Mishaps force
U.S.-Japan relations into
the light
SUB ACCIDENT, REBUFFS TO NAVY
SHOW FRICTION BETWEEN PARTNERS
TOMAKOMAI, Japan -- When the USS Blue Ridge,
flagship of the Navy's mighty 7th Fleet, scheduled a
port call in this gritty mill town in northern Japan
earlier this month, American officials intended for
the visit to generate good will and demonstrate the
enduring strength of the U.S.-Japan security
partnership.
But when the Blue Ridge was forced to turn back
five miles from shore, unable to navigate the shallow
harbor entrance while hundreds of clenched-fist
leftists and union activists on the docks protested the
ship's arrival, the aborted visit powerfully
demonstrated something entirely different: The
alliance is sometimes more brittle than most
Americans realize.
Even before the Feb. 9 submarine collision in
Hawaii sank the Japanese training vessel Ehime
Maru, in which nine passengers, including four high
school students, apparently drowned, the
embarrassing withdrawal of the Blue Ridge on what
should have been a routine port call offered a
sobering warning to the new Bush administration.
The Republican White House is eager to strengthen
military ties between Tokyo and Washington and
prod Japan into playing a larger security role in
Northeast Asia.
But the Blue Ridge's ignoble retreat was part of a
larger pattern, including a spate of arrests involving
U.S. servicemen on the southern island of Okinawa,
simmering anger over the submarine disaster and
unanswered questions as to why civilians were
sitting at the controls when the USS Greeneville
abruptly surfaced.
Taken together, these incidents could seriously
jeopardize many aspects of security cooperation with
Japan that is often taken for granted in Washington,
while fanning anti-U.S. sentiments in a nation with a
five-decade-old pacifist tradition and a stubborn
determination to do things its own way.
Long before the submarine collision, Tomakomai -- a
blue-collar city of 172,000 -- was fiercely debating
whether the Blue Ridge should even be allowed to
tie up. Those political machinations, along with high
seas, low tides and the belated realization that the
ship was too big to negotiate the channel leading into
the city's east harbor, helped scuttle the visit.
``For the safety of the crew and the vessel, we
decided it would be imprudent'' to attempt to
navigate the passage, said Cmdr. Matt Brown,
interviewed from aboard the Blue Ridge, after the
ship's officers realized that Tomakomai's 33-foot
channel was a tight squeeze for the vessel, which
requires at least 32 feet of water to safely pass.
Japanese mayor resists
Shigeki Sato, Tomakomai's chief harbor pilot, said at
least eight docks that could have accommodated the
Blue Ridge were available in this bustling
commercial harbor on the island of Hokkaido, less
than 100 miles from Russian territory. But the
warship was assigned an isolated eastern wharf,
miles from the city's downtown, because Mayor
Tadayuki Torikoshi didn't want it anywhere near his
town.
Like many other Japanese mayors and provincial
governors, Torikoshi insisted that the ship must
declare that it carried no nuclear weapons before he
would welcome it -- something the U.S. military
refuses to do.
``I was not satisfied by the answers I received'' from
Japan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, when he asked
for a non-nuclear guarantee, the mayor said in an
interview. ``They never gave me a clear answer. If
you asked the majority of the people in this city,
those who said `no' to a visit would clearly be the
majority.''
After much arm-twisting by the Foreign Ministry,
which pointed out that the mayor could not legally
block the ship's visit under the enhanced U.S.-Japan
defense guidelines recently approved by the
Japanese parliament, Tomakomai grudgingly gave in
-- but only as long as the warship berthed at the
far-off dock.
``They knew a week ago the channel was 10 meters
deep,'' the flabbergasted mayor said, when he
learned of the navigational problem, ``so I'm very
surprised to learn now that it's too shallow.''
Nor was it surprising that when the Navy suggested
that perhaps another dock on the busy, western quay
might be made available, the mayor had a curt reply:
``It is not favorable to move.'' He later explained that
he was unwilling to let his commercial facility
become known as a military landing area. Besides,
he had run for re-election on a pledge not to let
warships dock in his town.
The cancellation of the Blue Ridge's port call was
just one in a series of public-relations black eyes
U.S. armed forces in Japan have been forced to
endure in recent weeks.
Just one day before the Blue Ridge's scheduled visit,
Marine Corps Lt. Gen. Earl Hailston, the commander
of U.S. forces on Okinawa, was forced to apologize
to local officials for referring to his hosts as ``nuts''
and ``wimps'' in an e-mail he sent to his
commanders.
A week later, Hailston had to return again to Gov.
Keiichi Inamine's office to apologize, this time for
another Marine suspected of burning down a local
restaurant.
To the chagrin of Okinawan officials, the accused
had not yet been turned over to the Japanese for
prosecution because arson is not specifically listed
among the offenses for which a U.S. serviceman can
be transferred to Japanese police under the Status of
Forces Agreement governing U.S. troops in Japan.
On the general's second visit, a disgusted Inamine
refused even to shake Hailston's hand.
Port calls of the sort attempted by the Blue Ridge are
carried out as a matter of course in Australia, Hong
Kong, Indonesia and even Shanghai on mainland
China. The idea is to give sailors a chance to taste
local culture and do some ``public service'' works to
demonstrate their honorable intentions.
In fact, the Blue Ridge's sailors had hoped to come
ashore in this unprepossessing city of pulp mills and
warehouses, the home of the Oji Paper Co., to visit
Sapporo's famous ``Snow Festival,'' where gigantic
ice sculptures attract thousands of visitors. A
basketball game, a band concert and snow-removal
chores were also on the schedule, but they too were
scrubbed.
Collective self-defense
Before this recent rash of incidents, many of
President Bush's closest advisers, including Paul
Wolfowitz, deputy secretary of defense, and Richard
Armitage, named No. 2 at the State Department
recently, had given top priority to creating a cozier
defense relationship with Japan and having Tokyo
abandon its decadeslong prohibition against
collective self-defense.
Yet many Japanese say they aren't ready to take such
drastic steps. And the sinking of the Ehime Maru,
which dominated newspaper headlines last week in
Japan, has raised new questions about the
competence and sincerity of the U.S. military.
Many Japanese are appalled that civilians were in
the control center when the Greeneville collided
with the Japanese boat, and can't believe that the
submarine crew didn't try harder to rescue survivors.
Others complain that the Japanese government
``passively accepts'' explanations given by the Navy
without demanding clear explanations.
But meekly accepting mandates from ``big brother''
Washington has been commonplace in a nation where
even open discussion of Japan's defense options has
remained something of a taboo. The United States,
after all, wrote Japan's post-World War II
constitution and promises to defend the nation. In
exchange, Japan allows the United States to base
37,000 military personnel in the country, the highest
concentration on Okinawa.
Now, even the Japanese government worries that the
tragic accident could harm the overall relationship
between Japan and the United States.
``A number of hurdles lie ahead, such as Japanese
families' strong request for raising the Ehime Maru
and compensation for the victims,'' the Mainichi
newspaper in Tokyo editorialized last week.
``Clearing each hurdle is the path to alleviating the
anxiety of the Japanese people.''
Yet these days, with scandals dragging down both
Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori's ruling party -- his
approval rating stands at 14 percent -- and the
Foreign Ministry, where a senior bureaucrat has
been charged with embezzling secret funds, there is
little hope that real leadership could emerge within
Japan to engage the nation in an honest discussion
about real-world security.
``At the political level, Japan is incapable of coping
with the Bush administration,'' said Tadae Takubo,
dean of the social-sciences faculty at Kyorin
University in Tokyo. ``Regrettably, all we can do for
now is to expect America to understand that Japan is
now in agony. There is no way for Japan to avoid
keeping the Bush administration waiting for a while.''
W. Michael Meserve, U.S. consul-general in
Sapporo, Hokkaido's capital, insists that the majority
of citizens support Navy port calls and welcome the
presence of American troops on the island.
But interviews with residents uncover deep anxiety
about U.S. intentions.
``This port visit has become a really sensitive issue,''
said Masashi Maeda, a 30-year-old civil servant.
``When this whole controversy started, people were
nervous and thought maybe another black ship was
coming to town,'' he said, referring to Commodore
Matthew Perry's landing in 1853, which forced this
isolated island nation to open to the West.
Does he think Japan should rethink its security
policy? ``It's a new era, and times have changed,'' the
30-year-old said, ``but we haven't reached the point
yet'' where Japan could accept a greater military
role.
Another port call canceled
Last week, the Navy quietly scrubbed the planned
four-day visit of another vessel, the destroyer USS
John S. McCain, which had been scheduled to tie up
at Otaru, another Hokkaido port. The Navy officially
cited the submarine accident as the reason for the
postponement, but Otaru, like Tomakomai, had also
asked the ship not to come.
As dusk fell on the grimy city of smokestacks on the
night the Blue Ridge made its U-turn, a hearty band
of socialists and labor activists paraded through
downtown, carrying the red banners they had used at
first light to protest the arrival of the Blue Ridge.
``We thought we would have a protest rally tonight,''
said postal worker Hideo Saito, one of the
organizers, ``but now it's turned into a victory
march.''
``I want to be friends with American people,'' he
said, ``but I want to be friends in a different way than
through the military.''