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and with today's speaker I'd like to remind you that the Institute on world
affairs is a an activity open to the entire ISU community if you are here
you're part of that community and we welcome your participation
we'll begin meeting Monday after next at four o'clock in the pine room we'll talk
over this week for a few minutes and then we'll start arguing about what will
choose for next year we try to choose the most important topic in the world
and then we go out looking for the most important people we can the most
interesting the most knowledgeable those that can tell us the most to understand
that topic better and if you're at all interested or there's someone somewhere
in the world you'd like to have come here and have this university here come
get involved in the Institute they can part of the discussion and you can play
a part in the way this works out next year so please think about that welcome
to this news lecture before we introduce our speaker I'd like to bring to your
attention that tonight Jane Cortez is going to be giving a lecture in the Sun
Room on economy ecology and poetry and then tomorrow at noon here in the
Pioneer room we have a panelist spar speaking on engendering change women in
the new world order today's speaker Mitsu Goto-- served in executive
positions in europe and japan with the Nissan Motor Company before forming his
own international consulting firm for the auto industry while with Nissan he
was in charge of the International Affairs and he also worked in Europe
when Nissan opened its early plants in the UK he's a graduate of Wabash College
in Indiana and he did his graduate work at Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School of
Public and International Affairs he was managing director for the Japan Centre
for international exchange and his author of speaking out for Japan my
discipline in internationalism he's on the board of advisors for the Belgian
Business School a member of the Council of London's policies study Institute and
a recipient recipient of the Benjamin Rush Award for humanistic values in
corporate I introduced them to you go to' on us
Japanese relations are we on a collision course
thank you yes generous introduction my last name
Gothel is spelled g oto and when I went to Wabash College years and years ago
some of my classmates would call me goat oh hi goat or even call me hi billy goat
so around 1974 in the wake of first energy crisis Japanese cars started
selling like hotcakes in America and touched off a small small car war they
termed that the Japanese mass media corn and I am I thought my nickname should be
escaped as in scapegoat so if you like to call me escape be very happy
in fact my nickname was written up on the front page of Wall Street Journal in
February 1975 so I'm very pleased and to be on the campus of Iowa State
University today and feel honored to be invited invited by the Institute on
world affairs to speak to you today especially the day after the important
presidential election I don't know why you chose this particular day for me to
to speak but I'm delighted and feel honored to be here today I see sometimes
there are two kinds of dreams that I see in not that I see dreams that often one
dream that I sometimes see is myself walking up to a podium like this facing
an American audience such as yours unable to utter a single word of English
you see I did not speak a word of English
till I was about 17 or 18 so sometimes I see this kind of dream and wake up and
having really cold feet the other then then I'm also reminded of a young
Japanese boy someone like me who came to this country
to study his Japanese his English was so poor that whenever he wanted to say
something he had to look upwards in his pocket japanese-english dictionary
one day he will be invited to a party where he was introduced a pretty
American girl so he quickly looked up his dictionary and said you have a
beautiful high hid e you see in Japanese there one or
possibly two words which would describe outer coverings of anything but in
English you say strange enough human beings and picks up skin and horses and
cows have high on them tree has a bark Orange has a Reyn bananas appeal and
peace have pods on them and and of course I've known that that there are
some nuts in this country which have not shells on them but the skin on them also
but his friend immediately noticed the American friend said to him don't know
young man you should have used that word skin in a case like that complexion will
be too much for you so next Sunday following Sunday he goes to the local
church where the congregation was singing him jaimé jaimé o my Savior so
he started singing scheme a scheme me or my City
actually the other kind of dream that I sometimes see is the sky filled with
Boeing b-29 bombers that used to come drop bombs over us in the last years of
the war and and I was then attending a boarding school on the outskirts of
Tokyo but in the last year of the war all of the students who mobilized for
war effort we had to work in the nearby Nakajima aircraft engine factory
operating lathes and things like that and and that became the first target of
the b-29 bombers based in Marianas in November 1944 in the first wave of b-29s
came in high altitude and since from my childhood I was always interested in
airplanes and cars i disregarded the order to stay in the air raid shelter
and watch these b-29s come high altitude in broad daylight and
their bomb base open and bombs coming down
and fortunately the plant went up in smoke
but nobody was injured and I remember seeing Japanese anti-aircraft guns being
being shot but the the b-29s came in such high altitude that the guns could
not get to them but I do remember seeing a Japanese fighter playing congas a
style crashed into one of the between eyes and the both planes coming down
this was the first time I got to we Japanese got to see what the b-29 looked
like because there had been no published picture of the aircraft in the newspaper
or magazines and I was really fascinated with these long-range bombers now after
the nakajima aircraft plant went up in smoke I then returned to my hometown
which is Nagoya a big industrial city between Tokyo and Osaka or for that
matter between Kyoto and Tokyo and my my father said to me that perhaps between
eyes will start coming to Nagoya also because Nagoya was a home of Mitsubishi
aircraft which used to produce famous zero fighters and sure enough in March
of 1945 between I started coming dropping bombs over us but sometimes
they'll come nighttime and if you hear the engine you know each plane having
four engines and there are normally about five three to five hundred b-29s
in the air the engine noise alone had devastating psychological effect on us
dum dum glow and then we'll cringe in the area shelter and we soon hear bombs
exploding nearby and then on May 17th 1945 three months before walking to the
end my parental home which was a big Japanese style home in Nagoya went up in
smoke after 513 b-29s in a particular rate
dropped incendiary bombs in Nagoya and I remember standing on the smoldering
ruins of my parental home saying to myself my god what have we done and it
made me wonder why the Japanese army generals Tojo was the
Prime Minister army general who attacked through harbor in the first place
and wondered why Japan ever declared war against the United States I was really
mad at the Japanese army generals who started this last war and also wondered
if they had maintained a good dialogue with President of the United States
Secretary of State perhaps war could have been avoided or
if they had much better understanding of the great expanse of America especially
the Midwestern part of the United States and your industrial capability I think
war could not could not have happened and so when the war came to an end
then after I graduated from this boarding school senior high school I
decided that I would not want to go to college in Japan but rather I would grab
first opportunity offered to me to come to the United States to continue my
studies and and but I said to myself first you had to study the language so I
during the day I worked on my father's farm just outside of Nagoya and my
father being absentee landlord land would have been taken away by tenants if
I did not work on my father's farm under MacArthur's new agricultural policy and
so during the day I worked on my father's farm by night I would listen to
the Armed Forces Radio Japan was still under the Allied occupation and and
listen to especially newscast and then imitating the radio announcer who was
normally a GI I would read aloud the only english-language newspaper
published in The Japan Times trying to memorize phrases words and sentences
and when I became reasonably proficient in the language in about a year and a
half I then decided to go work for the local US military government in Nagoya
where a lot of my American friends would write to their own colleges in
universities and to see if they had scholarship available for me but in vain
I was also working with a young American in mid-30s civilian employee from Ladoga
Indiana a tiny town of 500 people even people in the air don't know where
he is but anyway one day this fellow became seriously you know he had bhavet
IPO that affected his neck he had hard time breathing and he was taken to flown
to US military hospital in Osaka and remained in an oxygen tank for ten days
but died there ten days later it just so happened that a few days he was stricken
I had taken his picture in your office and when I wrote a letter of condolence
to his mother back home in Indiana I thought she would like to have his
picture so I enclosed it and for the end of my letter I said someday I would very
much like to to come to your country to continue my education and she was
everything we had heard about me from her son and she was good enough to drive
to Crawfordsville Indiana which is about 13 14 miles from Ladoga and she talked
to the admissions wrecker Wabash College eventually Wabash College gave me a
scholarship so only because her her son did not make it back to Indiana I was
able to come and I and I had four years of one
or education in the heart of the Midwest so I became a kind of Japanese fujur and
and then I also received fellowship to do graduate work at the Princeton's
Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs so I've had
education wise best of both worlds and I'll be forever grateful to my American
friends who made it possible for me to come to the United States in the first
place now today I'm supposed to be talking
about u.s. apparent relations whether we are on a collision collision course my
thoughts always go back to January of this year when President George Bush
evidently was persuaded by the in commerce secretary Bob Mosbacher to
bring 21 US business leaders in the auto sector and I personally have had very
good relations with chairman of the big three trees of Detroit Lee Iacocca he
also had done graduate work in engineering at Princeton and I got to
know him very well he was president of Ford Motor Company and then read Pauling
germinal Ford and Bob's tempo of course he had to step down just a few days ago
but actually one of the Japanese
automakers said at the time that when there are so many of us we cannot
possibly have meaningful discussion you
know and in fact in in advance of their visit
both American and Japanese government negotiators negotiated is
sort of a autoparts purchased plants and I think on a voluntary basis Japanese
automakers now made commitments to buy as much as 19 billion dollars worth of
auto parts from us suppliers by 1994 but already there have been so much goodwill
on the part of Japanese automakers also the part of our government to want to
buy more from the United States and actually since becoming independent
international consultant I've been retained by chairman of the Timken
company which is the biggest bearings manufacturer in the United States and
also by chairman of our bean industries in Columbus Indiana which is the US
biggest all exhaust system manufacturer along with shock absorbers and their
Chairman also asked to come to Japan with the president but turned the
president down in saying they do not want to be politicized I'm also reminded
of the I mean as a other result the auto issue was really highlighted and you
know because of President Bush's visit to Japan I'm reminded of the story of a
Chrysler dealer somewhere small-town USA and the story that mr. Straub who is
Dean of the Sloan School of Management at MIT personally told me now this was
the Chrysler dealer in you know in the days when Chrysler Corporation was
having grave financial difficulties and the dealer
found it very difficult to move chrysler cars from his showroom floor and he
became and more and more depressed so he took to alcohol and eventually his
wife and children left him one evening he was nursing a bottle with his shaky
hands and suddenly I came smoke and with it a genie now Jenny said to him thank
you for having gotten me out of this bottle in gratitude I'd like to grant
you your last wish so the Chrysler dealer dealer says get me an import
dealership when the smoke cleared in the genie
disappeared the Chrysler dealer found himself in the middle of Tokyo selling
chrysler cars actually The Wall Street Journal had a notorious in January that
said Japan should have kept the Iacocca in Japan so that he will be directing
sales of Chrysler cars in Japan you know actually I felt this would be a golden
opportunity for Prime Minister nozawa first Japanese Prime Minister who
is very international minded and also who is able to speak English fluently
I thought maybe by getting together with the President of the United States they
can discuss broader issues global issues where Japan and the United States could
possibly collaborate but instead if you recall at the dinner hosted by our prime
minister President Bush threw up
we are fortunate he was probably very tired after a grueling trip to Australia
and other parts of Asia and so they did not get to discuss more important issues
of the day
maybe this being the day after the presidential election I should be
talking about about Texas businessman Ross Perot
but remember t boone Pickens the famous Texas oilman started coming to Japan
like a couple of years ago in saying that now that his company had had twenty
six percent of the Japanese lighting headlight
manufacturer called cojito manufacturing the three of his men be placed on the
Japanese company's board in the Japanese company also increased dividend payouts
and he kept coming back to Japan but over the years I got to meet him and see
him and I began to like this man he he one day gave me his autobiography
autograph and in reading his autobiography I admire the way he
managed his own company how he treated everyone my name's company you know just
like the Japanese Japanese company you know there's no distinction between blue
color and white color etc but he also told me a story to American women
walking down one of the fashionable streets downtown Houston one day when
they heard a frog I found a frog in the gutter and the Frog started talking to
them in saying that I used to be an oil man with the spell was cast I
came a frog now if one of you were to pick me up and kiss me
I'll be able to turn back into an oil man so one of the women picked him up
and instead of kissing him she put him in her purse and they continued down the
street after a while this other woman got concerned and said to the other why
didn't you kiss him and the other woman said nowadays a talking frog is worth
more than our oil man but as you know he was not successful in taking over
Japanese company and he often appeared before congressional committees in
saying that the Japanese companies are not open to foreign investors etc also
beginning January of 1990 Japanese government and the US negotiators began
a series of negotiations that were called SII which means structural
impediment negative almost sound like a star war you should be with something
and US side came up with many as 75 different demands ranging from Japan and
start buying American rice Japan opened up its market to big toy stores such as
tora tora like i can never pronounce that word toy toys are down to we
Japanese stop being or colleagues and take more paid holidays and also knowing
that we have pension for personal savings on the average we saved
16 fifteen to sixteen percent of our annual
income and to put put that into personal savings account as against your five to
six percent so American trade negotiators who come to Japan say to us
you know you become Spencer it and buy more from America etc so I was beginning
to feel that now wait a minute you are getting into our domestic you know in
our domestic affairs but even the poll conducted by a Japanese newspaper in I
believe in April of 1990 some forty percent of Japanese Paul felt that some
of the us demands are justifiable sixty percent of Japanese Paul also felt that
the Japan ought to start applying American rice bit a bit because
foodstuff in Japan tends to be very expensive compared to the food prices
here in the United States and then the Japanese side not to be to be outdone
for the first time came up with a dozen demands and to talk to the United States
of course the Japanese negotiate would say that us in Riyadh ought to put its
economic house in order by reducing federal huge federal budget deficit
reduce trade deficit with Japan and you encourage your industries to become more
productive improved productivity and competitiveness etc again I'm reminded
of the story of the Admiral of the fleet which was told by Marvin Runyon for
Nissan wood away from Ford Motor Company to run Nissan's manufacturing operation
in Tennessee in fact I was well I need some motor company I was in charge of US
investment project also and this story of the Admiral fleet is one day an
ensign on his flagship but watching the ship's radar screen and he saw a small
blip so he shouted we are on a collision course you change course and the voice
would come back and say you change course and you change course and and
they were getting nowhere finally the this incident reports this
back to the Admiral now Admiral of the fleet now had a microphone in his hand
he said this is the Admiral the fleet whoever you are change course and the
voice came back and saying god dammit I'm the lighthouse you change course
well I think US negotiators know that the we Japanese are very susceptible to
external pressure we would we would do something you know we will always react
to external pressure and so they have always used kind of harsh tactics harsh
rhetoric to get us to do something
actually caving in well not exactly caving in to pressure but beginning
about five six years ago we not be noticing for iteration of fact u.s. fast
food chains in Japan and first of all of course the McDonald's hamburger joint
and then Colonel Sanders Fried Chicken came
then Denise came baskin-robbins ice cream joint came Taco Bell and Pizza Hut
everybody is now in Japan and finally 7-eleven stores came in in joint venture
partnership with a Japanese retail chain called Ito yoga doll and there are now
more than 4,000 outlets throughout Japan and and they are doing very good
business they have very good market research program and the merchandise on
on their shelves are changed so often to meet the demanding tastes of
Japanese and actually parent company Southland corporation in Texas began to
have financial problems in the Japanese side in ended up going to the rescue of
Southland corporation and Southland I mean the Japanese yo-yo kado now has I
believe something like sixty percent equity in Southland corporation and I
think there is a very good example of joint venture between American company
and a Japanese company doing so well in Japan now the Japanese populace is
bombarded with what you Americans call junk food but we don't call it
youngsters really like your fast food restaurants and it's very hard for me to
keep my daughters from 17 not baskin-robbins ice cream joints for
example at any rate we are beginning to see obese children because of changing
food habits and and I'm afraid the rate of heart attack among all the
other people is on the increase because we we buy nowadays as much as 73% or
your beef export can you imagine this you know sometimes senator Bakk Max
Baucus in Montana and other senators or congressmen would say to us you must buy
more American beef and now we ended up buying as much of 73 percent of your
beef export I know the United States for example restrict the import of
inexpensive beef from Argentina or Australian but we ended up buying so
much American beef we also buy nowadays something like 68 percent of your pork
export and much of which both beef and pork come from Iowa in fact between Iowa
and Japan Iowa has trade surplus with Japan I was this morning was just
talking with Ratan governor joy Corning in Des Moines and I got to see her in
Tokyo in June of this year she was just saying that and that's really amazing
and and we also buy 51% of us citrus exports so our warehouses
are now bulging with grapefruits and oranges from the United States and my
family for example can enjoy grapefruit halves for breakfast every morning
prices have come down which is very good thing we also buy about 31% of your
chicken export and about 25% of soybean export corn
export feedstock export and and sorghum also I think and leave tobacco so we
last year if they ended up buying as much as 81 not 8.1 billion dollars worth
of agricultural products from the United States so we are United States and best
agricultural customer now Japanese industries also have been bending
backwards for Japanese government or government on universities also bending
backwards to buy more and more from the United States some seven years ago the
manufacturer goods imported from the United States accounted for only 30% of
imports from the United States but last year we the imports from the United
States totaled like fifty three billion dollars but 63% of which were
manufactured goods such as satellite space satellites communications
equipment computers a hundred million dollars worth of American movies and
American movies are very popular in Japan and we are also buying we like new
Cadillac Seville and which is becoming very popular in Japan Japanese
youngsters like Ralph Ralph Lauren you know outfits and there are also Brooks
Brothers tours in Japan now so we it's not that we do not like to
buy anything from America as some of you are led to believe but we really like
things American still and I hope more American companies would would bend
backwards to study the Japanese market and export their products to Japan
actually the Japanese today imports more on a per capita basis and per capita
dollar figure is something like 800 and not excuse me 387 dollars worth of u.s.
products at versus on per capita basis you Americans have been buying about
three hundred fifty-seven dollars worth of Japanese goods so that is where we
now stand
speaking of Iowa Japan relations in addition to to your exports Japanese
companies have come to Iowa to invest in sk the japanese bearings company has a
plan here rich Bridgestone also invested here in Iowa that's a tire company and a
Gino moto which is you know the company that makes seasoning called accent has a
plant here in Iowa Sammi Tommo Chemical also has come and
horn de part distribution facility is here in Iowa in Toyota Insurance Company
of North America has just decided to locate its head office in Cedar Rapids
Iowa so more and more Japanese companies are also
finding Iowa their American home homes in fact I was in when I was introduced I
used to be for a long time with Nissan Motor Company which is a tiny struggling
Japanese automaker and and I was also also I also spearheaded Nissan's right
to invest here in North America and we began a feasibility studies as far back
as 1974 and and the final decision to invest in Smyrna Tennessee was made in
time for the presidential election of 1980 you know was a toss-up between
Jimmy Carter's reelection and and or Ronald Reagan and in the end I was
negotiating with governors of Tennessee and Georgia Georgia governor was
democratic governor George Busbee and I played them against each other to get a
better deal and finally finally we decided Isan decided to go to Tennessee
because Lamar Alexander among other things moved state legislature to vote
as much as 7.2 million dollars for training our future employees and Nissan
itself matched with sitting aside as much as 52 million dollars for training
our people that's and then to date Nissan increase that amount by by double
that amount so and today today Nissan in Tennessee employs over 6,000 people and
yes I also decided to Bill's an Asian plant and Dekker
Tennessee but of the six thousand people over thousand people when they were
newly hired managers inclusive or sent to Japan jointly by the state of
Tennessee and Nissan and so that groups of maybe thirty and so that they can
receive on-the-job training lasting like six weeks in Japan
they will have orientation program for Japanese lifestyles also and whatever
they the garner and they would bring back to Tennessee and by having the best
of both worlds they have been producing real high quality vehicles in Smyrna
Tennessee and I for one are very happy that Nissan made their home in the
United States in Tennessee now the man who was named the first president chief
executive officer Marvin Runyon's name I already mentioned
he was vice president body and assembly a Ford Motor Company but he did such a
good job that he used to say the people are the greatest asset we have including
stake holders and he did such a good job that President Reagan tapped him to be
chairman of the travel TVA about a year ago President Bush asked him to become
Postmaster General well I think he's doing a very good job in you know was
possible us pasta pasta service has had some problems and I think Marvin Runyon
is a good job as Postmaster General today
before I conclude I just want to say that over the years in the last say two
decades the United States in the United States and Japan have become so mutually
interdependent our economies we have been bound by mutual security pact also
and culturally also there is so much going on even between educational
institutions in Iowa and the Japanese educational institutions and then state
of Iowa has had a long-standing association with Yamanashi Prefecture
which and where Mount Fuji is located I was told that in 1960 when the Yamanashi
Prefecture hit by a terrible typhoon
pigs were sent by generous people here in Iowa and that was the beginning of
Iowa and Yamanashi Prefecture sister state or sister Prefecture ties and
again I'm very grateful to the Iowa people for having sent relief goods to
Yamanashi Prefecture I think Japan probably needs America more than America
would need Japan Mike Mansfield who was long ago Senate the majority leader from
Montana was American ambassador to Japan during the Carter Administration and
also through the Reagan administration he's Democrat but he did such a good job
in Japan that President Reagan reappointed him
as ambassador to Japan he used to say the next generation next
century is the century of the Pacific and that's where the action is going to
be and that's where the growth is foreseen also there's no more important
bilateral relationship between that and that between Japan and the United States
barring none and I fully concur Japan also needs to play a bigger political
international role and of course as you have heard a prime ministers leadership
role Miyazawa leadership role has been debilitated by the political party
scandal involving political contributions intra factual dispute as
as to who should be the faction leader who is likely to be next
Prime Minister but at any rate because of Connemara position
I think Miyazawa Prime Minister has been keeping his mouth shut about his in his
own involvement and I think it has really stability his leadership role in
fact his popularity rate is now down to 20 percent so that's the kind of
leadership problem that we are having now until about November of last year
for four years I was on loan from Nissan Motor Company to the nonprofit
organization called Japan center for international exchange as managing
director now one of the major objectives of this organization was
not only annual congressional and parliamentary exchange program that we
had in the last 15 16 years in fact when Dan Quayle was freshman congressman from
Indiana he and his wife Marilyn were brought over to Japan and I was since
I'm a Wabash graduate in DePaul University
he's the Wabash archrival I was asked to take him out for first for breakfast and
dinner so ever since I got to know them very very well now same way with Al Gore
jr. and when he was a freshman congressman from Tennessee he and Tipper
were brought over to Japan and and I took I remember taking them out for
dinner and I've maintained very close contact with Al Gore jr. and Tipper
since then the fan Center for international exchange was also
organized major us-japan dialogue which is called Shimoda conference which will
bring together your political leaders business leaders and academics to always
policy oriented discussions we were also the parent committee for the trilateral
commission which is the brainchild of David Rockefeller and annually this
trilateral commission meet once a year North America Japan in Europe and we
used to organize policy oriented discussions but but the major objectives
of the Japan Center in the last few years had been to encourage or educate
Japanese political leaders and three years Japan really need to be
played a bigger political role in the community of nations and I don't know
how much we've been successful at least I can get these business leaders also
being crying I mean we also try to enlighten Japanese business leaders in
the American concept of corporate philanthropy getting involved with
community affairs increasing number of Japanese businessmen who are based in
this country now there is encouraged to get involved with Community Affairs when
invited to speak at the local Rotary Club luncheon or something they are
encouraged to speak you have but I don't think Japan could ever play and the kind
of moral broker or Quarles policeman's role of which the American President or
Secretary of State have played so I hope now that you have elected Bill Clinton
as the next president I hope the president that only can redress some of
your domestic issues your economy and
jobs and other domestic issues but I hope that he'll be very good
international international I mean president for the rest of it for the
rest of the world also Bob Strauss whom I have known for a long time he's
currently your ambassador to Russia who said several years ago let us build upon
a common vision so that the United States in Japan can
stand together as we approach the new frontiers of the 21st century and I feel
the same way thank you very much
actually not very many of us happen to know Bill Clinton that well although a
lot of Japanese business leaders have been coming to the either japan-us
southeast Association meeting at which governors of all seven southeastern
states bring a big number of business states business delegation to this
annual conference but Arkansas has never been part of this conference and so I
have known governors of all these seven southeastern states very very well some
some past governors but none of us really have met Bill Clinton although
he's been to Japan three times to to invite Japanese companies to come in
investing I think four or five Japanese companies but he is still kind of figure
everything we had done very well he has done very well as governor I'll consult
and of course he he was educated at Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar and I hope
somebody who is really qualified will be appointed your secretary of state and
and maybe somebody like war and Christopher's name has been I also feel
that you know in one of the presidential candidates debates he said
that in order to increase the tax base he's going to tax anyone making over
$200,000 a year and also he said foreign companies investing here in this country
I hope I hope he would not treat the foreign companies differently from US
companies because I for one feel that for example Nissan my former company
which has invested so heavily in the United States we consider that company
to be an American company no longer only maybe less than ten Japanese so I hope
Japanese companies that there are about 1,400 Japanese companies that have
invested throughout the United States for manufacturing I hope I hope they are
not subject to different rates of tax I really do not think so of course in
Japan as you know our economy is now they're suffering we say in Japan
bubbles also have burst and our stock market has been very depressed
real-estate values has started going down for the first time so economies are
not doing I mean Japanese companies are not doing very well
you know you know when American multinational corporations invest
overseas of course and they tend to create more jobs overseas also but I
think the statistics show that that also created more job opportunities here in
America also because your companies here will have to produce certain componentry
or something for overseas sure actually my primary concern or the concern of
business which means business - such as mr. mortar of Sony is the content of US
Japan trade you know I hope my my sincerest wish is that more American
companies would be able to export to Japan more of high value-added things
rather than raw materials and parts and components kind of things but looking at
the recent US Japan trade US companies tended to buy even machine tools from
the United Front from Japan a machine tool industry in United States used to
be world's number one huh why over the years I think they lost out
to foreign competition I I just do not know you might the same way or much of
your steel mills in fact my I'm not Weiser to the Timken company but Timken
company built a new steel mill in Canton Ohio in 1983 with technologies from two
japanese mills and that mill produces the cleanest steel in the United States
and for the inauguration Reagan and went there for the inauguration that steel
mill but I hope you will not lose years ago we talked about hollowing out of
industries but I think your basic thing I hope your basic industry will remain
strong I mean including your auto industry and parts and component
manufacturers also actually several years ago Japanese government agreed to
pick up more of the defense cost me the cost of having American troops based in
Japan and and I think we nowadays pick up the cost of all Japanese means
payroll of all the Japanese employees hired by the US military in Japan I
think housing cost and things of this kind and that amount per soldier for
airmen u.s. airman is higher than the the cost that which is tab which is
being picked up by any of the NATO countries so I think maybe half half the
cost of having US troops based in Japan is being picked up and by the Japanese
government I think I think the gradually US forces
stationed in Japan will be reduced I think already I think the US troops
based in Korea is being that was already announced but perhaps I think the number
of somebody told me there are 60,000 US forces
you know airmen and Navy and Army being based in Japan but perhaps that number
could be reduced I don't know we still you know follow pins and gave up the US
Naval Base Subic Bay and Clark Air Force Base in the Philippines was had to be
abandoned because of the eruption of that inner tube so I think US troops
would need some kind of base I think in Japan Air Force Base or maybe naval port
you know I also realized that the u.s. is is currently having a bit of
difficulty relationship with with China after the Kenya Moore incident because
of human rights issues involved but I think Japan is maintaining very cordial
relations with China we had our Emperor visit China just a week or so ago and
although our Emperor had to apologize to the Chinese people that you know during
wartime Japanese army invaded China and killed so many even trillion populace
but I think I think Japan can maintain cordial relations will probably can give
certain economic aid and but I also like to see and we Japan do this in
collaboration with US companies
no I do not well of course when Gorbachev came to
Japan the last time there was great expectation that he would make certain
concessions but that did not happen of course its position and within the
within Russia was being weakened but by Yeltsin but Yeltsin is also concerned
about the economic health of Russia and I don't think he is inclined toward
returning even two of the four northern islands to Japan but of course of course
Yeltsin would like to see seek Japanese economic aid but Japanese government
seems to be thinking you know if we depend gives Soviet Union I mean Russia
some kind of economic a package then in return we wanted some back but it's not
going to work work that way I don't actually because of the public opinion
prevailing there even during the 70s and for example Japanese industries
especially the auto industry had to comply with these the very strict
exhaust emission control standards and that was introduced in Japan I believe
1973 based on the so-called muskie standards and the basis of muskie
standards as I understood it was that somebody amateur measure
is also a mission on a busy street in Chicago and senator Edmund muskie put it
in the exhaust emission control so Japanese automakers have had to comply
you know initially the Japanese on all industry would say oh we just cannot
produce cars that can meet that kind of standard but we did it and as a result
the air over Tokyo and you know soccer metropolis has become very clean in the
meantime from stationary sources also or smoke smoke we have put in restrict
local regulations and as a result the air I think over top over Japan is now
relatively clean we are now concerned about the destruction of ozone layer
this what's my call it you putting in the air conditioning system it's now
quickly being replaced by something else what you put in also in the aerosol cans
also it being replaced I think Japanese industry has really bent backwards to
comply with strict exhaust emission control and in the meantime this also
produced new technologies and companies that would make waste treatment system
things of this kind in fact I'm now being asked to become consultant to
Nashville based four-year-old or company called
natural resources technology and company NRT to professors at the Vanderbilt came
up with very ingenious waste treatment there are five and they have just
licensed a Japanese manufacturer and also trading company for marketing in
Japan and new waste treatment facilities being built based on their technology in
Columbus Ohio and Cleveland Ohio and I'm being asked to go see and become
consultant there's a great deal of market for such that's us technology I
know somebody will ask me that question
of course there has been some talk among some Asian countries of forming Asian
trade bloc also including Japan but I think Japan has taken the position that
of course during during the last war Japan tried to create greater Asian
called prosperity sphere and our Asian neighbors we in some ways very about
Japan forming the Asian trade bloc also in some ways I think forming regional
trading blocks such as not is against the principles of gap well European
community in some ways but as I see it more American companies
including the excretes of Detroit would establish more manufacturing facilities
for example in Mexico where the labor cost is Lord and I don't know how this
and will contribute to the creation or loss of jobs here in America I'm a
little bit against big multinational corporations American or Japanese
farming out there work overseas where the labor cost is much more I think that
would tend to take their jobs away but there may be freer and freer trade
between US and Mexico and Canada yes over the years Japanese labor cost has
has really gone up perhaps and to the
level of advanced European countries but the ten perhaps in Germany labor cost is
probably higher than in Japan but compared to the u.s. labor costs there
should not be that much different stuff but perhaps I think you assets to labor
cost is higher
oh yes yes well Nyssa appointed a new president in June of this year and he
the man who moved up to chairman is mr. Coony
now both both rose through the ranks of manufacturing and new president
soo-ji has had no marketing experience where Nissan has been weak in marketing
and I'm afraid faith will take this a long time to become more market oriented
and company and Nissan in fact in internationalizing and the company is in
US or in Europe always elevated to the position of importance the local
nationals and the Japanese went back to Japan and I am afraid me even Nissan USA
in Los Angeles is now headed by x-coordinate and in marketing neason in
North America Nissan has been very very weak compared to the Toyota and Honda in
Europe only because in England Nissan sells outsells Toyota and anybody else
these are still number one Japanese automaker in Europe
of course I was in charge of Nissan's entire European operation until 1986
what I think is that Japan is not playing bigger political role I mean
befitting its economic strings that's what I I want to say but Japanese and
Prime Minister's I mean past Prime Minister's never had the international
experience of course the the only Prime Minister that that we have had who was
very articulate and internationally was not a funny but he is no longer a prime
minister perhaps when a younger generation Prime Minister is named after
me as our perhaps he can play a little bigger international role but we can we
can never provide the kind of leadership that US and president has
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