In mid-March I had a chance to discuss recent Japan-U.S. relations with George Washington University professor Mike Mochizuki. He summed up the Obama administration's view of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe as follows.

Before Abe visited Yasukuni Shrine on Dec. 26, U.S. government leaders had an image of the Japanese prime minister as a pragmatist. That's the very reason the United States said it was "disappointed" when Abe visited Yasukuni. U.S. criticism of Japan subsided for a while after the new year as Washington kept its distance from moves by China and South Korea, which tried to drum up domestic support by using history issues with Japan as a political tool.

Nevertheless, signs of a rise of self-centered nationalism in Japan — as illustrated by criticism of the Obama administration voiced by a close aide to Abe, verbal gaffes by the NHK chairman as well as attempts by lawmakers in the ruling Liberal Democratic Party and part of the opposition camp to kill the 1993 statement by then Chief Cabinet Secretary Yohei Kono on the wartime "comfort women" issue — reignited U.S. leaders' harsh view of Japan.