Bush Asks Trade Gains in Showdown in Tokyo : Diplomacy: President calls on Miyazawa to iron out differences over barriers to U.S. goods. ‘World leadership is at stake,’ he says.

TOKYO —  In a politically charged meeting today between leaders of the world’s two richest nations, President Bush emphasized U.S.-Japanese solidarity but issued a blunt call for progress on contentious trade disputes.

“I really believe we can move this process forward,” he told Japanese Prime Minister Kiichi Miyazawa as U.S. and Japanese business leaders looked on. “It is in our interest, it is in your interest. . . . World leadership is at stake.”

In an opening encounter in a showdown over Japanese barriers to U.S. goods, Bush urged that the two nations “iron out this difference between us without tensions mounting” but warned: “We’ve got to be specific.”

Miyazawa did not respond directly to the President’s plea but said he and Bush are “working hard to advance our bilateral relations . . . not only for the sake of our two countries but also for the rest of the world.”

At a briefing later, Bush’s national security adviser, Brent Scowcroft, said that Miyazawa had vowed that Japan would do its part in promoting growth to ensure that Bush “did not have to be unduly preoccupied with economic problems at home.”

While no discussions were continuing on specific proposals, Scowcroft said, “We have no reason for dismay.”

White House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater insisted earlier that Bush will have achieved his goals on a visit here simply by demonstrating the determination of the United States to press for more open markets.

But sources said that American officials are still quietly pressuring Tokyo for more concrete commitments, and Bush urged that the two nations “follow through” with steps to reduce the $41-billion U.S. trade deficit with Japan.

In a determined effort to allow Bush to declare his four-day visit a success, Japanese officials have made modest concessions.

On Tuesday, the Ministry of International Trade and Industry announced 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 ministry official stressed that the proposals are aimed not just at imports from the United States but those from all foreign nations. None of the goals announced Tuesday appeared significant enough to make a substantial difference to the American economy.

In advance of the Bush meeting with Miyazawa, a senior Administration official said that Tuesday’s announcement “certainly is not going to take care of the much deeper problem within the Japanese economy, which makes it very resistant to imports.”

The United States was understood to have urged that Japan significantly increase imports of American goods, especially auto parts, by billions of dollars a year.

Japanese officials were said to be urging companies here to accept only a much smaller increase than requested in U.S. auto parts imports, and the White House appeared reconciled to only modest immediate concessions.

In the first of two meetings with Miyazawa, Bush had been expected to 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.

Even as the President sought to take a more accommodating tack, the Big Three U.S. auto executives accompanying him here lashed out at 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.”

And despite Bush’s plea for progress, U.S. officials sought to deflate expectations that his long-awaited visit here might produce immediate economic results. “You don’t just go down to the corner shopping center and buy a bunch of jobs and put them in a basket,” White House spokesman Fitzwater said.

A senior Administration official described the Bush sessions with Miyazawa as “a good flash point” for U.S. economic concerns but cautioned: “Nothing is going to be concluded in this meeting.”

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

In addition, Treasury Secretary Nicholas F. Brady reached an agreement with Japan to promote global economic growth that was expected to force Japan to reduce interest rates later in the year.

While details of the accord were not yet available, officials indicated that Japan had agreed to maintain the growth of its economy at 3.5% a year, a pledge likely to require further economic stimulus.

In a speech in Osaka on Tuesday, 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 is “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.

In his visits with Miyazawa--the first since the 73-year-old Japanese leader took office late last year--Bush also was seeking 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--is 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.”

Iacocca, Stempel and Ford Motor Co. Chairman Harold A. Poling joined the 18-member U.S. business delegation traveling with Bush and Commerce Secretary Robert A. Mosbacher only after they arrived in Japan.

“To say we are coming to Japan to get a souvenir or we’re going to sit around and accept whatever favors they can bestow on us, that’s not the game,” Iacocca told the Associated Press. “The game is, you’ve got to change the basic trading relationship between these two countries. We don’t have to apologize to anybody.”

The American auto makers’ tough remarks came a day after the Big Three released their worst annual sales figures since 1983.

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.

The Japanese in November had proposed to increase that sum to $17 billion, but the Americans sought imports of $27 billion, Japanese media reported. It was indicated today that imports of U.S. auto parts would increase only modestly, to $19 billion.

The separate “voluntary plan” by 23 of Japan’s leading firms, including Matsushita, Toyota, Mitsubishi and Canon, calls for imports of manufactured goods to grow to $26.4 billion in 1993 from $16.3 billion in 1990.

In that period, 10 electronics firms would pledge to increase imports to $17.4 billion from $10.2 billion. Nine auto firms would agree to boost foreign buying to $7.3 billion from $4.9 billion. (It is unclear whether the increased auto company buying includes parts purchases.) Four machinery firms would expand imports to $1.7 billion from $1.1 billion.

The firms have also agreed to increase procurement of local parts and to hire more American staff. The plans include Nissan’s plans to expand its U.S. research staff by 100 people, Toyota’s program to increase purchasing of local parts to $6.3 billion in 1994 from $3.7 billion in 1990 and a pledge by Canon to boost the ratio of local content to 60% in 1995 from 45% in 1990.