The tragic end to the Shosei Koda hostage crisis may influence Japan's policy of deploying its ground troops in Iraq, especially as their one-year mission will soon expire, officials and analysts say.
"I don't think anyone in the government would say, 'Hey, let's not extend the operations of the Self-Defense Forces because of this,' " said a senior government official.
"But such an opinion could prevail among the public. If so, we may have to respect that because we're a democracy," the official said on condition of anonymity.