In Addition On The Abductees Deal

Over at 38North, the place for all things DPRK, Dr. Sheila Smith has up a long post on the new Abe Cabinet-DPRK agreement to reopen the investigation into the fates of Japanese either kidnapped or purportedly kidnapped by North Koreans or Japanese Red Army terrorists in the 1970s. (Link)

Four points to help fill out her narrative:

- What ultimately sank the Koizumi initiative on normalization was not a loss of public support for engagement with Pyongyang. It was the Japanese government's reneging on the agreement to return the living abductees to North Korea after a series of family visits. By keeping the five, deprogramming them and allowing the abductee lobby to use them as cudgels against the DPRK (and against any post-Abe government that tried to circumvent the abductee lobby to engage Pyongyang) Japan taught the DPRK a lesson in bloody-minded double-crossing -- something that Kim Jong-il thought he knew everything about.

- After Iijima Isao paid his very public visit to Pyongyang (Link) the chattering classes in Washington and New York mocked him, saying he had been used as a propaganda tool of the North Koreans to no gain. For that derision there has been no apology, nor will there be any. Furthermore, Iijima's lesson on how one gets the ball rolling with the DPRK will be ignored.

- While support for the abductees is wide, one should not be too certain of its depth. Like the current emnity for Chinese and South Koreans (distinct from emnity felt toward the Xi and Park governments) outrage over the abductees is mostly a pose, a feeling one is supposed to feel. A maudlin minority of miscontents and dupes shows up at abductee events. In public opinion polls, the majority of voters express inextinguishable anger. Altogether, though these items do not add up to much in the way of a public movement.

- Ergo: there is no public to punish the Abe 2.0 Cabinet if this initiative fails to bear fruit. The abductees issue is private business, owned by a coterie of Diet members of which Abe Shinzo is a charter member. The issue has been managed for the purpose of humiliating and boxing in administrations, this in order to pave the way for a return of a revisionist government. That the person in charge of that government is Abe Shinzo, the man the abductee issue first made prime minister, pretty much guarantees that when the Pyongyang investigators find nothing new, the response in Japan will be a dull thud.

Is Today The Day For The DPRK?

Yesterday Abe Shinzo envoy and symbol manipulator extraordinaire Iijima Isao (the bald gentleman above) met with President of the Presidium of the Supreme People's Assembly Kim Yong-nam (the other...errr...gentleman above).

Now it is true that the government of North Korea could just be trotting out its #2 leader for a meeting that goes nowhere, releasing footage of Iijima and Kim in The Big Chairs in front of The Big Painting only to metaphorically pull the chair out from under Iijima-san's massive posterior, humiliating both him and his prime minister.

However, does one need the #2 in the leadership to take time out of his busy schedule of evildoing in order to humiliate Iijima, whose formal title is the decidedly modest one of Special Advisor to the Cabinet (naikaku kambo sanyo)? Would not ordering a driver to take Iijima all around greater Pyongyang, permitting him meet no one of consequence, have done the trick? Yes, some commentators have suggested that the meetings Iijima has had with top government officials are designed to make South Korean and U.S. officials worried that Japan is about to cut a deal undermining ongoing denuclearization and military pull back efforts. (Link)

But a breakthrough, even a lousy one, should be welcomed, right?

As I noted earlier, the complete lack of coordination between the Government of Japan and the governments of the United States, South Korea and seemingly China...and the only-Abe-could-get-away-with-this keeping in the dark of the families of the abducted are indicators that Abe has something in the works similar to, if not commensurate with, the Nixon Shock (Nikuson shokku).

If Iijima has secured a deal in Pyongyang regarding a resolution of the abductees issue then that deal could be put to the Cabinet for Cabinet Decision (kakugi kettei) during the its regularly scheduled meeting today (Friday). Prime Minister Abe could then call a special press conference starting at, if experience is any guide, 18:00 local time.

We shall see.

Image courtesy: Sankei News

Non Verbal In Pyongyang

Iijima Isao, Koizumi Jun'ichiro's public relations wizard brought back into the Prime Minister's Residence by a suitably chastened Abe Shinzo, whose previous turn as Prime Minister shuddered from one P.R. disaster to the next, arrived in Pyongyang, luggage in hand (a kahuna who carries his own bags, wonderful!) for a big time official meeting with North Korean officials.

How do we know that this is a big time official visit?

Look at the lapel.



Iijima has his Prime Minister's Residence service badge on.

Oh, Iijima could have forgotten to take the badge off before leaving the plane. However, such an oversight is unlikely, given that the symbolism master was traveling to Pyongyang -- where the lapel badge is EVERYTHING.

An aside, but for a bald, fat dude, Iijima rocks the two-toned dress shirt look.

In all seriousness, Prime Minister Abe Shinzo spent a significant chunk of time during his exceedingly brief Diet Policy Speech promising a resolution of the North Korean abductees issue. With Iijima on the case in and heads rolling in Pyongyang, perhaps Abe was not, as I assumed at the time of the policy speech, just blowing smoke about a resolution of the abduction conundrum.

Prepare to be surprised. Nay, astonished.


Later - An earlier version of this post was published without the photo image. Apologies.

Screen grab courtesy: NHK

Ave Imperator, De Rideri Te Salutant

My hometown newspaper has something of a problem with Prime Minister Abe Shinzo. No, strike that. My hometown newspaper has a huge problem with Abe Shinzo. The editors of the Tokyo Shimbun could have chosen any number of the images from the PM's visit to the Nico Nico Douga event at Makuhari Messe. However, they thought the above -- which I am sure made Abe public relations wizard Iijima Isao wince and wish he were somewhere else -- was perfect for the middle of Sunday's politics page.

Sakusen, seiko!

Later - No, I do not want to think about why the Self Defense Forces had one of its latest generation tanks on display at a geeks, gamers and net vidiots convention. Perhaps the Minister for Cool Japan (yes, there is one) can explain it. Indeed, given the identity of the Minister for Cool Japan, I am pretty sure she can.

Later still - Video of Abe's visit to the event, courtesy TBS. (Link - J video)

Much, much later - TBS has removed the video but private videos are up on YouTube and other video sharing sites.

A scathing exegesis of Abe's tank photo op can be found at The Point. (Link)

Image courtesy: Kyodo News