Japanese PM Shinzo Abe Prepares ‘Tweetable’ Investment Figures For Trump Meeting
Japanese officials believe they have cobbled together a game plan for
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s summit with U.S. President Donald Trump, but doubts
still remain over how to deal with the unpredictable new leader.
Abe will enter the summit in Washington on Feb. 10 armed with an economic
cooperation package worth $150 billion (about 17 trillion yen) to create
hundreds of thousands of jobs in the United States, and a delegation that
includes top members of his Cabinet.
The strategy is to not only quell Trump’s claims of unfair Japanese trade
practices and currency manipulation but also to protect Abe’s “Abenomics”
economic measures and create channels for more traditional negotiations.
However, it remains to be seen if the economic package will be enough to soothe
over the U.S. president.
Tokyo has been consistently trumpeting the package as a boon for both
sides. “By further heightening the economic relationship between Japan and the
United States through greater cooperation, constructive discussions are
expected to build a win-win relationship for the two nations,” Chief Cabinet
Secretary Yoshihide Suga said at his Feb. 7 news conference.
Suga also announced that Abe would be accompanied on his visit to
Washington by Finance Minister Taro Aso, who also serves as deputy prime
minister, Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida and Hiroshige Seko, the economy
minister.
Although it is unusual for such core Cabinet ministers to join the prime
minister for a summit, the Abe administration hopes the lineup will convince
the United States that Tokyo is placing high priority on the meeting.
The economic cooperation package was compiled under the initiative of the
prime minister’s office, with some contributions from high-ranking bureaucrats
in the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry. The measures include investment
in high-speed railway systems in the United States as well as joint research in
robot development.
At the Feb. 3 Lower House Budget Committee session, Abe said, “I want to
talk with President Trump about the contributions that we can make for jobs (in
the United States).”Abe was forced to change his approach to Trump after the
president announced the United States’ withdrawal from the Trans-Pacific
Partnership free trade arrangement, which was considered a key part of Japan’s
growth strategy.
The Abe administration initially considered trying to convince Trump
about the importance of the TPP, but a high-ranking official in the prime
minister’s office said, “There is the possibility of being totally ignored if
we mentioned even the ‘T’ of the TPP.” Trump has made it clear he will focus on
bilateral trade deals, especially with nations like Japan that have trade
surpluses with the United States.
They will also strive to deflect criticism about the weaker yen because
it goes back to monetary easing measures, one of the “arrows” of Abenomics.Japanese
government officials have disputed Trump’s claims about the auto industry and
the yen. At his Feb. 7 news conference, Aso said, “The monetary easing measures
do not have the objective of weakening the yen.”
But Japanese government officials do not want the Abe-Trump meeting to
focus on those specific topics. Instead, they hope the economic cooperation
package will create what Abe has described as a “broad framework” in which to
discuss the overall economic relationship.
The inclusion of the three Cabinet ministers in the delegation is also an
attempt to seek out other U.S. officials who could become dependable
negotiating partners. One individual being eyed is U.S. Vice President Mike
Pence, who not only has more political experience than Trump but is also viewed
favorably within the U.S. Republican Party.
Japanese officials have sought to establish a Cabinet-level forum led by
Aso and Pence to further discuss economic issues. The idea is to have that
forum instruct lower-level officials to conduct more detailed discussions to
reach some form of compromise.
However, a Japanese government source noted, “The United States has not
responded in any way to the proposal.”
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