[War] Japan: "Solace in the Storm"

[Ian Martell]

“Solace in the Storm”
Prime Minister Shunichi Sato
Japan
July 16th 2006
-------------------------------------

Ichiro howled as the thunder shook the windows of the home of Prime Minister 
Shunichi Sato.

“Shhh, shhh, Chiro-chan,” the Prime Minister whispered holding the child 
close and rocking him back and forth.

It was no use child still cried. .

“I’ll take him,” said Ayame, Sato’s daughter and Ichiro’s mother.

Reluctantly Sato gave over his grandson amidst a flash of lightning and 
crash of thunder. Ichiro wailed.

“Shhh,” his mother soothed. “It’s too bad about the weather,” she said over 
her child’s chubby little shoulder. “It would have been nice to have a BBQ 
like we used to do when you came home from the Diet.”

Sato nodded and squeezed his daughter’s shoulder. “Me too, but what can we 
do?” he said looking outside at the rain pelting against the windows of the 
house.

Though he’d never admit it Sato was glad of the bad weather. Kazuo, his 
communications director, had convinced him to make a photo op of his last 
visit of the family home before taking office. Now with the rain and Sato’s 
refusal to let the media in his home it ended that non-sense once and for 
all. He could use this time as he intended, to relax and prepare for the 
rigours of office. This was nothing new to Sato, though, for the last 
twenty-five years since leaving the Ministry of Justice to run for the 
Shugiin (House of Representatives) in Tochigi’s 5th District he had held 
office, but he had never held an office as daunting and promising as Prime 
Minister. The month between his election in the Diet to the Attestation of 
himself and the Cabinet by the Emperor hardly seemed enough time and it was 
almost over. Tomorrow he would go before O-Tenno-sama, Akihito and be 
officially appointed Prime Minister. Then it would all be different.

Ichiro, finding his cries were useless against the thunder, seemed to quiet 
at last. Ayame sighed obviously relieved.

“Thank goodness,” she said. “I should probably lay him down for a while.”

Sato nodded. “Alright,” he said then turning so Ichiro could see him, he 
held out his finger for his first grandchild to grab a hold of and smiled. 
“Sleep well Ichiro-chan,” he cooed.

The child seemed singularly unimpressed, but grabbed hold of the finger none 
the less. Sato let him hold it for a moment before pulling it back.

Ayame smiled. “He’s just cranky because of the thunder.”

“Or he knows better than to shake hands with a politician,” came a familiar 
voice from the direction of the door.

Sato turned and smiled, seeing his old college roommate and friend Ryusei 
Sakamoto in the doorway and slightly behind him Akira, Sato’s eldest son.

“Ryu-kun!” Sato beamed as he went to greet his old friend.

“Ichi-kun,” Ryusei smiled as they clapped their hands in a shake half bowing 
as they did.

“I hope you don’t mind, he just showed up at the door,” Akira smiled.

“Well best not let anymore lawyers in the house, but we can excuse just 
one.”

Ayame smiled. “You are all lawyers! I am taking Ichiro out of here before he 
takes after the three of you,” she teased.

The others smiled, and Ryusei said his hellos to Ichiro and presented him 
with a stuffed Totoro doll before Ayame took her son away to be put to bed. 
Sato turned to his son. “What did Kazuo say?” he asked.

“He wanted me to convince you to change your mind about allowing cameras in 
the house.”

“He doesn’t know Ichi that well does he?” joked Ryusei.

Akira nodded. “No but why should he? He was a gift from the party, we would 
have preferred to handle public relations ourselves but he is very popular 
right now thanks to his work on the last campaign.”

Ryusei nodded. He’d been in politics before ‘descending from heaven’ as the 
revolving door between politics and the private sector was colloquially 
called to become counsel to The Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ, Japan’s 
largest private bank, he knew the score.

“Well you can tell him you failed, are your brothers here?” asked Sato not 
wanting to talk about his press secretary.

“Kiyoshi’s helping mom with making dinner but no word from Junji,” Akira 
said before thinking to add Hiroshi, his brother-in-law. “Hiroshi’s talking 
to Inoue about…” he trailed off looking significantly at Ryusei.

“I see, good, have him let me know what Inoue says.”

Akira nodded. “Good, in the meantime I’ll go help mother.”

He took his leave and shut the door behind him.

“I hope everything is okay,” Ryusei said.

Sato knew his friend was fully aware that Tadao Inoue was the newly 
appointed Minister of State for Defence and with the situation with North 
Korea discussions with him took on an extra weight.

“Nothing to worry about, we’re just digging around the root* about some 
proposed new language for Article 9.”

Ryusei nodded. “I see,” he said sitting down.

Sato followed suit but not before he’d gone to the liquor cabinet and gotten 
out two glasses and a bottle of his family brand of whiskey. He poured them 
both three generous fingers and considered the glass for a moment, his round 
face and emotive features reflected back at him with funhouse like 
distortions from the curve of the glass.

“So you finally made it,” Ryusei said.

Sato nodded. “Yes.”

“You don’t seem happy about it, or at least not as much as I would have 
expected. You’ve wanted this job since we were students together at Kansai.”

“Yes,” he said. “I am just a little… concerned I suppose, when I met with 
Koizumi the other day he told me something, he said, that I wouldn’t be as 
free as I thought I would be in this position. That being leader and being a 
member of the Cabinet is just as constricting.”

Ryusei, shrugged. “We are all constrained in what we do Ichi-kun.”

“True,” Sato said. “I just hope it isn’t so constricting that I cannot do 
the things the country needs. The last thing I want is those wooden faced 
old men getting in the way of what needs to be done because they are 
uncomfortable with change.”

Ryusei smiled. “Same old Ichi,” he said. “Have you realized though, that 
while I would never say your face was wooden, you are one of those old men. 
You’re almost sixty now, you have three grown children, a fourth taking his 
college entry exams this year, and a grandson, you are hardly the boy I 
roomed with at Kansai Gaidan.”

Sato smiled. “I don’t feel like an old man, Ryu,” he said. “I feel like I 
just started.”

“Good,” Ryusei said taking a sip from his glass of whiskey and smiling. 
“You’ll need that energy.”

Sato hrmphed, it was true, there would be many long hours of work ahead of 
him to say nothing of dealing with the new crisis of the North Korean 
missiles. Energy would be vital. After all if he couldn’t out smart those 
old men, he thought, he’d be able to at least out run them.

“I heard rumours,” started Ryusei. “That you are building consensus about 
developing first strike capabilities.”

Sato broke from his reverie and smiled. “Oh?” he asked. “And is it you or 
the Friday Club who’s asking?”

The Friday Club was the nickname taken on by the heads of all of the 
Mitsubishi Group’s companies who met one Friday every month. Sato knew 
Ryusei would have been promoted to their foremost lobbyist as soon as the 
Diet had elected Sato Prime Minister.

Ryusei smiled. “Well I am a company man now Ichi-kun,” he said as he took a 
swallow of his whiskey.

“I suppose so” said Sato philosophically. “Well all I can say is we are 
confounded by how we are to evade the North Korean air defences if such a 
strike were to happen. Also we feel while our F-2s and F-15s are admirable 
aircraft it has been the opinion of the JDA that a more specialized plane 
may be needed for the job. Perhaps we may need missiles of our own to deal 
with this.”

“Really?” Ryusei said his surprise was evident.

Sato however simply nodded. In other countries that sort of exchange would 
be criminal but in Japan as her laws were applied it was simply good 
business. Sato also had to consider that regardless of what he did or didn’t 
tell Ryusei, Mitsubishi would know the direction his government was looking 
before the first contract went up to bid, they had ‘friends’ in all levels 
of government and the Japanese Defence Agency who would gladly share what 
they knew. Both friends knew their relationship would be symbiotic. Ryusei’s 
career would profit with the news he brought the company, and Sato would 
have a valuable link to one of his country’s most vital conglomerates.

Sato took a sip of his whiskey. “Let us move on to other topics shall we?”

Ryusei nodded, a slight look of regret crossing his face. “A lot more 
complicated isn’t it?” he asked speaking of their relationship.

“Much more,” Sato agreed relaxing a bit now their necessary business was 
concluded.  “The bridge between business and politics

“And one that grows wider every day, soon we’ll be hypocrites like the 
Americans pretending that government and business doesn’t walk hand in 
hand.”

Sato grinned. “Sad but true,” he said. “But are you going to probe me on my 
stance on the relationship between business and government now too?” he 
teased.

Ryusei smiled. “No, no,” he said.

“Good,” Sato smiled and they sipped their drinks and remnissed about their 
days as students in Osaka’s Kansai Gaidan before Mariko, Sato’s wife came to 
the door and knocked.

“We’re ready,” she said. “Oh, hello Ryu, how are you?”

“I am well Mariko, have you been keeping Ichi out of trouble?”

Mariko smiled. “When I can.”

Ryu grinned. “You must be doing better than me then.”

They laughed and the three of them headed to the dining room to eat, seeing 
Akira and Hiroshi coming down from upstairs. He broke off and joined them. 
Waiting until his wife and best friend were out of earshot before speaking.

“What were you really doing all this time Hiroshi?” he asked his son-in-law.

“Trying to put Ichiro’s new crib together.”

Sato smiled.

“Did he believe you?” Akira asked about his talk with Ryusei.

Sato nodded. “I believe so.”

Akira nodded. “And when the Consul-General finds out?”

“We will deal with that when the time comes,” Sato said confidently.

The other men nodded and together they went to enjoy their last dinner 
before their new lives began.

Actions:

1> Introduce Shunichi and the big players in the personal side of his life, 
hint at some government policy to come.

_________________________________________________________________
Play Q6 for your chance to WIN great prizes.  
http://q6trivia.imagine-live.com/enca/landing