"Ladies and gentlemen, Japan is back," declared Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, addressing a Washington think tank in February 2013.

Abe himself had just bounced back. Two months earlier, a resounding electoral victory had returned him and his Liberal Democratic Party to power. He was buoyant.

He still is. "Japan is back" remains the message, at home and abroad. Doubts have crossed other minds but never, apparently, his own. He ranks among the best salesmen-in-chief postwar Japan has ever had.