We all know this story, some of us more explicitly than others: The lady receives from her gentleman an anticipated gift but, opening the package, discovers that the dress inside is not the one she wanted; she asked for red in one style, and this specimen is white in another. The apparel box is upended, the dress falls to the floor and during the uneven fusillade that comes next no plea from the defense will convince the room of a new dress when heretofore there was none to claim; or that the article provided is fancier and actually cost a little more than the article desired. No: red or nothing, and the failure is a serious one of communication, judgment, respect and consideration, and just what were you thinking?
American faith in the government and national character of Japan has won Tokyo a chance for a permanent United Nations Security Council seat at Washington's side. Acting Ambassador to the United Nations Anne Patterson identified the qualifications for the "two or so" positions the United States was willing to open, and Japan met all of them. Early on the Bush White House noticed the prospects of America's economic second ready to embrace the military obligations of democratic sovereignty it had been denied at the end of the Second World War, spared during the Cold War; and which the Japanese themselves politely declined when called to expel Saddam Hussein from Kuwait, submitting to the Western nations the pacifist constitution General Douglas MacArthur presented to Tokyo in the second year of Allied Occupation.
Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and his majority Liberal Democratic Party have led their country towards a reckoning with foreign policy that is more tradition than reason; Koizumi has followed most of the United States' advice, principally suggestions that only a militarily confident and efficacious country belongs on the Security Council, made last year by President Bush's former Secretary and Deputy Secretary of State. Japan's foreign interests and strategic objectives have closely aligned with Washington's, startlingly close to mutual allies who are still at arm's length; cooperation includes missile defense partnerships, negotiation with belligerents and modest yet sincere deployments to prominent theaters. The Diet will debate constitutional amendments, now with committee reports cautiously endorsing the recognition of Japan's possesion of and right to armed forces; doing so under the most supportive postwar Japanese public.
What of the coveted Security Council seat? Tokyo was incensed when it heard the news.
Political editor for the rightist Yomiuri Shimbun Takashi Oda bitterly saluted "the day Japan's proposal for United Nations reform was dealt a fatal blow by the U.S. government" shortly after a panicky bureau story declared the Council bid "in jeopardy." Foreign Minister Nobutaka Machimura called the decision "unexpected" and another official derided the invitation as "an embarrassment." All this for a categorical nomination from the United Nations' underwriter? Just so, as Japan was instead hoping to join the club with its own clique — the "Group of Four," or "G-4," a compact with Council hopefuls Brazil, India and Germany. The quartet offered a draft resolution alternative to America's public intent: ten new Council seats, six of them permanent, four of the six to G-4 and the remainder to Africa. Meeting criticism, G-4 members debated softening draft language — expanding on the same scale but delaying the veto rights of new Council seats. Countries in the General Assembly were naturally supportive of diluting the Security Council's power but six permanent seats were not a part of a Washington offer.
In May, Machimura expressed not only Tokyo's preference for Council entry as part of the Group of Four but a curious uncertainty about acceptance if singly nominated. Tokyo has taken Washington's objective announcement as more eradicative than China askance. Oda tells us why: it is believed that G-4 failure will "most likely drive a wedge" between each of the democracies which Tokyo has, for the first time, courted by itself. Japan has taken quickly to the regional and intercontinental partnerships prerequisite to a superpower: India, Germany and Brazil are each attractive markets for trade and investment; should Japan's constitution provide a legal basis for collective defense the trio, especially India, would make for helpful allies. Japan's choice of friends, unfortunately, includes three countries whose governments opposed the liberation of Iraq. With joint statements and photo-op gestures of solidarity, Japan's lone induction will be a kind of embarrassment. But India, Germany and Brazil have experienced one of their own, without sponsorship to enter a troubled institution in a troubled world body whose seventeen-resolution surrender to Saddam Hussein they applauded.
Exclusivity carries the most value for those who haven't got it. The Group of Four's Security Council is a place of prestige and good standing; the United States' Council is a dysfunctional anachronism. Foremost on President Bush's mind is reform: in sixty years the United Nations has made quite a mockery of the rule of law, human dignity and self-determination. Morally, it is the dictator's last refuge for legitimacy and in the disgrace of the Oil-for-Food program, a monument to the corruption of oligarchy. With reforms proposed by the White House enabling democracies to work independently of the United Nations bureaucracy and its worst clients, Washington intends to keep allies close. The Security Council, then, would be a temporary arrangement, Japan rewarded for its merits alone.
When the gall over its first painful diplomatic letdown subsides, Tokyo should understand. The vignette about sparring lovers has an epilogue. One week later, the dress can be found carefully hung in the lady's closet.