After publishing a set of Mid-Term Objectives and Near-Term Priorities for Japan-U.S. Space Cooperation, the group convened for a second meeting in Tokyo in December. The Tokyo meeting afforded the USJSF members the opportunity to engage directly with Japan’s space policy community, including officials from the Japanese government, industry representatives, the U.S. Embassy, and the public. The Tokyo workshop was intended not as a final step, but as an interim step that achieved two complementary goals: firstly, to use the Objectives and Priorities publication as interim recommendations reflecting the group’s concerns on space policy Nat a time of unprecedented fluidity in Japan’s post-WWII security policy. Secondly, the group aimed to receive feedback on the US JSF’s initial conclusions in the interest of refining its recommendations into a more final and formal product for delivery to the broader American and Japanese policy communities.
The USJSF met with those Japanese institutions most directly involved in Japanese space policy and the U.S.-Japan track-1 Comprehensive Dialogue in order to elicit further elaboration on and explanation of current government thinking and action on space policy. Meetings included the Office of National Space Policy within the Cabinet Office, the Japan National Security Council, MOFA, METI, MEXT, MOD, Japanese media, and a public audience of roughly eighty individuals at a Keio University seminar. Reflecting the group’s emphasis on the increasingly vital role of the private sector in national space objectives, the USJSF sought to understand more fully how it can play a role in helping to align national and bilateral space policy objectives with the capabilities, needs, and realities of the two countries’ private sectors.