Japanese Trade Talks Reaching Crucial Point
After years of bickering with Japan over specific trade disputes, the Bush administration decided last July to try a new approach-a frontal assault on "Japan Inc.," the tightly knit Japanese business practices and economic policies that U.S. trade officials believe give Tokyo much of its competitive edge in the world.</br></br>This new approach, the first time two sovereign nations have tried through negotiations to pull apart each other's economic systems and demand changes in them, has heightened the tense trade relationship between the United States and Japan to a new pitch following President Bush's personal intervention in talks with Prime Minister Toshiki Kaifu in February.</br></br>This week, the negotiations reach a crucial point. U.S. officials said the results of a preliminary report on the negotiations, to be drafted during two days of talks in Washington beginning tomorrow, will determine whether the Bush administration orders trade sanctions against Japan that could double import taxes on selected Japanese products.</br></br>Administration officials appear united on the need to retaliate if the preliminary report fails to show what U.S. Trade Representative Carla Hills called "a constructive blueprint for future action" by Japan to change its internal economy in ways that open the door to significantly more foreign goods and investment.</br></br>Even Hills, whose voice is among the more restrained in the administration on the tendentious Japan trade issue, said this time promises of action will not be enough. She said there will have to be "a sufficient down payment to show the American people there is real ... resolve" to open Japan to more foreign goods and investments.