Tokyo American Club, Tokyo, Japan

March 23, 2001

Voice: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. We're very honored to have the Commander in Chief of the Pacific Fleet Admiral Blair here today with us. Admiral Blair will be on the record this morning.

He is joined by General Paul Hester, the Commander of U.S. Forces, Japan; and the U.S. Embassy's Political Minister Consulate, Mr. Foster.

We'll have the Admiral make a statement and then we'll take questions.

Admiral Blair: Thanks very much.

Before I talk about my trip here and what I'm doing and why I'm here, let me take advantage of my first opportunity to talk to news representatives since the tragic incident with the Ehime Maru and please pass on to your readers my personal regret and apology for this incident which my forces were involved in. And let me tell you the continuing actions that will be taken with respect to this incident.

We are completing the Court of Inquiry. It has two purposes. First is to determine what can be done to make this very rare incident even less likely to happen in the future. Those sorts of recommendations will come from the Court. And second, the Court will make recommendations as to accountability for this incident and what must be done to hold individuals accountable.

Second, we are continuing with the planning for recovery of the Ehime Maru and the first stage of that planning is to determine, to make an environmental assessment of the actions that would need to be taken to recover the ship, and that will take several weeks to determine.

As you know, Japanese government representatives are closely involved and will be with us every step of the way.

Finally, the question of compensation for the, both property and for the families of those who are missing, still missing, is underway, and that will be handled in accordance with our regular procedures. So that's what is going on now in order to carry out our responsibilities for this incident.

Let me just finish by saying that as one who is heavily involved in all of the actions with the incident, I can best characterize it as we treated this incident as if it had been members of our own family who had been those harmed by it. All of the actions we took were by that standard.

My trip here to Japan this time is part of a three country stop. I began in China last week. I was in Korea earlier this week, and this is my final stop. The personal highlight for me will be saying farewell tomorrow to General Fujinawa who has been the Chairman of the Joint Staff Office. I will also begin a relationship with his successor who will take Gen. Fujinawa's place in order to continue this close military relationship that we have with the Japanese self defense forces. Of course General Hester (US Forces Japan)is our representative here on a day to day basis, but we in Hawaii as well as our military commanders in Washington stay in close touch on a personal as well as all other bases with the Japanese self defense forces. It's been a pleasure serving with General Fujinawa [ph] and we want to be sure to say goodbye to him.

In addition, I have meetings with other leaders. I will meet with Director Saito, Minister Kono, officials from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and from the JDA. As always, we are discussing the full range of issues which face our countries.

It's a dynamic time in Asia. The United States and Japan as strong allies in this region need to stay in close touch as we deal with North Korea, for example. That's the subject of my discussions. As I think was announced yesterday, Acting Assistant Secretary of State Hubbard will be arriving here in Tokyo later this week for further government to government negotiations, particularly on a trilateral basis with South Korea as we continue to coordinate our policies on North Korea.

So regional issues and a common approach to them are very much at the top of the agenda.

There will also be discussions of the individual issues relating to our forces working together as they do. In particular, we will discuss some of the issues with regard to the basing of U.S. forces here in Japan which we constantly review under the principles of the '96 Joint Declaration between President Clinton and Prime Minister Hashimoto.

So it's a good time to be here in Japan. I'm looking forward to my meetings. And let me take any particular questions that you may have.

Question: China has increased its defense budget by 17.7 percent. Do you think it's a threat to East Asian security?

Admiral Blair: I was in China when that increase was announced in their defense budget. The primary issue we have with China about its defense budget is the lack of transparency -- 17.7 percent of what is the question. Although China has published some White Papers, it does not yet have the same sort of openness of its defense expenditures that we have in our countries, and that's very important.

That being said, when I talk to Chinese military leaders at many levels, I was told that the bulk of this increase would go towards personnel costs, compensating their people in a better way, that military salaries had fallen behind other salaries, and also for maintenance of equipment. I think that's correct, that the budget increase by China represents a fuller funding of those activities.

But the important thing really for China to reassure her neighbors is to be more open and consistent about these budget increases so there is more good information and less speculation.

Question: What is your view on North Korea in the light of North and South exchanging the visit by the Premier, and on the other hand does the United States, the Bush government now come in and take a more tougher stance against North Korean than Clinton?

Admiral Blair: I think it's important to emphasize that the U.S. Administration is formulating its policy. It has not really completed it. So I don't think we can characterize any changes of overall U.S. policy. As I told the Koreans that I met with last week, I think there will be strong elements of consistency in our policy.

Number one, the policy is based on close consultation among the three countries who are here in the region and who deal with North Korea, the United States, Japan and South Korea. I think Assistant Secretary Hubbard's trip is an important step in that regard.

Second, the policy will continue to be based on ready, trained deterrent forces in South Korea. South Korean and American forces backed up by the United Nations command.

Third, there will be an element of engagement with North Korea.

So I think the main lines of policy which were worked out under Secretary Perry in his consultations with Japan and the United States will be there. Those are to consult and figure out the right mixture of tactics in order to achieve the goal which we all share, which is to lower the tensions there on the peninsula and induce North Korea to become a positive neighbor rather than one who threatens her neighbors.

Question: Correct me if I'm wrong, but in yesterday's newspapers, American papers, you proposed to the Chinese side to reduce the tension between China and Taiwan by reducing the number of missiles facing Taiwan and that China rebuffed the idea. I wonder if you can explain on that.

Also, what's your general impression of China, especially on the eve of that meeting between China's Vice Prime Minister and President Bush, especially the (unintelligible), the question in the short term I suppose is whether or not to sell the Aegis ships to Taiwan. What's your viewpoint on it?

Admiral Blair: I told the Chinese that what we both agree on is that the issues between Taiwan and China should be settled peacefully. We agree on that. We agree that there is one China.

In order to reach that goal that we share in a peaceful way, it seems to me that military measures are not helpful. It has to be through trade, individual transportation across the border, across the Taiwan Straits, diplomatic activity, student education, information technology, for example. Those are the ways that China and Taiwan can build the trust in order to reach some kind of arrangement.

Increasing military pressure on one side with a reaction on the other side adds nothing to the ability to solve the issues peacefully, but raises the tension. That was the reason, for example, that I testified in our Congress against the Taiwan Security Enhancement Act which was a measure proposed by some members of our Congress which would increase military emphasis on the American side. I thought that was wrong.

I told the Chinese that continuing to build these missiles of the type that they fired in the waters near Taiwan in 1996 was also the wrong way to bring progress in that area. I also told them that if they continued to build up missiles as they are, at some point the United States who has pledged to provide sufficient defense for Taiwan would respond. Then we would have increasing levels of military deployments, increasing levels of tension, but none of the non-military things that I think are going to solve it in the long term.

So I said this clearly to the Chinese that I talked with, they explained to me that our arms sales to Taiwan were wrong, but their building up of their own forces was an internal matter, so that's where we were.

But I am hopeful that in dialogue with the Chinese over time we can de-emphasize military measures and increase the chances of non-military measures solving that problem. I think we have to look at our Taiwan arms sales in the light of our overall goals in the region which have to do with the security of Taiwan but the one China ultimate solution.

Question: Did you fear that Chinese are playing a game, or did you feel any (unintelligible) other than saying (unintelligible)?

Admiral Blair: I saw on the Chinese side a desire to work with the new Administration and to attempt to look for common ground. I do see a clear recognition from the Chinese side that an increase of military measures could jeopardize the more important policies that they are pursuing, their economic development, their relationship with advanced countries in order to attract investment and to build markets.

So I think they recognize that their higher priorities have to do with economic development than with military confrontation, and I think that's very positive.

Question: On the Bush/Mori Joint Statement (unintelligible) between the U.S. and Japan, what is the (unintelligible)? How many people, what kind of people are working together, what kind of agenda they will be talking for such dialogue?

Admiral Blair: In my observation the better and closer and more rich an alliance relationship is, the more complex is strategic dialogue. It takes place at really all levels. It doesn't really depend on high profile summits to make progress.

I would characterize our relationship with Japan as of that character. It really takes place all the time in Washington, Hawaii, where I live, in Tokyo, and in the many multilateral bodies that we're members of.

So I think of the strategic dialogue as a complex series in which clearly the President, the heads and chiefs of government play an overall role in terms of setting it.

Those of us who engage in it work with our counterparts to advance the interests of both countries.

So I think the strategic dialogue is primarily focused on the President's telling those of us who work in this to look to the future. That we should look at the sort of Asia as a sort of world that both the United States and Japan want to live in. Then coordinate our military, diplomatic, economic policies in order to achieve that state.

One thing that I think is really important in the words that the President uses are that it be a future as much of opportunities as of threats. I think that's particularly true here in the Asia region in which without a cold war, without a defining big boundary down the region, it's a course of working with the countries to benefit their citizens. That's what Japan and China can bring to the table. That's what Japan and the United States can bring to the region dealing with countries who are developing and expanding like China, like India, changing like Korea. I think that's really the new strategic vision that we're all pushing towards in our individual ways.

Question: I would like to go back to China. About ten months ago I read a big article in the Washington Post, and there was about new strategic planning of the United States. It said the focal point of defense planning with the United States is shifting from Europe to Asia, especially China.

Is it true? And is what is happening right now?

Admiral Blair: I think that the focus of security attention is shifting to Asia slowly, but I would say it's richer than military planning. In fact I think the military planning is just one component of it. I think it's the recognition of the economic possibilities and the economic importance of Asia. It's the maturing diplomacy in Asia.

From the military side we have these two remains of past wars; on the Korean Peninsula and across the Taiwan Strait. So we have to manage these, as I say, these relics or remainders of past wars. But I think it's more of a strategy that is looking towards the future. And as you look towards the future, it's Asia that occupies more of our attention than other regions of the world, and I think that's right.

Question: I understand that your ships are visiting Singapore's new port. After more than ten years since the Cold War is over and you gave the up the bases in Philippines. In that new era the activity of the U.S. military will be changed?

Admiral Blair: Yes. I think it will. We talked about the points of friction in the region that are primarily from the past. I think the areas for military action in the future will be increasingly towards multilateral activities under, generally, U.N. auspices to deal with the emerging concerns. I think that my forces will find themselves increasingly involved in peacekeeping operations, in humanitarian assistance, in evacuation of non-combatants, in dealing with some of the transnational concerns like piracy, narcotics traffic. And I think that we are increasingly in Asia developing the capability to do these.

The East Timor operation was a real watershed in that instance, a case when Asian, mostly Asian nations, although there was European participation also, came together under a U.N. resolution to handle a very difficult problem which was of concern to all of the countries of the region.

The United States was not the leader of that coalition. It was Australia. We supported in ways that we could do that others could not, and we gave it full diplomatic backing, and it was a very successful operation.

But there were a lot of things that we could do better because we're not used to working together in multinational areas. This has been primarily a bilateral region focused on mutual defense treaties, and to come together as a multilateral group was something new.

Since then we've been working on a number of activities in order to be able to do it better, develop the doctrine, do staff planning exercises, discuss this at conferences so that we understand who can do what. Japan has been involved in some of these planning activities to the extent that its prohibition against collective defense allows.

But I think this is the way of the future for Asia. Not only will it handle the problems that we face here, but it also develops a habit of working together which is very, very important.

We should be measuring our progress here in Asia, not measuring our differences. We should not be falling back into arms races and threat-based thinking about everybody, we should be looking towards cooperation including military cooperation.

So I think it's a very important development for the future.

Question: In the European region with the time table there (unintelligible). And now (unintelligible) some unstable things around the region. So the American military will focus (unintelligible) more in Asia than Europe.

Admiral Blair: I think relatively speaking the United States will be paying more attention to Asia. But I think what's going on here in Asia is that countries are developing and extending their influence. Big countries such as China, India, and even Indonesia who will certainly be recovering from its difficulties and becoming more powerful again. Russia will be recovering from its difficulties and becoming more powerful again.

So how do we collectively manage increases of influence of countries in ways that contribute to greater good and don't divide us up into countries that regard each other as threats and coming to arms races against each other?

I think I've talked to some of you before. I hear a lot of thinking in this part of the world that reminds me of Europe in the 19th Century. Bismarck would be very at home with this.

This is the 21st Century when information technology is dominant, and international capital is running around the world, and our kids are all going to each others' universities and they're all traveling, and here we are talking like we're in Prussia or something. It's not the right way to think about it.

We need to think in collective, forward looking and cooperative ways in order to make things better for everybody.

Business is a good model. For businessmen when there's a transaction it's win/win. Someone gets a product; somebody gets some money. Military thinking is usually win/lose. Somebody is the victor; somebody's the defeated. We've got to go to the business model, I think, to have a good, bright future for Asia, and the more that we think in those terms rather than thinking who has raised the defense budget by a tenth of a percent, the better.

Question: What was your reading of the so-called Armitage Report which was published last fall? Especially, it was written by (unintelligible) specialist, and among others...

Admiral Blair: I'm sorry. Which report?

Question: Armitage Report.

Admiral Blair: Oh, yes.

Question: And among others it sort of recommended to change the Japan/U.S. security relations from burden sharing into something called power sharing, also risk sharing. And it touched on the issue of collective defense life of Japanese Constitution.

But the general tone of it that the, quite a big change from burden sharing to power sharing. I'd like to hear your assessment or your impressions, especially things like (unintelligible) obstacles for Japan to (unintelligible) from (unintelligible) corporation. What was your reading? Would you share the views in the report?

Admiral Blair: I certainly agreed with the emphasis that that report put on the Japanese/American relationship. I think it was absolutely right in pointing to that as the key relationship.

I think that that relationship is in fact evolving from being an alliance of the past to an alliance of the future. I think the actions taken in 1996 with the Declaration of the President and the Prime Minister, followed by the Defense Guidelines, expanding it from simply a defense relationship to concern with areas around Japan is in the right direction. I think it will evolve over time to some of the challenges of the new century which I've been talking about.

So I favor the general direction of that evolution and I think the sort of strategic dialogue we've been talking about will reach those answers eventually.

I feel strongly that however we go in the future, though, the military relationship should involve continued U.S. forces being stationed here in Japan and that it is very much in the interest of both countries to continue that fundamental stationing.

I think we need to address head on some of the local issues which are caused by that presence. There's been a great deal of controversy about Okinawa, for example. I believe firmly that any place else that we station the forces we now have in Okinawa they would be less effective militarily, less effective in supporting defense relationships with Japan and the United States and less effective in being able to work on these missions of the future which I talked about.

However, things have changed in the 50 years since the bases were first set up there. The southern area of Okinawa has become very populated. I think that initiatives like moving Marine Corps Air Station Futenma to the less populated north are exactly right in terms of being able to keep trained and ready forces there which can support our interests, and yet put less of a burden on their immediate neighbors. Naval Air Station Atsugi is another instance. We have had for the last ten years this interim arrangement where our aircraft go and do some of their qualifications in Iwo Jima. But that's more dangerous for our pilots and is not always possible because of weather, as we found out last year. It was possible this year to do the qualification primarily in Iwo Jima. We need to find a solution that again eases the intrusion on the lives of the neighbors of our bases and yet keeps trained U.S. ready forces.

So I see the alliance evolving to face new challenges. I see the stationing of our forces here being continually adjusted so that we can remain ready while we still keep trained and ready forces. And that we keep exercising with the armed forces of Japan both on the issues related strictly to the defense of Japan, but also on the security in and around Japan.

So I think the strategic dialogue will take us in that direction.

I think we have time for about one more question

Question: Concerning Ehime Maru incident, (unintelligible) guessing whether court martial be opened or not, but I think the most, shortest possible resolution be most desired. Are there any ways to expedite this process?

Admiral Blair: I am against artificially expediting a process which is dealing with such weighty matters as were raised by the Ehime Maru. I think that this decision will be as to what accountability action will be taken -- whether it be court martial or some other action -- will be taken within a few weeks. And based on what I know about the time it takes to consider these issues carefully, I think that's probably about the right time.

I would be against putting artificial pressure on it in order to do that. We need to both protect the rights of the individuals involved and see that accountability is properly adjudicated.

Question: I also wanted to ask about the Ehime Maru incident. The [commander] testified the other day on the stand and said that emergency surfacing, emergency blow was necessary to demonstrate the full capability of the submarine to civilians.

Could you think the emergency blow, such demonstration is necessary, you think?

Admiral Blair: I'm not going to answer individual questions about particular actions partly because I'm in the review chain for the accountability action. But also because I think we're beyond that point right now.

The important thing right now is to continue the actions that I described earlier. Take care of the incident, accountability, compensation, and then the recovery of the ship, and then it's to march on to strengthen this alliance which is so very, very important for both countries and for the region as a whole.

Thank you very much.

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