Trade With Japan

U.S. Ambassador Mike Mansfield has demonstrated commendable diplomatic skill in addressing the trade issue with Japan. At a time when vast amounts of dollars are being sent to the coffers of other nations in what is euphemistically called an “internationalized economy,” trade is becoming a volatile issue. This is especially true in countries like Japan, which lack the luxury of land mass and economic momentum that our consumers snack on with true arrogance.

Ambassador Mansfield is correct in asserting that our economic problems are of our own making, given the fact that American managers have donated jobs and technical knowledge to countries with less confrontational work forces. I have these notions relatively well-ordered in my mind.

Many observers of Japanese collective sentiment, moreover, would interpret the picture in The Times of Japanese farmers destroying an American car, burning American-grown oranges and an American flag as a ritualized response to the widely circulated picture of several U.S. Congressmen smashing a Japanese radio on the Capitol steps (Part I, April 24). Obviously, it is a carefully calibrated, culturally mandated response to the American provocation.

The only question that came to my mind was: where on earth did the Japanese farmers get the Pontiac?

BRECK ULE

Los Angeles