For years, Japan's political establishment has stamped out national leaders almost as uniformly as Japanese industry turns out transistors. The country's first ten postwar Premiers all reached power in their 60s or 70s, and most were equipped with identical attributes: samurai ancestries, diplomas from Tokyo University, decades of self-effacing service in government bureaucracies. Last week the mold was shattered when the Japanese Diet in a special session elected International Trade and Industry Minister Kakuei Tanaka, 54, the country's eleventh Premier since 1945. A muscular, self-made millionaire (construction, real estate) who has...
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