Editorial
Koizumi, Bush talks may prove puzzling

When Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi meets President Bush at Camp David today, it's likely that it will be Koizumi who walks away with the most omiyage.

Yet it's also likely Koizumi will be shaking his head, trying to figure out just exactly what those gifts mean — and if he really wants to take them home.

President Bush campaigned on a platform of elevation of Japan's status. He pledged to reverse President Clinton's emphasis on China at the apparent expense of Japan. (Observers who know Asia would prefer that Bush pay a lot more attention to both countries, as well as to the rest of Asia Pacific, than Clinton did. If Clinton was paying too much attention to China, why did his second secretary of state visit that vast country only five times?)

Similarly, Bush has promised to develop missile defense systems that can defend Japan, as well, perhaps, as Taiwan.

These are promised gifts that frankly worry Japan. The downgrading of Bush's relations with China threatens to spark a rivalry that can hardly benefit Japan, and the missile defense plan is likely to launch a regional arms race, leaving Japan to decide whether to jettison its pacifist constitution and join the race or risk being left behind.

Koizumi surely will ask Bush some pointed questions about the defense review being conducted by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, which reportedly contemplates pulling American troops back from forward bases in South Korea and Japan, defending those allies instead with long-range, high-tech weapons.

American commanders like Adm. Dennis Blair, Hawai'i-based commander of Pacific forces, have gone public with their objections to that possibility, worrying that a troop pull-out would surely be interpreted by those allies as an end to true commitment.

Leaders in Japan and South Korea no doubt agree, but complicating that discussion will be the frustration of the Okinawan population for having to bear the brunt of the American bases burden, intensified by reports of yet another rape for which American servicemen are being questioned.

The two leaders also will want to discuss the 1997 Kyoto environmental protocol, over which they badly disagree, and Koizumi's plans for long-overdue domestic economic reform.

The Japanese are serious about the Kyoto accord, which was signed in their ancient capital and which they fully intend to ratify. Like the Europeans, the Japanese were insulted by Bush's out-of-hand rejection of the treaty. Hopefully, Bush has learned that his imperious go-it-alone style has cost us friends.

An interesting twist in the economy debate will be that Koizumi's economic plan differs from the solution prescribed for him by Washington, but rather resembles Bush's own economic platform.

It is to be hoped that, on a personal level, Bush looks into Koizumi's eyes, much as he did with Russian President Vladimir Putin, and finds him a man with whom he can do business. Despite the best of intentions, there is serious and broad misunderstanding between Tokyo and Washington. This summit can go a long way toward changing that.