Simon World spots this Asia Times Online dreck on Japanese gun exports:

The international annual publication, the Small Arms Survey, for example, reported that in 2002 Japan exported $65 million worth of small arms which, in monetary terms, ranks Japan among the top eight exporters of small arms worldwide for that year. [8]

The Japanese government evades this issue by contending that “hunting guns and sport guns are not regarded as ‘arms’,” [9] and therefore the self-imposed ban on arms exports only applies to guns of a military specification. This raises the question of what differentiates a military specification gun from a sporting or hunting weapon. However, the Japanese Ministry for Export, Trade and Industry (METI) provides no comprehensive definition. Instead it decides on a case-by-case basis whether a weapon should be defined as being of military specification…

Each year small arms kill about 500,000 people around the world. So great is their impact on human security that UN Secretary General Kofi Annan observed, “In terms of the carnage they cause, small arms, indeed, could well be described as ‘weapons of mass destruction’.”

First of all, I think it is over-the-top to blame Japan’s exports of fine hunting rifles and shotguns for small arms deaths around the world. Secondly, it is absolutely asinine to suggest that small arms are what are killing people. No. Other people are killing people — for greed, money, resources, religion, land, ideas and so on. Guns, like clubs, rocks, knives, tanks, are facilitators of violence. In turn, whether violence is good or bad depends on context. Violence in defense of the innocent against the depredations of evil is good. Violence in context of thieving and murdering is bad.

The funny thing about it is that I often say “I wish the Japanese made more guns and exported them to the U.S.” Look how the Japanese auto industry has contributed to the competition in the global and American auto markets and helped to improve quality and lower prices.

As it stands, I have to choose between reliable, but pricey European guns or sometimes unreliable American-made guns (not referring to U.S. military arms). Wouldn’t infusion of the gun industry equivalents of Honda and Toyota be simply tremendous? One can only wish.