Historical Documents - Office of the Historian

Lot 122, Box 53

PWC–122
CAC–99

[Washington,] March 22, 1944.

Mandated Islands: Disposition of Japanese Nationals

I. The Problem

Are all Japanese personnel (military and civilian) to be evacuated from the Mandated Islands? (Question 4c)5

II. Departmental View

A.: Japanese Military Personnel
: Japanese military personnel captured on the Islands should be treated by the military authorities like any other prisoners of war and may be removed to such places as the military authorities may determine.
B.: Japanese Official Personnel
: Japanese official personnel should, except where the military governor may in his discretion otherwise determine, be interned. Such internment should be at such place or places as the military authorities determine.
C.: Japanese Civilians
: Japanese civilians whose activities the military governor may feel to be harmful to the military occupation should also be interned. Other Japanese civilians, in the discretion of the military governor, [Page 1217] may be segregated and kept apart from the native population if military necessity so requires. There should be no evacuation of such persons from the Mandated Islands, unless military necessity so requires, during the period of military occupation.
D.: Koreans
: Attention is called to the need for giving Koreans special consideration.
E.: Internees
: All civilian persons who are interned as herein provided should be accorded treatment compatible with the Geneva Convention of 1929 relative to the treatment of prisoners of war6 in so far as such Convention is adaptable to civilian internees.

Prepared and reviewed by the Inter-Divisional Area Committee on the Far East.

Foreign Relations of the United States: Diplomatic Papers, 1944, The Near East, South Asia, and Africa, The Far East, Volume V