While political commentators in Japan concluded that officials must have been out of their minds to invite the United States to put additional pressure on Japan to get involved in a war against Iraq, the Japanese government countered that the officials' getting together was nothing more than part of a "checking all the options" procedure and an attempt to "balance the relationship with the U.S. and Arab oil-producing nations."

Not much of a balance, however, can be expected when bombs start falling on Baghdad with all Arab nations opposing military action against Iraq.
Supporting military action against Saddam when nobody else does is surely the kind of spirit the Pentagon expects from its junior ally, although some political commentators in Japan suspect that policy makers got carried away daydreaming about becoming a "real" U.S. ally, securing Japan a place on Bush's list of "best friends."

Applauding U.S. military action, however, seems to go only so far even in Japan, and officials were careful to tone down their rhetoric at their not-so-secret meeting, concluding that Japan's decision to support a strike against Iraq would depend on the "purpose" of such an attack as well as on responses from European and Arab countries.