My friend, you focus on the negative qualities of leaders. Remember, that these men are politicians. Politicians are , naturally, going to be deceptive and calculating. If you study the writings of Niccolo Machiavelli, only a true politician will be able to hide his or her true intentions.
In regards to Nixon, he helped facilitate the Open Door Policy with Deng Xiaoping and is credited in helping revive the Chinese economy and the American strategy of courting China after the Sino Soviet Split. Nixon's policies in the US economy is something not really visited or studied but under his tenure, US economy was strong. As for Abe, a lot of people associate his negative ratings because many ministers that were under his party were resigning due to charges of plunder and corruption. This affected Abe's standing and of course he even mentioned that these resignations influenced his credibility. Hence , he resigned himself. Besides that tho, if you look at his policies in defense and on the economy -- they were stellar. He was largely unpopular, too, because he picked up after Koizumi, who had a strong relationship with Bush.
A large portion of Japan was anti-war and against the involvement of Japanese forces in the middle east. At that time.
