Takeo Azuma / Yomiuri Shimbun Staff Writer
The Democratic Party of Japan, in its manifesto, has shifted to a pragmatic approach in its foreign policy, a move clearly aimed at attracting conservative votes in the Aug. 30 House of Representatives election.
The change is also intended to open the way for flexibility in policymaking in the event the party win the election and takes power, political analysts said.
But the policy shift, rather than representing a fundamental change brought about through intraparty brainstorming, seems to have been decided on the hoof, thereby containing a potential danger, the analysts added.
"We remain consistent," DPJ President Yukio Hatoyama told reporters Sunday in Sanjo, Niigata Prefecture. Speaking of the party's policy of approving the continuance of the Maritime Self-Defense Force's refueling operations in the Indian Ocean for the time being, Hatoyama said, "We can hardly issue an order saying, 'All the ships must return,' the day after we come to power."
The DPJ had been criticizing the coalition government's foreign and security policy, denouncing it as being "obedient to the United States," while strongly opposing the overseas dispatch of the Self-Defense Forces.
Speaking on an NHK talk show Sunday, the Liberal Democratic Party's Acting Secretary General Nobuteru Ishihara criticized the main opposition party over its policy about-face, saying: "The party's security policy has changed repeatedly in the past couple of years. Can it build a relationship of trust with U.S. President [Barack] Obama? The people, I think, feel uneasy about this."
With its accession to power becoming a realistic possibility, the DPJ decided to change its policy strategy based on the judgment that if it stuck to its conventional stance, Japan-U.S. relations would cool rapidly.
In fact, the U.S. side conveyed just such a concern to the DPJ.
Harvard University Prof. Joseph Nye, a former U.S. assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs, met with Hatoyama, who was then DPJ secretary general, at a Tokyo hotel in December. Nye reportedly warned against the party's campaign pledges, which, he pointed out, included opposition to the relocation of the functions of the U.S. Marine Corps Futenma Air Station elsewhere within Okinawa Prefecture and a halt to the refueling operations in the Indian Ocean, saying that if these policies were pressed abruptly on the Obama administration, the administration would take this as a signal that the DPJ was not interested in maintaining the Japan-U.S. alliance.
Nye's warning sent a shock wave through the DPJ.
A DPJ executive who has connection with U.S. political circles immediately began spadework to prevent the party from including in its manifesto statements that would limit the policy options of foreign and defense ministers of a Hatoyama administration. A member of the party's manifesto study and preparation committee tried to win over party members hailing from the Japan Socialist Party, predecessor of the Social Democratic Party, by contending that "the Hatoyama administration [to be created in the aftermath of the general election] won't last long if it sticks to the position of objecting to everything [pertaining to security relations with the United States]."
The DPJ's assertion in its manifesto, which was unveiled Monday, differs greatly from its conventional position on the refueling mission. In its list of policies compiled in 2008 as the basis for producing the manifesto, the party expressed opposition to extension of the new Antiterrorism Law, asserting that the government had failed to reassess the refueling activities and scrutinize their effect. This claim was eliminated in its entirety in the 2009 list of policies.
DPJ Acting President Ichiro Ozawa, who harshly criticized the United States during his tenure as party president from April 2006 to May this year, said at a news conference in Otsuki, Yamanashi Prefecture, on Sunday: "The Japan-U.S. alliance and U.N.-centered diplomacy needn't be mutually contradictory. The issue will be easily enough settled if we hold talks on it with the United States."
Behind such a judgment is, as a party executive put it, a calculation that it is advisable to put priority for the moment on bringing about tangible results on issues related to the people's livelihood, such as provision of child allowances, and show its diplomatic hand later.
On July 21, when the lower house was dissolved for a general election, Hatoyama declared to a senior party member, "We'll pursue a pragmatic policy line from now on."
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Other opposition parties miffed
The SDP, a minor opposition party that is considering joining a DPJ-led coalition government if created following the general election, has been increasingly critical of the DPJ's policy shift.
Referring to the MSDF's refueling activities, SDP President Mizuho Fukushima said: "Since the opposition parties opposed the bill in question altogether, the first step to be taken must be to seek public disclosure of information on the refueling operations. It's unreasonable for the DPJ to change its stance [on the issue] abruptly."
The new Antiterrorism Law, based on which refueling operations are conducted, will expire in January. The Diet must pass a bill to revise the law if such operations are to be continued. The DPJ must start legislative preparations for that purpose immediately after the election if it takes over the reins of government.
But because the DPJ does not control the House of Councillors singlehandedly, it will require the cooperation of the SDP and the People's New Party if it establishes a government after the election. The refueling operations issue is expected to become a focal point in power-sharing negotiations with the two parties, observers said.
There is a view within the DPJ that the SDP's attempt to stress its difference from the DPJ in foreign and security policies is intended to avoid it being buried in the forthcoming election. Some DPJ lawmakers predict the SDP will follow in the DPJ's footsteps after the election, saying the party will also find it unavoidable to shift to a pragmatic policy line after the election.
But it remains to be seen how the SDP will react.
The DPJ's change of tack did not come about as a result of intensive discussions within the party. Given that the DPJ is a hodgepodge of lawmakers whose former party affiliations range from the defunct JSP to the LDP, a senior Foreign Ministry official cringed at the prospect of a DPJ-led government, saying, "There are too many things that we've been kept in the dark about, including its foreign policy."
As for whether to continue the refueling activities, DPJ Secretary General Katsuya Okada said: "If we come into office, we'll have the option of revising the new Antiterrorism Law. It can't be ruled out that the [refueling] operations will be permitted after necessary revisions are made to the law. It's useless to consider what we'll do on the matter at this juncture."
Okada thereby indicated that the party will decide on the matter after taking power.
Asked to comment on the SDP's objection to the DPJ's policy shift Sunday, Okada was sanguine, saying, "We'll be able to compromise with each other."
(Jul. 29, 2009)
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