Last week, the Asahi Shimbun ran an opinion piece by writer Genichiro Takahashi that was in the form of an advice column. The anonymous advice-seeker professed to having suffered the same fate as the three Japanese hostages who returned from Iraq to a chorus of derision. After all I went through, said the letter writer, why was I being treated this way?

"It is natural to assume that the government's job is to protect citizens," Takahashi said. "But they act as if working for the hostages' release is akin to unpaid overtime." He went on to say that this attitude infects the public, which complains about the "trouble" the hostages caused for the nation. "But what trouble do they cause for me?" Takahashi asks. "None at all."

The only Japanese people the hostages caused trouble for were those in the government who had something to lose, especially Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi. He staked his political career on the dispatch of Self-Defense Forces to Samawah and their safe return, and his relief at the hostages' release was accompanied by obvious annoyance at having been put through such an ordeal.