Historical Dictionary of United States-Japan ... - Bakumatsu Films

xxxviii • CHRONOLOGY
2001 20 January: George W. Bush is inaugurated as president of the
United States. 9 February: The USS Greenville submarine collides
with the Japanese fishing training vessel Ehime Maru, killing nine people
aboard the Ehime Maru. 26 April: Junichiro Koizumi becomes
Prime Minister of Japan. 30 June: U.S.–Japan Economic Partnership
for growth
5 July: Former Senator Howard Baker arrives in Tokyo as United
States ambassador to Japan. He serves until February 2005. 11 September:
Terrorist attacks in New York, Washington, and Pennsylvania
kill more than 3,000 people, including 2,900 Americans and 26 Japanese.
29 October: Anti-Terrorism Special Measures Law enacted.
2002 26 August: Assistant Secretary of State James Kerry informs
former Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto that North Korea is suspected
of developing nuclear weapons secretly. September: 50th anniversary
of the signing of the San Francisco Peace Treaty. 17 September:
Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi visits North Korea and signs the
Pyongyang Declaration.
2003 16 March: Vice President Dick Cheney mentions possibility of
Japan’s nuclear armament. 20 March: Invasion of Iraq begins. 27 March:
Defense Agency Director Shigeru Ishiba states at the Lower House Committee
on National Security that even though North Korea possesses nuclear
weapons, Japan will depend on the U.S. nuclear umbrella without
possessing its own nuclear weapons. May: At a summit meeting with
President Bush, Prime Minister Koizumi pledges to dispatch the Japanese
Self-Defense Forces to Iraq. 6 June: Laws on war contingencies enacted.
26 July: Special legislation calling for assistance in the rebuilding of Iraq
by which the Japanese Self-Defense Forces are dispatched to Iraq enacted.
6 November: Signing of the New Japan–US Income Tax Convention. December:
Japan decides to adopt Missile Defense (MD) system. In making
a new National Defense Program Outline, the Defense Department decides
the U.S. basic policy to reduce its front-line equipment.
2004 16 January: Based on the Special legislation calling for assistance
in the rebuilding of Iraq, the Japanese government dispatches the
advance party of the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force to Iraq. February:
The first of more than 600 Japan Self-Defense Force troops begin arriving
in Iraq to assist the United States coalition military. 20 February: