JAPAN: Warm Atmosphere

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In the Soviet Embassy mansion on London's Kensington Palace Gardens, known locally as "Millionaires' Row," Russia and Japan last week began their first high-level talks since the war. Russian Ambassador Yakov Malik, usually scowly, invited photographers into the Embassy's sacrosanct conference room and smilingly offered a cigarette to the Japanese Ambassador, Shunichi Matsumoto. The Japanese diplomat, who does not smoke, accepted the cigarette and beamed. "Very congenial," said Matsumoto afterwards. "The atmosphere is very warm."

Although no formal agenda for the talks has been set, the subject matter is plain for all to see. Russia wants Japan to declare itself neutralist, and has in its power, if it wishes, the ability to pay the Japanese a formidable price, to wit: return of Southern Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands; entry into the U.N.; return of 10,000 Japanese P.W.s and "war criminals"; trade and fishing concessions in Siberian waters. Some or all of these inducements, plus the "normalized relations" promised to the Japanese electorate by Premier Ichiro Hatoyama last February, might bring the neutralist pledge.

Hatoyama's precarious right wing coalition of Liberals and Democrats is in hot water at home, which weakens his ability to deal with the Russians, but may tempt him to dally with them in a reckless last-minute bid for popularity. But Hatoyama must also ask himself whether Japan can afford to quit the U.S. shelter. The U.S. spends about $800 million a year in Japan, and provides its only real defense.