(Bloomberg) -- Among the challenges awaiting Japan’s next prime minister, few will be as weighty as managing relations with its sole treaty ally the US and navigating fraying ties with China, the biggest trading partner for Tokyo.
The ruling Liberal Democratic Party will elect a new leader Friday who is set to become the next premier. During initial stages of the election campaign, foreign policy issues mostly took a back seat.
That changed last week after the fatal stabbing death of a Japanese schoolboy in China, an incident that prompted all the candidates to make calls for a full investigation and demand steps to protect Japanese citizens.
Tensions had already been high in meetings between Japanese and Chinese diplomats after a Chinese military aircraft made an unauthorized entry into Japanese airspace for the first time last month. Japan countered by sailing one of its warships through the Taiwan Strait for the first time earlier this week, Kyodo News reported Thursday, in a move likely to anger China.
The LDP’s dominance in parliament makes it all but certain the winner of its leadership race will be elected the nation’s next prime minister on Oct. 1. The nine candidates have all indicated they would continue to align with the US to counter China’s growing assertiveness, as well as threats from North Korea and Russia.
“I wouldn’t expect any great changes because the main objective of any Japanese government remains consolidation of the alliance with the US, and expansion of — and strengthening — ties to other security partners in the face of doubts about the credibility of the US and an increasingly hostile external environment,” said Brad Glosserman, a senior adviser at Pacific Forum, a think-tank based in Hawaii.
Confidence in the US has been shaken by recent moves seen as inward looking. These include opposition by US President Joe Biden, a Democrat, and from leading Republicans to a proposed deal by Nippon Steel Corp. to buy United States Steel Corp.
However, none of the candidates has advocated major change in Japan’s relationship with the US, and most want to continue deepening ties to other leading democracies including South Korea and Australia.
That doesn’t mean it will be smooth sailing. It still remains unknown how Democratic nominee Vice President Kamala Harris would approach Japan if she wins the November presidential election. During his campaign for the election, Trump has renewed criticism of trade imbalances with Japan. When he previously held the office, Trump demanded that Tokyo pay more to host US troops.
Japan may have its own requests. Shigeru Ishiba, a frontrunner in the LDP election, has said he would like a review of the agreement that allows US troops to be based in Japan to make it fairer. He hasn’t provided specifics.
Some of the candidates want Japan to be allowed to join the intelligence-sharing group of nations known as the Five Eyes, comprising the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the UK.
One of the foreign policy achievements of outgoing Prime Minister Fumio Kishida has been to foster a closer relationship with South Korea and increase trilateral cooperation with the US in areas such as missile defense. That progress could be at risk if a new prime minister doesn’t invest as much in fostering ties with Seoul.
Friction may surface if the new premier visits the Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo, a memorial for the nation’s war dead that is regarded by South Korea and some other nations as a symbol of past militarism. Sanae Takaichi, a staunch conservative who is among the election favorites, is a regular visitor to the shrine. She has said she would continue to go as prime minister.
Any visit to Yasukuni — where 14 Class-A war criminals are honored alongside other war dead — might trigger tension with the US. A visit by former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to Yasukuni in December 2013 prompted a rare public expression of discord when then US Ambassador Caroline Kennedy expressed “disappointment” over the visit. Abe then refrained from going to the shrine until he stood down as prime minister in 2020.
Alternatively, some political analysts say a more overtly nationalist Japanese prime minister may be a better fit in coordination with the US over China, the country that both have said is their primary strategic threat. Japan’s deep business ties to China sometimes make Tokyo cautious over fully aligning with the US, such as over restrictions on exports of semiconductor-related equipment.
“There is a possibility that Trump would see policy agreement with Takaichi in terms of being tough on China,” said Naoko Funatsu, a research fellow at the Japan Institute of International Affairs, a Tokyo-based think tank.
The third frontrunner in the LDP campaign is Shinjiro Koizumi, who studied at Columbia University in New York and worked as a researcher at a Washington think tank. Koizumi, 43, once served as environment minister but his lack of experience compared with most of the other candidates could be a handicap in the election.
“One of the concerns about Koizumi is his very limited track record in diplomacy,” said Yu Uchiyama, a professor at Tokyo University.
During the campaign, Koizumi hasn’t disputed his inexperience, but said his youth could be an asset, including in dealing with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, a contemporary at 40.
Koizumi’s father is Junichiro Koizumi, a former prime minister who held a 2002 summit in Pyongyang with then-leader Kim Jong Il, after which North Korea released some of the Japanese citizens it abducted during the 1970s and 1980s. Since then, Japan has demanded the release of all the other surviving abductees.
North Korea has said the issue is settled, with Kim Yo Jong, the sister of the current leader, saying in March a summit can’t be held because Tokyo has “no courage” to take the first step toward better relations.
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