Foreign Relations of the United States, 1950, East Asia and the Pacific, Volume VI

694.001/4–1250

Memorandum by the Assistant Secretary of State (Butterworth) to the Secretary of State

secret

[Washington,] April 12, 1950.

At Mr. Webb’s suggestion, I am putting in written form to you the recommendation which Mr. Howard and I discussed with him that as soon as possible, preferably before the end of this week, you arrange with Mr. Johnson for a meeting with him and the Joint Chiefs of Staff to discuss the pressing question of the Japanese peace treaty.¹ You will recall that at your last meeting with Mr. Voorhees he vouchsafed the opinion that it was desirable that you meet with the JCS though, of course, he had particular reference to the legal implications of a treaty without participation of the USSR and Communist China.

It seems to us not unlikely that there is a wider area of agreement between the JCS and the Department than appears from the JCS paper of December 22. At any rate, it is essential to have an exploratory talk before there is submitted to the National Security Council a Departmental recommendation.

We would need one meeting with you which need not last an hour before your meeting with the Secretary of National Defense and the JCS. Before the former meeting, we would have prepared a suggested number of questions which you might care to put to them.²

Since the conversation with Mr. Dulles, we have had a number of meetings at the Assistant Secretary level on the draft of the security arrangements which will be ready in tentative form for our meeting with you.³

1. For Mr. Howard’s memorandum of this meeting, held April 24, see p. 1175. For Secretary Acheson’s comments on the meeting, see Present at the Creation, pp. 430–431.
2. Extensive briefing memoranda, not printed, including the mentioned list of questions for the JCS, were prepared by Mr. Howard and Mr. Butterworth and were forwarded by the latter to the Secretary under cover of a memorandum of April 17, not printed (694.001/4–1450 and 694.001/4–1750). However, in a note of the 18th to Mr. Battle, Mr. Butterworth said that at a meeting that day with the Secretary, it had been agreed the latter would take with him to the meeting only Mr. Johnson’s letter to him of December 23 (with enclosed JCS memorandum of December 22) and Mr. Voorhees’ memorandum (with enclosures) of March 23 (694.001/4–1850). For Mr. Johnson’s letter and enclosure, see Foreign Relations, 1949, vol. vii, Part 2, p. 922. For Mr. Voorhees’ memorandum, see p. 1150.
3. Mr. Howard’s draft of a security arrangement dated April 17, not printed, was included in the briefing memoranda mentioned in the preceding footnote. A later draft of April 19 is printed infra.