As predicted, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, making good of his promise to the Japanese five years ago, paid his respects to his country's war dead at the highly controversial Yasukuni Shrine last Tuesday. This was his fifth visit there, but the first that he made on the day that marks the end of World War II Aug 15.

To the victims of Japanese militarism outside Japan, the date is deeply symbolic as well as emotive, as it arouses the painful memories of the atrocities committed by the Japan Imperial Army. Koizumi's blatant disregard of the sentiments of the Asian peoples is deplorable.

As with his previous visits on different dates, China and Korea (both North and South) registered their ritual protests in the sternest terms possible. Russia, traditionally indifferent to the historical wounds of the Asians, has also taken a swipe at the Japanese prime minister for its own strategic concern.

Despite their strong reactions, Japan's neighbouring countries in fact had known that Koizumi would not budge on the Yasukuni issue. Visiting the shrine - which also honours the 'spirits' of the 14 A-Class war criminals, including wartime prime minister Hideki Tojo - on Aug 15 was a promise that he could not go back on. He had had five years as prime minister, extraordinary by Japanese standards, and he saved the emotionally-charged visit for the last.

To say that the world is appalled at Koizumi's defiance is wide off the mark. Lets be realistic, not all countries are aware of the negative implications of Yasukuni visits by a Japanese leader. The United States, for one, clearly cannot care less. Instead of reproaching Tokyo, both the White House and the State Department have announced they had no desire to meddle in Japan's domestic affairs.

Worse, they urged Beijing and Seoul to move on and look to the future, not to the past, much to the dismay of those who had hoped the Americans could do more to harness the increasingly hawkish Koizumi and some of his cabinet colleagues from the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), who are now tied in a race to succeed him.

Ironically, this rhetoric echoes the words of Malaysia's Dr Mahathir Mohammad. When he was prime minister Mahathir, a Japanophile, called on China to leave history behind and patch up with Japan for the sake of Asian unity on a number of occasions. This ahistorical view, naturally, is not shared by many in Malaysia.

Thanks to the enormous powers that he accorded himself as prime minister at the time, those who were angered by his insensitive remarks could only express their grudging resentment in cautious words. Now that Washington has chosen a similar stance, I am eager to know what the US apologists have to say on this.

A reckless business

There are reasons why Washington is eager to wash its hands off the Yasukuni controversy. Since 2001, US activities on the optimisation of American military and political presence in the Asian Pacific region have shown that the Bush administration is bent on employing its allies first and foremost Koizumi and his like-minded colleagues to strategically contain China while keeping Russia at bay.

This strategic arrangment corresponds with Japan's long-term foreign policy goal of raising its military as well as political profiles, a risky mission that Koizumi has been too glad to undertake.

To make Japan more than an economic giant in Asia, Koizumi has boldly chosen to strengthen the Japanese military and political alliance with the US. In mid June this year, the Defence Committee of the LDP put forward an initiative to pass a permanent law on Japan's Self-Defence Forces (SDF) to prepare Japanese soldiers for overseas operations in the future.

The LDP lawmakers have suggested that such military operations in international flashpoints from the Taiwan Strait to the Middle East should be made viable even without a resolution by the United Nations. It is more than a lucky coincidence that both the neocons in the US and the rightwing politicians in Japan share the same distaste for the world's highest political body, and see it as an impediment to their ambitions.

Upgrading the constitutional position of the SDF can be a reckless business. Japan's engagement in 'peacekeeping' operations overseas alongside US troops will inevitably provoke China into militarising its foreign policy further, which will lead to a new round of the arms race in a region that already has too many complex and combustible issues to deal with. It will weaken and even rupture the existing regional security arrangements in this part of the world.

Military significance aside, Japan will not hesitate to manipulate the current stalemate over North Korea to its own advantage. The world has seen Beijing's dismal failure in persuading Pyongyang to opt for diplomacy, and this has been quickly seized by Tokyo and Washington to paint the emerging global power in a very bad light.

The rightists in Japan now call for Japan's right to a regular army, which the SDF is not, while US Vice-President Dick Cheney has calmly stated that a nuclear arms race in the region could be in the offing.

The greater risks

What is more, the ambit of the US-Japan security pact extends beyond East Asia. Not so long ago, a Japanese scholar told me he saw the peoples of the Central Asian republics as Japan's 'little brothers'.

He has a point, because the Japanese nation, ethnically and culturally, has its origins in the Altai. I could not help reminding him that Central Asia only comes into play for its strategic values in the context of modern warfare.

In the last few years, efforts have been made by the US and Japan to expand their presence in the region, with a view to balancing and constraining Russia in the north and China in the west. This is evidenced by Koizumi's launch of the Central Asia Plus Japan programme in 2004. Two months ago, Tokyo also adopted an Action Plan of Development of Regional Cooperation in Central Asia.

Apart from the usual economic and cultural contents, Japan has managed to include other aspects into the Action Plan, such as regular political and security dialogues, as well as the fight against terrorism.

Seen in this light, one should not be the least surprised to realise that, as far as Washington is concerned, Koizumi's premiership has been 'remarkable' and will no doubt end on a high note too.

But this dangerous policy of tying Japan more tightly into the geo-political strategies of the US, which none of Koizumi's predecessors had dared to dream of, will also expose Japan to greater risks and regional isolation in the long run.

In short, Koizumi will not only be remembered for his final bravura at Yasukuni, but for the costly legacy that he will bequeath his successors for years to come.