Winning The Battle But Losing The War

A small but increasingly vocal minority among the Japanese general population has begun to put pressure on their government to put an end to the so-called ‘research whaling’ that takes place each year in the Southern Ocean. And there are some Japanese politicians at both the local and national level who seem willing to support the proposal currently being worked on by the United States and other anti-whaling countries that would close the loopholes in the 1986 moratorium on commercial whaling. In return, the principal whaling nations of Japan, Iceland, and Norway would be allowed to conduct limited and tightly monitored commercial hunts in their own coastal waters. Unfortunately, such a compromise will likely fail, and when it does, it will be due in large measure to the shortsighted actions of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society. Mr. Tadamasa Kodaira, a pro-whaling lawmaker in the governing Democratic Party said that the recent aggressive actions of foreign environmental groups like Sea Shepherd have fanned popular ire, making it impossible for Tokyo to compromise. The operative word there, in case you missed it, is IMPOSSIBLE. Thus, in saving the lives of hundreds of whales in the Southern Ocean this year, Sea Shepherd has doomed many thousands more to death over the years to come. There is a time to fight, and a time to talk. Sea Shepherd obviously does not know the difference: in winning the battle on the high seas they are losing the war. And while men fight, whales die.