Lot 56D527: Office of Northeast Asian Affairs
Memorandum of Conversation, by the Counselor of the Mission in Japan (Huston)
Subject: American Military Bases in Japan.
| Participants: | Prime Minister Shigeru Yoshida |
| Mr. Cloyce K. Huston |
In an after-dinner conversation at his residence yesterday evening, Prime Minister Shigeru Yoshida spoke rather freely on the question of American military bases in Japan in the post-treaty period. He began by narrating the story of his assumption of the leadership of the Liberal Party and by saying that he was soon going to undertake a speaking tour in the Osaka district in connection with the campaign for the House of Councillors elections next June, in which he hoped to increase the Liberal Party seats from sixty to a hundred in order to attain what he called “a working majority”.1 When I asked him what the principal issues of the campaign would be, he replied that the principal domestic issue would be taxation, but that the people would be asking many questions on the subject of a peace treaty and the problem of security for Japan.
The Prime Minister then spoke along the lines of his recent replies to various interpellations in the Diet, in which he has maintained consistently that Japan should not abandon its renunciation of war, as Japanese disarmament provides the best means of ensuring the country’s future security, and that during the Occupation the Japanese have no right to interfere with the construction of military bases or such other facilities as SCAP finds necessary. In the post-treaty period, he said, Japan must rely upon the United States for protection as it will possess no armaments of its own.
Repeating frequently the expression “I tell our people”, he said humorously that when it is objected that Japan will become a colony of the United States, he always replies that, just as the United States was once a colony of Great Britain but now is the stronger of the two, if Japan becomes a colony of the United States, it will also eventually become the stronger! Then, speaking more seriously, he said that [Page 1167] naturally the United States did not wish Japan to become a colony or a satellite, but that the Soviet Union would be a great danger to Japan if left unprotected [sic]. He then continued to speak quite volubly on the general subject, avoiding any specific commitments, but always allowing the inference that he would be favorably disposed toward whatever practical arrangements the United States might consider necessary in order to assist Japan in the maintenance of her security in the post-treaty period. He definitely avoided any flat statement, however, that he would favor American military bases in Japan after the treaty.
The Prime Minister then shifted the conversation to the subject of China, expressing and reiterating in many different ways his belief that China would never become a slave of the Kremlin. Referring to centuries of Chinese history, the character of the Chinese people, their consistent successes in the past in thwarting efforts at domination or absorption, and their superiority to the Russians in intelligence, cleverness, and political astuteness, he declared that he had every confidence in the outcome. The Chinese, he concluded, will be “too much for the Russians”.
- One hundred and thirty-two of the 250 seats in the House of Councillors were at stake in the election held June 4. The Democratic Liberal Party increased its representation to 76.↩