711.94/8–1046
Memorandum by the First Secretary of Embassy in the Soviet Union (Davies)63
Subject: Comments of the Embassy at Moscow on the Policy and Information Statement concerning Japan, dated June 1, 194664
It is felt that Section II, 4, dealing with Soviet relations with Japan should be approached on a more fundamental basis.
Current Soviet policy toward Japan springs from a sense of profound frustration. The defeat and occupation of Japan by the United States, far from removing in Soviet eyes the Japanese threat to the U.S.S.R., has only meant that the Soviet Far East now has on its doorstep a first-class rather than a second-class power. The U.S.S.R. may have felt during the past decade that it could effectively resist a Japanese attack. It is not likely to believe that the conversion of Japan into at least a temporary or potential American “place d’armes” represents an improvement in the defensive position of the Soviet Far East.
The U.S.S.R. can, of course, look forward to the withdrawal of American military forces from Japan. But given the Soviet self-induced belief that the United States is by its very nature committed to a course of imperialistic militarism and that the U.S.S.R. must inevitably come into armed conflict with the capitalist West, the Kremlin’s suspicions of American intentions regarding Japan cannot be dispelled by any measures short of those which would assure the U.S.S.R. predominant influence in Japan.
Proceeding from this fundamental outlook, current Soviet policy toward Japan is designed to disrupt to the greatest possible degree the development of a healthy Japan oriented toward the United States. To this end the U.S.S.R. seeks to hamstring by all possible means the American program for the rehabilitation of Japan.
The U.S.S.R. is utilizing the Far Eastern Commission and the Allied Council of Japan as a sounding board for criticism of American policies in the hope that thereby it may discredit SCAP administration and provoke international and domestic American interference in an effort to disrupt that administration. Other international organizations, such as the WFTU, are likely to be exploited, so far as the U.S.S.R. is able, for the same purpose.
As a second course the Kremlin is undoubtedly seeking to use the Japanese Communist Party for the immediate purpose of creating confusion in Japan and opposition to the United States. In long range [Page 286] terms, the Kremlin presumably hopes to develop and utilize the Japanese Communist Party and associated front organizations as a Trojan Horse in a bid for Soviet control over Japan.
While it is undoubtedly true that no evidence has come to hand showing direct connections between the Japanese Communist Party and the U.S.S.R., we must, in our own interest, assume that such connections do exist. To do otherwise would be ignoring past experience with all Communist Parties. While these parties may not get daily or periodical directives, the leaders of the parties are all cast from the same Moscow-inspired mold and undoubtedly receive basic directives from Kremlin sources.
In view of the exclusive philosophy of the U.S.S.R. in international affairs—a philosophy which dictates that he that is not with me is against me—it is worse than idle, it is a delusion, to assume that Japan can be reconstructed as a neutral, self-sufficient nation, enjoying friendly relations with both the United States and Soviet Union. The American and Soviet frontiers meet in the Japan Sea. At present we occupy Japan. If we withdraw from Japan without having assured ourselves of a favored position there, Japan may in all probability sooner or later be captured by the Soviet Union. The tables will have been turned and we shall be confronted with Japan as a “place d’armes” of the only other first-class power.