SO MUCH FOR JAPANESE RETICENCE:

How a lowly samurai inspired Koizumi to put rebels to sword: Japan's reforming Prime Minister tells of his great political gamble (Richard Lloyd Parry and Robert Thomson, 9/28/05, Times of London)

WHEN Junichiro Koizumi, the man behind Japan’s political revolution, has time to himself, he seeks refuge in the past, reading about a bloody era of Japanese history known as the Momoyama Period.

Late in the 16th century, after a century of continual civil war, Japan was adrift and in despair. Out of nowhere came a lowly samurai named Oda Nobunaga, who won a series of brilliant victories, overcame the corrupt aristocracy and dominated Japan.

He was an aesthete, art patron and merciless killer. His most notorious act of brutality was to burn down 3,000 Buddhist temples outside Kyoto and butcher their inhabitants. And 400 years later, Oda Nobunaga is a source of inspiration, if not a role model.

“I am learning greatly about the harsh life of a samurai warlord,” Mr Koizumi told The Times in his first interview since winning an election that has turned Japan’s political order on its head. “Every day they faced death. There are a lot of lessons to be learnt.” Like his samurai exemplar, Mr Koizumi has risen from relative obscurity to set in motion a transformation of Japanese politics.