There are at least four private gun clubs within a half-mile of one another on this Honolulu strip dotted with hotels and touristy shops, and a public shooting range sits at the southeast tip of the island. The clubs advertise with posters (in English and Japanese) in the upscale malls here, and they hire men to pass out fliers (also in English and Japanese) along the busy sidewalks of Waikiki.

Jeff Tarumi, the range manager at the Royal Hawaiian Shooting Club, estimates that 90 percent of his customers are foreign, with the majority from Japan. He said that all of the club’s employees are required to speak at least a little Japanese.

“Believe it or not, knowledge of guns is not as important, because you can train them on the job, but you have to speak Japanese,” Mr. Tarumi said. “The U.S. market is a little harder, because people come in here and say, ‘Well, I can shoot for free in my backyard.’ ”

The clubs, in which visitors can shoot everything from AK-47s to 9-millimeter Glocks, prove especially alluring to Japanese tourists, who often have seen guns in movies and on television, but cannot actually shoot them at home.

David B. Kopel, the author of “The Samurai, the Mountie, and the Cowboy: Should America Adopt the Gun Controls of Other Democracies?” said, “The only law-abiding citizens in Japan who own guns are very highly motivated sportsmen.”

In 2012, nearly 1.5 million Japanese visited Hawaii, making them third in total visitor expenditures and visitor days, according to an annual report by the Hawaii Tourism Authority.

“How many people would come to Hawaii and end up going to the gun clubs? Tens of thousands,” said Harvey F. Gerwig, president of the Hawaii Rifle Association. “It’s a huge draw.”