Japan’s Takaichi Likely To Avoid Supporting American-Israeli War Against Iran

Japan’s Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi will have to engage in her most diplomatic double-talk when she sees President Trump at Washington for a summit at which she’s expected to deflect American requests for support in the war against Iran. Although Japan ranks as America’s most important ally in Asia, Japan imports 95 percent of its oil from the Middle East, 70 percent of it down the Persian Gulf through the Strait of Hormuz. Japan is reluctant to join any military attempts to pry open that critical bottleneck in the flow of oil that it desperately needs to fuel its economy. “A U.S. request for Japan’s assistance in this matter would put Tokyo in a difficult position,” said one of Japan’s biggest newspapers, Asahi Shimbun. Japanese officials at this stage are avoiding definitive American comments on cooperation.At issue, say the Japanese, is whether they have the legal right, under Article 9 of Japan’s post-war “Peace Constitution,” to send Japan’s Self-Defense Forces into combat overseas. Japanese officials have said the war has yet to endanger Japanese citizens, the rationale for supporting America as a staunch ally. About 55,000 American troops are stationed in Japan, headquarters of the United States Fifth Air Force and a division of marines, mainly for defense against Communist China and North Korea.Ms. Takaichi, an advocate of a strong Japanese military and firmly committed to the American alliance, was equally evasive about what she would say when meeting Mr. Trump at the White House, probably on March 19. The Japanese news agency Kyodo quoted her as saying she was unable to “make a legal assessment as of now” while “awaiting detailed information” on the attacks that American and Israeli forces launched last weekend.“ All she knew for sure was “we will have deepened discussions on the Middle East — including Iran — and the increasingly severe international situation.” At the heart of Japan’s hesitation is that Japan, for the sake of importing oil, has cultivated unusually friendly relations with Iran. Japanese imports of oil from Iran have been sporadic due to American sanctions, but Japan has been getting regular shipments from all the other Persian Gulf nations, including Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates. On the basis of the strong Japan-Iran relationship, Iran’s ambassador to Japan, Peiman Seadat convened a press conference in Tokyo at which he demanded Japan “decisively confront” the American and Israeli air strikes. Mr. Seadat warned that Iran would blockade the Strait of Hormuz, Japan’s Jiji Press reported, “until aggression is stopped.”Japan, however, may get around the blockade by going into emergency oil reserves. Kyodo reported that Japan, by drawing upon its own reserves and on those of oil-producing nations, with which it has promises of cooperation, would have enough to last for 254 days. Release of the reserves, said Kyodo, would “help to calm the domestic situation before it gets more heated.”Regardless, Ms. Takaichi is sure to appear super-friendly with Mr. Trump, just as they were in their first meeting in October after which she said Japanese-American relations had entered ”a new golden age.”The Iran war, however, presents her with a new challenge requiring the kind of legerdemain at which Japanese leaders have become most adept over many years of dealings with Washington. Nikkei Asia, published by Japan’s financial newspaper, Nihon Keizai Shimbun, summarized Japanese ambivalence.“Japan has avoided speaking out clearly on the merits of the American and Israeli strikes on Iran,” it said, while declining to back Mr.. Trump’s “effort to engineer regime change through force and urging Iran to show restraint without condemning its retaliation.”

Japan’s Takaichi Likely To Avoid Supporting American-Israeli War Against Iran

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