U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates reportedly will arrive in Tokyo sometime during the week of Nov. 4. His visit will come a week after Japan's Maritime Self-Defense Force refueled a Pakistani navy destroyer in the northern part of the Indian Ocean for the last time under the Japanese mission to support U.S.-led anti-terrorism operations. The debate over Japan's warship-refueling mission reached a head in September when former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe resigned over the issue. Japanese troops have provided indirect support to U.S.-led operations in the Indian Ocean since 2001, under a government mandate that is renewed on an annual basis. Now, following Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda's futile Oct. 30 attempt to persuade opposition leader Ichiro Ozawa to attain upper house approval of a mandate for an extension (the upper house is controlled by the opposition Democratic Party of Japan — the DPJ), authorization for the mission will expire Nov. 1. This will be the first time such a renewal has not been passed seamlessly without interrupting ongoing operations. Nevertheless, it will prove to be more of a domestic political hiccup than a devastating setback for the U.S.-Japanese military relationship, provided that Fukuda secures two-thirds of the lower house in a subsequent vote, which is highly likely because the lower house is controlled by the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). The refueling mission will only be temporarily delayed as Ozawa tries to capitalize on the issue and steal back some of the poll popularity that Fukuda won in the aftermath of Abe's resignation. What Gates is likely to find in Tokyo, however, is a debate not about whether Japan should expand its military capability and activity but about how that expansion should be carried out. Both the LDP and the DPJ (particularly the latter, since Ozawa took over in 2006) agree on the need for Japan to redefine and reshape its military capabilities and to "normalize" and take responsibility for its own defense in a post-Cold War world. The difference between the two sides, however, is over how closely that defense expansion should be linked to the United States. Ozawa has long accused the LDP of being too closely tied to Washington for Japan's own defense and for shaping the direction of Japanese defense development and attention. At the same time, Ozawa, once an LDP member himself, has been a strong voice for Japan taking part in international peacekeeping operations (albeit by reinterpreting the constitution), which would be a step toward redefining Japanese military capabilities and actions. In 1999, Ozawa called for deployment of Japanese peacekeepers to East Timor, and — more recently — he said Tokyo should send peacekeepers to Sudan. And he has gone further than that, saying in 2003 that should China become too "conceited," the Japanese could grow "hysterical," and that, "If Japan desires, it can possess thousands of nuclear warheads." For Ozawa, the goal is a strong, independent Japan with a military to match its economic prowess — not all that different from the LDP position. The biggest differences lay in how each side wants to achieve this goal. Ozawa and his supporters want Japanese defense development to occur under the guise of international cooperation; the country should participate in U.N. missions but keep from being drawn into U.S. conflicts. According to them, Japanese defense development should not be constrained or shaped by U.S. interests but should be based on Japanese interests. In contrast, LDP strategists see the surest and quickest path to a militarily independent Japan as being one closely linked to the United States. They want to let Washington continue to provide for Japan's security while Tokyo focuses on building up its defense capabilities — and takes advantage of technology transfers and joint development of systems with the United States. The LDP fears that pulling away too soon from the U.S. security umbrella would put Japan at considerable risk. The long-term goals of the DPJ and LDP are the same. The path to achieving them is not. The current debate over refueling is primarily a domestic political dispute, one in which Ozawa and the DPJ are trying to cash in on domestic sentiments to increase their strength and perhaps break the LDP's monopoly on power. But it also reflects the deeper strategic differences over how closely to Washington Tokyo should walk as Japan adjusts to the new world order.