Japan continues towards a full realization of democratic autonomy:

As salty winds gusted off Tokyo Bay, a crack unit of Japanese commandos ascended the starboard ladder of a ship in a simulated hunt for weapons of mass destruction. They secured and patted down the crew, then searched the docked vessel until they uncovered its hidden cargo - a mock stash of sarin gas.

The training exercise late last month was all for the cameras. Japan, along with Australia, France and the United States, was showcasing its willingness to prevent the transit of weapons by terrorists and renegade states, particularly North Korea. But for Japan, a country that since World War II has eschewed any impression as an aggressor, the decision to take a leading role in a high-profile military exercise marked a rare display of force. It underscored another mission: to redefine this nation as more than just an economic power.

Even so, the country goes two steps forward and one step back. The commandos conducting the drill were not armed; the boarded ship was Japanese and its commander gave permission for his own interdiction. But somehow it's fittingly and comfortingly Japanese: intent, if understated.

Nearly a year ago I read an Yomiuri Shimbun editorial challenging Japan's pacifist foreign policy and the American-drafted constitution that — Cold War-influenced "reverse course" on military policy notwithstanding — enforced it. Article 9 of the Japanese constitution renounces the making of war, and in the post-Cold War world of terrorist-spiked authoritarianism, non-participation in the free world's defense hardly seems a practical solution. Since then the matter has met encouraging public response, an initial endorsement from Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and, not without a little prodding from the United States' Secretary and Deputy Secretary of State, serious attention from the Diet.

In recent weeks and months, the prime minister has politically distanced himself from amending Japan's constitution, affecting a straddle by insisting that the country's desire to sit on the United Nations Security Council can be considered separate from the ability to defend itself and its allies. Tokyo lawmakers, who were conducting panel studies on constitutional alteration, also seem to have lost a bit of nerve:

Revision debate was expected to be on a political agenda as early as next year. But in a turnaround from its emphasis on constitutional debate during the Upper House election in July, opposition Minshuto (Democratic Party of Japan) plans to focus on pension and other social security issues-a sore spot of the ruling coalition-in the next Lower House election.

"Our focus in the next two to three years will be a change of power," said Minshuto leader Katsuya Okada on Oct. 31. "Debate on constitutional revisions can move on, but carrying them out will be an issue in the future."

Minshuto made major advances in the Upper House election on the strength of its attacks against the government's unpopular pension reforms. The largest opposition party plans to delay specific revision moves until after the next Lower House election, to take place within three years.

Japan's perennial majority party, the Liberal Democratic Party, is apparently positioning itself to peel off DPJs who believe in and are willing to support constitutional revision. Debate ensues in 2005, though given the slight change of tide, it remains to be seen if domestic politics will take precedence over Japan's larger concerns. No amendment is expected, in the words of the LDP, much before 2008. Even so, there is reason to believe that progress will come with a less magnificent entrance:

Officials are now negotiating with the Pentagon a broad redefinition of the U.S.-Japan alliance, in which the United States is now largely responsible for the defense of Japan. On the table, Japanese officials say, is a new concept of "an alliance in global terms" in which the armed forces would work more closely with the U.S. military, both at home and on missions abroad.

Proponents of a more evenly distributed defense and expansion of the free world prefer that the Japanese confront their political anachronisms directly. But if form quietly follows function, we might be just as pleased.