Japan To Hold Iraq War Inquiry?

Most of all, I came to realize the opacity of the Japanese government's decision-making process regarding the Iraq War.

"I believe it would be appropriate to support the United States should it resort to the use of military force."

So said Junichiro Koizumi, then Japan's prime minister, when he met reporters on March 18, 2003, two days before the Iraq War started.

Shigeru Ishiba, then chief of the Defense Agency, now the Defense Ministry, says this was the first time he heard Koizumi state that Japan would support the Iraq War.

"There had been no discussion of whether to support the Iraq War at meetings of Cabinet members," he says.

Even the then chief Cabinet secretary, Yasuo Fukuda, says he never heard Koizumi say explicitly, "We will support the Iraq War" before the conflict began. From Here