law for the deployment of Maritime Self-Defense Forces (MSDF) refueling ships in the Indian Ocean in support of coalition activities in Afghanistan expires in January, a DPJ-led government would …
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The end of the beginning
Ozawa Ichiro indicated, in a tearful press conference Tuesday evening, that he will stay on as DPJ president despite the indictment of his chief public secretary — but Ozawa's statement may have only been the end of the beginning of the final act of Ozawa's long career.The press conference itself was a masterpiece of defiance. …
The DPJ gambles
Prime Minister Aso Taro returned from the G20 meeting in Washington and immediately met with Ozawa Ichiro to discuss the conclusion of the extraordinary session of the Diet.The LDP and the DPJ are set for another showdown over the MSDF refueling mission in the Indian Ocean, as the DPJ has announced that it will boycott …
The DPJ embraces tactical retreat
Yamaoka Kenji, the DPJ's Diet strategy chairman, indicated in Diet proceedings Wednesday that the DPJ will consent to a quick vote on the bill extending the MSDF's refueling mission in the Indian Ocean. He didn't say that the DPJ would support it, of course, but he did say that the DPJ would consent to moving …
Komeito riles the LDP
It is safe to assume that when Mori Yoshiro admonishes someone, the mood in the LDP is bleaker than previously thought.Mr. Mori, whose mission is not the advancement of an agenda of reform or reaction but the preservation of LDP primacy, has taken it upon himself to use his bully pulpit as a former prime …
Out with a whimper
MTC beats me to pointing out the futility of the forthcoming seventy-day extraordinary session, which will convene from Sept. 12.The government, he notes, will lack the time to pass the most significant pieces of legislation on the agenda (beyond a stimulus package) and override the upper house if necessary. No refueling mission extension. No tax …
Don’t expect Japanese troops in Afghanistan
With five or six weeks until the start of the autumn extraordinary session of the Diet, one of Fukuda Yasuo's responsibilities during the recess is determining his government's approach to the Japanese contributions to operations in and around Afghanistan. The enabling law for the current Maritime Self-Defense Forces refueling mission will expire in January, meaning …
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Japanese boots, Afghan ground?
In the Fukuda government's continuing quest to determine its strategy in regard to the time-limited MSDF refueling mission in the Indian Ocean, Machimura Nobutaka, chief cabinet secretary, floated a new idea over the weekend: expanding the Japanese contribution in Afghanistan to include JSDF personnel on the ground. The prime minister addressed Mr. Machimura's remarks the …
Tobias S. Harris 