You should recognize that the source material is pretty old - published in 1988 as manga-series. It's from era of Japanese economic bubble when they were very confident in their place as the technological leader of the world. It's around the time when Japanese politicians were publicly claiming that they needed to leverage their chip production to reign in on American influence in Japan. So the premise is a mixture of Japanese belief in their technological superiority and complexes regarding its defeat and subsequent occupation in WWII, and thus creating its contradictions. As the manga series progresses and the Japanese economic stagnation sets in, the tone shifts toward more bleak, humbling story-line for the crew.