"We are managing to stay in business now, barely," he lamented in Wada, a town some 60 km (38 miles) southeast of Tokyo. "But unless we are allowed to take minkes, I don't know how long we can go on."

Japan, along with fellow whaler Norway, will press for the resumption of commercial whaling at the annual meeting of the International Whaling Commission (IWC) that starts on Thursday in the southwestern city of Shimonoseki.

This effort is likely to fail, as it has before, with divisions between the pro-whaling camp and those who oppose it increasingly deep and the issue emotionally fraught.

Yet even though it faces fierce opposition from around the globe, Japan - usually the most sensitive of nations to foreign opinion - remains determined to keep on whaling.

MYSTICAL ATTACHMENT

Some Japanese are pro-whalers for the most practical of reasons, blaming whales for falling fish catches, for example. Others - especially older people, among them policy makers - have an almost mystical attachment to the mammal.

In old whaling areas, like those around Shimonoseki, whale was believed to bring prosperity and was ritually eaten on certain days for good luck.

Hiroshi Goto, a university student, said the Japanese had always respected whales as crafty and intelligent opponents.

"Westerners look down on what they eat, like pigs and cows," he said. "We respect whales, even as we eat them."

In more recent memory, whale meat helped Japn through the difficult years after World War Two, providing an important source of protein for the impoverished nation.

"There are times in the past when whale saved Japan," said Tetsuji Fukuyoshi, owner of a Shimonoseki firm selling seaweed.

Japan's current stance may even stem from a primal fear that giving in on whaling could leave it vulnerable to demands that it stop taking other kinds of fish.

Two years ago, for example, Japan was at odds with Australia and New Zealand over its research fishing of tuna, without which no sushi dinner is complete.

These days, whale meat has now become a scarce, luxury food item that is rarely eaten, a situation some find puzzling.

"For us, whales are the same as fish," said Yuichiro Harada, an official with the Federation of Japan Tuna Fisheries. "Protecting only whales seems contradictory."

HUNGRY WHALES

Japan agrees with protecting endangered whale species, but argues that others, such as the minkes, are in no danger of dying out and that hunting within limits should be allowed.

Moreover, it says the whales consume such vast amounts of fish that they have contributed to a drop in Japanese fish landings by half, to six million tonnes, over the last 20 years.

This has sparked stark portrayals by pro-whaling groups of whales pitted against humans for cherished, and dwindling, fish in one of the world's largest fish-eating nations.

At a recent festival in Shimonoseki, people hawked t-shirts showing bloated, burping whales and the slogan: "Whales are increasing, fish are decreasing. People are in trouble."

"Since commercial whaling ended in 1986, the number of whales has risen, and they eat a lot of fish, often the same kinds we have on our dinner tables," said Noriyoshi Hattori at the Japan Whaling Association.

"Unless we do a certain amount of thinning of the whales, we risk unbalancing the ecology of the seas."

Anti-whalers and others outside Japan suggest that factors such as overfishing and pollution have taken a larger toll.

"Whales do eat a lot of fish," said Dr. Ray Gambell, a British whale biologist and longtime IWC secretary until he retired two years ago. "But I personally am not totally sympathetic to what they are saying.