Bush Stresses Shared Goals in Japan Talks : Diplomacy: Security, not trade, is his first order of business, aides say. But Big Three auto executives say it’s ‘high time’ to stand up to Tokyo.

TOKYO — In a politically charged meeting between leaders of the world’s two richest nations, President Bush today took an accommodating tack, emphasizing U.S.-Japanese solidarity in hopes of laying ground for progress on more contentious trade disputes.

As Bush began a long-awaited session with Japanese Prime Minister Kiichi Miyazawa, U.S. officials said the President will seek to affirm the nations’ shared security interests before trying to “chip away at the ice block of economics,” on which there appeared less hope of clear success.

“We’re trying to lay a foundation on which to build,” an Administration official said before the session. “If you don’t have a good security foundation, you can’t get anywhere.”

In a further effort to set modest goals for the Americans, White House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater insisted today that Bush will have achieved his mission, simply by demonstrating to Japan that the United States intends “to compete in world markets and press for market share.”

But sources said that American officials were still quietly pressuring Japan behind the scenes to agree to significantly increase imports of American goods, especially auto parts, by billions of dollars annually.

On Tuesday, the Ministry of International Trade and Industry did announce a separate program with goals to nearly double imports of autos, electronics and machinery to $26 billion over the next two to three years through a “voluntary plan” by 23 of Japan’s leading firms.

But a senior Administration official said today that such a plan “certainly is not going to take care of the much deeper problem within the Japanese economy, which makes it very resistant to imports.”

Nevertheless, White House spokesman Fitzwater described such offers as “encouraging” and suggested that they showed that Bush’s visit had already transformed Japanese attitudes.

Despite their latest import efforts, Japanese officials were said to be urging companies here to accept only a much smaller increase than the Americans had pressed for; the White House appeared reconciled to no more than modest concessions.

As part of his bid to perpetuate the U.S.-Japan link forged in the Cold War, Bush was expected to ask that Japan bear more of the cost for the 56,000 U.S. troops still stationed here in a symbol of the American security commitment.

But even as the President hoped to emphasize security matters before talking trade, the angry Big Three U.S. auto executives accompanying him immediately attacked the Japanese.

Chrysler Corp. Chairman Lee Iacocca told reporters Tuesday night: “I think it is high time our government faced up to their government--be polite about it but tough--and said we can’t continue this way.” General Motors Chairman Robert C. Stempel insisted that American auto makers had traveled to Japan “not because we come from a position of weakness but because we come from a position of strength.”

White House officials sought to deflate expectations that the trade showdown might produce immediate economic results. “No one was saying we’d be coming back with 2 million jobs in our pockets,” one U.S. aide insisted Tuesday.

In a determined effort to allow Bush to declare his four-day visit a success, Japanese officials announced the modest concessions on imports.

But none of the measures have appeared significant enough to make a difference to the American economy, and a senior official of the Ministry of International Trade and Industry stressed that the proposals were aimed not just at the United States but all foreign nations.

The focus of American concern remains the $41-billion U.S. trade deficit with Japan, with nearly three-fourths of that gap represented by commerce in autos and auto parts.

Treasury Secretary Nicholas F. Brady was expected to press Japan to embrace new budget policies designed to promote economic growth, and Administration officials said an agreement on the issue was expected later today.

In a speech Tuesday in Osaka, Bush stressed that the United States had been “pleased at the success so far” in opening Japanese markets to U.S. products and companies, including a new Toys ‘R’ Us store he visited in Nara. But he said his Administration was “not satisfied with just reaching these piecemeal trade agreements.

“In the case of free and open trade,” he said at an opening ceremony for the store, “we want agreements that produce permanent improvement in access and in U.S. sales to Japanese markets and permanent improvements in the lives of Japanese consumers.”

He appeared determined to defuse concerns that the U.S. trade stance could sour U.S.-Japanese relations, saying, “I will do my level best as President of the United States to preserve and strengthen the important relationship between Japan and my great country.”

On the topic of joint security, Bush and Miyazawa are expected today to wrap up work on a “Tokyo Declaration,” detailing the nations’ shared military and security interests in the post-Cold War world.

Bush’s plea for Japan to bear a greater burden of the $6-billion U.S. defense costs here was an unexpected renewal of a longstanding American request; Japan now picks up about 50% of the tab for the American presence, making it cheaper for Washington to station troops here than at home. But Administration officials said Bush would ask Tokyo to provide electricity and other services free to help increase the Japanese share of the military costs to about 75% by 1995.

In his first of two days of visits with Miyazawa--the first since the 73-year-old Japanese leader took office late last year--Bush was expected to seek to cement the kind of relationship he had forged with former Prime Minister Toshiki Kaifu.

To ensure the cordiality of their contact, U.S. officials said Bush--who also met with Emperor Akihito--was unlikely to make a point here of a Japanese ban on rice imports. The United States has demanded that Tokyo lift its agricultural barriers. But the issue is so politically sensitive in Japan that an Administration official expressed mock astonishment when asked if Bush would confront Miyazawa about the American concern. “You mean in public?” he asked.

On the American side, U.S. auto executives have clamored so loudly for protection from Japanese imports that the White House already has sought to distance itself from the Big Three executives. On their first day in Japan as members of Bush’s trade mission, Iacocca and Stempel appeared again to blame Tokyo for their companies’ failure to sell American autos to the Japanese.

“We have world-class cars,” Stempel said. “We joined the President for just that reason: that America can be proud of the goods it produces, can be proud of the technology it has.”

In Tokyo, there were indications that Miyazawa was pressuring Japanese auto makers to accept a scaled-back deal to increase auto parts imports over 1990 levels of $10 billion.