Is Shinzo Abe's 'new nationalism' a throwback to Japanese imperialism?
Abe is also charged with arrogance, chauvinism and historical revisionism, by minimising or ignoring wartime legacies such as the controversy over Korean "comfort women" who were forced into prostitution by Japanese troops during the second world war.
As a battleship-grey drizzle sweeps across Yokosuka harbour, home port to the Japan maritime self-defence force and the US Seventh Fleet, Fujii stands four-square on his helicopter deck, a totemic red Japanese sun-ray ensign flapping at the flagstaff behind him. His stance exudes quiet purposefulness.
The Murasame, armed with advanced missiles, torpedoes, a 76mm rapid-fire turret cannon and a vicious-looking Phalanx close-in-weapons-system (CIWS) Gatling gun, is on the frontline of Japan's escalating standoff with China and its contentious bid to stand up for itself and become a power in the world once again. And Fujii clearly relishes his role in the drama.
Asked whether he will be taking his ship south, to the hotly disputed waters off the Senkaku islands in the East China sea (which China calls the Diaoyu and claims as its own), Fujii smiles and bows. His executive officer, acting as translator, explains that "for security and operational reasons" the captain cannot comment. The situation there is just too sensitive.
The name Murasame means "passing shower". But Japan's decision last year to in effect nationalise some of the privately owned Senkakus – officials prefer to call it a transfer of property rights – triggered a prolonged storm of protest from China, which has been sending ships to challenge the Japanese coastguard ever since.
So far, there have been no direct armed exchanges, but there have been several close shaves, including a Chinese navy radar lock-on and the firing of warning shots by a Japanese fighter plane. China's weekend declaration of an exclusive "air defence identification zone" covering the islands was denounced by Tokyo and Washington and sharply increased the chances of a military clash. US B-52 bombers and Japanese civilian airliners have subsequently entered the zone, ignoring China's new "rules". On Tuesday, Beijing said it had monitored the flights; its next move is awaited with some trepidation.
For Shinzo Abe, Japan's conservative prime minister who marks one year in office next month, the Senkaku dispute is only one facet of a deteriorating east Asian security environment that is officially termed "increasingly severe" and which looks increasingly explosive as China projects its expanding military, economic and political power beyond its historical borders.
One year on, Abe's no-nonsense response is plain: Japan must loosen the pacifist constitutional bonds that have held it in check since 1945 and stand up forcefully for its interests, its friends and its values. The way Abe tells it, Japan is back – and the tiger he is riding is dubbed Abe's "new nationalism".
It is no coincidence that high-level contacts with China and South Koreahave been in deep freeze ever since Abe took office, while the impasse over North Korea has only deepened. Unusually, a date for this year's trilateral summit between Japan, China and South Korea has yet to be announced.
The Beijing and Seoul governments profess to view Abe's efforts to give Japan a bigger role on the world stage, forge security and defence ties with south-east Asian neighbours, and strengthen the US alliance as intrinsically threatening – a throwback to the bad old days of Japanese imperialism...
