Office of the Historian

310.394/11–452

Memorandum by the Officer in Charge of Japanese Affairs (Hawley) to the Director of the Office of Northeast Asian Affairs (Young)

confidential
[Washington,] November 4, 1952.
  • Subject:
  • Japan’s Participation in the United Nations

Reference is made to letter of October 23, 1952 from Mr. Kamimura, Japanese Minister to Mr. Young; Memorandum of Conversation, October 25, 1952, subject: Japanese Attitudes on Associate Membership in the United Nations; Tokyo’s Telegram 1433, November 1, 1952; and draft Memorandum of November 3, 1952 from Mr. Wainhouse, UNP to Mr. Hickerson, UNA, subject: Non-Voting Participation by Japan in General Assembly and Other Questions.1

NA concurs generally with the preliminary views expressed in UNP’s memorandum to UNA2 but believes that a somewhat firmer indication of our position be revealed to the Japanese Ambassador or his representatives stressing the following points:

1.
Full membership in the UN is to be preferred to any other form of participation therein. Efforts on our part to obtain for Japan any form of membership other than full membership should not be attempted until such efforts have been exhausted. To explore the possibilities of anything less prior to that time might indicate doubts on our part as to Japan’s eligibility for full membership.
2.
The possibility of Japan’s admission with full membership remains a possibility should we ever decide to accept a package deal on membership. This should be given due consideration before we launch into a new and probably complicated venture of seeking to establish a means whereby Japan, Italy and possibly other friendly nations would be able to enjoy limited participation in the United Nations while Soviet satellites would not.3
3.
Since Japan does not wish to occupy a unique status in the United Nations and we do not wish to propose or assent in the creation of a unique status for Japan, it is essential that Japan take the initiative in sounding the views of Italy and also those of other member states prior to deciding whether to ask our assistance in obtaining a form of non-voting participation.
4.
If, attempts to obtain full membership for her in the current session of the General Assembly appear to be unsuccessful, and Japan requests our assistance in exploring with other friendly nations the possibility of a non-voting status, we should do so. In so doing, however, we must make it certain to Japan that we will proceed on a tentative basis relying heavily on the attitude of the member states consulted and the assurance that Japan sincerely wishes such an arrangement.
5.
Finally we believe that it is necessary to establish the proper channel for discussions between Japanese representatives and our own. There appears to have been an overlapping of conversations and approaches between Mr. Takeuchi and the U.S. delegation at New York and between Mr. Kamimura and Mr. Young in Washington. Having determined our position on the question of seeking a non-voting status for Japan, negotiations on the methods of procedure should be handled through the Bureau of United Nations Affairs.

The answers to the questions raised in Mr. Kamimura’s letter of October 23, 1952 to Mr. Young appear to have been answered satisfactorily by the UNP memorandum. The answers can be transmitted orally or by letter, whichever appears more expedient.4

  1. Memorandum of conversation, Oct. 25, not found in Department of State files.↩
  2. Nov. 3, supra.↩
  3. Marginal notation beside this paragraph: “We can’t talk much about a package deal as a possibility, can we?”↩
  4. The Department of State files do not indicate how or when the Office of Northeast Asian Affairs may have communicated with the Japanese Embassy.↩