The Yokosuka base of the U.S. Navy lies in Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's constituency. As a local politician, Koizumi has always been invited to whatever function the Navy was holding at Yokosuka. Koizumi, however, has never attended any.

"That's why some people think I'm anti-American," he was heard to say before he became prime minister.

Of course, he is anything but anti-American. What he was really driving at, I believe, was that he had the sense to keep some distance from America.

But I suppose he has changed. "The wise adapt themselves to changed circumstances," or so goes an old adage. Ever since he became prime minister, Koizumi has turned into a confirmed believer in Japan's alliance with the United States, and has chosen U.S. President George W. Bush as his ultimate bosom buddy.

During the Persian Gulf War, it was Bush's father who called then-Prime Minister Toshiki Kaifu whenever Japan's cooperation had to be sought. The Japanese media dubbed the hotline "Bush phone"-a pun on "push-button phone."

In the July, 2003, issue of "Kokusai Mondai" (International affairs) magazine, Kaifu recalls his summit with Bush Sr., who asked, "Toshiki, please call me George." Kaifu notes, "There is such a thing as compatibility or chemistry in any human relationship."

But even though Kaifu's Japan coughed up no mean sum to help the war effort in the Gulf, the nation faced the humiliation of being told by the United States that not only was this irresponsible "checkbook diplomacy," but also the contribution was "too little" and came "too late," and Japan "shedded no blood."

This bad experience seems to have become imprinted in Koizumi's mind as exactly the kind of thing he must avoid repeating at all costs. I believe this is why Koizumi was reacted quickly to firmly support the war in Iraq against international public opinion, commit a lot of money to Iraqi reconstruction, and decide to send Self-Defense Forces personnel to Iraq.

How far should Japan "cuddle up" to America and accommodate its demands? Whenever I mull this sticky question, I remind myself of what happened in 1980.

In late 1979, the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan. A scandalized U.S. President Jimmy Carter called for a boycott of the Moscow Olympics the following year. However, the International Olympic Committee would not allow politics to interfere with sport, and rejected the U.S. proposal during a general assembly. Global opinion became split right down the middle.

As it turned out, athletes from Britain, Italy, France and many other European nations defied their governments and participated in the Moscow Olympics.

The Japanese Olympic Committee was basically in favor of participation. But then-Prime Minister Masayoshi Ohira kept applying pressure on the JOC to boycott the Games, and finally prevailed. Ohira was determined to stand by the United States.

Around the same time, Japan was forced to make another painful decision. The Islamic revolution had succeeded in Iran, where U.S. Embassy staff in Tehran were being held hostage. In the face of this crisis, Ohira saw no choice but to prove his allegiance to the Americans by suspending oil imports from Iran-the oil Japan needed desperately.

"Distressing" was how Ohira felt, according to his memoirs titled "Ohira Masayoshi Kaisoroku."

When he went to see Carter in the United States, Ohira assured him Japan would stand by America even in bad times. America was in a jam, fighting the Soviet Union on one front and Islamic fundamentalism on the other, and Ohira felt deep sympathy.

"Without America, what will become of the world? We must help Carter in these dark moments," Ohira said at the time.

"Japan-U.S. alliance" is a commonly used expression today, but it was Ohira who used it first during his summit with Carter. This represented a turning point in Japanese diplomacy, in that the nation asserted clearly for the first time that it considered itself a member of the Western world.

As an extention of this, Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone would establish his much touted "Ron-Yasu" relationship with President Ronald Reagan.

Perhaps Koizumi also means to stand by the United States in these bad times. I certainly sense he is prepared to go out of his way to help America.

But what torments Bush now is quite different from what tormented Carter 23 years ago. For one, there is no more Soviet Union, and the United States is the world's sole superpower. Granted, the threat of terrorism is real. But I would say America has provoked other nations with its arrogance and self-righteousness. After all, did America itself not invite the terrible mess that is going on in Iraq?

The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan was already becoming ancient history when I noticed an article in the Oct. 6 issue of The New York Times that seemed to underscore the irony of history.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, who was with the KGB before the collapse of the Soviet Union, was quoted as suggesting that "the invasion of Iraq had created a terrorist haven where one did not previously exist," and that "the danger exists of a decade-long struggle like the one fought by the Soviet Union in Afghanistan in the 1980s."

Back in spring, when the United States was about to invade Iraq, The New York Times ran a commentary on March 9. "... the United States seems determined to carry out military and diplomatic action that is almost unprecedented in the history of civilized nations," said the author-Jimmy Carter himself.

I see nothing wrong with the idea per se of Japan standing by America in bad times as well as good. But do the Japanese people truly want to share America's present anguish? Put it another way, is Koizumi feeling any torment at all?

Compared to Ohira's dilemma over the Olympic boycott, the SDF dispatch to Iraq is an incomparably serious matter. Does Koizumi even understand this?

The Lower House election campaign kicked off Tuesday. Bush, who talked intimately with Koizumi in Tokyo recently, must be an unseen protagonist in the upcoming election. 　（2003/10/29）