Japan's Hatoyama, U.S. envoy discuss enhancing ties

* Concerns simmer about U.S-Japan ties after election
* Japan's next leader seeks to sooth alliance concerns
* Tough U.S. words could spark backlash - analysts (Recasts with meeting between U.S. envoy and Hatoyama)
By Chisa Fujioka and Linda Sieg
TOKYO, Sept 3 (Reuters) - Japan's new leader and Washington's envoy agreed on Thursday to enhance ties amid concerns about the alliance after an election win by Yukio Hatoyama's party, which has pledged a more independent diplomatic course.
The prospect of a Democratic Party administration in Japan, ruled for most of the past half-century by conservatives who put the U.S. partnership at the core of its security stance, has raised worries in Washington about a tilt away from the alliance.
Most analysts say no huge shift is in store after Hatoyama takes up the premiership on Sept. 16, but investors are also concerned about a possible rocky road ahead.
"We talked about the very deep relationship between the United States and Japan," U.S. ambassador to Japan John Roos told reporters after a meeting with Hatoyama.
"We spent a lot of time talking about how to enhance and further deepen that relationship across a broad range of issues, not only strategic issues, but scientific issues, cultural matters ... because the two countries have shared values and shared interests," Roos said.
"We have lot of work to do but we are going to do it together," he said.
The meeting followed an early morning phone conversation in which Hatoyama sought to reassure U.S. President Barack Obama that the relationship would stay central to Tokyo's diplomacy.
"I told him we think the U.S.-Japan alliance is the foundation (of Japanese diplomacy) and I would like to build U.S.-Japan relations with eyes on the future," Hatoyama said.
The Democrats pledged in their campaign platform to create a more equal partnership with Washington while forging warmer ties with Asian neighbours such as China.
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The U.S.-educated Hatoyama also raised eyebrows in Washington with a recent essay, published in English, in which he attacked the "unrestrained market fundamentalism" of U.S.-led globalisation. He has since sought to play down those comments.
"It was an error of judgment on the part of Hatoyama and the DPJ to have the essay published in English," said Koichi Nakano, a professor at Tokyo's Sophia University.
"It was for domestic consumption and had its purpose in the campaign context, but putting it out in English for an American audience was unwise."
U.S. officials, including Roos himself, have recently raised some eyebrows too by forcefully reiterating Washington's position that deals on U.S. forces in Japan were not up for renegotiation.
"Obama needs to send a message to the whole administration to bite their tongues or they will provoke a fight," said Columbia University professor Gerry Curtis.
"The internal politics of the DPJ and its coalition don't allow them to just walk away from his platform a few days after the election. But give them a few months and there will be ways to deal with these issues," he said.
The Democrats, themselves a mix of former LDP members, ex-socialists and younger conservatives, are trying to form a coalition with two tiny parties, including the leftist Social Democrats, whose support is needed in parliament's upper house.
The new ruling party has said it wants to re-examine an agreement governing U.S. military forces in Japan and a deal on rejigging U.S. troops under which about 8,000 Marines would leave for the U.S. territory of Guam and a Marine air base be shifted to a less populated part of the southern island of Okinawa.
Hatoyama has also said he plans to end a naval mission in support of U.S.-led operations in Afghanistan when its legal mandate expires in January.
Few analysts expect a Democratic Party government to make big changes in the alliance, given decades of close ties and Japan's reliance on the U.S. nuclear umbrella to protect it from such regional threats as unpredictable nearby North Korea.
But Washington would do well to avoid a strident tone in talks with Japan's government-in-waiting, some analysts said.
"Japan is so heavily reliant on the United States that radical change is not going to happen," Nakano said.
"But American senior officials taking such a haughty stance after the Japanese people have spoken in favour of a change of government is not diplomatically very sound. (Additional reporting by Yoko Nishikawa and Yoko Kubota in TOKYO, and Matt Spetalnick and Paul Eckert in WASHINGTON; Editing by Paul Tait)