740.00119 PW/9–1846
Ambassador Edwin W. Pauley to Mr. Willard L. Thorp, Deputy to the Assistant Secretary of State for Economic Affairs
Dear Mr. Thorp: On May 2nd I sent to you a copy of my comprehensive report on Japanese reparations which had been revised as the result of discussions with members of the State Department and which I understood was acceptable to them. On August 13 I again wrote you reporting that a copy of the report had been given to the Chief of the Economic and Scientific Section of SCAP in Tokyo with a request that comments be sent to you. In the latter letter I requested that the State Department undertake responsibility for sponsoring this report in SWNCC and for expediting its approval in order that I might submit it to the President with SWNCC concurrence with the object in view of its being used as a basic statement of policy.
By letter of August 26 Clair Wilcox, Acting Deputy, reported that “… the State Department has prepared in form for presentation to SWNCC the industrial removal program contained in your report, as agreed to in May”. I assumed that this meant my entire comprehensive report (of May 2, 1946) was being submitted to SWNCC, as was done with my Interim Reparations Program of 18 December 1945.
However, I am now informed that the Department does not intend to submit to SWNCC the comprehensive report in its entirety. Instead, I am advised the Department has drafted and proposes to sponsor in SWNCC a paper which utilizes only certain recommendations contained in my comprehensive report and, in the case of a certain of the appendices, quotes individual sections of the report. Insofar as my understanding of our previous correspondence and discussions is concerned, this is not what I requested in my letters of 2 May and [Page 568] 13 August and certainly is not what I understood the Department had agreed to do.
I cannot subscribe to or endorse the apparent program of the Department as outlined in the draft paper entitled “Final Reparations Removal Program for Japan” because it fails to follow the recommendations contained in my comprehensive report. Also the Department’s proposed draft refers to a final reparations removal program. You will note that my comprehensive report submitted on 2 May carefully avoids the use of the word “final”. I do not believe, at this time, we can denominate any reparations program for Japan as “final”.
Reparations do not begin and end with “removals”. Reparations are part and parcel of a basic economic program affecting not only a defeated Japan but also a war torn East Asia. I do not believe that policy on reparations can be determined intelligently if the subject is treated in a vacuum. In order to fulfill my duties as the personal representative of the President, I believe it is essential that our reparations policy be stated in a concise form in its entirety together with a concise statement of the justification for that policy including relevant material which may—and in fact does—go beyond the mere fact of removal of certain industrial plant. I believe my comprehensive report of 2 May meets these basic requirements. Naturally, the Department, or any other interested branch of the Government, may differ with or object to the policy set forth in my report or with any phase of its implementation. It was the purpose of resolving any such objections that the request for presentation to and discussion in SWNCC was proposed.
If the Department, for any reason, finds itself unable now to sponsor my comprehensive report of 2 May in its entirety, I would appreciate your advising me promptly, specifying those particulars of the report to which it objects. Failing that, I shall assume that the Department will, pursuant to the understanding expressed throughout our correspondence, immediately prepare and sponsor the entirety of the comprehensive report of 2 May before SWNCC. The agreed procedure with respect to the Japanese program was different from Germany in that I filed my comprehensive report to the President prior to taking it up with the other interested governmental agencies …6 This time we felt it was better for us to take it up with the other agencies before giving it to the President. You can see, therefore, how extremely anxious I am to get action on this because I am delaying my report to the President pending this action. Already the President has asked, through his Legal Counsel, Mr. Clark Clifford, for certain phases of these reparations reports that I cannot give him until I hear from you.
[Page 569]I shall now, therefore, thank you in advance anticipation of an early reply.
Sincerely,
- Points appear in the original.↩