This was published 4 months ago
‘Anything you want’: Trump’s love-in with Japan’s new leader
Updated ,first published
Singapore: US President Donald Trump has famously reserved some of his highest praise for the world’s strongmen leaders. So it was a good sign for Japan’s new female prime minister, Sanae Takaichi, that Trump was already effusive with praise ahead of their first meeting on Tuesday morning, saying he had heard “phenomenal things” about her.
With the red carpet rolled out at Tokyo’s Akasaka Palace, a fleet of US cars parked out the front, and a pledge by Takaichi to accelerate the country’s defence spending gilding Trump’s arrival, Japan pulled off the kind of diplomatic coup that has defeated other nations: securing adulation, however superficial, where others have been scorned and humiliated.
“I want to just let you know, any time you have any question, any doubt, anything you want, any favours you need, anything I can do to help Japan, we will be there. We are an ally at the strongest level,” Trump told Takaichi.
Granted, this was Trump on foreign soil, where even he has not strayed from the norms of dignity and respect to the host. Nonetheless, it was as strong an endorsement as Takaichi could have hoped for. Trump feted her as being poised to become “one of the greatest” prime ministers, adding that the late Japanese leader Shinzo Abe would be happy to see her in the top job.
Trump’s early fondness for Takaichi, an ultraconservative national security hawk who has styled herself as Japan’s “Iron Lady” and Abe’s protegee, is due in large part to her closeness to the former prime minister.
In his first term, Trump found a kindred spirit in Abe, with the pair bonding over golf and forming a genuine friendship before he was assassinated in 2022. “He was one of my favourites,” Trump said early this week.
Takaichi, too, leaned into the flattery as they greeted each other on Tuesday, praising the US president on his peace-making efforts between Thailand and Cambodia and in the Middle East.
“I myself am so impressed and inspired by you, Mr President,” she said.
As the meeting got under way, the White House confirmed Japanese media reports that Takaichi would join a handful of other world leaders in nominating Trump for the accolade he most desires: the Nobel Peace Prize.
The meeting was an early high-stakes test for Takaichi, who took office as Japan’s first female leader a week ago, leading a fragile minority government.
She was forced to form a new coalition with the right-leaning Japan Innovation Party after her party’s long-time partner, the more centrist Komeito Party, walked away, citing policy differences under her leadership.
In the spirit of calculated obsequiousness that has become the secret-sauce recipe for a successful audience with Trump, the Japanese government prefaced his arrival by floating a plan to buy a fleet of American Ford F-150 trucks.
Never mind that the trucks are too big for Japan’s narrow roads and tight parking spaces, the idea impressed the US president, who told reporters aboard Air Force One this week that Takaichi had good taste, remarking, “that’s a hot truck”.
The two leaders signed a deal to work on bolstering the supply of critical minerals and rare earths, adding to a string of similar deals Trump secured firstly with Australia and then with Asian partners at the ASEAN summit in Malaysia this week – all of it designed to loosen China’s chokehold on the sector, albeit with most analysts acknowledging it will do little in the immediate term.
But behind the surface of the love-in, in Tokyo the gritty details of Japan’s trade deal with the Trump administration – a source of considerable political angst in Japan – were left to be worked through another day.
The deal struck in July by Takaichi’s predecessor, Shigeru Ishiba, committed Japan to investing $550 billion ($838 billion) in American industries in exchange for a tariff rate of 15 per cent, lower than the 25 per cent initially threatened by Trump. The kicker is that the deal handed Trump the power to direct where Japan’s money was spent.
Perhaps Takaichi will succeed where Ishiba failed and, with the support of Abe from beyond the grave, secure a sweetened outcome.
Setting the stage for a friendship she hopes will rival the one Trump had with her mentor, she gifted Trump a putter that belonged to Abe, and the pair signed baseball caps with golden embroidery declaring: JAPAN IS BACK.
Get a note directly from our foreign correspondents on what’s making headlines around the world. Sign up for our weekly What in the World newsletter.
Lisa Visentin is the North Asia correspondent for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age based in Beijing. She was previously a federal political correspondent based in Canberra.Connect via X or email.