NEWS ANALYSIS : U.S. Influence in Bangkok Has Its Limits : Diplomacy: Japan is the largest foreign aid source, and Washington alone can do little to affect events.

Although the Bush Administration on Wednesday pressed for an end to violence in Thailand, U.S. officials have found that in the post-Cold War environment, there is not much Washington can do alone to influence events in Bangkok.

Japan is now by far Thailand’s largest supplier of foreign aid and investment. In 1990, Tokyo supplied about $419 million in grants and loans to Thailand, about 74% of Thailand’s entire worldwide foreign aid.

And Japan has demonstrated once again with Thailand--as it did with earlier political crises in China and Myanmar (Burma)--that it is far more hesitant to use its economic leverage on behalf of human rights and democracy than is the United States.

While the Bush Administration cut off U.S. economic aid to Bangkok after a military coup there last year, Japan did not. Some U.S. critics argue that Japan’s policies effectively undercut American efforts on behalf of democracy and human rights.

“The United States should encourage Japan to follow the American lead,” said Mike Jendrzejczyk, Washington director of the human rights group Asia Watch. “. . . In a case like this (Thailand), where there’s blood in the streets and international outrage, the Japanese should take much stronger action than they have.”

Over the last few days, as Thailand’s military used force against civilian demonstrators seeking the ouster of Prime Minister Suchinda Kraprayoon, Bush Administration officials tried repeatedly to prevent the use of force.

The Administration suspended joint combat training exercises with the Thai military, and on Wednesday, President Bush said he was “concerned about the instability in Thailand, very concerned about the violence.”

By contrast, Japan this week continued its aid program to Thailand. And in their public statements, Japanese officials avoided condemnation of the Thai military, suggesting instead that Suchinda’s regime and the anti-government protesters were equally responsible.

“The Japanese government is deeply concerned about the rising tensions in Thai politics and wishes a peaceful and rapid return to order,” Chief Cabinet Secretary Koichi Kato said in Tokyo on Tuesday.

Some Bush Administration officials argue that Japan is slowly moving away from a foreign policy that ignored political questions and was dictated almost exclusively by commercial interests. For example, Japan recently announced that it will take human rights issues into account, at least to some extent, as a factor in distributing foreign aid.

“If you’re thinking of some sort of distinction between the moral Americans and the amoral Japanese (on human rights policies), that sort of distinction would have been accurate four or five years ago, but it’s changing over time,” one senior Administration official said Wednesday.

Others insist that rather than undermining American human rights policies, Japan actually supports them--but that Tokyo moves more slowly than Washington and always lets Americans take the lead.

“For better or worse,” said one State Department official, “the United States has been in the lead on human rights issues in Thailand, Burma and so forth. But Japan has tended to follow what we have done.”

Nevertheless, another State Department official acknowledged Wednesday that Japan’s hands-off approach to human rights issues “is not something that we feel comfortable with, in terms of how we do business.”