Takakura

White-haired and gray-eyed, Takakura carries the bearing of a seasoned operator within the Japanese Cabinet, a behind-the-scenes fixture rather than a public showman.

Aramaki tags him a hawkish conservative loyal to the American cause, and events prove the read accurate. Many treat Takakura as the true power behind Kayabuki's administration, handed the secretary's chair to placate hardliners in the ruling party who had never trusted her. His aims parallel those of Kazundo Gouda, whose Cabinet Intelligence Service reports straight up to him, but the two chase different ends, and each insists he acts as a stand-alone through the Refugee Crisis.

Early in 2nd GIG, Takakura acts as the conduit tying Section 9 to Prime Minister Kayabuki, a duty that turns critical during Hideo Kuze's assassination attempt. As refugee suicide bombings shake the nation, an economically battered Imperial America floats a treaty to reaffirm Article 9 and keep Japan's Self-Defense Forces from operating offensively overseas; its real prize is the Japanese Miracle, a micro-machine able to cleanse radioactive fallout and blunt the danger of a nuclear strike. Kayabuki sets the pact aside to manage Dejima, while Takakura champions it as Japan's ticket to global-power status.

With the Cabinet fractured and Kayabuki nearly powerless on her own, he maneuvers to shift crisis authority away from the police and Public Security toward the military. Falsified intelligence supplied by Gouda smooths the way: the Coast Guard blockades Dejima, and the army later moves into Nagasaki to secure a city under nuclear threat. As outrage over Dejima swells, Takakura talks the Cabinet into sanctioning an armed invasion of the enclave, sold as a search for plutonium said to be in Kuze's hands. After Kayabuki, advised by Aramaki, stalls the assault at the UN, he places them both under house arrest and effectively seizes the government. Only when the Tachikomas sacrifice themselves to stop America's nuclear strike does Kayabuki retake control and order his arrest; his role is presumed hidden from the public, and he is thought to still be alive in confinement.