The Peculiar American

Managing the Alliance...For the Long Stretch
The good news is that Japan has agreed to send money and troops to. Perhaps Turkey announcing it was ready to contribute to the reconstruction effort broke the ice and is allowing other fence-sitters like Japan and Korea to step forward.

The bad news is that Japan mya not be contributing as much as it could out of some lingering resentment over Gulf War I:

"Japan is still smarting from what it feels was ungrateful treatment following the 1991 Persian Gulf War, when it was accused of checkbook diplomacy after coughing up about $13 billion toward the effort, but no troops. Yukio Okamoto, one of Koizumis top advisors on Iraq policy, said Japan's cash contribution this time around will almost surely be 'at least less than half' Japan's contribution toward the previous Gulf War. 'We were treated like dirt after the Persian Gulf War,' he said. 'Well, now, we intend to send Japanese [forces] to Iraq, so our contribution should not be expected to be as high."

Our allies have long memories, even if we don't.