In this Saturday, Dec. 15, 2012 photo, supporters of Japan's largest opposition Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) gather with national flags during a parliamentary election campaign in Tokyo. Japanese were voting Sunday, Dec. 16 in parliamentary elections that were expected to put the LDP, once-dominant conservatives, back in power after a three-year break ? and bring in a more nationalistic government amid tensions with big neighbor China. (AP Photo/Kyodo News) JAPAN OUT, MANDATORY CREDIT, NO LICENSING IN CHINA, HONG KONG, JAPAN, SOUTH KOREA AND FRANCE
In this Saturday, Dec. 15, 2012 photo, supporters of Japan's largest opposition Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) gather with national flags during a parliamentary election campaign in Tokyo. Japanese were voting Sunday, Dec. 16 in parliamentary elections that were expected to put the LDP, once-dominant conservatives, back in power after a three-year break ? and bring in a more nationalistic government amid tensions with big neighbor China. (AP Photo/Kyodo News) JAPAN OUT, MANDATORY CREDIT, NO LICENSING IN CHINA, HONG KONG, JAPAN, SOUTH KOREA AND FRANCE
A boy places his grandmother's vote into a ballot box at a polling station in Tokyo, Sunday, Dec. 16, 2012. Voters cast their ballots Sunday in parliamentary elections which are likely to hand power back to a conservative party that ruled Japan for most of the post-war era. (AP Photo/Itsuo Inouye)
A girl places her mother's vote into a ballot box at a polling station in Tokyo, Sunday, Dec. 16, 2012. Voters cast their ballots in parliamentary elections which are likely to hand power back to a conservative party that ruled Japan for most of the post-war era. (AP Photo/Itsuo Inouye)
Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda of the ruling Democratic Party of Japan casts his ballot for parliamentary elections in Funabashi in Chiba Prefecture, east of Tokyo, Sunday, Dec. 16, 2012. Japanese were voting Sunday, Dec. 16 in parliamentary elections that were expected to put the once-dominant conservatives back in power after a three-year break ? and bring in a more nationalistic government amid tensions with big neighbor China. (AP Photo/Kyodo News) JAPAN OUT, MANDATORY CREDIT, NO LICENSING IN CHINA, HONG KONG, JAPAN, SOUTH KOREA AND FRANCE
Election workers count votes at a ballot counting center in Tokyo, Sunday, Dec. 16, 2012. The main opposition Liberal Democratic Party won a clear majority in Japanese parliamentary elections Sunday, media exit polls showed, signaling a rightward shift in the government that could further heighten tensions with rival China. (AP Photo/Itsuo Inouye)
TOKYO (AP) ? Japan's conservative Liberal Democratic Party stormed back to power Sunday after three years in opposition, exit polls showed, signaling a rightward shift in the government that could further heighten tensions with rival China.
The results were a sharp rebuke for the Democratic Party of Japan, showing widespread unhappiness for its failure to keep promises and get the economy going.
The victory means that the hawkish former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will get a second chance to lead the nation after a one-year stint in 2006-2007. He would be Japan's seventh prime minister in six-and-a-half years.
Public broadcaster NHK's exit polls projected that the LDP, which ruled Japan for most of the post-World War II era until it was dumped in 2009, won between 275 and 300 seats in the 480-seat lower house of parliament. Official results were not expected until Monday morning. Before the election, it had 118 seats.
The LDP will stick with its long-time partnership with the Komeito, a Buddhist-backed party, to form a coalition government, said Yoshihide Suga, deputy secretary general of the party. Together, they will probably control about 320 seats, NHK projected ? a two-thirds majority that would make it easier for the government to pass legislation.
With Japan stuck in a two-decade slump and receding behind China as the region's most important economic player, people appeared ready to turn back to the LDP, which led Japan for so many decades. To revive Japan's stagnant economy, Abe will likely push for increased public works spending and lobby for stronger moves by the central bank to break Japan out of its deflationary trap.
Voters also appeared to back the LDP's vows to build a stronger, more assertive country to answer increasing pressure from China and threats of North Korean rocket launches. Abe has repeatedly said he will protect Japan's "territory and beautiful seas" amid a territorial dispute with China over some uninhabited islands in the East China Sea.
"I feel like the LDP will protect Japan and restore some national pride," Momoko Mihara, 31, said after voting for the Liberal Democrats in the western Tokyo suburb of Fuchu. "I hope Mr. Abe will stand tall."
The ruling Democratic Party of Japan, which won in a landslide three years ago amid high hopes for change, suffered a crushing defeat, capturing less than 100 seats, exit polls showed, down sharply from its pre-election strength of 230.
The results were a rebuke to Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda's Democrats for failing to deliver on a series of campaign pledges and for doubling the sales tax to 10 percent to meet growing social security costs as the population ages and shrinks.
The new government will need to quickly deliver some sort of results ahead of upper house elections in July.
The LDP may also have benefited from voter confusion over the dizzying array of more than 12 parties, including several news ones, and their sometimes vague policy goals.
One of the parties, the right-leaning, populist Japan Restoration Party, won between 40-61 seats, NHK projected. The party is led by the bombastic nationalist ex-Tokyo Gov. Shintaro Ishihara and Osaka Mayor Toru Hashimoto, both of whom are polarizing figures with forceful leadership styles.
Abe, 58, is considered one of the more conservative figures in the increasingly conservative LDP.
During his previous tenure as prime minister, he pursued a nationalistic agenda pressing for more patriotic education and upgrading the defense agency to ministry status.
It remains to be seen how he will behave this time around, though he is talking tough toward China, and the LDP platform calls developing fisheries and setting up a permanent outpost in the disputed islands, called Senkakus by Japan and Daioyu by China ? a move that would infuriate Beijing.
During his time as leader, Abe also insisted there was no proof Japan's military had coerced Chinese, Korean and other women into prostitution in military brothels during Japan's wartime aggression in Asia. He later apologized but lately has suggested that a landmark 1993 apology for sex slavery needs revising.
He has said he regrets not visiting Yasukuni Shrine, which enshrines Japan's war dead, including Class-A war criminals, during his term as prime minister. China and South Korea oppose such visits, saying they reflect Japan's reluctance to fully atone for its wartime atrocities.
The LDP wants to revise Japan's pacifist constitution to strengthen its Self-Defense Forces and, breaching a postwar taboo, designate them as a "military." It also proposes increasing Japan's defense budget and allowing Japanese troops to engage in "collective self-defense" operations with allies that are not directly related to Japan's own defense.
It's not clear, however, how strongly the LDP will push such proposals, which have been kicked around by conservatives for decades but usually make no headway in parliament because they are supported only by a fairly small group of right-wing advocates.
Toshiyuki Kataoka, a 67-year-old retiree from Chiba, east of Tokyo, said that the Democrats proved to be novices running the country. "It was someone driving on a learner's permit," he said. But he said he would be willing to support them again because he's worried about the nationalistic influence of the LDP. "Japan does seem to be turning to the right, and I don't want to be a part of that."
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