his state visit to japan. joining me now, retired admiral, former nato supreme allied commander and msnbc national security analyst. i guess the question is begging to be asked. how's that for diplomacy? at least for an optics perspective, you have shinzo abe and japan appear to be catering to the president exactly the way he would want to be catered to. why would they be doing that? >> they deeply, deeply value this relationship. you have to chuckle at a picture of the president getting in a sumo ring. this could be his career post presidency. you never know. i think more likely -- kind of a better optic would have been to go to a baseball game. both the japanese and the americans are crazy about baseball. we both have professional leagues. go throw out the first pitch at a baseball game. this just is unusually jarring. hey, bottom line, though, we have a strong relationship with