An analysis of recent statement by the Japanese government on the ILC project

Recently, on March 7, Japan made an official statement on a long-pending issue of hosting the International Linear Collider (ILC) in Iwate prefecture. The statement is, however, very ambiguous and may have brought about some confusions among those concerned with the ILC project domestically and internationally as well. Basically, the Japanese government says that it is interested in the ILC project but has no intentions to host the ILC yet. The government representative also says that Japan is ready to continue the international discussion on the ILC project. For those who have expected a conclusive decision from the Japanese side, these statements are disappointing with an impression of lack of leadership by the Japanese government. Indeed, there are many reports in such a tone.

Japanese government punts on decision to host the International Linear Collider (Science, March 7, 2019)
Plans for world's next major collider stuck in limbo (Nature, March 7, 2019)
Japan puts plans for the world's next big particle collider on hold (Science News, March 7, 2019)
Disappointment as Japan fails to commit to hosting the International Linear Collider (Physics World, March 7, 2019)
Japan defers ILC decision (Symmetry, March 7, 2019)

It is understandable that oversea media respond negatively, given that the deadline of the statement has been postponed. Note that last December the Science Council of Japan (SCJ), a special organization under the cabinet office, reported that due to financial obscurity and other circumstantial situations (such as lack of communication among researchers) the SCJ is not fully convinced to support the ILC program in Japan, although it admits the scientific significance of the ILC. In response to this negative opinion, the European representatives of the ILC project decided to postponed the due date from the end of last year to March 7, 2019.

At the end of last year I felt that SCJ's report was somewhat reasonable because of the followings.

1. Japan is an earthquake country and we are still in a way of recovering from the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami disaster on March 11, 2011. Thus, financially it may be difficult to get public and political supports for the ILC which allegedly costs 800 billion yen (over 7 billion US dollar) in total.
2. An international experimental project such as ILC should be constructed in a stable continent with little risk of earthquakes and should be hosted by a relatively rich country. In the current situation China or India would be the best choice.
3. The reason why Iwate prefecture in Tohoku region was chosen as a proposed site (or why Saga prefecture was not selected) was not clear at least for me. Some people speculate that it is related to the financially demanding decommissioning process of the Fukushima nuclear power plant.
4. The very situation that Japan is asked by other countries to host the ILC is not a good sign to convince the public to support the project. If Japan has unique technologies to build the ILC and takes an initiative to lead the project with international cooperation, then the public would be eager to support the ILC project but the situation is different.

Since the SCJ is an organization under the government, I have speculated that the Japanese government might well deny the ILC project. But on a day before March 7, I have come to know via the Japanese media that the government has not decided anything yet. Personally, I found this news perplexed because it is impolite not to say anything decisive, having kept the European representatives so long time. I was and am still afraid that the international ILC representatives are getting fed up with the ambiguous responses from the Japanese government and eventually withdraw the ILC plan from Japan, meaning that Japan may lose trust in international academia. I guess this is the worst scenario I could think of for the future of the Japanese particle-physics community. Thus I urge the Japanese government to make a final decision on whether it hosts the ILC or not as soon as possible.

Having said that, let me now defend the recent statement of the Japanese government. As mentioned above, I have imagined that the government has a negative attitude to the ILC project after the SCJ report. According to the Japanese media, however, things seemed to change drastically on February 20, 2019, when three major business organizations released a joint statement to support the ILC project. The three organizations are the Japan Business Federation (Keidanren), the Japan Chamber of Commerce and Industry (JCCI), and the Japan Association of Corporate Executives (Keizai Doyukai). These organizations represent the Japanese private-sector business and industry, and have traditionally been very influential in policy-making processes in Japan. With the strong support from the economic side, the budget problem of the ILC, probably the most concerned obstacle in the SCJ report, is expected to be lessened. Recent developments in drilling and tunneling technology by use of the shield machines in Japan are remarkable. In modern daily lives the Japanese people enjoy newly constructed deep-underground highways and subways. These are few Japanese videos on these developments.

With the help of the world-best shield machines and diligent construction workers,  the construction period can be shortened, meaning potential reduction of the ILC budget. Furthermore, since the ILC is basically constructed underground the ILC itself is almost earthquake-proof.

Having known these facts, I come to realize that the above-mentioned concerns 1. to 4. would partly or fully be solved by the strong support from the business and industry world. There is also a group of volunteer politicians lobbying for the ILC; after February 20 many of them visited the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT), the governmental body in charge of the ILC related matter, to ask supports. I guess the government/MEXT has tried to coordinate various opinions on the ILC up to the last minute. I simply consider that since the joint-statement by the business organization was too late for MEXT to make the statement conclusive. In this sense I frankly evaluate the official statement in a positive way.

There are of course some frustrations and worries, as mentioned earlier, on the ambiguous nature of the recent statement. But, given that this is the first time that the Japanese government officially and publicly discuss the ILC project, I guess, the statement can be interpreted as a substantial first step to the realization of the ILC in Japan. One may find similar arguments in some articles by a local newspaper in the Tohoku region; English translations of these are available below.

The Japanese government expresses interest in ILC (Iwate Nippo March 8, 2019)
Minister of MEXT expects for deliberations on the ILC to continue; Chief Cabinet Secretary says academic process is necessary (Iwate Nippo March 9, 2019)
Reactions in Iwate to the government's position on the ILC - happiness and confusion (Iwate Nippo March 9, 2019)

Now that strong supports for the ILC from economic and political sectors have been shown, it is a time for the academic sector or the SCJ to respond. The minister of MEXT insists that the government awaits the decision of the so-called ''master plan'' of the SCJ where it determines next-generation big science projects in Japan. The candidates for the master plan projects are scheduled to be chosen in October 2019 and the final form of the master plan will be released in February 2020. Further, the next-generation plan for particle physics experiments in Europe will be reported in May 2020. The minister of MEXT comments that the government would scrutinize these reports to consider whether Japan hosts the ILC or not. If the ILC should not be chosen in October, the ILC project would be abandoned, I guess. Since the SCJ has already commented about the ILC in a negative fashion, it seems difficult or almost impossible to reverse their (scientific) opinion. Thus, it is not a good idea to leave the matter to the SCJ for the sake of the ILC. As explained above, the situation now is different from last December when the SCJ gave a negative report. I hope that somebody who can connect industry and academia in Japan persuades key SCJ members to change their opinion such that they do not lose their honors at all.

Politically, the matter of the ILC becomes too big for a single ministry MEXT to handle with. Pro-ILC politicians advocate the ILC as a next national project after the Tokyo Olympic. If the Japanese academy can not unify their opinions towards the ILC (which is highly probable), then it would be a time for the prime minister to show its leadership. At this stage, I guess we can not help but expect strong leadership by the government to realize the ILC in Japan.