Japan after the 2004 Asian Tsunami

‘Why Give?’ asks Brad Williams. What factors should be considered when interpreting Japan’s US$500m pledge of emergency assistance in the wake of the Dec. 2004 Asian Tsunami? A figure behind only Australia (US$810m) and Germany (US$674). Leaving aside the development of humanitarian sensibilities among the Japanese public since the mid-1990s, far more interesting are the politico-diplomatic forces and objectives influencing the sum, constitution and deployment of Japan’s relief package.

Battling for the accruement of political capital, states engaged in ‘competitive compassion’ directly following the disaster. Doubling the United States’ pledge, Japan announced US$30m in aid, before themselves doubled by China’s US$63m. In response, the US increased its offer to $350m, before Japan’s final announcement of US$500m (similar one-upmanship occurred among European states), as one MOFA official stated “We cannot present a lower figure than the US”. In addition to national pride, Japan found an opportunity to assume a prominent international role divorced from the taint of militarism. Tokyo was of course conscious of the ‘China factor', Southeast Asia representing ‘a key arena in the contest for regional leadership'. With cutbacks to Japan's ODA budget caused by the continuing recession, China, having changed course after the 1995 conflicts for sovereignty over the Spratly Islands gained significant influence, coming off the better in the aftermath of the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis by refusing to devalue its currency and saving the region from further recession. Japan on the contrary came under criticism by Malaysian PM Mahathir for ‘lack of urgency in distribution’ of aid. Learning from the experience, and operating with the assistance of myriad NGOs (particularly Japan Platform (JPF), an aid implementation entity created Aug 2000 after the failures of 1997, and receiving significant public funding) Japan was able to announce on the 21st of January 2005 that ‘it had finished disbursing emergency assistance’.

Eschewing the ‘chequebook diplomacy’ of earlier years for ‘visible assistance’, Japan deployed 1,800 SDF personnel in afflicted zones (concurrent with the 1,000 serving in Southern Iraq), ‘Japan’s largest overseas disaster relief deployment’, promoting internationally the image of the SDF as a legitimate relief organization. Furthermore the situation enhanced the notion of ‘burden sharing’ and interoperability with US forces, ‘foreseeing future joint operations’. Williams writes, ‘Public approval of the SDFs tsunami disaster relief activities has provided the impetus for the Japanese government to re-examine the submission to the Diet of an amendment to the SDF Law that would elevate overseas operations to the status of a ‘primary duty’ alongside home security’. Even the Japan Communist Party for the first time approved the overseas deployment of SDF forces.

Finally, Tokyo sought to use the tsunami as an opportunity to promote her bid for a permanent seat on the UNSC – Koizumi in fact raised the issue with Kofi Annan at the special ASEAN meeting in Jakarta on January 6th, Finance Minister Machimura similarly conveyed this to several of his South Asian counterparts. At the summit Koizumi announced Japan’s transfer from the competing US-led ‘core group’ to the UN-centric emergency assistance framework, ‘deflecting the criticism of foreign policy being too US-oriented, also [highlighting] the important place of the UN in foreign policy’. It is interesting to note Japan’s ‘double hedging’ – with $250m distributed bilaterally to specific recipients, and the other $250m funneled through UN-affiliated entities. Japan’s bid for a UNSC seat that year was unsuccessful, representing ‘the failure of Japan’s economic power to achieve an important diplomatic objective’.

Australia’s contribution of AU$1 billion, the greatest pledge of all nations, was distributed through a newly created bilateral organization (AIPRD) ‘reflecting Canberra’s desire for cooperative relations with a stable Indonesia’. It is sobering to reflect on this while noting that only five years later, in the wake of controversies over refugees and renewed media interest in the refusal of the Indonesian government to officially acknowledge the 1975 execution of Australian journalists at Balibo on the East Timor border, it appears that Australian-Indonesian ties are worse than ever.

Firearms in Tokugawa Villages

According to David Howell’s recent article in Japanese Studies, at any one time there were around 150 000-200 000 matchlock muskets circulating within peasant villages during the Tokugawa period, many being produced in Sakai and Kunitomi in Ōmi Province (Shiga Prefecture). Not targeted during Hideyoshi’s katanagari, guns weren't consistently regulated by the Shogunate until the 1650s. While ‘illicit weapons’ were confiscated, the exceptions became imagined as farming implements rather than weapons and categorized as hunter’s guns (odoshi teppō) and farmer’s guns (ryōshi teppō) for frightening and slaying animal pests (boars and deer). After the repeal of Tsunayoshi’s ‘laws of compassion’ shortly after his death in 1709, farmers were permitted to use live ammunition and their guns reclassified as ‘two-season’ or ‘four-season’. Unlike hunter’s guns, essential for their occupation and afforded greater importance, farmer’s guns were officially considered expediential and temporary, and were formally ‘borrowed’ from the government. By the early 18th century for practical reasons gun licenses were regulated by village authorities (for transferring the licenses of dead/incapacitated gun holders, and managing firearm ‘borrowing’ and repairs).

There were of course many unregistered guns floating around, many being unofficial replacements of damaged ones. Inspection tours were carried out in the Kantō region in 1838-40, responding to the threat of masterless samurai, unregistered commoners (consistently assumed to be criminal) and assorted ruffians. Rather than directly targeting warumono, these tours sought to dry up the pool of hidden, unlicensed firearms in villages, and in this were largely successful. In actual practice mainly damaged guns were confiscated with the remaining unlicensed ones entrusted to village officials who would proceed to request valid licenses for them.

From the early 1810s, but more particularly after the 1840s peasants occaisionally engaged in vigilante action, and sent requests for licenses for firearms for self-protection (yōjin teppō) in the face of escalating warumono violence. Capable villagers in Kōzuke and Musashi were officially enjoined to provide support in the repression of the 1864 Tengutō Insurrection, and the Bushu Outburst in 1866, and at other times to assist the Kantō Regulatory Patrol. Early in that decade bakufu edicts encouraged villages to react with necessary force in emergencies. ‘In the true spirit of micromanaging Tokugawa bureaucracy, the edict included instructions concerning the banners each village force would display and pointers on the preparation of bentō lunches’. Even so, there is little evidence of peasants actually using firearms to kill anyone. After the Restoration, the Meiji state placed tight restrictions on farmers’ gun ownership, with only a minority of professional hunters awarded licenses by 1876.