Who does US want to be Japan’s next leader?

As Liberal Democratic Party members struggle to pick the next prime minister of Japan, there is a vote that will not be counted but matters a lot – who does Washington want to be Japan’s next leader?

The most obvious answer to that question is that Washington doesn’t care. At the senior levels of government and policymakers, “they could care less,” a former senior government official who remains deeply engaged with Japan told Toyo Keizai. “At the expert level, there are preferences. But no one in Washington is talking about it all.”

One reason for this lack of interest is also obvious – Americans are deeply engaged with their own, highly contested election. But the unique nature of the Japanese party election makes it confusing, not least because of the very large field of candidates.

And ultimately, Americans assume, perhaps wrongly, that the result of the election is not going to change Japan’s foreign and domestic policy.

Still, for American policymakers and experts, it matters who emerges as Japan’s next leader. What is most important for the US is “who can be an effective leader that re-energizes the Japanese public, that delivers an economic agenda that is sustainable, that allows Japan to keep up its defense expenditures and encourages the Japanese economy to be a key hub in global supply chains,” says Mireya Solis of the Brookings Institution, one of the premier Japan experts in Washington.

“Folks in Washington are looking for somebody who will continue the Abe [Shinzo] alliance policies, expanding the alliance, and expanding what Japan can do within the alliance,” says Ambassador Joseph Donovan, Jr, a former senior State Department official with extensive experience in Japan.

Along with that, Americans are