By MARTIN FACKLER NYTimes News Service
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TOKYO — As Japan’s prime minister prepares for his first meeting with President Donald Trump, he is hoping to make a personal connection with the leader of the superpower on which his country depends economically and militarily. But in the unpredictable Trump White House, even a simple meet-and-greet might be a risky gamble.

The summit between Trump and Japan’s prime minister, Shigeru Ishiba, which is scheduled for Friday, is the result of months of behind-the-scenes efforts by a wide range of Japanese — not just diplomats and lawmakers but also one of the country’s richest investors and the widow of an assassinated former prime minister.

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When he arrives at the White House, Ishiba will most likely seek reassurances that Trump won’t target Japan in a trade war or abandon America’s post-1945 security guarantees at a time when his nation faces a muscular China and a nuclear-armed North Korea.

In exchange, the Japanese prime minister is expected to come with concessions that could include promises to buy more U.S. weapons or energy, invest in U.S.-based artificial intelligence and share more of the defense burden in the Asia-Pacific region.

“This summit will be the moment of truth,” said Narushige Michishita, a professor of security affairs at the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies in Tokyo. “Does Mr. Trump view Japan as an indispensable partner in the Asia-Pacific, or are we just another counterpart across the bargaining table?”

So far, Japan’s name hasn’t come up when Trump has threatened to impose tariffs on many other major U.S. allies and trading partners. The two leaders seemed to get off to a good start when Ishiba called Trump in November to congratulate him on his election victory.

“It was my first time speaking to him, but he seemed friendly,” Ishiba told reporters. “I got the impression that he was someone I could speak honestly with.”

However, former diplomats say that asking the mercurial U.S. president to observe the status quo will be a tall order. These are still the early days in the administration of a transactional president who is eager to show results to his supporters.

“Ishiba is taking a risk,” said Glen Fukushima, a former trade official and ex-president of the American Chamber of Commerce in Japan. “The more time he spends with Trump, the more chance that Trump will make new demands.”

Then there’s the possibility of what some analysts now call a “Gaza surprise,” a reference to the summit this week between Trump and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel, when the U.S. president blindsided the world by proposing a takeover of Palestinian territory.

Before the Japanese-U.S. summit, Ishiba has prepared by gathering an informal “Trump strategy council” of top officials from across his government, who gamed out the possible demands that the president might make and how Japan should respond, according to Japanese news media.

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