Japan Appears Interested in NATO, but Is NATO Interested in Japan? : Tokyo wants observer status in the Atlantic alliance, but not all its members are enthusiastic about the idea.

Japan may finally be on the verge of informally joining the Western security alliance.

After being held virtually at arm’s length for 41 years, Tokyo has begun quietly exploring ways to strengthen its ties with the Brussels-based North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

On June 19, for the first time in NATO’s history, top alliance officials held a special meeting to discuss ways to expand the organization’s security cooperation with Japan. U.S. officials said the meeting marked an important milestone in NATO-Japanese relations.

And a few weeks later, when NATO leaders invited officials from the emerging democracies of Eastern European to establish liaison offices at the organization’s headquarters here, Japan politely inquired how soon its own NATO observer group could set up shop in Brussels.

Indeed, the two aren’t unrelated. As Soviet military power has receded on NATO’s eastern front, economic power and technology have become increasingly important as measures of power and influence--and in those areas Japan holds much of the allied might.

At the same time, for all the arms control agreements that the two superpowers have struck, the security situation in the Far East, if anything, may have worsened. Japan remains the West’s main bulwark in the region.

Those arguments were underscored to NATO leaders personally by Hisashi Owada, Japan’s deputy foreign minister, during the June 19 meeting here, and they have also been endorsed by U.S. officials.

William Howard Taft IV, the U.S. envoy to NATO, and a leading proponent of expanded Japanese ties, argues that such realities have made it “logical to expect we’ll see more of (the Japanese) in NATO, in (arms-control negotiations) . . . and in the European capitals.

“The Japanese are more and more appreciating the fact that their security does depend on what’s happening in Europe,” Taft added.

It also fits in with President Bush’s pledge--at a March 2 summit meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Toshiki Kaifu in Palm Springs--to help forge a “global partnership” with Japan that would give Tokyo a wider say in Western security policy.

Tokyo has been seeking such a wider role for months.

Admittedly, not every member of NATO is as eager as the United States to see Japan increase its ties to the 16-country organization. Some wary West Europeans suspect that Tokyo is merely using the NATO relationship to help win a bigger foothold in Europe’s new single market.

France, for example, conspicuously boycotted the June 19 meeting, contending that any effort by NATO members to reach out to Japan would violate the organization’s charter, which pledges only to ensure the defense of Western Europe.

To be sure, few observers believe that Japan would ever be invited to join as a full partner in NATO. To begin with, the Japanese constitution prohibits the government from committing troops to fight abroad in potentially offensive warfare.

At the same time, European governments are unlikely to want to commit themselves to defending Japan just as peace finally appears to have arrived on the Continent.

But time may be on Tokyo’s side. As the more-traditional threat to NATO diminishes, continuing political uncertainty in Asia is expected to push Japan and NATO into an unprecedented security partnership.

Japan’s interest also comes just as NATO is trying to recast itself in more political terms. A larger role for Japan, which in postwar years has used diplomacy--rather than threat of war--to help keep the peace, would help ease Soviet fears of NATO.

As a result, analysts say it’s no accident that Washington--which has led the alliance’s efforts to transform itself to deal with the post-Cold War world--also has taken the lead in welcoming Japan more closely into the NATO fold.

Pentagon security architect Paul D. Wolfowitz told delegates at last month’s NATO meeting that the deepening of security cooperation between NATO and Japan should focus not only on Soviet military power but also on the ethnic and religious conflicts that threaten world stability.

Wolfowitz argued that a newly forged link between Japan and NATO would help the allies confront the dangers of missile technology spreading throughout the Third World.

For the Japanese, the invitation to coordinate more closely with NATO brings several benefits--most important, a voice in arms negotiations that could otherwise allow the Soviet Union to shift military forces from its European front to Asia.

“We’re looking at some way of assuring the continued engagement of the Japanese in the ongoing discussion about European security,” Taft said recently.